Glenn Beck - Miracles and Massacres - True and Untold Stories of the Making of America

At sunset that evening, Decatur and his men—all dressed as Maltese sailors—left their frigate and boarded an aptly named ketch called the Intrepid . The Intrepid would attract less notice than the Essex both because of its smaller size and because, as a ketch that had been previously captured from the enemy, it would not look to the Tripolitans like a threat.

The course was set for the port of Tripoli, only a few miles in the distance. At nine thirty the silhouette of the city’s ramparts, dimly lit by lanterns, appeared on the horizon. A few minutes after that, the three masts of the captured USS Philadelphia , now The Gift of Allah , came into view. They glided silently forward, knowing that if Tripoli’s sentries were alerted they didn’t stand a chance.

“Man hua?” a voice cried out. Who goes there?

Decatur didn’t speak any Arabic, but his helmsman did. He yelled back that they were Maltese traders seeking port for the night.

“Tayyib.” Very well.

With the wind dying down in port, the sixty-foot ketch coasted on its own momentum toward the docks. Its destination was not, however, any slip.

It was the Philadelphia .

Silent, except for the heavy breathing of the crew and the lapping of water against the hull, the ketch maneuvered alongside the great warship. It’s a shame it has come to this , Decatur thought.

His men grabbed the cannon nozzles of the Philadelphia and affixed ropes to the hull.

“Board now,” Decatur whispered. The sailors clambered over the gunnels.

“Amreeki!” Shouts rang out from ship—Americans! Twenty Tripolitan guards on board the Philadelphia had seen Decatur’s men. They were swiftly silenced with muskets, but the secret was out.

Decatur’s men turned the Philadelphia ’s great cannons toward the city, launching volley after volley and making quick work of the clay and brick buildings in port. Then they lit a fuse to the ship’s store of gunpowder and jumped back aboard the ketch.

Whether it was called the Philadelphia or The Gift of Allah , the once-mighty warship, now burning from bow to stern, would soon be of no further use to anyone.

U.S. Capitol

Washington, D.C.

March 26, 1804

The president appeared to be enjoying himself at this most unusual party. Two years ago, supporters had sent Thomas Jefferson a twelve-hundred-pound block of cheese. Today, starting at noon, Jefferson—with the help of an equally massive loaf of bread and an open invitation to the public—expected to finally finish it off.

Guests at the Capitol ranged from farmers to fishermen, politicians to proletarians, and slaveholders to, according to one senator, their slaves. Some came for the cheese, which had become famous, others came for the alcohol, which was in great supply, but William Eaton was there for something else.

“Mr. President,” said the former consul to Tunis, several hours into the festivities, “if I could just have a moment of your time.”

Jefferson, Eaton knew from watching closely, had already enjoyed a few drinks. Maybe a few too many. But perhaps, he thought, the president’s temporary reduction in inhibitions might work to Eaton’s advantage. Perhaps he had caught Jefferson at just the right time.

“Of course,” said the self-styled president of the common man. Hearing from his people was, along with the consumption of the large block of cheese, the purpose of today’s party. If he was looking down on Eaton, it was only because his excitable guest was six inches shorter.

After a brief introduction, Eaton jumped right into the matter on his mind. “Sir, the capture of the Philadelphia is the latest outrage in a war we are losing.” If Jefferson was taken aback by Eaton’s abruptness, he didn’t show it. He had, after all, read equally blunt appraisals of the war effort.

“Our navy doesn’t have enough ships to win this war,” Eaton continued. “And our commodores don’t have enough boldness. The last commodore spent seventeen months in the Mediterranean but only nineteen days before the enemy’s port! A fleet of Quaker meetinghouses would have done just as well!”

The president tried to interrupt Eaton, but he was just getting warmed up. Interspersing his passionate plea with lines he had delivered to congressmen a month earlier, Eaton told Jefferson, “There is no limit to the avarice of the Barbary princes. Today Tripoli demands three million dollars. Next year the Pasha will want ten million. Like the insatiable grave, they can never have enough. The solution is not to be found in blockades and bribes but in a change of regime!”

Jefferson, even in his state of mild inebriation, appeared skeptical. Eaton pushed. “The project is feasible! I have met a man named Hamet Qaramanli, who is the rightful Pasha.” Nine years earlier, Hamet’s younger brother, Yussef, locked Hamet out of his own palace in Tripoli. In one day, he had lost his throne, his country, the loyalty of his brother, and the company of his wife and children, who had become Yussef’s first hostages.

“He is an enemy of piracy,” Eaton continued. “He is a friend of America. He belongs on the Tripolitan throne. And with your support, I can put him there.”

“Is that so?” asked a still-doubtful president.

“I can march with Hamet Qaramanli from Cairo to Tripoli. His people will rally to his flag. With an Arab army, we can attack by land and put a true friend on the throne. He will release the men of the Philadelphia and swear to never kidnap Americans. Nor will he demand a dollar of tribute from the United States. I need only some money and Marines.”

Jefferson knew the naval war was producing no results and he understood the public’s anger over the capture of the Philadelphia . He was angry, too.

It might be the alcohol , he thought to himself, but this Eaton fellow is making a lot of sense .

Tripoli

May 1, 1804

William Ray awoke as he had every day for the last seven months: in hell. Damp clothes, a grumbling stomach, and a full day of backbreaking work were ahead. Ray had no way of knowing that this day was different. Help was finally on the way.

Four days after the cheese party at the Capitol, President Jefferson had given William Eaton the title of “Agent of the United States Navy” and the promise of forty thousand dollars. His mission was to put Hamet Qaramanli on the Tripolitan throne.

William Ray had never heard of William Eaton or Hamet Qaramanli. The only “Qaramanli” he knew was his captor and torturer: Yussef, the Pasha of Tripoli. Unaware that a rescue plan was in place, Ray and his fellow prisoners remained careful never to offend their guards.

So far, they’d managed to escape the most extreme forms of torture. Simple beatings, however, were another matter. Today, for their captors’ amusement, one American slave had received the traditional Tripolitan beating: bastinados.

Ray watched with resignation as the Marine was thrown onto his back, his feet tied and raised above his head so that he was hanging upside down. Then a slave master slammed a wooden rod into the soles of his feet as hard as he could. Then he did it again, and again and again.

The slave cried out, but his pain only seemed to encourage them.

Another blow came.

And then another.

And then two hundred more.

How long , William Ray thought, will my country let us languish in this hell?

Five hundred miles east of Derna

Ten months later: March 12, 1805

Five days earlier, William Eaton, Hamet Qaramanli, and their army of approximately four hundred Arabs, European mercenaries, and United States Marines had left Alexandria, Egypt. Their first mission was to march across the desert to the city of Derna, a coastal jewel in the Pasha’s crown located about four hundred miles to the east of the capital, Tripoli City. If they could capture Derna, they knew they would demonstrate their ability to capture the city of Tripoli itself. For that reason, and because Eaton had promised many of the Arabs in his army that they could make money by looting Derna, it was essential to take this city first.