Tripoli Harbor: Lear to the Rescue
I shall, my dearest love, give you a detail of my situation &c. from day to day as far as my time admit, knowing how deeply interesting to you everything is which relate to me.
—TOBIAS LEAR TO HIS WIFE, FANNY, MAY 25, 1805
THE WINDS AIDED HIS PURPOSE. A strong steady breeze filled the dozen sails of the USS Essex, propelling the ship and Lear rapidly toward Tripoli. Within a scant thirty-six hours they reached the destination, and on the morning of Sunday, May 26, spotted two American warships on blockade duty about five miles outside Tripoli harbor.
The captain of the Essex and Tobias Lear were rowed over to the USS Constitution. Lear had the pleasant task of informing his friend Captain John Rodgers that Barron was stepping down and that Rodgers would now be commodore, the highest position in the squadron. From all evidence from his letters, Rodgers for months had been eagerly awaiting the summer season to attack Tripoli; he envisioned days of naval glory for his country and himself. He even joked about winning medals and freeing the ladies in the Bashaw’s harem.
In his letter of resignation, Barron informed Rodgers that he was sending Tobias Lear to negotiate peace. To Rodgers, the good news of his promotion was dampened, if not doused, by the likelihood of aborting plans to shower Tripoli with cannonballs and to sink their ships. All winter, Rodgers and fellow officers and crews had slogged their way through the dullness of blockade duty by daydreaming of summer glory. He was a commodore with his hands tied behind his back, at least for now.
Formality ruled in all things diplomatic. Newly minted Commodore Rodgers donned his dress uniform: a long blue waistcoat with a standing white collar, trimmed in half-inch-wide gold lace that swirled down the long lapels; the gold lace also ringed the cuffs and pocket flaps. Gold epaulets adorned each shoulder. The phalanx of more than a dozen brass buttons were stamped with an anchor, an eagle, and fifteen stars. Tobias Lear was also formally attired in waistcoat and high collar.
Rodgers and Lear then boarded the smaller frigate Essex and stood in to Tripoli harbor. Lear informed Rodgers of the prearranged signal for peace negotiations. The sailors hoisted a white flag of truce at the foremast, and a Spanish merchant flag at the mizzenmast. As the ship glided toward the inner harbor, the Essex gunner fired off two salutes. The officers, also in uniform, stood upon the deck. Crewmen, in clean outfits, performed their duties. A U.S. Navy ship did not slouch into port; it paraded in.
Lear could see the Bashaw’s castle rising over the harbor with minarets peeking out behind. No response came from the land.
The prisoner Dr. Cowdery happened to be onshore with Bashaw Yussef that morning. When word came of three U.S. frigates in the outer harbor, the Bashaw went to his castle’s large balcony that overlooked the port, the same viewing stand from which he had gloated over the mangled corpses of American sailors washed ashore the previous summer. “At about 11 A.M., the smallest [frigate] came near in and hoisted the banners of peace,” wrote Dr. Cowdery. “The Bashaw asked his head men of the town, who were with him in his gallery, whether it was best to hoist his white flag. All except one, the chargé d’affaires for Algiers, declared in favour of it, and of making peace if possible. They expressed great contempt towards the Algerine consul for his advice, and said that whoever would advise the Bashaw not to hoist the white flag at such a critical moment must be his foe.”
Photographic view of Tripoli in 1905 from the roof of the French consulate looking seaward. The cityscape changed little from the Barbary Wars era, with one notable exception: the stout minaret of the Gurgi mosque.
The Bashaw ordered that two shots of salute be fired by way of equal respect and that the white flag be raised over the ramparts of the castle. About a half an hour later, at about 2 P.M., the Bashaw sent out to the frigate his negotiating team: the Spanish consul, Don Gerando de Souza; Jewish moneylender Leon Farfara; and Shoush Hammad, the rais of the marine (harbormaster).
With all due ceremony of piping and drums, the men boarded the Essex to confer with Lear. The Spanish consul repeated the Bashaw’s previous demand of $200,000, and Lear rejected it immediately as absolutely unthinkable. The elegant Spaniard implored Lear to come ashore to conduct direct talks with the Bashaw. After fruitless conversations throughout the afternoon, Lear agreed that he would come ashore the next day, if the Spanish consul would guarantee that the Bashaw “would put aside in toto” his current offer. The Spaniard said he would go ashore and return the following morning with the Bashaw’s answer. (Since negotiations in Barbary always involved great jockeying back and forth, bluff and counterbluff followed by steady price reductions, there appeared little doubt that the Spaniard could deliver a yes to that very modest demand by Lear.)
Dr. Cowdery’s diary entry for that Sunday concludes with a clear interpretation of how Yussef’s negotiators perceived the talks. “They returned at evening with the joyful news of a prospect of peace. There was a visible change from gloominess to joy, in the countenance of all the Turks.” Marine private William Ray also wrote that there were “paroxysms of joy” among the prisoners.
Yussef had gone to sleep on Saturday night—fearful of rebellion, financial ruin, and impending American bombardment—and had woken up to see a U.S. frigate with a white flag at the foremast and a diplomat eager to negotiate.
A storm suddenly hit Tripoli. High winds angled toward the coast on Monday. Commodore Rodgers deemed it too dangerous to linger so close to shore. The last thing he wanted on his first days as commodore was to beach another U.S. frigate on Kaliusa Reef. The three American ships, exchanging signals, headed out to sea, meandering in curtains of the rain, completely out of sight of Tripoli. The gale winds tossed the ships all day. Once safely far offshore, the ships reefed sails to ride it out. Around 5 P.M., the winds diminished enough that Commodore Rodgers had himself rowed back from the Essex to his flagship, Constitution.
All that day Monday, the people of Tripoli gazed seaward. Sunday’s hopes were seeming like a tantalizing dream. Did the Spaniard misunderstand? Was it all a ruse? “Both Turks and Christians were all anxiously looking out for the frigates,” wrote Dr. Cowdery. “It was said that Col. Lear had promised to come on shore this morning and that the Spanish consul was preparing a dinner for the gentlemen who were expected to come with him. We were all agitated alternately by hope and despair. The terraces and every eminence in town were covered with people of all classes and ages who were looking for the wished for peacemaker. But not a frigate nor a sail hove in sight during the day.”
On Tuesday, midmorning, a fleck of white appeared on the gray horizon; over the hours, the blur crystallized into a vessel flying American colors, but it turned out to be a brig that merely hovered far offshore. (The ship was the USS Vixen, come from Malta, with dispatches, looking for the American blockade vessels.)
“The Turks began to think the frigate had gone to fetch the whole fleet, which they had heard consisted of 60 sail, of different sizes,” wrote Dr. Cowdery. “They thought that the flag of truce was only a [ploy] of the Americans to find out the force of Tripoli.”
The long day slipped away; the sun began to dip down. Then silhouetted against the rose red horizon were the sails of three American frigates and a brig. “[That sight] revived our hopes,” wrote Dr. Cowdery. “The Bashaw showed the greatest anxiety for peace. He was sensible of the danger he was in from the lowness of his funds and the disaffection of his people.”
Meanwhile, at sea, Lear had no idea of the desperation of his adversary. No communication from inside Tripoli had reached any American official since Eaton and Hamet had captured Derne, and Lear made little effort to explore the situation in the capital. He had predetermined his major conditions, and except for the so-called punctilios, he intended to stick to them.
At 8:15 A.M. on Wednesday morning, the Essex glided into the harbor with a billowing white flag at its foremast. The Americans fired a two-gun salute; the Tripolitans answered in kind. Turbaned men in a fine little pleasure boat rowed the Spanish consul out to the Essex. Instead of demanding that Lear come ashore, the Bashaw had granted De Souza a tiskara, that is, a commission to negotiate in his name. Lear eyed the Arabic document and Spanish translation and around 11 A.M. he invited De Souza to join him on the flagship Constitution to continue the discussions.
All day they jockeyed. Given Lear’s manners, the whole procedure was probably slow and courteous, perhaps even embellished with patriotic speeches about amity and commercial prosperity. However, as for the sticking points, the Spaniard relayed that the Bashaw would relinquish his demand for annual tribute payments, but his ransom demand would not dip below $130,000. (One wonders whether Yussef’s spies, perhaps through Joseph Pulis, had learned that Lear’s secret orders allowed him to go as high as $500 per prisoner.)
All eyes in Tripoli were fixed upon the Bashaw’s boat bobbing at the side of the massive frigate. Lear and De Souza fell into a rutted circle. “I told the Sp Consul, to prevent unnecessary delay and altercation, I would give him my ultimatum which must be decided on,” Lear wrote. This haste, after four years of war, must have seemed odd to the Bashaw. Lear’s terms called for the delivery within two days of all the American prisoners; in exchange for which, Lear, acting for the United States, would deliver all Tripolitan prisoners and would pay $60,000 ransom. Both sides would agree to enter into a “mutually beneficial” treaty.
That evening, Lear on the Constitution, amid the mealtime hubbub of more than 350 sailors, recapped the day’s events to his beloved Fanny. “Thus stands the business at present, and I hope and believe it will terminate favourably and honourably for us. The great object on our part is to get our unfortunate fellow citizens, and on his, a wish & necessity for making peace.”
Lear had been separated five days from his young bride and he couldn’t help adding: “My dearest Fanny, I have not much time for my own amusement, which would be to write much more to you, and [you] will therefore receive my letters, long or short, as the effusion of my heart.”
The following morning, the Spanish consul reached the Constitution around 10 A.M., was piped aboard with due ceremony, and descended into the captain’s cabin to conduct negotiations in private. The Bashaw sent along a huge gift of fresh fruit—dates, oranges, lemons, limes—for the commodore and consul general.
With customary politesse, the Spaniard informed Lear that the Bashaw had not accepted his ultimatum. Lear remained adamant. He relayed his heroism to his wife. “I have declared that I will not recede one inch from it and that it is unnecessary for us to exchange another word on the subject.” The Spaniard requested permission to send a letter ashore to ask the Bashaw’s opinion.
Rodgers, hearing this and no doubt still hoping for war, wrote: “How things will turn out is yet uncertain.” At that moment, he sent the USS President to Malta and Syracuse to refit and try to find the other five U.S. Navy ships and order them to prepare for a ten-week cruise. (Barron’s various errands had scattered the fleet.)
The harbor boat returned hours later with an answer to the Spaniard’s question. The Bashaw stated simply that he requested that Lear come ashore to negotiate. Lear refused, and while the Spaniard attempted to sway him, the winds started beating toward shore. Commodore Rodgers ordered the ship to tack away from Tripoli. The Spaniard spent the night as the guest of the U.S. Navy.
The following morning, Friday, May 31, Rodgers timed his efforts to bring the Constitution into the harbor as early as possible. At 7 A.M. he ordered the reefs out of the topsails. A quarter hour later, he had the Spanish consul rowed over to the Vixen, which set sail and gingerly steered around Kaliusa and brought the Spaniard shoreward. Around 1 P.M., the Vixen towed the Spaniard in his boat back to the Constitution. The consul informed Lear that the Bashaw would agree to the $60,000 but that he could not possibly allow the American prisoners to leave immediately. And he could not complete the ransom negotiations without first settling on a new peace treaty. (The implication was clear: The Bashaw, without the hostages, would have no leverage on setting the treaty.)
Lear was once again adamant. “I told him the business had already been protracted beyond what I conceived to be a reasonable time but as the weather yesterday would not admit of our countrymen being sent on board, I would allow the Bashaw 24 hours from this time to agree to my proposition in toto or reject them.” Lear put those conditions in writing.
De Souza begged for further time, but Lear refused. As the Spaniard was leaving the Constitution around 5 P.M., Lear gave him a large American flag. If the Bashaw agreed to Lear’s conditions, De Souza was to fly the flag over the old American consulate the following morning.
The morning of Saturday, June 1, broke clear and warm. A sail appeared on the horizon; it turned out to be the USS Nautilus, arriving from Derne by way of Malta with copies of the latest orders from Washington. (Barron, knowing their importance, had not only sent them by speronara but also by the Nautilus.) Rodgers now learned firsthand of Eaton’s victory at Derne and of the arrival of the heavily laden store ship Ceres, and more important of plans for a massive naval buildup. Within a month, barring storms, the new commodore would have in total a dozen ships and ten gunboats, five hundred new recruits, and plenty of ammunition for the cannons and food for the men. He could pound Tripoli from afar with his frigates and come in close for the kill with his gunboats. The logistics of an attack on Tripoli were solved . . . and the administration’s appetite for war was clearly revealed. But his friend Lear was already handling peace negotiations and had made an offer.
The men aboard the Constitution, and the Nautilus and the Essex, stared into the harbor at the site of the old American consulate. Tobias Lear and Commodore Rodgers traded the spyglass. No American flag, no sign of a treaty, could be seen flying from the old building. The Bashaw was turning down Lear’s proposal.