Typically, when we think of pirates, images of Long John Silver with an eye patch and a parrot come to mind.  This is, of course, fiction.  There were some pirates in the Caribbean (although most of them were Jews displaced by the Spanish Reconquista) but by far most pirates hailed from ports in Asia and Africa where European navies had a significant disadvantage.  The most notorious corsairs were European renegades who moved to the Barbary Coast, converted to Islam, and brought up-to-date naval expertise to piracy in the Mediterranean. 

The main focus of these pirates was to capture slaves for the Ottoman slave trade and while they primarily operated in the western Mediterranean, they were known to raid European coastal towns in western France, Spain, Portugal, and even as far north as the British Isles, the Netherlands, and Iceland.  When Muslim control of Spain ended in 1492, the slavers’ attacks increased (perhaps as a form of retribution). With Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli under the sovereignty of the Ottoman Empire, these pirates became known as Barbary Pirates since they often enjoyed protected status in these provinces or Barbary states. Before the American Revolution (1775–1783), the ships operating out of the North American British colonies were protected from the Barbary pirates by the Royal Navy. During the Revolution, the Kingdom of France formed an alliance with the former British colonies in 1778, and assumed the responsibility of providing protection of U.S. merchant ships in the Mediterranean and eastern Atlantic Ocean.  After the Revolutionary War ended and with the brooding French Revolution in 1789, the new United States had to face the threat of the Barbary pirates on its own.

In July of 1785, two American ships were captured by Algerian pirates and the survivors forced into slavery.  A rumor circulated that Benjamin Franklin, who was returning to Philadelphia after serving as ambassador had been captured by Barbary pirates which caused considerable upset in America.  Fear and distrust of standing armies had caused the Confederation Congress to disband the Continental Navy had sell off its ships sold in 1785.  Now President John Hancock (fifth president under the Articles of Confederation) faced a dilemma, without a navy capable of projecting force across an ocean, how could the United States respond to the ransom demands of these pirates.  The country was forced to pay tribute monies and goods to the Barbary nations for the security of its ships and the freedom of its captured citizens.   

When George Washington became President (now under the new US Constitution), he David Humphreys as Commissioner Plenipotentiary and gave him orders to negotiate a treaty with the Barbary powers. The United States, initiated a series of peace treaties with the individual Barbary provinces of the Ottoman Empire — Morocco (1786), Algiers (1795), Tripoli (1797) and Tunis (1797).  These treaties were eventually ratified by Congress and signed by President John Adams. 

Even before anyone in the United States saw the Treaty, its required payments, in the form of goods and money, had been made in part (and we are upset by Oliver North giving guns to the Sandinistas…  Seems we have a long tradition of covert payoffs!).  Forty thousand Spanish dollars, thirteen watches of gold, silver & pinsbach, five rings, of which three of diamonds, one of sapphire and one with a watch in it, One hundred & forty piques of cloth, and four caftans of brocade, were delivered to Pasha of Tripoli to secure the peace. However, this was not enough.  This first payment was less than the demands stipulated under the treaty and an additional $18,000 had to be paid by the American Consul James Leander Cathcart when he arrived on April 10, 1799.  It was not until these final goods were delivered that the Pasha of Tripoli recognized the Treaty as official. The peace under this treaty lasted a year.

On March 20, 1794, at the urging of President George Washington, Congress had voted to authorize the building of six heavy frigates and establish the United States Navy.  Washington believed that ransoms alone could not stop these attacks and that the Barbars would only demand more and more money. By 1797, the United States had paid out $1.25 million or a fifth of the government’s annual budget then in tribute. These demands for tribute had imposed a heavy financial drain and by 1799 the U.S. was in arrears of $140,000 to Algiers and some $150,000 to Tripoli. Many Americans resented these payments, arguing that the money would be better spent on a navy that would protect American ships from the attacks of the Barbary pirates. When Thomas Jefferson became President in 1801, the Pasha of Tripoli, demanded increased payments and Jefferson refused.  He then sent the newly constructed U.S. naval fleet under the command of Commodore Richard Dale to the Mediterranean. Commodore Dale’s squadron included Philadelphia, President and Enterprise

The ship Philadelphia, while blockading Tripoli’s harbor, ran aground on a reef. The ship was eventually captured and the crew taken prisoners and put into slavery. To prevent this powerful war ship from being used by the Barbary pirates the ship was later destroyed by a raiding party of American Marines and Sicilian sailors from the armed forces of King Ferdinand. This conflict would escalate and eventually involve not just the new American navy but allies from the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. American marines would launch a protracted overland assault on Tripoli (“from the Halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli…”) and force the Ottomans to stop raiding American and European merchantmen.  The war also brought an end to the American practice of paying tribute to terrorist (as are all pirates) Within decades, European powers built ever more sophisticated and expensive ships which the Barbary pirates could not match in numbers or technology.

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