Quarterdeck and Bridge

by John H. Schroeder

U.S. NAVY

WHEN STEPHEN DECATUR DIED IN 1820, JOHN QUINCY ADAMS MOURNED the nation’s loss of a hero “who has illustrated its history and given grace and dignity to its character in the eyes of the world.” His spirit, noted the Secretary of State, was “as kindly, as generous, and as dauntless as breathed in this nation, or on this earth.”¹ Coming as they did from such a critical judge of character as Adams, these remarks reflected the tremendous impact that Decatur had made on his generation. His career had combined stirring military exploits, providential good fortune, and exemplary personal attributes in a manner that captured the imagination of his fellow citizens. In an era of military heroes, Decatur was the most heroic naval figure of his day. Congress, presidents, and public officials praised him. Banquets, speeches, toasts, and poetic verses celebrated his achievements. Gifts, awards, and mementos flowed from a grateful public.

From the time of his birth in 1779, Stephen Decatur, Jr., seemed destined for a nautical career. Of maritime stock, he was born near the sea and grew up in a seafaring environment. His paternal grandfather had served in the French navy and migrated via the West Indies to Newport, Rhode Island, where he married an American in 1751. Their son Stephen was born the following year shortly before the family moved to Philadelphia, where he spent his childhood, became a ship master, and married Ann Pine in 1774. During the Revolution, Stephen Decatur, Sr., commanded several American privateers, made numerous captures, and collected a considerable amount of prize money.

In the meantime, Mrs. Decatur had left Philadelphia during the British occupation and moved to Sinepuxent on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, where she gave birth to Stephen, Jr., on 5 January 1779. After the Revolution, Stephen senior returned to Philadelphia, commanded merchant ships for the shipping firm of Gurney and Smith, and became part owner with his business associates of the merchant vessels Pennsylvania and Ariel.2

Stephen, Jr., and his younger brother, James, enjoyed a pleasant and typical childhood in Philadelphia. When Stephen was eight, his father took him on a voyage to Europe to help him recover from an attack of whooping cough. That voyage seems to have imparted a strong desire in the boy for a career as a ship captain. His mother objected to additional cruises, however, and he spent his next few years as a student at the Protestant Episcopal Academy, where his classmates included Richard Rush and future naval officers Richard Somers and Charles Stewart. Although Decatur later entered the University of Pennsylvania, he was indifferent to academic study and remained only a year before accepting a position as a clerk for Gurney and Smith.

In addition to its commercial activities, the firm also built ships and served as the naval agent in Philadelphia. When Congress authorized construction of three frigates for the new Navy, the firm contracted to build the forty-four-gun United States. Decatur, whose pastime was the construction, sparring, and rigging of miniature ships, was sent to New Jersey to supervise the getting out of the keel pieces for the new warship and was on board when the United States was launched on 10 May 1797. Fortuitously, Decatur had played a minor role in the construction and the launching of a ship that would carry him to a great triumph fifteen years later.³

In the midst of a worsening diplomatic crisis with France in 1798, Decatur received his warrant as a midshipman in the U.S. Navy. The commission was obtained and delivered by Captain John Barry, a close friend of the family and the commander of the United States. In the process of supervising construction of the frigate, Barry had been impressed with young Decatur’s desire to become a naval officer. Understanding the family’s opposition, he did not consult them before obtaining the warrant. Stephen’s mother withdrew her objections when Barry arrived in person to deliver it.⁴

Decatur was fortunate to be assigned to the United States and to serve under Barry, who as one of the most distinguished naval officers of the Revolution, provided excellent tutelage for the young officer. During the undeclared naval war with France, Decatur participated in a number of cruises on board the United States and one on board the brig Norfolk. Although these cruises provided excellent experience and resulted in the capture of several French prizes, the United States did not engage in any major naval action. Rather, it was Stephen’s father who distinguished himself by volunteering for action, commanding the Delaware and capturing the French schooner Croyable, as well as several other prizes. Later, the senior Decatur commanded the frigate Philadelphia and captured five more French privateers.

As a young officer, Decatur advanced quickly. He became a lieutenant in 1799, a first lieutenant in 1801, and received his first command in 1803. From the outset Decatur distinguished himself as a resourceful, able, and courageous officer and impressed others as a likable and exceptionally promising individual. A handsome, athletic man at five feet ten inches, he was a striking figure. Another officer later remembered Decatur’s “peculiarity of manner and appearance . . . I had often pictured myself the form and look of a hero, such as my favorite Homer had delineated; here I saw it embodied.”5

During these early years Decatur also demonstrated an acute sense of honor, and this sensitivity to various slights involved him in several affairs of honor as either principal or second. In 1799, the first mate of a merchant ship insulted Decatur and the Navy when the young officer came to collect several seamen who had enlisted in the Navy and later signed on with the merchant ship. Decatur held his temper and left with his enlistees, but he later demanded an apology after discussing the matter with his father. When the mate refused to apologize, Decatur challenged the man to a duel and used his excellent marksmanship to wound rather than kill the offender, thus exonerating his own personal honor and courage.

Several years later, in the Mediterranean, Decatur served as the second for Midshipman Joseph Bainbridge in a controversial duel with an Englishman who was the secretary to the British governor of Malta. After a scuffle in a theater, the Englishman, who was an experienced duelist, challenged Midshipman Bainbridge. Decatur agreed to serve as a second but insisted on a distance of only four paces because of Bainbridge’s inexperience in duels. When Bainbridge killed the Englishman in the confrontation, the governor objected to the affair and demanded that the two American naval officers be tried in civil court for murder. Commodore Richard V. Morris responded by sending both officers home as passengers on board the Chesapeake.

In spite of this potentially damaging incident, Decatur received command of the brig Argus and returned to the Mediterranean in late 1803. By the beginning of 1804, Decatur commanded the schooner Enterprise, a part of Commodore Edward Preble’s naval squadron waging war against Tripoli. The young republic’s problems with Tripoli and the other Barbary states dated back to the 1780s, when the rulers of these states began to demand tribute from the newly independent United States. The Barbary powers had long preyed on merchant ships plying the Mediterranean trade. If a nation paid tribute, its ships were unhindered. If it did not, the Barbary corsairs captured merchant vessels and held their crews for ransom. For various reasons, the major naval powers of Europe usually preferred to pay tribute rather than attempt to destroy the Barbary corsairs and impose peace on their rulers.⁶

Initially, the United States signed treaties with each of the four states and continued to pay tribute during the 1790s. Humiliating to the young republic, these agreements reflected American naval weakness in the Mediterranean. When the Pasha of Tripoli demanded increased tribute and declared war against the United States in 1801, the Jefferson administration decided to retaliate and sent a naval squadron to the Mediterranean. For two years, the successive commands of Commodores Richard Dale and Richard V. Morris proved ineffective. Although American naval vessels blockaded Tripoli, captured a number of ships, and scored several victories, their efforts were inconsistent and did not bring Tripoli to terms.

In September 1803, the Navy Department appointed Commodore Preble to command the squadron in the Mediterranean. Although he ranked low in the Navy’s list of captains, Preble proved an excellent choice. He was a tough commander known for his foul temper and iron discipline, but he was also an energetic officer determined to prosecute the war vigorously, a quality that his younger officers understood and revered in him. His initial squadron in the Mediterranean consisted of six warships, all commanded by officers under thirty years of age, a group that became known as “Preble’s Boys.”7

Shortly after taking command, Preble suffered a serious setback when the Tripolitans captured the thirty-six-gun frigate Philadelphia on 31 October 1803. Under the command of Captain William Bainbridge, the Philadelphia had been blockading the port of Tripoli when she ran aground on uncharted rocks in the harbor while pursuing a Tripolitan ship. All attempts to free the American warship failed, and Captain Bainbridge finally surrendered after a four-hour gunboat attack. Two days later, the Tripolitans used a high tide to refloat the Philadelphia, recovered her guns, and moved the frigate into the harbor within range of their forts. In one stroke, the Bey had gained a powerful frigate to bolster his defenses as well as 307 captives who could be held for large ransom.

When news of the disaster spread, the idea of recapturing or destroying the ship surfaced immediately. From captivity, Captain Bainbridge also suggested the idea in a letter written in lemon juice, which was invisible until subjected to heat. Lieutenant Decatur offered to lead such an expedition, as did Lieutenant Charles Stewart. The Philadelphia held special significance for Decatur because she had been built and paid for by the citizens of Philadelphia and commanded in the naval war against France by Decatur’s father. After the Enterprise, commanded by Decatur, captured the Tripolitan ketch Mastico, Commodore Preble decided to risk the plan and selected Decatur to lead the mission. The captured vessel offered an ideal means of entering the enemy harbor and approaching the Philadelphia without alarm.⁸

On 31 January 1804, Preble ordered Decatur to collect a force of seventy-five men and proceed in the captured ketch, renamed the Intrepid, to Tripoli in the company of the Siren. Decatur’s party was then to “enter that harbor in the night, board the Philadelphia, burn her and make good your retreat in the Intrepid, if possible, unless you can make her the means of destroying the enemy’s vessels in the harbor, by converting her into a fire-ship for that purpose.” Preble’s instructions did not provide the option of recapturing and escaping with the Philadelphia from Tripoli.

Although Decatur’s orders were simple, the task he faced was difficult and dangerous. The Philadelphia was fully armed, well manned, and anchored within range of more than one hundred shore guns, as well as Tripolitan gunboats in the harbor.9 Decatur selected volunteers for his force and set sail in early February. After a two-week passage delayed by bad weather, the Intrepid entered the harbor on the evening of 16 February. Sicilian Salvatore Catalano piloted the ship to avoid suspicion while the American crew were either dressed as Maltese or concealed. When they approached the Philadelphia and were hailed, Catalano replied that the ship was Maltese and had lost her anchors in a recent storm, and he sought permission to moor alongside the frigate for the night.

Once the request was granted, a line was attached, and the concealed Americans began to haul the small ship toward the frigate. Not until the Intrepid was alongside the Philadelphia did the Tripolitans realize the ruse and shout an alarm. Within five minutes, however, the Americans, using no firearms, secured the ship from the startled enemy. Twenty Tripolitans died, one was taken prisoner, and the remainder were driven overboard in the attack. The Americans then set the ship on fire, returned to the Intrepid, and escaped from the harbor under fire from Tripolitan gunboats and shore batteries. In the attack, the Intrepid suffered only minor damage; no American was killed, and only one man was injured slightly. The courageous Decatur had been the second man to board and the last to leave the Philadelphia.¹⁰

The news of Decatur’s triumph delighted Commodore Preble, who had written to the Secretary of the Navy only a short time before to emphasize that the Philadelphia had to be destroyed, but that the mission would “undoubtedly cost many lives.” Now, almost miraculously, Decatur had returned, the Philadelphia had been destroyed, and not a single American life had been lost. Preble immediately wrote to the Secretary to praise Decatur’s achievement and recommend his “instantaneous promotion to the rank of post captain.”¹¹ No less a figure than Lord Nelson termed the feat “the most bold and daring act of the age.” In May 1804, Secretary of the Navy Robert Smith conveyed President Jefferson’s special thanks and promoted Decatur to the rank of post captain, thus making him the youngest captain in American naval history. At the same time, the President praised Decatur in a presidential message, and Congress passed a resolution lauding the men of the Intrepid, authorizing presentation of a sword to Decatur, and approving two months of extra pay to each man on the mission.¹²

Meanwhile, Preble had imposed a blockade on Tripoli and, in August 1804, began a series of naval attacks on the city. In the first of these actions, Stephen Decatur commanded one of the two squadrons of attacking gunboats while James Decatur, a lieutenant, commanded a gunboat in the other squadron. Decatur was towing a captured Tripolitan gunboat out of the harbor when he learned that James had been killed by a Tripolitan commander, who had first surrendered and then shot the young lieutenant when he boarded the vessel. Accompanied by ten men, Stephen Decatur sought out and boarded the suspected enemy gunboat. In fierce hand-to-hand fighting, Decatur almost lost his own life before he finally shot and killed the enemy commander. Decatur had been saved only by the selfless action of a devoted sailor, who blocked a blow directed at Decatur with his own head, thereby suffering a serious injury. In the fighting, all twenty-four Tripolitans were either killed or wounded while the Americans suffered only four wounded. Although Decatur was exhilarated by these combat missions, the death of his brother and the subsequent loss of boyhood friend Lieutenant Richard Somers tempered much of his excitement.13

Shortly after these events, Decatur received notification of his promotion and assumed command of the Constitution and then the Congress in November 1804. After a peace treaty was concluded with Tripoli in June 1805, Decatur returned to Hampton Roads in the Congress. There he received a hero’s welcome and in the process met his future wife, Susan Wheeler, the daughter of a wealthy merchant who was the mayor of Norfolk. During 1805 and 1806, Decatur was feted and honored on a number of occasions, including a banquet in Philadelphia during which his father commemorated the contribution of his two sons with the moving toast, “Our children are the property of their country.”¹⁴

During the next several years, Decatur’s career continued to advance as he performed various duties close to home. In addition to supervising construction of new Jeffersonian gunboats and commanding the Gosport naval yard, Decatur took command of the frigate United States in 1810 and helped to protect American shipping by cruising along the coast. Although he hoped to be excused from serving, Decatur was a member of the court-martial that suspended Captain James Barron for five years for his role in the Chesapeake-Leopard affair in June 1807. The court found Barron guilty of not clearing his ship for action once the American officer had received the British ultimatum to relinquish the alleged British deserters on board. Thus had been sown the seeds of a quarrel that would surface more than a decade later with tragic consequences.

In contrast to the findings of the Barron court-martial, Decatur presided over an 1811 court of inquiry that completely exonerated Commodore John Rodgers for his role as commander of the President in the near destruction of the smaller British Little Belt in May of that year.

When Congress declared war on England in June 1812, Commodore Rodgers had already prepared his five-ship squadron for action and was able to sail from New York within days. The squadron, which included Decatur’s United States, sailed in pursuit of a large British merchant convoy, but it experienced a disappointing cruise and captured only a few British vessels. A few weeks later, the squadron returned to Boston, where it was reorganized into three small units under the commands of Rodgers, Bainbridge, and Decatur. Although Decatur’s squadron consisted of the United States and the Argus, the two ships separated after sailing from Boston in October.

Dispersal of the Navy’s few warships very much reflected Decatur’s own strategic analysis of the manner in which the naval war should be conducted. To counter Britain’s huge navy, the United States had only sixteen warships, eight of them frigates, in 1812. Like most of his naval colleagues, Decatur feared that the British navy would either destroy or blockade the small U.S. Navy if the United States concentrated its warships in one squadron or based them in one or two ports. Instead, Decatur believed that the American frigates should be fully provisioned and dispatched individually or in pairs without specific instructions as to their cruising grounds. Relying on the situation at hand as well as their good judgment and initiative, American naval commanders could then harass and raid British commerce around the globe. American attacks on British commerce worldwide would force the British, in turn, to disperse their own naval forces along their far-flung shipping lanes and thereby diminish British naval power in American waters. Although the potential efficacy of this strategy was exaggerated, the size of the U.S. Navy left the nation’s military leaders few other options.15

After separating from the Argus, the United States sailed eastward and by the end of October was cruising between the Azores and the Canary Islands. In the early morning of 25 October 1812, Decatur’s crew spotted an approaching ship that proved to be the British frigate Macedonian, commanded by Captain John Carden. Ironically, Decatur and Carden had met before the war and discussed the comparative merits of their two ships. Although the United States was larger and carried more heavy guns, Carden argued that the Macedonian would win an encounter because she had a battle-tested crew and her smaller eighteen-pound guns could be handled more rapidly and effectively than the twenty-four-pounders of the United States. In addition, the American frigate was known to be a poor sailer and was supposedly much less maneuverable than the Macedonian.¹⁶

In the battle that settled this argument, Carden enjoyed the wind advantage, but he apparently mistook the United States for the smaller American frigate Essex, which would have given him a marked advantage in long-range heavy guns. As a result, the British captain kept his distance and unwittingly played into Decatur’s own tactics. With superior firepower, Decatur and his well-drilled gun crews capitalized fully and directed a destructive bombardment at the Macedonian. At one point, the firing of the American twenty-four-pounders became so rapid that the British mistook the solid sheet of flames for a fire on board the United States.

Decatur’s superior seamanship prevented Carden from using his smaller guns effectively throughout the battle or from closing later to board the United States. Finally, with his masts destroyed, his guns disabled, and his decks a scene of carnage, Carden was forced to surrender. Of her 301-man crew, the Macedonian had lost 104 killed or wounded. The United States had lost seven dead and five wounded and had suffered only minor damage.17

Not wishing to risk losing his prize should he meet a superior enemy, Decatur decided to return to New London and arrived there on 4 December 1812. During the following weeks, Decatur and his crew were honored by a round of celebrations. The legislatures of Massachusetts, New York, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Virginia expressed their appreciation, as did official bodies in the cities of New London, New York, Philadelphia, and Savannah.

During 1813, the British responded to the loss of several warships by tightening their blockade of the Atlantic coast and hampering American naval efforts. In New York the blockade posed a serious problem for Decatur, who, despite his best efforts, was unable to escape with his squadron. In 1814, the Navy Department transferred Decatur to command of the frigate President, but he still did not return to sea. During the summer of 1814, the British offensive in the Chesapeake Bay and the capture of Washington, D.C., created fears that the British might also attack Philadelphia or New York. In response, the Navy Department ordered Decatur to postpone a cruise in the President and to take charge of the naval defenses of New York.

After it became apparent that no British attack on New York was imminent, Decatur proposed an extended cruise against British commerce. With a squadron consisting of the President and the sloops Peacock and Hornet, Decatur would raid British commerce in either the area east of Bermuda or the Bay of Bengal. The Navy selected the latter plan, and Decatur again attempted to slip through the British blockade. On the evening of 14 January 1815, the President sailed past Sandy Hook in high winds but ran aground in the process. Nearly two hours of heavy pounding damaged the President and seriously impaired her sailing speed.

Unable to return to port because of strong westerly winds, Decatur sailed fifty miles along the Long Island coast in an effort to elude the British. Early the next morning, he encountered a British force of four warships, and a chase ensued with the British frigate Endymion closing to firing range by late afternoon. Decatur’s plan of boarding and capturing the enemy frigate was foiled as the Endymion maintained a safe distance; the two ships exchanged shots, and the British ship was forced to retire with damage. Because the presence of the British warships precluded any attempt to capture the Endymion, Decatur made a last attempt to escape, but his efforts failed. He was unable to elude the enemy and was finally forced to surrender after two British frigates began to bombard the President. In the battle, the Americans lost twenty-four killed and fifty-five wounded, or more than twice the casualties of the British.18

Although some naval historians have contended that Decatur might have seriously damaged one or both of the British frigates had he not surrendered prematurely, his compatriots and his naval peers did not question either his performance or his courage. Decatur returned to the United States shortly after word of the Treaty of Ghent arrived and was received as a hero in both New London and New York.

In April 1815, a naval court of inquiry exonerated Decatur and praised him for his command of the President. The court found that misplaced beacon boats had caused the President to run aground and sustain damages that eventually led to her capture. Denying that different tactics might have produced success, the court concluded that Decatur had adopted the “proper measures” and made “every possible effort to escape.” Moreover, the court considered “the management of the President, from the time the chase commenced till her surrender, as the highest evidence of the experience, skill, and resources of her commander, and of the ability and seamanship of her officers and crew.” Noting that the Endymion had been disabled and would have been captured had other British warships not been present, the court asserted that “In this unequal conflict the enemy gained a ship, but the victory was ours.”¹⁹

On 20 April, Secretary of the Navy B. W. Crowninshield conveyed to Decatur the approbation of the President and the Navy Department for “brilliant actions [which] have raised the national honor and fame even in the moment of surrendering your ship to an enemy’s squadron of vastly superior force, over whose attack, singly, you were decidedly triumphant.”²⁰ In the meantime, the Navy Department also signified its high opinion of Decatur by offering him his choice of positions.

Relations with Algiers had deteriorated during the war with England, as the Dey had demanded additional tribute in 1812 and then captured the brig Edwin and enslaved her crew. Only the fact that few American merchant ships plied the Mediterranean during the war prevented more ship seizures. In response, Congress approved President James Madison’s request in March 1815 for measures against Algiers. Decatur was selected to command the first of two naval squadrons to be sent to the area, and he accepted on the condition that he could return to the United States immediately upon the arrival of the second squadron, which was to be commanded by his senior, Commodore William Bainbridge.

On 20 May, Decatur sailed from New York in the Guerriere, and on 15 June, he reached Gibraltar with a squadron of nine American warships. He immediately sailed in pursuit of an Algerian naval squadron that was rumored to be in the area under the command of Admiral Reis Hammida. On 17 June, the American squadron captured the forty-six-gun Algerian frigate Mashuda and killed the admiral in battle. In addition, thirty other Algerians were killed and more than four hundred taken captive. Two days later, the American brig Epervier ran the twenty-two-gun Estedia aground and captured her. In this encounter, another twenty-three Algerians died and eighty were taken prisoner.

Decatur then proceeded to Algiers, where he and American Consul-General William Shaler opened negotiations through the Swedish consul on 28 June. Decatur, whose military reputation was well known throughout the region, informed the Algerians of their naval losses and delivered a letter from President Madison that offered the Dey a choice of either peace, on terms of equality, or war. Decatur and Shaler added a note emphasizing that the terms of any settlement must be based on perfect equality between the two nations, inclusion of the most-favored-nation principle, and an end to the payment of any form of tribute to the Dey. In addition, the Americans refused to accept a temporary truce during the negotiations and insisted that the negotiations be concluded on board the Guerriere rather than on shore.

The following day, the Algerians agreed to discuss the model treaty, presented by the Americans, that ended all forms of tribute, provided for the return of all prisoners without the payment of any ransom, and specified that the Dey would pay ten thousand dollars, plus a quantity of cotton, to indemnify Americans for their losses. In addition, the treaty included a most-favorednation clause and provided that captives taken in future wars were to be treated as prisoners of war, not slaves. Although he refused to return the captured Algerian ships to the Dey as part of the treaty, Decatur agreed to restore them to Algiers as a gift to the Dey.21

When the Algerians pleaded for a temporary truce to make final arrangements, Decatur refused and set off in pursuit of an approaching Algerian cruiser. In the face of such pressure, the Algerians quickly agreed to final terms and, within a matter of hours, returned to the American squadron with the signed treaty as well as all ten American prisoners. On that same day, 30 June 1815, Consul-General Shaler was received on shore with full honors. Only two weeks after sailing into the Mediterranean, Decatur had, in less than forty-eight hours, concluded a landmark agreement with one of the Barbary states.

Decatur’s remarkable success can be attributed in large part to the size of his squadron and the commodore’s experience in the Mediterranean. Although negotiations moved with alacrity and the Algerians proved most cooperative, Decatur harbored no illusions about his adversary’s motives. In his report to Secretary of the Navy Crowninshield, Decatur noted that the treaty “had been dictated at the mouth of the cannon, has been conceded to the losses which Algiers has sustained, and to the dread of still greater evils apprehended.” Decatur added that “the presence of a respectable naval force in his sea will be the only certain guarantee for its observance.”22

From Algiers, Decatur sailed to Tunis. There, he exacted an indemnity of forty-six thousand dollars for two American merchant ships that Tunis had permitted British men-of-war to capture in the harbor of Tunis during the recent war. Then, in early August, Decatur proceeded to Tripoli where he imposed a similar indemnity of twenty-five thousand dollars and insisted that ten Christian slaves be released. After sailing through the Mediterranean, Decatur touched at Gibraltar, met the second squadron, and returned to New York on 12 November 1815.²³

As on previous occasions, Decatur’s successes in the Mediterranean in 1815 produced a new round of honors and celebrations. Secretary of State James Monroe commended Decatur, and President Madison praised his achievements in a December 1815 message to Congress. Congress also expressed its appreciation by appropriating one hundred thousand dollars to indemnify Decatur and his crew for the losses they sustained when the Algerian prizes were returned to the Dey. In 1815 and 1816, Decatur again enjoyed a series of banquets, speeches, and toasts. It was during a banquet in Norfolk, in April 1816, that he added to his legend by uttering his famous toast: “Our Country. In her intercourse with foreign nations, may she always be in the right, but our country, right or wrong.” Although long criticized in some circles as a dangerous expression of patriotic duty, Decatur’s adage subsequently became a virtual motto of the Navy.²⁴

When the resignation of Isaac Hull created a vacancy on the three-man Board of Navy Commissioners, Secretary of the Navy Crowninshield selected Decatur for the prestigious position. With the board located in Washington, Decatur and his wife settled there, bought a home, and then built a mansion facing Lafayette Park across from the White House. In their new residence, Decatur and his wife soon assumed a prominent social role in the official life of the capital. Decatur brought the same talent and energy to his new position that he had shown in his previous commands at sea.

In its role of providing professional expertise to the Secretary of the Navy, the board played an active administrative role in the construction of warships, the development of ordnance, the purchase of naval supplies, the creation of numerous regulations, and the supervision of various sensitive personnel matters. The commissioners also provided important advice on strategic questions, as in 1817 when Decatur submitted a report on the best site for a naval depot within the Chesapeake Bay and the best means of defending the bay by the use of stationary batteries.25 The department largely adopted Decatur’s recommendations.

Although he much preferred the challenge of active sea duty in wartime, Decatur seems to have been relatively content during these postwar years and might have maintained his style of life had not a tragic duel ended his life prematurely. That duel’s origin dated back to the court-martial that suspended Captain James Barron for five years for his role in the Chesapeake-Leopard affair. Barron subsequently served as a merchant ship master and was out of the country when the War of 1812 began. After his suspension ended in 1813, Barron requested reinstatement to active duty but did not return to the United States. Although the Navy Department placed Barron on half pay as an officer on leave, it did not reinstate him because of additional incriminating charges that another naval officer had levied against Barron in the Chesapeake incident.

Here the matter stood until Barron returned to the United States near the end of 1818 and applied in person to Secretary of the Navy Smith Thompson for restoration the following February. When these efforts failed, an increasingly embittered Barron blamed Decatur for the failure. As a navy commissioner, Decatur had actively opposed Barron’s reinstatement because of his conduct since the Chesapeake affair. Moreover, Decatur had stated his position in an outspoken and vigorous manner a number of times.²⁶

After he received reports of these statements, Barron, encouraged by other officers who were resentful of Decatur, opened an extended correspondence with his adversary. He began by accusing Decatur of insulting his honor as a naval officer. In the ensuing exchange, which lasted more than seven months, Decatur denied that he had any “personal differences” with Barron but admitted that he had openly opposed Barron’s reinstatement because his “conduct as an officer since the affair of the Chesapeake, has been such as ought to forever bar your readmission in the service. . . . In speaking thus, and endeavoring to prevent your readmission, I conceive I was performing a duty I owe to the service; that I was contributing to the preservation of its respectability.” Although he had not actually insulted Barron, Decatur’s strong opinions, sense of honor, and standards of conduct led Decatur to assume a position that, while technically correct, did not help avoid a duel.

The friction between Barron and Decatur was compounded by the role of Captain Jesse D. Elliott, who resented Decatur’s support of Captain Oliver Hazard Perry in a quarrel with Elliott over the latter’s role in the Battle of Erie. At any rate, Elliott apparently falsely reported Decatur’s remarks to Barron and encouraged him to call Decatur to the field of honor.²⁷

In January 1820, Barron issued the challenge, which Decatur promptly accepted. After arrangements were made by Commodore Bainbridge and Elliott, acting as seconds for Decatur and Barron, respectively, the two antagonists met at Bladensburg, Maryland, on 22 March 1820. Firing from a distance of eight paces, Barron was wounded in the hip and Decatur mortally wounded in the hip and abdomen. Decatur was carried back to his home, where he lingered briefly but died that same evening.28

News of Decatur’s death stunned the capital. The nation’s loss of a beloved hero created an outpouring of grief as Congress adjourned on the day of his funeral. The services were attended by all of official Washington, including the President and the Chief Justice. With full honors, Stephen Decatur, Jr., dead at age forty-one, was buried at Kalorama, the estate of a close friend in Washington.

During a relatively brief naval career, Stephen Decatur, Jr., was a central figure in a series of naval actions that elevated him to the stature of an authentic national hero. His role in the destruction of the Philadelphia captured the imagination of a nation frustrated by months of indecisive activity in the Mediterranean and the recent loss of an American frigate to Tripoli. Decatur’s immediate avenging of his brother’s death in hand-to-hand fighting embellished his reputation for personal valor. In 1812, the defeat and capture of the Macedonian by the United States fueled national pride in the Navy and reaffirmed Decatur’s exceptional seamanship. In 1815, the dramatic successes of Decatur’s naval squadron in the Mediterranean further enhanced both his stature and the republic’s confidence during the months after the War of 1812. Even the surrender of the President to the British in January 1815 did not diminish Decatur’s legendary heroism because of the skillful manner in which he commanded his damaged frigate against a numerically superior force. In a young republic with only a brief military history, Decatur’s were daring exploits indeed.

Of particular significance in these triumphs were Decatur’s flawless character and exceptional personal qualities, which seemed to make these achievements possible. As with other military heroes, fortune placed Decatur at the right place at the right time. But, in each instance, Decatur’s own attributes allowed him to overcome difficult obstacles and achieve victory where lesser men would have failed. With Decatur, a rare combination of courage, resourcefulness, determination, kindness, and judgment produced an exceptional leader revered by his men. Even when he failed and had to surrender the President, naval peers and contemporaries agreed that his superior talents had brought him close to success and only very bad luck had prevented his escape. In The Life of Stephen Decatur published in 1846, naval officer Alexander Slidell Mackenzie summarized those qualities that made Decatur such an appealing figure to nineteenth-century Americans:

The fortune of Decatur, like that of Caesar, was dependent mainly upon himself, upon the happy ascendancy within him of the qualities essential to success, of a spirit prone to hardy enterprise, and accurate judgment . . . upon a steady confidence in his own intrepidity and force of character . . . upon his own matchless courage and prowess; upon his celerity of thought and action; and upon that imperturbable calmness of temper which left him, in critical situations, master of himself, of others, and of events.29

In addition to these personal characteristics, Decatur manifested an intense sense of honor, a passion for glory, and a love of country. In an age that romanticized such values, Decatur stood as an exemplary military figure to be emulated and a patriot to be idolized.

Embellishing the Decatur legend were a number of coincidences and fortuitous events that seemed to verify his providential destiny. That the Philadelphia had been built by the citizens of his hometown and commanded by his father was auspicious. Decatur’s role in the birth of the United States, which he would first serve in as a midshipman and later command against the Macedonian, follows this pattern. Providence also seems to have had a role in the willingness of a loyal seaman to take a blow directed at Decatur in Tripoli in 1804, as well as in Decatur’s conversation with Captain John Carden prior to their battle in the War of 1812.

Still, in spite of his dramatic deeds, exemplary character, and heroic stature, historians have not accorded Decatur a place among the top rank of American naval officers. Rather, his historical significance is confined largely to his individual achievements and to the high standards of conduct that he set for the Navy. Although studies of the period and naval histories tend to note his exploits, they do not dwell on Decatur’s importance. Moreover, Decatur has not been the subject of a serious biography in almost half a century.

Stephen Decatur’s historical significance as a secondary figure is attributable to several factors. First, the luster of his valorous actions has dimmed considerably as subsequent generations of Americans have adopted new heroes and celebrated more recent military triumphs.

Second, his victories tended to be in actions of limited military or strategic significance. Stirring as they were, his successes in Tripoli had little effect on the outcome of that conflict, and his capture of the Macedonian did not alter the strategy or the outcome of the War of 1812. His expedition to the Barbary states in 1815 occurred in a secondary diplomatic arena and only hastened the end of hostilities that many thought should have been concluded long before.

Third, Decatur had little long-range impact on the development of American naval policy or strategy. In fact, to the extent that he championed commerce raiding by single warships, some naval historians would consider Decatur’s ideas an impediment to the development of a more realistic strategy of naval warfare.30 At the same time, it is likely that, had he enjoyed the long career then common in the Navy, Decatur would have left his imprint on American naval development after 1820.

Finally, Decatur later came to symbolize some of the flaws as well as the positive attributes associated with the officer corps in the early Navy. His passion for military glory was widely accepted by contemporaries living in an era of romanticism, but subsequent generations have tended to be more cognizant of the dangers inherent in a quest for personal military glory. Decatur’s exaggerated sense of honor and acute sensitivity to slights against himself, his uniform, and his country involved him in a series of affairs of honor and eventually led to his senseless death.

Although duels over questions of honor were then common in American naval affairs, Decatur’s death stirred a sharp public reaction and encouraged efforts to end the practice of dueling. By 1850, duels among American naval officers had become rare, and the Navy finally made dueling a violation of law in 1862. Clearly, this highly individualized code of conduct and means of settling real or imagined personal differences had no place in a modern navy.

Likewise, although Decatur’s adage “Our country, right or wrong” was initially extolled in the Navy and even suggested as the official motto when the Naval Academy was established in the 1840s, his brand of unquestioning loyalty long has been criticized in nonmilitary circles as a dangerous form of false patriotism. In comparison with the character and achievements of his naval contemporaries, Decatur’s shortcomings appear minor, indeed, and his illustrious record of naval combat is unsurpassed. Without peer, Decatur stands as the most exemplary naval hero of his time, and that, in and of itself, remains a considerable historical legacy.

NOTES

1. Charles Francis Adams, ed., Memoirs of John Quincy Adams, Comprising Portions of His Diary from 1795 to 1848, 12 vols. (Philadelphia, 1874–1877), 5:32, 36.

2. For detailed narratives of Decatur’s life and career, see Charles Lee Lewis, The Romantic Decatur (Philadelphia, 1937), and Alexander Slidell Mackenzie, The Life of Stephen Decatur (Boston, 1846).

3. Mackenzie, Life of Decatur, 17–18.

4. Lewis, Romantic Decatur, 19–20.

5. Remarks of Captain Robert S. Spence as quoted in Mackenzie, Life of Decatur, 35~36.

6. For background on American diplomatic relations with the Barbary powers, see James A. Field, Jr., America and the Mediteranean World, 1776–1882 (Princeton, N.J., 1969), and Ray W. Irwin, The Diplomatic Relations of the United States with the Barbary Powers, 1776–1816 (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1931).

7. See Christopher McKee, Edward Preble: A Naval Biography 1761–1807 (Annapolis, Md., 1972).

8. Ibid., 190–91; Mackenzie, Life of Decatur, 65.

9. Captain Edward Preble to Lieutenant Stephen Decatur, 31 January 1804, in Naval Documents Related to the United States War with the Barbary Powers, 7 vols. (Washington, D.C., 1939–1944), 3:376–77 (hereafter cited as NDBP).

10. For descriptions of the action, see Decatur to Preble, 17 February 1804; Lieutenant Charles Stewart to Preble, 19 February 1804; and Preble to Secretary of the Navy, 19 February 1804, NDBP, 3:414–15, 415–16, 440–41.

11. Preble to Secretary of Navy, 19 February 1804, NDBP, 3:441.

12. Annals of Congress, 2d Session, 8th Congress (1804–1805), 16, 17, 682–83.

13. For accounts of these actions, see Preble to Secretary of the Navy, 18 September 1804; Narrative of Attacks on Tripoli by Richard O’Brien; and Decatur to Preble, 3 August 1804, NDBP, 4:293–310, 341–43, 345.

14. Mackenzie, Life of Decatur, 136–38.

15. Decatur to Secretary of the Navy, 8 June 1812, Captains’ Letters, Record Group 45, National Archives. On the question of strategy, see Alfred T. Mahan, Sea Power in Its Relation to the War of 1812, 2 vols. (Boston, 1919), 1:314–19.

16. Mackenzie, Life of Decatur, 156–58.

17. For Decatur’s account of the battle, see Decatur to Secretary of the Navy, 30 October 1812, Captains’ Letters; and Decatur to Susan Decatur, 30 October 1812, in Mackenzie, Life of Decatur, 371–72. For descriptions of the battle, see Mahan, Sea Power, 1:416–22, and Theodore Roosevelt, The Naval War of 1812, (New York, 1882), 144–56.

18. Decatur to Secretary of the Navy, 18 January 1815, Captains’ Letters. Also, see Mahan, Sea Power, 1812, 2:397–403; and Roosevelt, Naval War, 144–49.

19. Mahan, Sea Power, 2:401–3; Roosevelt, Naval War, 144–54; and Report of the Court of Inquiry, 17 April 1815, Niles Weekly Register 8 (29 April 1815): 147–48.

20. Secretary of the Navy to Decatur, 20 April 1815, Niles Weekly Register, 8 (29 April 1815), 148.

21. Decatur to Secretary of the Navy, 19 and 20 June and 5 July 1815, in American State Papers, ser. 8: Naval Affairs, 4 vols., class 6 (Washington, D.C., 1834), 1:396.

22. Decatur to Secretary of the Navy, 5 July 1815, in ibid. Also, see Charles O. Paullin, Diplomatic Negotiations of American Naval Officers, 1778–1883 (Baltimore, 1912), 110–15; “On the Shores of Barbary,” in Roy F. Nichols, Advance Agents of American Destiny (Philadelphia, 1956), 113–24;

23. For correspondence that describes Decatur’s activities in Tunis and Tripoli, see American State Papers, Class 6, 1:397–99. Also, see Paullin, Diplomatic Negotiations, 115–16.

24. Mackenzie, Life of Decatur, 294–96; and Lewis, Romantic Decatur, 182–83. Also, see Peter Karsten, The Naval Aristocracy: The Golden Age of Annapolis and the Emergence of Morden American Navalism (New York, 1972), 194–95.

25. Decatur to Secretary of the Navy, 2 January 1817, in Makenzie, Life of Decatur, 386–98.

26. Lewis, Romantic Decatur, 201–22; and Mackenzie, Life of Decatur, 303–34. Also, see Don C. Seitz, Famous American Duels (New York, 1929), 176–226.

27. The correspondence between Barron and Decatur is contained in Mackenzie, Life of Decatur, 398–440.

28. Lewis, Romantic Decatur, 223–37; and Seitz, Famous Duels, 222–25.

29. Mackenzie, Life of Decatur, 350–51.

30. Harold Sprout and Margaret Sprout, The Rise of American Naval Power, rev. ed. (Princeton, N.J., 1967), 83–85.

FURTHER READING

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