Rough Waters: American Involvement with the Mediterranean in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries 9780986497346

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SERIES EDITOR Lewis R. FISCHER (Canada) MANAGING EDITOR Maggie M. HENNESSEY (Canada) EDITORIAL BOARD Lars U. SCHOLL (Germany, Chair) M. Elisabetta TONIZZI (Italy, Vice-Chair) Stig TENOLD (Norway, Secretary)

Caria ANTUNES (Netherlands) John BARZMAN (France) Tapio BERGHOLM (Finland) Hubert BONIN (France) Huw V. BOWEN (Wales) Gordon H. BOYCE (Australia) Jaap R. BRUIJN (Netherlands) James E. CANDOW (Canada) Maria FUSARO (England) Ruthi GERTWAGEN (Israel) Graydon R. HENNING (Australia) Gordon JACKSON (Scotland) Adrian JARVIS (England) Jan Tore KLOVLAND (Norway)

Silvia MARZAGALLI (France) Kenneth MCPHERSON (Australia) Michael B. MILLER (USA) Graeme MILNE (England) Kenneth MORGAN (England) Jari OJALA (Finland) Sarah PALMER (England) Chris REID (England) M. Stephen SALMON (Canada) Morten K. S0NDERGAARD (Denmark) Carl E. SWANSON (USA) Carmel VASSALLO (Malta) William D. WRA Y (Canada)

INTERNATIONAL MARITIME ECONOMIC HISTORY ASSOCIATION

Jesus M. VALDALISO (President) Amelia POLONIA (Vice-President) Malcolm TULL (Vice-President) Berit E. JOHNSEN (Secretary) Ayodeji OLUKOJU (Treasurer)

MAILING ADDRESS Maritime Studies Research Unit Memorial University of Newfoundland St. John's, Newfoundland AlC 5S7, Canada

RESEARCH IN MARITIME HISTORY NO. 44

ROUGH WATERS: AMERICAN INVOLVEMENT WITH THE MEDITERRANEAN IN THE EIGHTEENTH AND NINETEENTH CENTURIES Edited by Silvia Marzagalli, James R. Sofka and John J. McCusker International Maritime Economic History Association St. John's, Newfoundland 2010 ISSN 1188-3928 ISBN 978-0-9864973-4-6

Research in Maritime History would like to thank the University of Nice and Memorial University of Newfoundland for their generous financial assistance in support of this volume. The editors would also like to thank the Consulate-General of the United States at Marseille, the Région Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur and the ANR-Programme Navigocorpus for supporting the conference at which these papers were originally presented.

Research in Maritime History is published semi-annually, in June and December. T h e contents are copyrighted by the International Maritime Economic History Association and all rights are reserved under Canadian and international law. Copying without the written permission of the International Maritime Economic History Association is prohibited. Research in Maritime History is available free of charge to members of the International Maritime Economic History Association. The price to others is US $25 per copy, plus US $5 postage and handling. Back issues of Research

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Lars U. Scholl (comp.), Merchants and Mariners: Selected Maritime Writings of David M. Williams

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Lewis Johnman and Hugh Murphy, Scott Lithgow: Déjà vu All Over Again! The Rise and Fall of a Shipbuilding Company

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David Gleicher, The Rescue of the Third Class on the Titanic: A Revisionist History

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Torsten Feys, Lewis R. Fischer, Stéphane Hoste and Stephan Vanfraechem (eds.), Maritime Transport and Migration: The Connections between Maritime and Migration Networks

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and

Table of Contents About the Editors / iii Contributors' Notes / í Silvia Marzagalli, James R. Sofka and John J. McCusker, "Rough Waters: American Involvement in the Mediterranean in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries: An Introduction" / 1 John J. McCusker, "Worth a War? The Importance of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean" / 7 Luca Codignola, "Relations between North America and the Italian Peninsula, 1763-1799: Tuscany, Genoa and Naples" / 25 Silvia Marzagalli, "American Shipping into the Mediterranean during the French Wars: A First Approach" / 43 Nathan Perl-Rosenthal, "Notes toward a Franco-American Mediterranean 'From Below'" / 63 Anthony J. Antonucci, "Consuls and Consiglieri: United States Relations with the Italian States, 1790-1815" / 77 Pierangelo Castagneto, "Old and New Republics: Diplomatic Relations between the Republic of Genoa and the United States of America" / 101 Victor Enthoven, '"From the Halls of Montesuma, to the Shores of Tripoli: ' Antoine Zuchet and the First Barbary War, 1801-1805" / 117

Miquel Ángel Casasnovas Camps, "Minorca: The First United States Naval Base in the Mediterranean and the American Consulate at Port Mahon" / 135 James R. Sofka, ' " T h e Jeffersonian Idea of National Security' Revisited" / 161 Jeff Seiken, "The Reluctant Warrior: Thomas Jefferson and the Tripolitan War, 1801-1805" / 185 Christine E. Sears, "Slavery as Social Mobility? Western Slaves in Late Eighteenth Century Algiers" / 207 Elena Frangakis-Syrett, "Americans in the Mediterranean in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries: Concluding Remarks"

/ 221

ii

ABOUT THE EDITORS SILVIA MARZ AG ALLI is Professor of Early Modern History at the Université de Nice, France, and Director of the Centre de la Méditerranée Moderne et Contemporaine. Her research focuses on eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century merchant networks and maritime trade. She is the author (with Pierre-Yves Beaurepaire) of Atlas de la Révolution française: Circulations des hommes et des idées, 1770-1804 (Paris, 2010); Révolution, Consulat et Empire (1789-1815) (Paris, 2009, with Michel Biard and Philippe Bourdin); "Les boulevards de la fraude: " Le négoce maritime et le Blocus continental, 1806-1813: Bordeaux, Hambourg, Livourne (Villeneuve d'Ascq, 1999); Négoce, Ports et Océans: Mélanges offerts à Paul Butel (Bordeaux, 2000, with Hubert Bonin); and Bordeaux et la Marine de Guerre: XVIIe-XXe siècles (Bordeaux, 2002). She is presently coordinating Navigocorpus, an international programme (2007-2011) aiming to create an on-line database on merchant shipping. JOHN J . MCCUSKER is the Ewing Halsell Distinguished Professor of American History and Professor of Economics at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas. In his research and writing McCusker focuses on the economy of the Atlantic World during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. He has lectured and taught in Austria, Belgium, Canada, China, England, Finland, France, Ireland, Italy, as well as the United States. He has published numerous works, including The Economy of British America, 1607-1789 (Chapel HUI, 1985; 2nd ed., Chapel Hill, 1991, with Russell R. Menard); Rum and the American Revolution: The Rum Trade and the Balance of Payments of the Thirteen Continental Colonies (2 vols., New York, 1989); The Beginnings of Commercial and Financial Journalism: The Commodity Price Currents, Exchange Rate Currents, and Money Currents of Early Modern Europe (Amsterdam, 1991, with Cora Gravesteijn); and editor-in-chief, History of World Trade since 1450: An Enclyclopedia (2 vols., New York, 2005). JAMES R. SOFKA < [email protected] > served on the organizing committee of the "Rough Waters" conference in 2008. He teaches at the Federal Executive Institute in Charlottesville, Virginia, offering courses in international relations, European diplomatic history and international law to senior members of the American federal civil service. He previously taught in these fields, along with early American foreign policy, in the Department of Politics at the University of Virginia from 1993-2006, iii

where he also served as Dean of the undergraduate honors program in the College of Arts and Sciences. A Jefferson scholar, Dr. Sofka has published widely on Jefferson's foreign policy and regularly lectures on the subject at the Robert H. Smith International Center for Jefferson Studies at Monticello, where he has held two fellowships, as well as for the Brookings Institution. Along with other leading Jefferson scholars, he recently appeared in the 2010 documentary "Jefferson" broadcast nationally on the History Channel. His current research project is a book-length study of Jefferson's foreign policy entitled "A Commerce which Must be Protected: " The International Policy of Thomas Jefferson, 1785-1809.

CONTRIBUTORS ANTHONY J . ANTONUCCI < [email protected] > isa PhD candidate at the University of Connecticut. The essay in this volume is an early exposition of work on his PhD thesis, a study of the social networks formed by Americans who lived, worked and travelled in the Italian States between 1790 and 1860. His research interests include: transnational American studies, the cultural history of transatlantic foreign relations, nineteenth century American travel writing and the history of the book. The holder of a one-year Fulbright grant, he is currently living in Italy where he is conducting research for his PhD thesis, "'Sophisticates Abroad:' American Relations with the Italian States from Thomas Jefferson to Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1790-1860." MIQUELÀ. CASASNOVAS CAMPS < [email protected] > has been a lecturer in economic history at the University of the Balearic Islands (Palma) and currently teaches at IES Josep Maria Quadrado High School in Ciutadella, Minorca. He is also a researcher at the Institut Menorquí d'Estudis and a lecturer at the University of the Balearic Islands (Minorca). He has published a number of books and articles on the history of Minorca and the Balearic Isles, including Historia de les liles Balears (Palma de Mallorca, 1998; 2nd ed., Palma de Mallroca, 2007), Historia de Menorca (Palma de Mallorca, 2005); and Historia Econòmica de Menorca: La transformació d'una economia insular (1300-2000) (Palma de Mallorca, 2006). His research interests focus on the island's economic history. PIERANGELO CASTAGNETO < [email protected] > is Assistant Professor of American History at the American University in Bulgaria. He has published several articles and books on American history and Euro-Atlantic relations between the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries, iv

including "From Waiden to Wilderness: The Making of Anglo-Saxon Identity in Nineteenth Century America," in Luisa Passerini (ed.), Across the Atlantic: Cultural Exchanges between Europe and the United States (Brussels, 2000), 25-37; "Woodrow Wilson e le frontiere della democrazia americana," in Roberto Macçarini (ed.), L'uomo e il Presidente: Studi su Woodrow Wilson (Milan, 2001), 25-45; "Philadelphia Freedom: The American Revolution and Italian Historiography between Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries," in Flavia Brizio-Skov (ed.), Reconstructing Societies in the Aftermath of War (Lafayette, IN, 2004), 51-69; Sweet Home Minnesota: La carriera politica di Ignatius Donnelly (Genoa, 2006); "Consoli genovesi e diplomazia Americana: Il Trattato tra gli Stati Uniti e il Marocco del 1786, " in Genova: Una "porta " del Mediterraneo (Genoa, 2006), 71-95 ; "Hogs, Pumpkins, and Republicanism: John Taylor, Andrew Nelson Lyle, and Southern Agrarian Identity," in Patrick Leech and Raffaella Baccolini(eds.), Constructing Identities. Translations, Cultures, Nations (Bologna, 2008), 215-230; and "'Con la sola riserva della perduta liberta: ' La fine della schiavitù' nella Repubblica di Genova," in RiMe Rivista dell'Istituto di Storia dell'Europa Mediterranea, No. 1 (2008), 29-50. LUCA CODIGNOLA < [email protected] > is Head of the Institute of History of Mediterranean Europe of the Italian National Research Council, Professor of North American History at the University of Genoa and Adjunct Professor at Saint Mary's University in Halifax, NS. His main field of research is the Roman Catholic Church in the North Atlantic in the early modern era. He has also written on early European expansion. His most recent publications include Columbus and Other Navigators (Genoa, 2007); "Roman Catholic Conservatism in a New North Atlantic World, 1760-1829," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., LXIV, No. 4 (2007), 717-756; "The Holy See and the Conversion of the Aboriginal Peoples in North America, 1760-1830," in Anthony G. Roeber (ed.), Ethnographies and Exchanges: Native Americans, Moravians, and Catholics in Early North America (University Park, PA, 2008), 77-95; "The Swiss Community in Genoa from the Old Regime to the Late Nineteenth Century," Journal of Modern Italian Studies, XIII, No. 2 (2008, with M. Elisabetta Tonizzi); and Humans in Outer Space: Interdisciplinary Odysseys (Vienna, 2009, ed., with Kai-Uwe Schrogl). VICTOR ENTHOVEN < [email protected] > is Associate Professor of History at the Netherlands Defence Academy and the Royal Netherlands Naval College, and a Senior Research Fellow at the Free University of Amsterdam. In conjunction with Johannes Postma, he has edited Riches from Atlantic Commerce: Dutch Transatlantic Trade and Shipping, 1585V

1817 (Leiden, 2003), and has published with Steve Murdoch and Eila Williamson, The Navigator: The Log of John Anderson, VOC PilotMajor, 1640-1643 (Leiden, 2010). He currently is completing a book on Dutch entrepreneurs in the eighteenth-century Atlantic world. ELENA FRANGAKIS-SYRETT is Professor of History at Queens College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. A Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, she has been Visiting Research Fellow at the London School of Economics and at Newnham College, Cambridge. Her research interests relate to the commercial and financial history of the eastern Mediterranean from the late seventeenth through to the early twentieth centuries. Her publications include The Commerce of Smyrna in the Eighteenth Century, 1700-1820 (Athens, 1992; Turkish ed., Istanbul, 2006; Greek ed., Athens, 2010); Chiot Merchants in International Trade (1750-1850) (Athens, 1995, in Greek); Trade and Money: The Ottoman Economy in the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries (Istanbul, 2007); and numerous articles in international journals. NATHAN PERL-ROSENTHAL < [email protected]> is a PhD candidate in history at Columbia University, where he is completing a comparative study of the role played by letter-writing practices in elite political organizing in the American, Dutch Patriot and French Revolutions. He is the author of "The Divine Right of Republics: Hebraic Republicanism and the Debate over Kingless Government in Revolutionary America," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., LXVI, No. 2 (2009), 535-564, for which he was awarded the 2009 Richard L. Morton Award for the best article by a Quarterly author in graduate school at the time of submission. CHRISTINE E. SEARS < [email protected] > is Assistant Professor of History at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. Her research interests centre on comparative slavery, privateers and gender, particularly during the early American republic. Her current work in progress is a monograph entitled "A Different Kind of Slavery: American Slaves in Barbary, 1776-1830." J E F F SEIKEN < [email protected] > is a civilian historian for the US Air Force. He has published several essays on early American naval history and is currently working on a book about US naval policy from the end of the Revolution through the aftermath of the War of 1812.

vi

Rough Waters: American Involvement with the Mediterranean in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries: An Introduction1 Silvia Marzagalli, James R. Sofka and John J. McCusker

In his path-breaking study of the sixteenth-century Mediterranean world, Fernand Braudel identified the "invasion" by Atlantic ships and merchants as one of the major, long-lasting events in the history of the Mediterranean Sea in early modern times.2 According to Braudel, the arrival of English, Flemish and French Atlantic vessels and their captains began discretely in the early sixteenth century as a result of an increased Mediterranean demand for cheap transport services. Within a few decades, however, northern Europeans evolved from a complementary to a commanding position in the region. Atlantic shipping and trade came to dominate the most lucrative Mediterranean trades, and the Atlantic powers steadily imposed their rules and politics on Mediterranean countries, progressively subordinating the region to Atlantic interests. Their de facto commercial presence was reinforced by the establishment of consulates (the first English consuls settled in Naples and Marseilles in 1461) and trade treaties (the first capitulations between the Ottoman Empire and France and Great Britain were signed in 1535 and 1580, respectively, on the model of the Venetian ones) and were enforced by an assertive military force, initially privateers and later navies (the first arrival of the English navy in the Mediterranean was in 1620). From the early seventeenth century,

'This volume had its origin in papers presented at an international conference organized by the Centre de la Méditerranée Moderne et Contemporaine at the University of Nice, France, on 17-18 October 2008. The conference was sponsored by the Consulate-General of the United States at Marseille, the University of Nice, the Région Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur and the ANR-Programme Navigocorpus. The editors are grateful to all of them for their generous support. 2

Fernand Braudel, The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II, trans. Siân Reynolds (2 vols., New York, 1972-1973), I, 606-642. In this regard, see also Gelina Harlaftis and Carmel Vassallo, "Maritime History since Braudel," in Harlaftis and Vassallo (eds.), New Directions in Mediterranean Maritime History (St. John's, 2004), 1-19.

1

Marzagalli, Soflca and McCusker

2

Northern merchants established themselves in major Mediterranean ports. 3 After the British and the Dutch, other Atlantic powers followed; Danish and Swedish ships, for example, ventured into the Mediterranean in the eighteenth century.4 The result, according to Braudel, was unquestionable: "Il y a eu, par la ruse, la force et la violence, par le jeu des différences économiques, une conquête de la mer Intérieure par les Nordiques." 5 This account has been challenged, most recently by Molly Greene, who has insisted on the vitality of Mediterranean (notably Greek) shipping and trade, especially in the lucrative eastern Mediterranean markets. She has suggested a different picture of the Mediterranean, one which was characterized by the particular situation and determined by the relative weakness of surrounding countries. According to Greene, the penetration of Northern shipping into Mediterranean trade happened more slowly than Braudel had claimed, and it became enmeshed in a network of intra-Mediterranean relations: "The northern Europeans, then, were just one group among many in the complex of commercial activity in the seventeenth century. They were not in a position to impose their will on the marketplace; nor was anyone else...This resulted in some rather striking relationships of convenience." 6 Although Greene disputed whether a national division of labour provided an adequate framework in which to capture Mediterranean trade, she did not deny the impact of a "new reality of powerful 'northern' states interested in controlling and advancing the fortunes of their own nationals. " 7

'Michela D'Angelo, Mercanti inglesi a Livorno, 1573-1737 (Messina, 2004); Carmel Vassallo and Michela D'Angelo (eds.), Anglo-Saxons in the Mediterranean: Commerce, Politics and Ideas (XVII-XX Centuries) (Msida, 2007); and Marie-Christine Engels, Merchants, Interlopers, Seamen, and Corsairs: The "Flemish" Community in Livorno and Genoa (1615-1635) (Hilversum, 1997). 4

Leos Müller, Consuls, Corsairs, and Commerce: The Swedish Consular Service and Long-Distance Shipping, 1720-1815 (Uppsala, 2004); and Dan Andersen, "The Danish Flag in the Mediterranean, Shipping and Trade 1747-1807" (Unpublished PhD thesis, 2 vols., University of Copenhagen, 2001). 'Fernand Braudel, La Méditerranée: L'espace et l'histoire (Paris, 1977), 180. 6

Molly Greene, "Beyond the Northern Invasion: The Mediterranean in the Seventeenth Century," Past and Present, LI, No. 1 (2002), 52: "If in the western Mediterranean historians have been distracted by the fireworks between the English and the Dutch on the one hand, and the Spanish on the other, further east the steady disintegration of Italian, and particularly Venetian, sea power worked slowly to reorganize commercial, and even social life" (48). 7

Ibid., 58.

Introduction

3

It is with this controversial picture in mind that we aim in this book to analyze the presence of American ships, merchants and interests in the Mediterranean in the first decades following the independence of the United States. Was there, after the English, Dutch and Scandinavians, an American "invasion" of the Mediterranean? The influx of United States shipping - now under its own flag - in the decades following independence brought Americans back to ports and trades with which they had long been familiar as citizens and traders flying British colours. But this reappearance was not without some difficulties. As John McCusker and Luca Codignola demonstrate, North Americans' activities in the Mediterranean before independence had been essential to their Atlantic balance of trade, allowing them to compensate for their imports of British manufactures. Then in the next decade, benefiting from their neutrality during the French Revolutionary wars, American shipowners were extremely successful in penetrating French trade; the number of United States ships entering Bordeaux rose from thirty-three in 1791 to 352 in 1795.8 After 1783 the United States aimed above all to recover and to consolidate previous commercial positions. Given the relative unimportance of their role in overall Mediterranean trade, despite their presence since the seventeenth century, it is difficult to argue that there was an American "invasion" of the Mediterranean. Both Luca Codignola and Silvia Marzagalli try to assess the importance of American shipping and trade in the Mediterranean in the first decades following political independence - a period about which virtually nothing is known9 - whereas Nathan Perl-Rosenthal explores the FrancoAmerican Mediterranean "from below" through the daily experiences of maritime crews. Their first results point to an increase in American commercial and economic interests in the Mediterranean between 1783 and 1815. In order to prosecute this trade, the United States had to organize protection for its shipping, since after 1783 American ships no longer benefited from the security provided by the British flag before independence. Protection was needed both from Barbary privateers and from any commercial problems posed by local authorities in southern Europe. 10 All these threats increased 8

Silvia Marzagalli, "Establishing Transatlantic Trade Networks in Time of War: Bordeaux and the United States, 1793-1815," Business History Review, LXXIX, No. 4 (2005), 811-844. 'Silvia Marzagalli is the coordinator of Navigocorpus, a French-financed international project which aims to create an on-line database of shipping that will provide, among other things, a better understanding of the importance of Atlantic shipping within the Mediterranean. 10

The term "Barbary pirates" is frequently and erroneously used to describe the forces attacking international commerce in the Mediterranean at the turn of the nine-

4

Marzagalli,

Soflca and

McCusker

dramatically during periods of warfare when belligerents' conflicting interests introduced peculiar - and usually biased - interpretations of the rights of neutral shipping. Since this sudden absence of maritime security called for a diplomatic response, it is not surprising that issues related to Mediterranean trade were important components of the diplomatic efforts of both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson in London and Paris, respectively. T h e United States not only dispatched diplomatic agents to Europe and North Africa but also applied for the assistance of other European powers whenever it was judged convenient, pointing to the persistence of the "rather striking relationships of convenience" identified by Molly Greene. The United States also progressively organized a consular service to assist merchants and captains, as Silvia Marzagalli shows. The evolution of these services on the Italian peninsula is developed in detail by Anthony Antonucci and Pierangelo Castagneto. In doing this the United States largely adopted patterns which had ensured the success enjoyed by the northern European powers in the Mediterranean over the previous three centuries. T h e development of the American consular service was part of the overall increase in consular networks in the eighteenth century, a phenomenon that contributed -

teenth century. Under accepted international legal definitions then and now, "pirates" or "corsairs" are maritime criminals operating independently for profit without the protection of a recognized flag. Such activity did in fact occasionally occur in the Mediterranean region, but it was not of sufficient scope to attract much attention and was unrelated to what became known as the "Barbary War." More accurately, the acts of hostage-taking, seizure of ships and cargoes, and loss of life that plagued American and European shipping interests were the work of privateers employed as agents under the legal flags of Morocco and the regencies of Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli as a form of calculated state policy. Tunis, Tripoli and Algiers were nominally under the sovereignty of the Ottoman Porte but in practice enjoyed considerable latitude and autonomy along the coast of North Africa as the focus of Ottoman policy became increasingly centred on the Eastern Mediterranean and Black Sea regions after the war with Russia from 1768 to 1774. As such, attacks against commercial interests were political and governmental, rather than criminal, in nature and were viewed as such by Thomas Jefferson and his European contemporaries. When captured by American forces during the Barbary War, for example, Tripolitan sailors were on the whole treated as prisoners and privateers rather than immediately hanged under then-accepted rules for dispatching pirates. The United States and European powers entered into treaties with these regimes, conducted diplomatic relations with them through consulates and recognized that these governments controlled the conduct of their agents on the high seas. In the parlance of 2010, the maritime forces of Algiers, Tripoli, Tunis and Morocco would be considered state-sponsored paramilitaries rather than criminal enterprises. This point is accentuated in James Sofka's essay that appears in this volume. While the editors have attempted to standardize usage across the span of essays, occasional references to "piratical activities" refers to the methods used in the seizure of ships and is not a characterization of the policies of the individual governments.

Introduction

5

together with the expansion of the printed commercial press" - to the modernization of the diffusion of economic information and its progressive independence.12 Victor Enthoven develops this point in his essay on the role of the Dutch consul Antoine Zuchet during the American War with Tripoli; through this case study he demonstrates the evolution of the consular network to include mercantile, military, diplomatic and humanitarian concerns. Peace, commercial treaties and active consuls did not, however, always prevent incidents, which ranged from the enslavement of crews by Barbary privateers to the seizure of ships and cargoes by European belligerents. Tensions also occasionally led to open conflict that required the intervention of naval forces, as in the wars against Tripoli (1801-1805), Great Britain (18121815) and Algiers (1815-1816). The presence in the Mediterranean of the United States Navy necessitated logistical support in the form of two naval bases: first, Port Mahon on Minorca - a case which is described by Miquel Ángel Casasnovas Camps - and later La Spezia in Italy.13 From the American perspective, the "Barbary War" launched by President Thomas Jefferson in 1801 marked the first extended deployment of United States forces abroad and demonstrated the seriousness with which the government understood the dynamics of Mediterranean trade. Two papers analyze this conflict from markedly different perspectives. James Sofka presents a

"John J. McCusker, European Bills of Entry and Marine Lists: Early Commercial Publications and the Origins of the Business Press (Cambridge, MA, 1985); McCusker and Cora Gravesteijn, The Beginnings of Commercial and Financial Journalism: The Commodity Price Currents, Exchange Rate Currents, and Money Currents of Early Modem Europe (Amsterdam, 1991); McCusker, "The Demise of Distance: The Business Press and the Origins of the Information Revolution in the Early Modern Atlantic World," American Historical Review, CX, No. 3 (2005), 295-321; Arnaud Bartolomei, "La publication de l'information commerciale à Marseille et Cadix (17801820): La fin des réseaux marchands?" Rives nord-méditerranéennes, No. 27 (2007); and Leos Müller and Jari Ojala (eds.), Information Flows: New Approaches in the Historical Study of Business Information (Helsinki, 2007). 12

For a first attempt to analyze the diffusion of information about the Mediterranean by United States newspapers and the publicity given to consular information, see Silvia Marzagalli, "La fonction de la place commerciale de Livourne dans l'appropriation de l'espace méditerranéen par les Américains (fin XVIIIe siècle-1815)," in Wolfgang Kaiser (ed.), Lieux, Places, Espaces: Les dimensions spatiales des pratiques marchandes en Méditerranée (Moyen âge-époque moderne) (Paris, 2011, forthcoming); and Marzagalli, "La circulation de l'information et les réseaux marchands à l'époque moderne," in Sébastien Laurent (ed.), Entre l'État et le marché: l'information et l'intelligence économique en France (XVIIIe-XXe siècles) (Paris, 2010), 13-43. "Howard R. Marraro, "Spezia: An American Naval Base, 1848-68," Military Affairs, VII, No. 4 (1943), 202-208.

6

Marzagalli, Soflca and McCusker

Jefferson who, motivated by economic Realpolitik and comfortable in the ways of European power politics, went to great political and military lengths to assert American interests in the Mediterranean during his first term. Jeff Seiken takes a different approach, offering the image of an ambivalent Jefferson, reluctant to use force and unprepared for the demands of a long and vigorous campaign. While these scholars advance competing interpretations of the motives and operations of United States policy in the Mediterranean, they agree on the need to analyze the war from the perspective of the early nineteenth rather than the early twenty-first century. Since the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, the long-neglected Barbary War has been invoked in the context of American counter-terrorist operations, an ahistorical perspective that would have been inconceivable to Jefferson and his contemporaries. By pointing to the opportunities enjoyed by two American prisoners during their captivity in Algiers, Christine Sears contributes to a better understanding of the Barbary States and their relations with Christian slaves. Both captives became United States consuls once they were rescued, a factor which increased American capacity for understanding Mediterranean affairs through the intermediation of their own staff rather than relying on foreign agents. Pondering the English presence in the Mediterranean in the last quarter of the sixteenth century, Fernand Braudel exclaimed: "Quel chemin en quelques années à peine!" ("They had come a long way in a few years.") British success, he concluded, "was certainly not based on power and force" but on "subdety, not to say guile." And it was also based on patience. It was not until the second third of the seventeenth century that "that paradox, an English-dominated Mediterranean came to pass." 14 If it took the English more than a century to establish their hegemony in the Mediterranean, it took more than two centuries to have a truly American Mediterranean, culminating in United States naval efforts during the two world wars of the first half of the twentieth century and the permanent presence of the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean from 1950 onwards. Jefferson's insistence on a "commerce which must be protected" would lead the United States to follow in the footsteps of the major European powers and see the Mediterranean as a critical venue for American economic and strategic security. Understanding the scope, role and impact of that pursuit among such disparate actors was the purpose of the 2008 Nice conference and is, we hope, the outcome of this volume.

l4

Braudel, Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World, I, 628-629.

Worth a War? The Importance of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean John J. McCusker

This essay argues that the period after the Peace of Paris in 1783 was marked not by the start of American involvement in the Mediterranean but by its revival. Many studies of the economy of early British America demonstrate the long-standing existence of trade between the Thirteen Continental Colonies and Mediterranean Europe but offer little detail.1 The reasons for the omissions and confusions are several and understandable, but the fact is that the connections were venerable, considerable and increasingly vital to the early American economy. Perhaps the most powerful evidence of the importance of this longterm trade in the minds of Americans was their decision to wage war to defend it.2 To begin where the story paused, on the eve of the War of Independence, appendix 1 presents estimates of the colonial balance of payments for the five-year period 1768-1772, a quinquennium significant not only because it is the only time for which we have sufficient data to engage in this exercise but also because it is arguably when the Continental Colonies had reached the top of their economic game. There are several difficulties with this table for this essay - some of which will be addressed later - but if we accept these data for

'This essay addresses and expands upon some of the issues raised in John J. McCusker and Russell R. Menard, The Economy of British America, 1607-1789 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1985; 2nd ed., Chapel Hill, NC, 1991). See the references in the index of the book to Mediterranean Europe and southern Europe. I can only envy the data that formed the basis of the analysis in Charles Albert Keene, "The American Commitment to the Mediterranean Marketplace, 1776-1801" (Unpublished PhD thesis, University of California, Santa Barbara, 1979); and Keene, "American Shipping and Trade, 1798-1820: The Evidence from Leghorn," Journal of Economic History, XXXVIII, No. 3 (1978), 681-700. His work provides important points of comparison and contrast with this essay. The prospect of a new era in such scholarship is to be found in the Navicorpus project ("Corpus des itinéraires des navires de commerce, XVIIe-XIXe siècles") now underway at the University of Nice under the direction of Professor Silvia Marzagalli. 2

The other essays in this volume speak to various aspects of the Barbary War itself, and I defer to them for detailed discussions of its various aspects.

7

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present purposes, appendix 1 indicates just how crucial trade with the Mediterranean region had become for Americans by 1775. Two points of particular consequence can be noted in the appendix. Exports from the Thirteen Continental Colonies to "Southern Europe and the Wine Islands" - otherwise called "Southern Europe" - amounted to nearly fifteen percent of all colonial exports (the "visibles" in the current account). The value of the trade was critical in itself, but it was even more so because the colonists imported much less by value from Southern Europe than they exported to the region by a ratio of more than six to one. 3 Colonial exports to the Mediterranean earned the colonists some £358,000 sterling in net credits. Contemporaries recognized the nature and significance of this imbalance. As one commentator wrote in Gaine's Universal Register for the Year 1776 about a prime component of that trade, "the great Fishery of Cod carried on upon...the Banks of Newfoundland" was about more than exports. "This is a valuable Branch of Trade to the Merchant, a Source of Livelyhood to Thousands, and an excellent Nursery to the Royal Navy; it increases the National Stock, £300,000 per Annum, in Gold and Silver, return'd for the Cod we sell to the North, to Spain, Portugal, Italy, and the Levant." 4 Our commentator thereby underscored the second notable element of the data in appendix 1 : that nearly one-third of a million pounds sterling, transferred to London in the form of specie and bills of exchange,5 contributed quite substantially to offset the imbalance in the colonists' trade with Britain, an imbalance that reemerged with gusto in the 1780s. 3 The trade balance continued to favour the Americans in the early nineteenth century, at least in their commerce with Leghorn, but only by a ratio of two to one. Keene, "American Shipping and Trade," 697.

*Gaine's Universal Register, or, American and British Kalendar, for the Year 1776 (New York, [1775]), 136-137. Cf. the earlier statement by Gov. Samuel Shute of Massachusetts: "The Trade of this Province is principally to Europe by Codd Fish to Spain Portugall and the Mediterranean the produce whereof is remitted chiefly to Great Britain either per bills of Excha[nge] or Gold." Great Britain, National Archives (TNA/PRO), Colonial Office (CO) 5/867, part li, fol. 314r, Shute to Commissioners for Trade and Plantations, 17 February 1719/1720. See also [Ellis Huske], The Present State of North America, &c. ([1st ed.], London, 1755), 77; and Richard Price, Observations on the Nature of Civil Liberty, the Principles of Government, and the Justice and Policy of the War with America (1st ed., London, [1776]), 83 ("...this balance is paid...partly by circuitous remittances through Spain, Portugal, Italy, &c..."). ^ h e preferred remittance of such surpluses a half-century later, at least in regard to trade with Leghorn, was still the bill of exchange on London. Keene, "American Shipping and Trade," 697-699. On bills of exchange and related matters, see John J. McCusker, Money and Exchange in Europe and America, 1600-1775: A Handbook (Chapel Hill, NC, 1978; 2nd rev. ed., Chapel Hill, NC, 1992).

Importance of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean

9

Trade with Southern Europe was the only major overseas commerce that consistently earned a net credit in the colonial balance of payments. Thus, the argument runs, after the War of Independence ended, Americans were only too anxious to re-establish this uniquely lucrative trade - and, if necessary, to go to war to defend it. Two questions emerge from this premise. What were the origins and nature of this trade? How did it change over time to become quite so essential?6 In pursuit of answers to these questions, this essay takes several directions. To begin, as is common in any discussion of early modern history, it is useful to make some distinctions and to enter appropriate caveats because of the nature of the information available to us. The essay then quickly traces the history of commerce between the British Continental Colonies and Southern Europe from the first decades of colonial settlement until the War of Independence. The discussion highlights the growing engagement of the colonists in a trade that was of increasing importance not only for their export markets - and thus an earner of credits in the "visibles" column of the colonial balance of payments - but also to their own overseas shipping industry, and thus an earner of credits in the "invisibles" part of the colonial balance of payments. These observations point to a key realization: no matter how impressive the net credit balance from visibles, it was only part of the story. In other words, the American advantage ran to much more than that £358,000, perhaps by half as much again. Almost all this trade and the ensuing credits were lost to the Americans during the War of Independence because of the success of the Royal Navy in destroying American participation in the fish trade and in transatlantic commerce generally.7 The revival of trade with Great Britain just after the 6

In his response in October 1774 to the usual enquiries about the state of the colony from the British government, Gov. Jonathan Trumbull described Connecticut's trade with the Mediterranean. "Those Vessels that go...for Gibralter and Barbary, carry Flour, Lumber, New-England Rum, and Stores for Muling." On their return "from Barbary [they bring] Mules, [that are subsequently] sold in the West Indies for Bills of Exchange that are ultimately cashed in London." Heads of Inquiry Relative to the Present State and Condition Of His Majesty's Colony of Connecticut, Signified by His Majesty 's Secretary of State, in his Letter of the 5th July, 1773; With the Answers Thereto (New London, CT, 1775), 6. This picture differed a bit from the one painted in a similar letter from Gov. Thomas Fitch, at Norwalk, Connecticut, to the Board of Trade, 15 April 1756: "This Colony hath little or no trade with foreign plantations or any part of Europe, saving some few vessels to Lisbon and the Mediterranean with fish, the product of which is principally remitted by bills to England." TNA/PRO, CO 5/1274/177. 7 See Richard Buel, Jr., In Irons: Britain's Naval Supremacy and the American Revolutionary Economy (New Haven, 1998). Cf. Tench Coxe writing in a memorandum to Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, probably late in 1790: "The British have the greater part of the Mediterranean trade, our vessels being unprotected by passes.

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Treaty of Paris in 1783, which created an even greater strain on the United States balance of payments, made it even more imperative for the Americans to try to regain their old footing in the trade with Southern Europe. 8 Our pursuit of these lines of inquiry behoves us both to be precise in our references to different peoples and places - if only to make comparisons more valid - and also to recognize that other writers in other times have not been either so precise or accurate. For instance, for present purposes the one unit of analysis over the period before 1775 is the Thirteen Continental Colonies, "the colonies that became the United States" and, after 1775, those same United States.9 However comfortable others were or came to be with this designation, neither contemporaries on the same side of the Atlantic nor Europeans on the other side thought much, if anything, about that collectivity until after 1783. The closest we might come are references to the British colonies in North America (as opposed to the British West Indies), but even that grouping leaves something to be desired for the purposes of this analysis, as we will see. Reciprocally, the British colonists may have known where London was and what Great Britain amounted to, but just how the rest of Europe was divided and grouped was neither precisely nor commonly shared in the consciousness of British Americans. Our European unit of analysis is "Southern Europe." 10 That designation, in wide use in the Continental Colonies and later in the United States, was fluid and imprecise, however much we may wish it to have been otherwise. We will not find people in the eighteenth-century BritThe rest is divided in small portions among the French, Spaniards and ourselves. Occasionally a few Italians partake." Library of Congress (LC), Manuscript Division (MD), Thomas Jefferson Papers (TJP), Series I: General Correspondence, 1651-1827, LXIX, items 12,007-12,008, and as reprinted in Julian P. Boyd, et al. (eds.), The Papers of Thomas Jefferson (36 vols., Princeton, 1950-), XIX, 235. 8

McCusker and Menard, Economy of British America (2nd ed.), 358-377.

'Robert E. Gallman, "Can We Build National Accounts for the Colonial Period of American History?" William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., LVI, No. 1 (1999), 23-24 (quotation on 24). Cf. Stanley L. Engerman and Robert E. Gallman, "U.S. Economic Growth, 1783-1860," Research in Economic History, VIII (1983), 1-46. 10 That is, all of Europe south of Cape Finisterre, embracing the Iberian Peninsula, the Spanish- and Portuguese-owned islands off the African coast (Canary Islands, Madeira, Azores, Cape Verde Islands and Säo Tomé), that part of Africa that bordered the Mediterranean Sea and the parts of Europe on the northern shore of the Mediterranean. "Southern Europe" as a category thus included parts of the Ottoman Empire. For British trade with the Ottomans, see Ralph Davis, Aleppo and Devonshire Square: English Traders in the Levant in the Eighteenth Century (London, 1967); and Elena Frangakis-Syrett, The Commerce of Smyrna in the Eighteenth Century (1700-1820) (Athens, 1992).

Importance of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean 11

ish colonies regularly referring to what we may prefer for this essay - Mediterranean Europe - even to the point of using different names for the same places (no less different spellings of those names). The simple and continuing penchant for Anglophones to call the port of Livorno by the name of Leghorn is merely the best known of these anomalies. The confusions lurking in the references to the trade are matched by the paucity of available records. It is not necessary to belabour the point, but it is necessary to make it. There are almost no compiled trade data for either of the two points of reference, the Thirteen Continental Colonies or Mediterranean Europe. 11 What evidence we do have of the commerce between the two is largely anecdotal and thus subject to the distortions of the particular. And the two ends of the chain rarely referenced each other in consistently intelligible ways.12 Perhaps the best and worst example of this situation is the very compilation of trade data from the Continental Colonies just mentioned, the one that is the basis, ultimately, of much that is in appendix 1. Grouping such a wide territory and such different trades into the single category "Southern Europe" courts confusion. The only unifying factor in such a grouping is that the seas from Cape Finisterre to the Bosporus were all subject to the depredations of the pirates of North Africa, and thus all fell under the fabled protections of the "Mediterranean Pass" - or not, as the case may have been. 13 "The main set of data for the trade of the Thirteen Continental Colonies is TN A/PRO, Customs (CUST) 16/1, Ledger of Imports and Exports, British North America, 1768-1772. This is discussed and used intensively in John J. McCusker, "Colonial Statistics," in Susan B. Carter, et al. (eds.), Historical Statistics of the United States: Earliest Times to the Present (4th ed., 5 vols., New York, 2006), V, 627-772. Data for the trade of Mediterranean Europe have yet to be compiled (but see note 1), although there are many excellent studies of the commerce of specific places. For British and British colonial trade with Livorno, see, for instance, Elizabeth] R. Poyser, "Anglo-Italian Trade from the Reign of Elizabeth to the French Revolution with Special Reference to the Port of Leghorn" (Unpublished MLitt thesis, University of Cambridge, 1951). Among many relevant works by Gigliola Pagano de Divitiis, see II commercio inglese nel Mediterraneo dal '500 al '700: Corrispondenza consolare e documentazione britannica tra Napoli e Londra (Naples, 1984); Mercanti inglesi nell' Italia del Seicento: Navi, traffici, egemonie (Venice, 1990); and Verso i mari del Nord: Mediterraneo ed Europa settentrionale in età moderna (Rome, 2005). See also Pagano, "Il Mediterraneo nel XVII secolo: L'espasasione commerciale inglese e l'Italia," Studi Storici: Rivista Trimentiale dell'Instituto Grancci, XXVII, No. 1 (1986), 109-148. l2

For example, vessels that entered Livorno or Naples with an Englishspeaking captain did not necessarily come from Great Britain. Compare something similar in the early nineteenth century as described in Keene, "American Shipping and Trade," 692-694. l3

For some three centuries prior to the early nineteenth century, the North African states of the Barbary coast (Tripoli, Algiers, Morocco and Tunis) assessed tribute

12

John J.

McCusker

Related to this is the problem inherent in the way the information was initially gathered. T h e records were generated by Customs authorities at each port of entry. Most records merely state the place the ship captain indicated as his most recent port of call or, reciprocally, his most likely first port of call. Ships setting out or returning h o m e f r o m a long voyage with several stopping points enter these documents with only the most proximate of ports stipulated as their origin or destination. Thus, a vessel departing Salem said to b e sailing to Newfoundland may very well have been starting out on a very long voyage to Livorno by way of Newfoundland and several other ports before returning to Boston by way of London - or not. 1 4 While all such cautionary considerations come into play as limitations on what we can say based on existing documentation, it is still possible to gain a reasonable understanding of the trade between the Thirteen Continental Colonies and Southern Europe and thus to make some sense of what Americans thought vital to their international trade and why. 1 5 T h e story we can tell from a variety of countries - notably Great Britain - to secure safe passage for their merchant vessels in the Mediterranean Sea and its Atlantic approaches; see David Richardson, The Mediterranean Passes in the Public Record Office (East Ardsley, 1981). Of the vessels that took out Mediterranean passes at the port of London during the eighteenth century, roughly forty percent were headed initially to British North America. Ibid., 10-11. The presumption must be that they were ultimately bound for Southern Europe. Vessels were also issued Mediterranean passes in colonial ports; see Charles M. Andrews, The Colonial Period of American History (4 vols., New Haven, 1934-1938), IV, 208. For one such example, see [Pennsylvania (Colony), Provincial Secretary], "Mediterranean Passes, 1761-1764," in John Blair Linn and William Henry Egle (eds.), Pennsylvania Archives, 2nd ser. (Harrisburg, PA, 1876), II, 628-629. Cf. T[ito] Benady, "The Settee Cut: Mediterranean Passes Issued at Gibraltar," Mariner's Mirror, LXXXVII, No. 3 (2001), 281-296. 14

For example, the voyage of the 300-ton William and George of London, Thomas Babb master, began sometime after April 1640 and took Babb and his crew from London to Virginia, New England, Newfoundland and the Mediterranean with stops at Sidon, Livorno, Marseilles, Malta and Málaga. See William H. Whitmore and Walter K. Watkins (eds.), A Volume Relating to the Early History of Boston Containing the Aspinwall Notarial Records from 1644 to 1651 (Boston, 1903), 134-135 and 252254. Cf. the story of the regular annual voyages of the ship George from England to New England to Bilbao and back over the decade of the 1630s as described in Regina Gräfe, The Globalization of Codfish and Wool in the Early Modem Period: SpanishEnglish-North American Triangular Trade in the Early Modern Period (London, 2003), 15-16. l5

We may someday be able to use other materials once they have been analyzed and their data organized - for instance, the records of Mediterranean passes, colonial newspapers, business newspapers (such as the Livorno and Marseilles bills of entry) and the British American naval officer shipping lists - to fill in the gaps, but

Importance of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean 13

is quite powerful, ripe with ramifications for all parties concerned and rich with potential explanations for what happened in the 1780s and 1790s. The very complexities of the trade that make it hard to trace help explain why people pursued it. There was profit to be made at every turn. It is a tale best told in terms of the balance of payments of the entities involved. The British colonists in the New World had two different ways to pay for the many goods and services that they bought from the Mother Country. The easier and better known method was a direct, bilateral exchange involving cargoes of British and other European goods carried from British to colonial ports in British ships, and colonial commodities carried back again. Think tobacco from Virginia and Maryland - or, for the British West Indians, sugar. The more convoluted and less well-known method of earning credits in the balance of payments started in the same way - i.e., cargoes of British and other European goods brought westward in British bottoms - but developed quite differently. The colonists who did not produce tobacco or something like it - goods that had a ready, steady demand in London - sought to pay for what they imported by a variety of means other than direct, bilateral exchanges. The data in appendix 1 illustrate some of these other ways. To use the technical language of the table, the colonists who did not produce tobacco or something like it established credits in their balance of payments by exporting gold and silver and selling it abroad, by exporting a range of commodities to customers throughout the Atlantic World, by building ships and selling them abroad, by providing employment for British civil servants and military personnel, or, most spectacularly, through the "carrying trade," that is by providing mercantile services through investment in the operation of ocean-going vessels. Credits earned other than in Great Britain were transferred to London indirectly either in goods, services or by using financial instruments, most usually bills of exchange. To sum up: the Thirteen Continental Colonies established adequate credits in their balance of payments to offset their debits to a total of some £4,200,000 per year (roughly half a billion 2010 dollars) between 1768 and 1772 when their foreign trade was at its height.16

doing so is difficult and time-consuming and has yet to be accomplished. For the bills of entry, see John J. McCusker, European Bills of Entry and Marine Lists: Early Commercial Publications and the Origins of the Business Press (Cambridge, MA, 1985), 52-75. Cf. the seventeenth- and eighteen-century commodity price lists from eight Mediterranean ports described and discussed in John J. McCusker and Cora Gravesteijn, The Beginnings of Commercial and Financial Journalism: The Commodity Price Currents, Exchange Rate Currents, and Money Currents of Early Modern Europe (Amsterdam, 1991), 439-443. "For this estimate, see the methods and data in John J. McCusker, How Much Is That in Real Money? A Historical Commodity Price Index for Use as a Deflator of

14

John J. McCusker

There are several additional points to be made with reference to these estimates. The argument implicit in these data is that the people of the Thirteen Colonies were doing quite nicely on the eve of the American Revolution. The ramifications of this observation have been explored elsewhere, but they are quite compelling.17 The colonists were able to establish sufficient balancing credits through an expanded involvement in inter- and extra-imperial maritime trade - increasingly in transatlantic maritime commerce and progressively more in ships owned and operated in the colonies.18 Nothing, or at least very littìe, of what they were doing contravened the letter of the law. They were not in breach of the Navigation Acts, and they operated within the British mercantilist system.19 Finally, the increasing prosperity of the Continental colonists enriched the British in Great Britain as well as those in the colonies since eighty percent of the goods they imported came directíy from Great Britain.20 Trade with Great Britain consequently was of major importance to the Mother Country, a fact that became increasing obvious in the decade after 1775.21 British merchants had been slow to offer backing to the government in Money Values in the Economy of the United States (Worcester, MA, 1992; 2nd rev. and enlarged ed., Worcester, MA, 2001), extended by subsequent research. •'McCusker and Menard, Economy of British America (2nd ed.); and McCusker, "Colonial Statistics," in Carter, et al. (eds.), Historical Statistics, V, 627772. 18

For the diversification of trade routes, see McCusker and Menard, Economy of British America (2nd ed.), 195-197. For the increasing colonial ownership of vessels, see John J. McCusker, "Sources of Investment Capital in the Colonial Philadelphia Shipping Industry," Journal of Economic History, XXXII, No. 1 (1972), 146-157, as revised and updated in McCusker, Essays in the Economic History of the Atlantic World (London, 1997), 245-257. l9

It is necessary to remember that vessels and companies based in the colonies were considered British in law and thus were subject to the same strictures and protections as those based in London or Bristol; McCusker and Menard, Economy of British America (2nd ed.), 46-50. See also John Reeves, A History of the Law of Shipping and Navigation (Dublin, 1792). Cf. Oliver M. Dickerson, The Navigation Acts and the American Revolution (Philadelphia, 1951). More generally, see McCusker, Mercantilism and the Economic History of the Early Modern Atlantic World (forthcoming). 20

"More than forty percent of exports [from Great Britain] of British-made goods went to the colonies." Dickerson, Navigation Acts, 279-281. A fair proportion of those goods were then re-exported to Latin American ports; see Adrian J. Pearce, British Trade with Spanish America, 1763-1808 (Liverpool, 2007). 21 For this and what follows, see also Dora Mae Clark, British Opinion and the American Revolution (New Haven, 1930).

Importance of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean 15

the prewar years when King George III and his ministers sought to deal ever more sternly with the rebellious colonists.22 While British merchants ultimately came around and supported government, the lost trade during the war cost them dearly, and their advocacy that the war be ended grew louder as the military effort waned, faltered and ultimately failed, especially after the French and other allies joined the battle on the colonists' side. Thus, once the war was over British merchants did all they could, as rapidly as they could, to reestablish the old lines of commerce, to pour - or even to dump - British goods into eager American hands. The problem for the Americans as usual was how to pay for what they wanted to buy. The war had done more to disrupt their trades than it harmed British commerce. Sales to Britain had ceased and were slow to revive, especially the all-important exports of tobacco and rice, but also of cod and grain. 23 Exports to the British West Indies never did revive because Great Britain applied the Navigation Acts against the United States, which of course was now outside the empire.24 The colonial shipbuilding industry had been destroyed by the war, and its chief overseas customer, Britain, was hesitant to return to the market, again because of the Navigation Acts. Credits from British civil servants and soldiers once stationed in the colonies evaporated completely. Alternatives to these lost credits were slow to appear. In short, the United States balance of payments was in desperate shape in the 1780s.25 One solution seemed obvious: reopen, rebuild and expand trade with Southern Europe. The nature and importance of trade between the Thirteen Continental Colonies and Mediterranean Europe had evolved over time. At its beginning in

^Bernard Donoghue, British Politics and the American Revolution: The Path to War, 7775-75 (London, 1964). 23

The average annual value of cod exports from Massachusetts to all overseas markets dropped between 1765-1775 and 1786-1790 from $1,074,300 to $609,900. United States, Department of State, Report of the Secretary of State, on the Subject of the Cod and Whale Fisheries, Made Conformably to an Order of the House of Representatives of the United States, Referring to Him the Representation of the General Court of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts on Those Subjects; February I, 1791 [compiled by Thomas Jefferson] (Philadelphia, 1791), 14. "Charles W. Toth, "Anglo-American Diplomacy and the British West Indies (1783-1789)," Americas: A Quarterly Review of Inter-American Cultural History, XXXII, No. 1 (1976), 418-436. "Curtís P. Nettels, The Emergence of a National Economy, 1775-1815 (New York, 1962); and Gordon C. Bjork, Stagnation and Growth in the American Economy, 1784-1792 (New York, 1985).

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McCusker

the seventeenth century it was based mainly on codfish. 2 6 T h e North Atlantic had provided fishermen with "unlimited" quantities of fish for centuries, and even before the English settled colonies in close proximity to the banks off the coasts they organized a profitable industry harvesting cod. 2 7 By the 1630s English fishermen resident on the banks for some or all of the year were major players in the Atlantic fishing industry, both in catching and processing fish and in carrying them to market. North Atlantic codfish were especially marketable to Spain (and its AÜantic islands), Portugal (and its Atlantic islands) and to the people of the Mediterranean. Not only did the harvest and markets grow steadily over the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but so also did the share of that market served by merchants resident in Boston, Marblehead, Salem and elsewhere in New England. 2 8 Clever folk, they carried with them other commodities f r o m the Continental Colonies for which they developed customers in Southern Europe. Among the earliest and most obvious of the 26 The role played by the cod fishery was recognized early. In his 1626 report to Cardinal Richilieu, Chevalier Isaac de Razilly called it "the best trade in Europe...you make good Spanish coin out of it." Razilly so impressed Richelieu that he afterwards appointed him Lieutenant-Governor of New France and Governor of Acadia. Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Nouvelle Acquisition Française 9389, Chevalier de Razilly to Cardinal Richelieu, 26 November 1626, as quoted in Fernand Braudel, Civilization and Capitalism, 15th-18th Century, trans. Miriam Kochan and Siân Reynolds (3 vols., New York, 1981-1984), I, 218. 27

"Cod from Newfoundland was the lever by which [England]...wrested her share of the riches of the New World from Spain." Harold A. Innis, The Cod Fisheries: The History of an International Economy (New Haven, 1940; rev. ed., Toronto, 1978), 52. See Raymond McFarland, A History of the New England Fisheries (Philadelphia, 1911); Ralph Greenlee Lounsbury, The British Fishery at Newfoundland, 1634-1763 (New Haven, 1934; reprint, Hamden, CT, 1969); A[nthony] R. Micheli, "The European Fisheries in Early Modern History," in E[dwin] E. Rich and C[harles] H. Wilson (eds.), The Economic Organization of Early Modern Europe (Cambridge, 1977), 133184; and Mark Kurlansky, Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World (New York, 1997). 28 On New England's trade in fish during the eighteenth century, see four essays by James G. Lydon: "Fish and Flour for Gold: Southern Europe and the Colonial American Balance of Payments," Business History Review, XXXIX, No. 2 (1965), 171-183; "North Shore Trade in the Early Eighteenth Century," American Neptune, XXVIII, No. 4 (1968), 261-274; "The Salem and Bilbao Fish Trade: Symbiosis in the Eighteenth Century," Proceedings of the North American Society for Oceanic History, I (1977), 1-24; and "Fish for Gold: The Massachusetts Fish Trade with Iberia, 17001773," New England Quarterly, LIV, No. 4 (1981), 539-582. Much that he wrote in these articles has been assembled, revised and expanded in Lydon, Fish and Flour for Gold, 1600-1800: Southern Europe in the Colonial American Balance of Payments (Philadelphia, 2008).

Importance of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean 17

other commodity exports were wood products, specifically the staves, headings and hoops with which to make wooden casks as containers for such things as wine and oil.29 Emerging rapidly in the middle third of the eighteenth century as one more collateral trade was the export of grains and grain products (about which more below) to the extent that by 1768-1772 the estimated value of grains exported from the Continental Colonies to Southern Europe outpaced the value of fish by two-thirds. In an average year in that five-year period the value of grain exports from the middle colonies alone was worth more than the value of fish from New England and Newfoundland combined.30 Very clever indeed, these exporters carried an increasing proportion of their exports in ships owned and operated in the colonies, earning profits not only from the exported commodities but also from the exported mercantile services. The colonial trade in exported fish had grown up as an extension of the West Country English trade; it was West Country, and later London, interests that organized and directed it. While colonial merchants were at first simply the junior partners of English-based businesses, even by the 1630s and 1640s some merchants in colonial ports were beginning to play a more crucial role beyond merely assembling a cargo of fish to be shipped in a Bristol bottom. As early as 1637 a Marblehead-built and owned ocean-going ship freighted a cargo of dried codfish on the owners' account for sale in the West Indies.31 The transition is key because of its implications for the colonial balance of payments. As a junior partner in a Bristol-based venture, the colonial merchant might earn as a commission a small part of the profits of a voyage. Were he to undertake to organize the entire voyage on his own, he could earn the profits from both ends of the buying and selling of the cargoes involved. Should he also own the ship, the enterprise could be even more lucrative, involving both the profits from imports and exports and those from the ocean 29

For the New England trade in wood, wood products and naval stores, see Joseph J. Malone, Pine Trees and Politics: The Naval Stores and Forest Policy in Colonial New England, 1691-1775 (Seattle, 1964; reprint, New York, 1979); Charles F. Carroll, The Timber Economy of Puritan New England (Providence, RI, 1973); and David E. Van Deventer, The Emergence of Provincial New Hampshire, 1623-1741 (Baltimore, 1976). ^For these data, see McCusker and Menard, Economy of British America (2nd ed.), 108, 115, 130, 174 and 199. ''Christopher Paul Magra, "The New England Cod Fishing Industry and Maritime Dimensions of the American Revolution" (Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Pittsburgh, 2006), 126-127. Cf. Magra, The Fisherman's Cause: Atlantic Commerce and Maritime Dimensions of the American Revolution (Cambridge, 2009).

18

John J.

McCusker

freight charges and all the other things accounted as "invisibles" in the balance of payments. Thomas Willing, the foremost merchant of pre-Revolutionary Philadelphia, once commented that "[c]arriage is an amazing Revenue." 3 2 Willing was just as good a practitioner of the lesson he extolled as he was its preacher. It was his city and port that during his lifetime witnessed perhaps the most significant change in colonial commerce with Mediterranean Europe. There were two parts to this development. Remember codfish? If codfish was the currency of colonial exporters in the first century of such commerce, then grain dominated the next fifty years. T h e growth in E u r o p e ' s population had come to outstrip the continent's ability to feed itself. Countries like Great Britain that had once been net exporters of food became by the 1750s net importers. 3 3 The farmers of the Continental Colonies moved decisively to meet the new demand, and the colonial merchants seized the opportunities so offered. By 1768-1772 exports f r o m the Continental Colonies of grains and grain products constituted by value some twenty-three percent of total commodity exports. Tobacco, the proverbial staple export of the Thirteen Continental Colonies, was still ahead of all other commodities but at twenty-eight percent no longer quite so decisively. South32 A S chairman of a committee of the Second Continental Congress, Willing made the comment on 4 October 1775 during a debate over whether foreign vessels should be permitted to carry colonial produce. He went on to draw an historical lesson to emphasize his opposition to such a suggestion, which he summed up thusly: "Holland and England have derived their maritime Power from their Carriage." See John Adams' notes on the debate in L[yman] H. Butterfield, et al. (eds.), Diary and Autobiography of John Adams (4 vols., Cambridge, MA, 1961-1966), II, 188-192 (quotation on 190). See also Eugene R. Slaski, "Thomas Willing: A Study in Moderation, 17741778," Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, C, No. 4 (1976), 491-506.

33

0n the grain trade from the perspective of the colonists, see Paul G.E. Clemens, The Atlantic Economy and Colonial Maryland's Eastern Shore: From Tobacco to Grain (Ithaca, NY, 1980), 179-183 and passim. See also Edward C. Papenfuse, Jr., "Economic Analysis and Loyalist Strategy during the American Revolution: Robert Alexander's Remarks on the Economy of the Peninsula or Eastern Shore of Maryland," Maryland Historical Magazine, LXVIII, No. 3 (1973), 173-195. Compare the documents he cites: New York Public Library, George Chalmers Papers, 16061812, Maryland, I, fol. 53, "Aggregate of Wheat, Flour, and Indian Com Annually Exported from the Eastern Shore of Maryland, on an Average, from the Year 1770 to 1775," and "Annual Exports of Each of the Eight Counties on the Eastern Shore of Maryland." For the English perspective, see E[phraim] Lipson, The Economic History of England (3 vols., London, 1915; 6th rev. ed., London, 1956), II, 419-448; T[homas] S. Ashton, An Economic History of England: The 18th Century (London, 1955; rev. ed., London, 1966), 48-51; and A[rthur] H. John, "English Agricultural Improvement and Grain Exports, 1660-1765," in D[onald] C. Coleman and A[rthur] H. John (eds.), Trade, Government and Economy in Prelndustrial England: Essays Presented to F.J. Fisher (London, 1976), 45-67.

Importance of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean 19

era Europe was the largest regional importer of colonial grain, consuming fifty percent of the total. Of that fifty percent, Mediterranean Europe constituted one-third.34 The other change in the trade of the colonies with Mediterranean Europe had to do with the lesson Thomas Willing preached. As much as a merchant might earn buying and selling goods, there was still more to be made in providing mercantile services. The colonists in general and the merchants of the ports in the middle colonies, New York and especially Philadelphia, reoriented themselves in the middle third of the eighteenth century to better take advantage of these new transatlantic opportunities. For Philadelphia the percentage of shipping tonnage clearing for Southern Europe tripled between midcentury and the eve of the War of Independence, while total tonnage cleared simply doubled.35 Moreover, the percentage of that increased tonnage that was locally owned grew impressively. It was colonial merchants who sought both to profit from the new export trade to Mediterranean Europe and to do so in their own ships.36 The impact of these trades, and the changes in them across the eighteenth century, was quite considerable: they increased massively the credits earned for the colonial balance of payments in both the visibles and invisibles sections of the current account. We do not know by how much they grew, but we do know that the combination provided individual mercantile firms with greater resources with which to settle accounts in London. For the balance of payments with Great Britain, these earnings helped offset the net debits created by the colonists' imports. How did all this involve trade with Mediterranean Europe? We can look again at appendix 1. First, 34

As Secretary of State, Thomas Jefferson summed up this part of the narrative in his 28 December 1790 "Repon on American Trade in the Mediterranean Sea." Prior to 1776, "about one Sixth of the Wheat and Flour exported from the United States, and about one Fourth in Value of their dried and pickled Fish, and some Rice, found their best Markets in the Mediterranean Ports." Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson., XVIII, 423. 35

McCusker and Menard, Economy of British America (2nd ed.), 194-197. On the eve of the War of Independence, trade between the colonies and ports in the Mediterranean employed annually some eighty to 100 ships of about 20,000 registered tons manned by 1200 sailors. Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson., XVIII, 423. Writing from a different perspective - while imprisoned in Algiers — Richard O'Brian, in a letter to Jefferson dated 28 April 1787, stated that "before the war Americans used to employ 200 sail of merchantmen in the streights [sic] trade." They "used to reap great advantages by it." Quoted in ibid., XI, 322. O'Brian (sometimes spelled O'Bryen, sometimes O'Bryan) was the master of the Philadelphia-owned Dauphin, which had been taken on 30 July 1785. He appears again several times in this volume. 36

McCusker, "Sources of Investment Capital."

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John J. McCusker

compare the net credits in the three commodity trades listed at the top of the table. The trade balance of the Continental Colonies with Great Britain and Ireland was in deficit by £1,417,000, and trade with the West Indies was also negative (£11,000). By contrast, the export trade of the Continental Colonies with Southern Europe was in credit to the sum of £358,000. Associated freight earnings were at least half that sum again.37 Second, the resulting credits were consistently transferred to London to help offset the imbalance in the colonists' trade with the Mother Country. While not the key to balancing the payments of the Thirteen Continental Colonies, trade with Southern Europe was particularly lucrative: it had been growing very rapidly in the thirty years prior to 1776, and it had developed as a pattern of trade that was especially beneficial in the colonial balance of payments. Continued and increasing trade with this region promised ever larger credits transferable to those markets where the Americans wished to buy and where they had little to sell relative to what they wanted to purchase.38 It is these developments that explain why the newly independent United States sought to restore and grow that trade after the War of Independence. The professed purpose of this essay has been to suggest that the period after the Peace of Paris in 1783 witnessed less the beginnings of American involvement in the Mediterranean than an attempt simply to resume that involvement and, if possible, to expand it.39 The citizens of the new Republic expected to be able to resume the commercial relationships with their trading partners that had been so instrumental in powering their successful economy before the Revolution.40 At its most hopeful, their desire was to extend those 37

In 1786 John Adams estimated that 200 American ships engaged in the Mediterranean trade would earn freight revenues of £200,000 sterling (accounted as invisibles in the balance of payments). Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, X, 86-87, Adams (London) to Jefferson (Paris), 3 July 1786. 38

Keene, "American Commitment to the Mediterranean Marketplace," 197248, attempts a similar estimate for the 1790s. 39

That is clearly the point that Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson was trying to make in 1791: "The fisheries of the United States, annihilated during the war; their vessels, utensils, and fishermen destroyed; their markets in the Mediterranean and British America lost." Report of the Secretary of State, on the Subject of the Cod and Whale Fisheries, 5. "•One Maryland merchant calculated in 1790 that "from fifty to one hundred Vessels, would be immediately employed in the Mediterranean, if we could send [them] there with safety. If that trade could be opened to our ships it would give a Spring to the New England Fisheries, as well as open a market for our produce" - by which he most likely meant the export of grain. "At Present we are compelled to send to Britain for Ships to carry American produce into the Mediterranean Sea, a market always open

Importance of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean 21

relationships. Most important of all was the trade with Great Britain which had been central to the early American economy. British merchants were as interested in reopening the old connections as were their American counterparts, and the former ties were reconnected astonishingly quickly, perhaps all too easily.41 Another matched pair of business interests thought that they, too, could be resurrected - and for a short while they were. The sugar planters of the British West Indies expected that once the fighting had ended they could again buy what they needed for their plantations from their former contacts on the continent and sell to the Americans all the sugar, molasses and rum they could take. Their presumption mirrored that of the North Americans, but standing in the way of both were British mercantilists and their Navigation Acts.42 It was not to happen the way both so ardently desired for another fifty years. The same Navigation Acts that after the American Revolution separated the United States from the British Empire had earlier limited trade between the British colonies and the rest of the world. United States merchants, now free of those constraints, tried to open new trades with places as far afield as the Baltic and the Pearl River delta. These links were slow and difficult to establish, however, if only because vested interests in many places were reluctant to permit new competition. One trade that had been open in the past and now promised to become of even greater consequence was with the ports and peoples of the Mediterranean Sea. Indeed, it had been essential in the past because of the particular nature of the trade. The United States had high hopes for reopening that comand Suited for us." Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XVIII, 401, "Extract of a letter from a Merchant in Mary[lan]d," 28 March 1790. •"Esmond Wright, "The British Objectives, 1780-1783: 'If Not Dominion Then Trade,'" in Ronald Hoffman and Peter J. Albert (eds.), Peace and the Peacemakers: The Treaty of 1783 (Charlottesville, VA, [1986]), 3-29. See also Vincent T. Harlow, The Founding of the Second British Empire, 1763-1793 (2 vols., London, 19521964), especially I, 448-492; and Charles R. Ritcheson, Aftermath of Revolution: British Policy toward the United States, 1783-1795 (Dallas, 1969). 42

Herbert C.[F.] Bell, "British Commercial Policy in the West Indies, 178393," English Historical Review, XXXI, No. 3 (1916), 429-441; and Lowell Joseph Ragatz, The Fall of the Planter Class in the British Caribbean, 1763-1833: A Study in Social and Economic History (New York, 1928; reprint, New York, 1963). See also Ritcheson, Aftermath of Revolution, 212-227 et seq.; and R[ezin] Fenton Duvall, "Philadelphia's Maritime Commerce with the British Empire, 1783-1789" (Unpublished PhD thesis. University of Pennsylvania, 1960). Cf. Alice B. Keith, "Relaxations in the British Restrictions on the American Trade with the British West Indies, 17831802," Journal of Modern History, XX, No. 1 (1948), 1-18.

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John J. McCusker

merce after the American Revolution, especially so because before the conflict "Southern Europe and the Wine Islands" had constituted not only the colonists' third largest trading region but also because it was their fastest growing commerce in the decades immediately prior to 1775.43 In the 1780s, just as Americans seemed ready to re-establish themselves in the trade to Southern Europe, they were stopped in their tracks by North African pirates. No sooner had the United States begun to establish itself under the new order than Barbary scimitars replaced British statutes as an obstacle to their ambitions. At stake was the United States balance of payments. Eventually the government thought the trade worth a war, its first as an independent nation.

43 John Adams called the Mediterranean trade "an extensive Field of Commerce and Wealth to America." Quoted in Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers erf Thomas Jefferson., XVIII, 413.

Importance

of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean

23

Appendix 1 Estimates Average Annual Debits and Credits in the Balance of Payments of the Thirteen Continental Colonies, 1768-1772 (Thousands of £'s Sterling) Debits Current Account ("Visibles") Commodities Exports to Great Britain and Ireland such as tobacco, rice and grain Imports from Great Britain and Ireland Exports to the West Indies such as fish and timber Imports from the West Indies Exports to Southern Europe and the Wine Islands such as fish, grain, and timber Imports from Southern Europe and the Wine Islands Ship sales Payments for servants Payments for slaves Current Account ("Invisibles") Trade Related Net earnings from freighting goods Net earnings from commissions, interest, insurance Net money transfers by immigrants, civil servants, military personnel British government collections/expenditures in the Thirteen Continental Colonies, such as Taxes and duties Military expenditures Salaries of civil servants Capital and Bullion Accounts Specie and Indebtedness Totals Subtotals Total exports Total imports Balance of commodity trade (-£980) Totals of non-commodity trades Grand Totals

Credits

£1615 £3082 £759 £770 £426 £68 £140 £80 £200

£600 £220

£40 £410 £40 -

£30

£2940 £3920 £320 £4240

£1300 £4240

Notes:

Exports are valued F.O.B, ("freight on board"), exclusive of ocean freight charges, commissions, interest and insurance; imports are valued C.I.F. ("cost, insurance, freight") and include such charges. The dashes indicate categories for which we have no estimates; thus they have no impact on the data in the table, though obviously they had some impact upon reality.

Sources:

John J. McCusker and Russell R. Menard, The Economy of British America, 1607-1789 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1985; 2nd ed., Chapel Hill, NC, 1991), 81-

34 John J. McCusker

82, table 4.1, as revised based on ongoing research. Table 4.1 is founded in the work of James F. Shepherd and Gary M. Walton; see their Shipping, Maritime Trade, and the Economic Development of Colonial North America (Cambridge, 1972), as summarized in Walton and Shepherd, The Economic Rise of Early America (Cambridge, 1979), 101. While based in the analysis of Shepherd and Walton, this table organizes the data a bit differendy and employs recent research to revise some figures. For a critical analysis of the original work, see McCusker and Menard, Economy of British America (2nd ed.), 72, note 2. See also John J. McCusker, "Colonial Statistics," in Susan B. Carter, et al. (eds.), Historical Statistics of the United States: Earliest Times to the Present (4th ed., 5 vols., New York, 2006), V, 627-772. Especially relevant to the revisions are Jacob M. Price, "A Note on the Value of Colonial Exports of Shipping," Journal of Economic History, XXXVI, No. 3 (1976), 704-724; Peter D.G. Thomas, "The Cost of the British Army in North America, 1763-1775," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., XLV, No. 3 (1988), 516 (for British government military expenditures in America); and Jared Ingersoll (London) to Governor Thomas Fitch (New Haven), 6 March 1765, reprinted in Franklin B. Dexter (ed.), "A Selection from the Correspondence and Miscellaneous Papers of Jared Ingersoll," Papers of the New Haven Colony Historical Society, IX (1918), 320 (for the military and civil establishments).

Relations between North America and the Italian Peninsula, 1763-1799: Tuscany, Genoa and Naples Luca Codignola

American and Italian historians have for the most part based their understanding of late eighteenth-century relations between North America (mostly the newly independent United States) and the states of the Italian peninsula on the printed accounts and correspondence of a few enterprising travellers, reciprocal constitutional influences or diplomatic endeavours. While there is little new that can be said from these perspectives, in recent years the Italian historian Andrea Addobbati has revolutionized our understanding of eighteenth-century relations between Tuscany and the United States by examining business exchanges. For his part, the French historian Pierre Gervais has challenged the commonplace notion of a homogeneous Atlantic world, emphasizing instead the significance the "thick web of relationships" that extended many existing European networks to North America based on family connections and commercial chains of trust. The following review of the early relations between North America and the Italian peninsula describes a steady exchange of goods and people between the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, the Republic of Genoa and the Kingdom of Naples, on the one hand, and British North America and the United States on the other. By piecing together what was previously unknown or unconnected, it indirectly confirms Gervais' interpretation.1 It is a truism that the British continental colonies, Newfoundland and New France on the western shores of the Atlantic and the states of the Italian peninsula on the other side of the sea showed little interest in each other until well after the end of the Seven Years' War (1763) and perhaps not until after the end of the American War of Independence in 1783. Still, given the available evidence and the fact that until 1783 almost everything "American" went under the British flag, there seems to have been more going on than was pre'Andrea Addobbati, "Oltre gli intermediari: La Anton Francesco Salucci & Figlio alla conquista dei mercati americani (1779-1788)," in Paolo Castignoli, et al. (eds.), Storia e attualità della presenza degli Stati Uniti a Livorno e in Toscana (Pisa, 2003), 145-183; Addobbati, "Filippo Mazzei e Giuseppe Bettoia: una relazione d'affari all'ombra della Rivoluzione Americana (1773-1781)," Nuovi Studi Livornesi, XI (2004), 133-194; and Pierre Gervais, "Neither Imperial, nor Atlantic: A Merchant Perspective on International Trade in the Eighteenth Century," History of European Ideas, XXXIV, No. 4 (2008), 465-472.

25

26

Luca Codignola

viously believed. Aside from Philadelphia, the area of West Florida, then under British jurisdiction, seemed to have the most interest in Italian products. A 1766 shopping list of the Governor of West Florida, George Johnstone (17301780) included "Genoa Coarse Paper. Spanish Cards made there. Women's Stockings made of coarse silk...Velvets Flowered & Plain. Silks of different kinds. All kind of Glass Ware." In 1770-1771 the Gazzetta Toscana reported that eighty, ninety and 100 mules were sent from Italy to West Florida on three different British ships. On 28 October 1772 Leghorn welcomed the ship Polly under Captain Anthony Byvanch, carting "grains, broad peas, fava beans, sarsaparilla, tin, and lead" from New York. Two more cargoes of grain arrived in 1773 from Philadelphia and in 1775 from Virginia. Raw materials and cereals, together with fish, cloth and colonial products (sugar, coffee and cocoa) were among the most common items conveyed by British vessels to Leghorn during the eighteenth century. The outbreak of the American War of Independence did little to change this pattern of occasional relations. In 1777 an unnamed British agent in Marseilles reported a ship being fitted out in Leghorn "for American Privateers." Benjamin Franklin received an application from an American "citizen" then in Florence, James Harriman, who suggested that he be appointed consul in Florence or Leghorn to enhance commerce between Tuscany and the new Republic.2 Cod (salted and dry) was a significant item of trade to southern Europe, with Leghorn and Naples in the early 1770s receiving as much dry cod as Barcelona, Lisbon or Oporto. Rarely, however, do historians of the relations between the Italian peninsula and North America mention cod, and no one has ever tried to quantify it. Still, the records kept by local authorities and surviving commercial correspondence provide some circumstantial evidence from the perspective of the Italian peninsula. In the 1770s and 1780s, some fifty or sixty ships are estimated to have called at Leghorn carrying processed salted fish, which included products of the Icelandic fishery, such as herring, and North American cod and salmon. Pietro Bernardo Prato (1743-1814), the generally reliable Leghorn diarist, and the Gazzetta Toscana, a periodical published in Florence which recorded arrivals and departures from Leghorn relayed by government employees, were often at odds. In 1771 Prato reported only two ships carrying cod, but the Gazzetta Toscana mentioned eighteen such arrivals, a number so high that it lowered the price. In 1772 Prato did not 2 Great Britain, National Archives (TNA/PRO), Colonial Office (CO) 5/584, fols. 279rv-285rv, George Johnstone to John Pownall, 23 October 1766; CO 5/149, fols. 212rv-213rv, David Maitland to John Robinson (Marseilles), 12 June 1777; and CO 5/149, fols. 216rv-217rv, Maitland to [Robinson], 17 June 1777; Gazzetta Toscana, No. 4 (1770), 15-16; No. 14 (1771), 56; No. 52 (1771), 208; No. 1 (1772), 4; No. 44 (1772), 176; No. 5 (1773), 20; and No. 14 (1775), 56; and Leonard W. Labaree, et al. (eds.), The Papers of Benjamin Franklin (39 vols., New Haven, 1959- ), XXVI, 210 and XXVIII, 51-52.

Relations between North America and the Italian Peninsula

27

report any entrances, whereas the Gazzetta Toscana mentioned the arrival of nine such vessels between October and December. In 1795 Prato reported eleven arrivals, but none was mentioned by the Gazzetta Toscana. As impressionistic as these figures may be, the available sources do allow us to draw two conclusions. First, a number of Leghorn mercantile firms, which were among the consignees of such cargoes, were able to use profits from the cod trade to diversify their investments; second, such arrivals were a regular occurrence during the last three months of the year, except for some years in which war disrupted regular flows of cod (e.g., 1767, 1781-1783, 1788, 1790 and 1792).3 Towards the end of the eighteenth century, the cod trade enabled a number of local merchant firms to use their profits to enter other commercial enterprises. According to Frédéric-Robert Meuricoffre (1740-1816), who wrote to Franklin in 1783, the cod trade in Naples had a long and consistent history amounting to forty or fifty cargoes per year totalling about 3000 quintals. Unfortunately, we do not have comparable data for other major ports on the Italian peninsula, but there must have been similar, if smaller, arrivals and cargoes. A small sample relating to Genoa in 1783-1789 lists fifteen ships carrying cod from Newfoundland and Labrador among a total of eighteen arriving from North America. According to a survey of local periodicals listing ship arrivals, vessels carrying cod from Newfoundland continued to predominate during the 1810s. Aside from its economic significance, the social implications of this ongoing cod trade between North America and the Italian peninsula must be considered. A good portion of the crew members of the ships that carried cod and salmon must have been familiar with northeastern North America, most likely with Newfoundland, Nova Scotia and New England. Towards the end of the 1770s, when crews from Leghorn, Naples and Genoa began to be assembled by daring local entrepreneurs who wished to try their luck trading with the rebellious colonies, the number of Italian-born crew members grew in proportion. Of the 100 men who between 1779 and 1785 comprised the crews of the five ships of the Leghorn firm Anton Francesco Salucci e Figlio, seventy-eight came from Tuscany, all but ten from Leghorn itself. In addition, two were Americans and one was a Nova Scotian.4 'Biblioteca Labronica "F.D. Guerrazzi" (BLL), Sezione di Storia Locale (SL), Giornale della Città (GC), Porto di Livorno dell'Anni MDCCLXIV e LXV Compilato da Pietro Bernardo Prato, Ms. 63 tomi [1764-1813] (Prato); R. C[ole] Harris, et al. (eds.), Historical Atlas of Canada (3 vols., Toronto, 1987-1993), I, plate 28; JeanPierre Filippini, Il porto di Livorno e la Toscana (1676-1814) (3 vols., Naples, 1998), I, 46, 58 and 63; and Nadia Pardini, "Il porto di Livorno e i traffici commerciali tra l'Europa e l'America Settentrionale attraverso lo spoglio della Gazzetta Patria poi Gazzetta Toscana (1766-1811)," Rassegna Storica Toscana, L, No. 2 (2004), 227-263. "American Philosophical Society (APS), B/F85, XXVIII, No. 142, fols, lrv3rv, Frédéric-Robert Meuricoffre to Benjamin Franklin (Paris), 5 June 1783; and XLI,

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Luca Codignola

Historians have long believed that the value of Leghorn's export trade with the Americas, including the West Indies and South America, was trifling in the early modern era. Recent scholarship, however, shows that much more went on than previously thought, and the attention paid to the enlightened enthusiasm of Filippo Mazzei (1730-1816) has revealed a parallel network of people, interests and ideas. In fact, until recently Mazzei has been studied exclusively for his relations with the intellectual élites of his time rather than his business connections. Aside from the cod trade, there was little of substance prior to the 1770s. The first ship with a Tuscan crew bound for the British continental colonies may have left as early as 1746/1748 under the sponsorship of the civil governor, Marquis Carlo Ginori (1701-1757). This one voyage, of course, is admittedly insufficient to overturn the minimalist perspective supported by, among other evidence, an observation of the British Anglican chaplain, Andrew Burnaby (1734-1812), who in 1765 complained to his friend George Washington that he had to wait almost a year to answer his letter because "we have so seldom any Ships bound from this Port to America." 5 Mazzei's fifteen years in London provided him a privileged viewpoint on the new opportunities offered by North America. In fact, the reason he returned to Tuscany was a business project, contrived in 1771, to produce wine, olive oil and silk in Virginia and to exploit a new trade route with Tuscany. Unable to gain much support from the Grand Duke, Pietro Leopoldo of Hapsburg-Lorraine (1747-1792), or to elicit much interest among local peasants and artisans, Mazzei sailed away a frustrated yet still hopeful man, reaching Virginia in late 1773. What happened to him between 1771 and 1773, however, was unknown to historians until recently. Prior to leaving Leghorn, Mazzei had secured the partnership of Giuseppe Bettoia (1734/1740-post 1781), the leading representative of Stefano Bettoia e Figlio, who was to handle Mazzei's No. 54, fols. lrv-2rv, Meuricoffre to Franklin, n.d. (after 5 June 1783); Archivio di Stato di Livorno (ASL), Governo civile e militare (GCM), filza 1301, No. 93, Giuseppe Bettoia (Leghorn), 23 January 1779; No. 1303, fol. 5v, Filippo Cianchi (Leghorn), 2 March 1782; fol. 35r, Camillo Fiorentini (Leghorn), 28 April 1783; fols. 50v51r, Giovanni Taddei (Leghorn), 12 May 1784; fol. 59v, Gaetano Andreoli (Leghorn), 31 January 1785; fol. 6Ir, Antonio Natali (Leghorn), 1 April 1785; and Luigi Bulferetti and Claudio Costantini, Industria e commercio in Liguria nell'età del Risorgimento (1700-1861) (Milan, 1966), 166. 'Library of Congress (LC), Washington Papers (WP), Ser. 4, fol. 94v, Andrew Burnaby to George Washington, 29 Aprii 1765; Ettore A. Albertoni, "Il contributo di Filippo Mazzei nella storia della circolazione delle idee tra Europa e America," in Filippo Mazzei, Istruzioni per essere liberi ed eguali, eds. Margherita Marcinone and Giuseppe Gadda-Conti (Milan, 1984), 7-19; Addobbati, "Mazzei e Bettoia," esp. 133-139; and Antonio Zobi, Storia civile della Toscana dal MDCCXXXVII al MDCCCXLVIII (5 vols., Florence, 1850-1853; reprint, Port Chester, NY, 2001), I, 363.

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29

ships arriving from Virginia and to prepare the cargo for the return voyages. One of the vessels that Mazzei sent to Bettoia was the 175/180-ton American brig Norfolk, commanded by the Virginia captain Thomas Woodford (1736post 1779). In early 1775 Woodford had carried flour, beans and wheat to Leghorn, but he was subsequently unable to return to North America due to the impending American War of Independence. Since Woodford's relationship with Virginia and Mazzei was temporarily severed, Bettoia employed him on the Newfoundland route, changing the ship's name to L'Amicizia and probably registering it in Ireland to hide its American origin. In 1777, however, Stefano Bettoia e Figlio went bankrupt, and one year later Bettoia, unbeknown to Mazzei, sold L'Amicizia to a fellow merchant, Sebastiano Vincenzo Salucci (1753-post 1803), who had just become the main representative of Anton Francesco Salucci e Figlio. The Mazzei-Bettoia partnership failed in that they were unable to carve out a major role in the trade that had been going on for years between British North America and Leghorn. Still, fifty vessels from British North America arrived in Leghorn between 1770 and 1774: eleven in 1770, five in 1771, twelve in 1772, four in 1773 and eighteen in 1774. They carried mainly cod (twenty ships), wheat (nineteen) and tobacco (three), but some also transported campeche wood, rice, grain, peas, fava beans, sarsaparilla, tin and lead. They came from Newfoundland (twenty), Virginia (ten), Philadelphia and Québec (four each), New York (three), and other provenances (Halifax, Charleston, Boston, Baltimore and Bermuda). By the early 1770s a number of British mercantile firms based in Leghorn that had started in the cod trade began to expand into other products, of which Virginia wheat was the most important. This is where the Bettoia-Mazzei firm should have come in, but the partners had not been able to hold on long enough. 6 Anton Francesco Salucci e Figlio was more successful. When he purchased L'Amicizia, Salucci also took over the American project that Mazzei had initially devised. Mazzei had suggested to Bettoia that Woodford be sent to Paris to convince the American envoy Benjamin Franklin of the utility of a business connection with Tuscany. Salucci agreed, and in August 1778 Woodford was in Paris to explain to Franklin that his new firm intended "hazarder la premiere Expedition de ce Port [Leghorn], pour le Continent Ameriquain." Franklin was favourably impressed and promptly granted Woodford the required passport. Boldly intending to take advantage of the challenging conditions, Salucci proceeded to rename the former Bettoia ship La Prosperità, registered it in Leghorn and assembled its fifteen-man crew, including Bettoia, who had been granted a certificate as captain. Woodford ("Tommaso Vodi6 APS, B/F113.m, Mazzei to Giovanni Fabbroni (Virginia), 30 January 1775; Thomas Woodford to Fabbroni (Leghorn), 18 December 1775; and Mazzei to Fabbroni (Pisa), 16 March 1781. See also Addobbati, "Mazzei e Bettoia," 149, 184, n. 33 and 185, n. 45 which revise Addobbati, "Oltre gli intermediari," 146, η. 6.

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forti") was the pilot, and Andrea Pulidori was the supercargo representing the owner. Salucci loaded the ship with wine, brandy, cloth, fruits and salt, and on 25 January 1779 La Prosperità set sail for Norfolk, Virginia, uou autre bon Endroit de la Cote du Continent." The vessel was to sail via Cádiz and Saint Eustatius to try to conceal its true destination. In the end, however, this pioneering voyage - devised by Mazzei, prepared by Bettoia, secured by Woodford, guaranteed by Pulidori and financed by Salucci - was unsuccessful. On 20 April 1779 the brig encountered a British blockade near Chesapeake Bay and was captured by two British sloops of war which took it to New York where both the ship and cargo were confiscated. On 4 May 1779 Bettoia wrote to Salucci in Leghorn that he was going to remain in New York to visit some acquaintances.7 This disastrous outcome did not discourage Salucci. As soon as conditions allowed, given his belief that "the General Independency of The Unite [hc] Provinces [was] not very far," he was willing to try again. As the "first Expeditions Shall be the happiest," he begged Franklin to grant him some privileged information that would allow his company "to take the best of it, and restore our Losses" at the earliest opportunity. While La Prosperità was sailing towards Virginia, Mazzei was on his way back to Tuscany, but he was captured by the British and taken to New York. He eventually made it to Tuscany in 1780, only to discover that his debts were uncollectable. In his capacity as agent of the province of Virginia in Tuscany, he tried to convince his friends to subscribe to a scheme to encourage clandestine trade between the rebellious provinces and the Italian states. For political rather than economic reasons, this scheme was stalled by Franklin, who opposed any initiative coming from individual provinces and had for this reason withdrawn his support for Mazzei.8 After the Revolution the commercial relationship Mazzei had first devised began to bear fruit. In early 1783 Salucci resumed his plan to trade with the United States. He purchased the 100/130-ton brig II Diligente, armed with six pieces of cannon, and on 5 May he sent it to Philadelphia under the command of Captain Camillo Fiorentini (c. 1749-post 1786) from Portoferraio. On 26 December the brig was successfully back in Leghorn with a cargo of tobacco, wax and dyewood. One year later, the company sent three ships to the United States. The authorities in Leghorn then began to acknowledge the 7

ASL, GCM, Registro No. 1298, fol. 57rv, Pietro Leopoldo of HapsburgLorraine to Bettoia (Leghorn), 16 January 1779; and filza 1301, No. 93, Bettoia (Leghorn), 23 January 1779; BLL, Prato, XIII (1779), 11 and 217; Labaree, et al. (eds.), Franklin Papers, XXVIII, 472^74; XXIX, 250-251; and XXX, 15; and Addobbati, "Mazzei e Bettoia," 170-171. 8 Labaree, et al. (eds.), Franklin Papers, XXX, 15; and Julian P. Boyd, et al. (eds.), The Papers of Thomas Jefferson (36 vols., Princeton, 1950- ), XXX, 311.

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opportunities offered by the American market. In early 1785 the American entrepreneur E. Brush (fl. 1784-1785) visited Leghorn on his way to Naples. He apparently met with the Governor of Leghorn, Federigo Barbolani, the Earl of Montauto (1742-1789) and the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Ferdinand III of Hapsburg-Lorraine (1769-1824), to promote the idea of reciprocal commercial exchanges and treaties. In 1785 the Florentine merchant, Antonio Vincenzo Marchesini (fl. 1769-1786), proposed the establishment of the Compagnia di Commercio Toscana to trade internationally, including with North America. According to Prato, the government did not support the project despite the fact that Marchesini had moved to Leghorn in December 1785 and had immediately obtained the approval of the Earl of Montauto. On 7 April 1785 another Leghorn merchant, Giovanni Niccola Bertolli (fl. 1758-1786), sent the brig Città di Livorno manned by nine men under the command of Antonio Natali (c. 1735-post 1786) to Boston with an American citizen, Thomas Laughton (c. 1748-post 1786) as pilot. When it returned to Leghorn on 10 January 1786 it was the only vessel to arrive from the United States between 1786 and 1788, surviving a close encounter with Algerian pirates off Minorca. What looked like the beginning of a rapidly growing trade for Salucci and his company ended abruptly for reasons that had nothing to do with North America. Four of his ships left for the United States, but none returned because he had to sell them to pay for the legal proceedings following the unlucky capture in 1780 of one of his ships, the snow Teti, by a Spanish corsair. This loss ruined Anton Francesco Salucci e Figlio, which went bankrupt in 1788.9 One of the associates in Anton Francesco Salucci e Figlio in its pioneering American ventures between 1778 and 1785 was Nicola Filicchi (c. 1721-post 1806), a merchant from Pietralunga, near Gubbio in the Papal States. Although Nicola Filicchi did not move to Leghorn, two of his sons did: Filippo Filicchi (1763-1816), probably in the early 1780s, and Antonio Filicchi (1764-1847) in 1792 or 1793. The former joined Anton Francesco Salucci e Figlio and became acquainted with the company's American ventures. In 1785, ®ASL, GCM, Registro Copialettere No. 975, fols. 379rv-380r, Francesco Pierallini to Vincenzo Alberti (Leghorn), 17 November 1784; Registro No. 1298, fol. 149rv, Leopoldo to Fiorentini (Leghorn), 29 April 1783; Registro No. 1303, fol. 35r, Fiorentini (Leghorn), 28 April 1783; fols. 50v-51r, Taddei (Leghorn), 12 May 1784; fol. 59v, Andreoli (Leghorn), 31 January 1785; fol. 61r, Natali (Leghorn), 1 April 1785; filza 30, fol. 41rv, Francesco Seratti to Federigo Barbolani, Earl of Montauto, Pisa, 30 January 1785; filza 32, fol. 70rv, Antonio Vincenzo Marchesini to Leopoldo, n.d. [December 1785]; fols. 71rv-82rv, Marchesini to Leopoldo, n.d. [December 1785]; and fol. 157rv, Pedro de Arabet to Barbolani (Alicante), [11] February 1786; BLL, Prato, XV (1781), 162; XVII (1783), 67 and 209; XVIII (1784), 23 and 277; XIX (1785), 16, 29, 38 and 47; and XX (1786), 10, 23 and 370; Boyd, et al. (eds.), Jefferson Papers, XV, 616-617; and Addobbati, "Oltre gli intermediari," 157, 161166, 171 and 176.

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at the height of the success of his American enterprises, Salucci decided to secure his American base by sending the twenty-two-year-old Filippo Filicchi across the Atìantic. His main correspondent was the New York firm led by William Seton (1746-1798), an entrepreneur of Scottish origin and the leader of William Seton and Co., a company with extensive connections in both the United States and the West Indies. Filicchi was to follow the detailed guidelines set forth in a notarial contract creating a new company, Filippo Filicchi and Compagnia, in which both partners enjoyed limited responsibilities and privileges. Anton Francesco Salucci e Figlio was to retain exclusive rights over Filicchi's activities for three years and to receive half of the new firm's profits. Moreover, it could terminate the limited partnership if Filicchi traded unwisely. For his part, Filicchi was the sole representative of the new firm, was not required to invest any money and was not responsible for any damages or losses incurred (except for a portion of his own income). Furthermore, he was entitled not only to half of the new company's profits but also to half the deals he procured for Anton Francesco Salucci e Figlio and half the profits thereof. If anyone was sent from Leghorn to the United States to assist Filicchi, the latter was responsible for only one-quarter of his wages. The contract was signed in Leghorn on 28 April 1785, and Teresa Geltrude left Leghorn on 23 May, carrying Salucci to Málaga and Filicchi to New York. 10 Filicchi's first visit to the United States lasted from 11 August 1785 to May 1788. His only known letter sent from America was dated 9 November 1785.11 In New York he introduced himself to "our correspondent Mr. Curson," most likely the Baltimore merchant Richard Curson, Sr. (1726-1805) or his second son, Richard Curson, Jr. (1763-1808). On 23 August Filicchi left for Philadelphia by ferry and stagecoach, arriving in the capital two or three days later, where he remained for twenty-three days. There he met other Italians (nazionali), such as the Neapolitan owner of a cafe who spoke with a clear Tuscan accent and a man from Milan. Filicchi was back in New York for five or six days in late September. In October he went to Providence (a long sixday passage from New York) and then to Boston, where Anton Francesco Salucci e Figlio had its main contacts. Filicchi was to contact a local merchant, Thomas Russell (fl. 1785), for the first instalment of his allocation. He was certainly in Boston on 18 October when he received a letter from Leghorn. '"Archivio di Stato di Firenze (Florence), Dipartimento Esecutivo della Camera di Commercio, filza 1186, No. 47, fols. lrv-5rv, Leghorn, 28 April 1785; and Florence, 6 May 1785. This contract was found by Addobbati; see "Oltre gli intermediari," 155 and 169-171. "I owe the knowledge of this letter to Robert Kim Stevens and Revalee Stevens, currently of San Pedro, CA, who found it in Rome (see below) while working on an archival survey under the direction of the American historian Lewis Hanke (19051993).

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Sometime around that date he also received a personal letter from Salucci, who was then in Madrid, informing him that the legal dispute over Teti was going well but required his presence in Spain during the winter of 1785-1786. The same ship likely conveyed another letter in which Salucci ordered Captain Giovanni Taddei (c. 1744-post 1785) to direct Teresa Geltrude to Cádiz rather than Leghorn. The ship was scheduled to depart around 17/19 November 1785. Filicchi left New York in May 1788 and was probably in Leghorn for most of 1788-1789, where he must have kept an attentive eye on the events following the bankruptcy of the Anton Francesco Salucci e Figlio. As this also coincided with the end of the three-year contract which bound the American activity of the Filicchi e Compagnia to its parent company, he probably began to act on his own behalf during that year. He was also in Gubbio in late 1788 and early 1789.12 Filicchi's second visit to America was quite short, lasting from the summer of 1789 to late that year or early the next. In the United States Filicchi probably got married and closed his books before returning home to start his own company and to profit from the room left by the bankruptcy of his former employer and the absence of Salucci, who remained in Spain until 1801. The only ship that arrived from the United States in 1791, the brig Spedizione (perhaps a translation of Expedition or Expeditious) under Captain Melzer Joy (fl. 1791), brought "merchandise" from Boston for Filicchi on the top of the usual cargo of cod for Giovanni Carlo Giera e Figli. It was likely soon thereafter that the new company, Filippo e Antonio Filicchi, was created with the two brothers as partners. In June 1793 John Carroll (1736-1815), the Bishop of Baltimore, was aware that Filicchi was already "frequently send[ing] cargo vessels to New York," and a year later Seton confirmed that Filicchi had "kept up a constant Trade with the United States before and after 1793."13 12

Archivio di Stato di Roma, Miscellanea di Carte Politiche e Riservate, busta 17, fase. 760, fols. lrv-lOrv, Filippo Filicchi to Nicola Filicchi; Cassetti del Catalogo Nos. 34 and 35, busta 1/418 (or 4108), fols. lv-9v, Filippo Filicchi to Nicola Filicchi and Barbara Bentivegni Filicchi (Boston), 9 November 1785; LC, WP, Ser. 7, fols. 1371rv-1372rv, William Seton to Edmund J. Randolph (New York), 29 March 1794; Annabelle M. MelvUle, Elizabeth Bayley Seton, 1774-1821 (New York, 1951), 320, n. 15; Thomas O'Brien Hanley (ed.), The John Carroll Papers (3 vols., Notre Dame, IN, 1976), I, 309; Luca Codignola, "Gli imprenditori livornesi Filippo e Antonio Filicchi e il Nord America (1785-1806)," in Castignoli, et al. (eds.), Storia e attualità, 43-66; James H. McGean, "The Earliest Baptismal Register of St. Peter's Church, New York City," [US Catholic Historical Society] Historical Records and Studies, I, No. 1 (1899), 99; and Luca Codignola "Religione e affari tra Italia e Stati Uniti, 1785-1847: Alla ricerca dei Filicchi," Il Veltro: Rivista della Civiltà Italiana, XXXVI, Nos. 1-2 (1992), 121-134. 13 ASL, Governatore e Auditore, filza no. 2402, inserto 959, fols. lrv-70rv, Carlo Pellegrini (Leghorn), 22 March 1790; and Filicchi (Leghorn), 17 July 1790;

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In early 1794 President Washington provided a new step in Filicchi's rising career by appointing him American consul at Leghorn. Filicchi had sought this post for some time, both by lobbying through his American family and by applying directly to Thomas Jefferson, then the Secretary of State. For several years, however, these efforts came to naught because, in Seton's words, "the Mediterranean Trade did not then come under contemplation and consideration." In 1794 Filicchi successfully assisted the American brig Minerva, owned by the Seton firm, and made sure that news of his usefulness reached Washington either by writing him directiy or by having someone else inform him that "even without the assistance of an American Consul [in Leghorn] notice ha[d] been taken of his Circular in which he requests protection for the American Colours." Meanwhile Seton, his American protector, had again applied on his behalf to the new Secretary of State, Edmund J. Randolph (1753-1813). He described Filicchi as a person who, through "knowledge and perseverance," had "laid the foundation of a most valuable branch of Commerce. " Duties paid on his "valuable" cargoes, he added, amounted to "very considerable sums." Further, he had always carried home in return "produce from this Country." Seton emphasized that "no Person residing in that Country has an equal claim to this honor" and that "no Man will do more credit to the Appointment if he is honored with it." Thus, in a period in which the new Republic made a number of diplomatic appointments all over the world, Filicchi became the first United States consul on the Italian peninsula. In sum, Filicchi's American acquaintances and protectors, his fluency in English, presence in Leghorn, profession of "the highest attachment imaginable for the United States" and his "unremitted attention to everything relating to it" made him an ideal candidate for the position.14 During his mandate Filicchi mainly dealt with American ships whose cargoes were impounded by the English and whose United States seamen were forcefully impressed into English naval service, as well as with the constant state of conflict between the Western powers and Tripoli, Tunis and Algiers. Rumours of Filicchi's expected replacement by Thomas Appleton (1763-1840), BLL, Prato, XXV (1791), 24; and LC, WP, Ser. 7, fol. 1371v, Seton to Randolph (New York), 29 March 1794. "United States, Congress, Senate, Senate Executive Journal, 3rd Cong., 2829 May 1794 and 10 December 1794; Archivio Filicchi (Leghorn), Miscellaneous, Washington to Filicchi, 10 December 1794; LC, WP, Ser. 7, fol. 1370v, John Middleton Vining to Thomas Jefferson, 1 March 1791; and fols. 1371rv-1372rv, Seton to Randolph, 29 March 1794; United States, National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), Record Group (RG) 84, Leghorn, No. 1, Filicchi to Washington, 29 October 1793; No. 3, Filicchi and Antonio Filicchi to Seratti, 21 October 1793; and No. 4, Filicchi to Seton, 11 November 1793; and Boyd, et al. (eds.), Jefferson Papers, XIX, 354-355.

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a Bostonian who had lived in France, began to circulate as early as 1795, but his official successor did not come for several years. On 7 February 1798 John Adams, the new President, nominated Appleton for the position, and the Senate approved the next day. By 30 July 1798 Filicchi had heard of Appleton's appointment, and a few months later he informed Timothy Pickering, the new Secretary of State, of Appleton's arrival in Leghorn in November 1798. "Although he had no Letter for me, and...his commission did not mention that my Powers were withdrawn, and although I had no official communication of it of any kind," Filicchi showed his loyalty to the United States government by personally facilitating Appleton's official recognition by the Tuscan authorities.15 The family and business networks that grew around the Salucci and Filicchi families in Leghorn, and the Curson and Seton families in New York, provide some clear evidence of networks of interests and people that touched on both the Italian peninsula and the United States and were constantly being created and nurtured while they grew in extent and importance. On the Italian side, we have already described how prior to and during his stay in the United States Filicchi took advantage of the links between Anton Francesco Salucci e Figlio and the Seton family of New York. Other evidence of these networks is also available on the American side. For decades several young members of the Curson-Seton extended family profited from the hospitality of their correspondents in Leghorn - first the Saluccis and then the Filicchis - and later extended their connections to Rome. In all likelihood, twenty-three-year-old Samuel Curson (c. 1761-1786) went to Leghorn (as well as to Venice and Trieste) where he was met by the remaining members of the Salucci family, since Salucci and Filicchi had sailed on Teresa Geltrude on 23 May 1785. Curson was followed to Europe by twenty-one-year-old William Magee Seton (17681803), whose stay lasted from the spring of 1788 until 1789 during which time he visited Spain, the Italian peninsula and France. He then visited his extended family in Great Britain and toured the main English manufacturing towns. In Leghorn, where he remained for three months, he met with Giovanni Battista Luigi Salucci (1764-post 1805) and the then twenty-five-year-old Filicchi, whom he had probably met in New York. In Rome Seton met Antonio Filicchi and the Jesuit, John Thorpe (1726-1792), the agent of the English Jesuits who also acted on behalf of American clergy. On a second trip to Leghorn in the summer of 1791 aboard the brig Eagle, William Seton was accompanied by two of his brothers, James (1770-post 1822) and Henry (fl. 1791), both of whom returned home later in the summer. In 1791 and 1792 William M. Seton and Filicchi in Leghorn coordinated cargoes to and from New York. Commercial prospects looked very promising. Seton returned to New York around l5

NARA, RG 84, Leghorn, Nos. 1, 3-5, 8-13, 15, 19-20, 22 and 24, Filicchi's dispatches; and No. 24, Filicchi to Timothy Pickering, 14 February 1799; and Senate Executive Journal, 5th Cong., 7 February 1798.

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February 1792 but was in Leghorn for a third time during the second half of 1793. By 25 January 1794, though, he was back in New York. 16 Leghorn, of course, was not the only Italian city to participate in trade with America. Another was Genoa, where aside from the cod trade we owe most of what we knew of the early relations with North America in the second half of the eighteenth century to the correspondence of three diplomats - Francesco Maria Ageno (1727-1788), who was minister in London around the time of the Seven Years' War and the American War of Independence (1759-1765, 1768-1773 and 1774-1782); Pietro Paolo Celesta (1732-1806), minister in London (1756-1759) and ambassador to Spain (1784-1797); and Giuseppe Ravara (1760-post 1803), Genoa's first consul to Philadelphia (1791-1797). Yet there was certainly more going on beneath this apparently calm surface. Some insight can be gleaned through the activities of the Ceronio family. Following a common pattern among merchant families, Stefano Ceronio (fl. 17751793) had arrived in Philadelphia sometime in late 1775, recommended to the local firm of Willing, Morris and Co., which was soon to gain power when in 1775 the soon-to-be American rebels asked Robert Morris (1734-1806) to join the Secret Committee of Commerce. Aside from his personal financial expertise, Morris' presence allowed the revolutionaries to tap into the firm's extensive trade network, which had significant ramifications in Europe and the West Indies. Initially, the main task of the Secret Committee was to procure woollen clothing and blankets, mainly from France, for the forthcoming campaign of 1776-1777. These articles were to be paid for by revenues deriving from the sale of American products, such as rice, tobacco, indigo, flour and wheat.17 By May 1776 Morris sent Ceronio to Cap-François, in French SaintDomingue, to act as a special agent for both Willing, Morris and Co. and the Secret Committee. Ceronio was said to be "a young Italian Gentleman... warmly attached to our Cause" who was "capable & faithful to the last degree." Silas Deane (1737-1789), another merchant who belonged to the Secret Committee and was in France at the time, was told to direct all merchandise procured in France to Ceronio to be secretly reshipped to the United States. Although Ceronio admitted that he did not know Washington person16 Melville, Seton, 13 and 22-23; Annabelle M. Melville, John Carroll of Baltimore: Founder of the American Catholic Hierarchy (New York, 1955), 108; Joseph I. Dirvin, Mrs. Seton, Foundress of the American Sisters of Charity (New York, 1962), 34-35 and 42-43; Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton, Selected Writings, eds. Ellin M. Kelly and Melville (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1987), 9; and Gino Franchi, Un dialogo di amicizia e di fede: Corrispondenza tra i Seton e i Filicchi (1788-1890) (Leghorn, 2006), 20-21, 29, 30-34 and 35-37.

"Paul H. Smith, et al. (eds.), Letters of Delegates to Congress, 1774-1789 (Washington, DC, 1976-), V, 37; and Richard N. Juliani, Building Little Italy: Philadelphia 's Italians before Mass Migration (University Park, PA, 1998), 16-21.

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ally, the members of the Secret Committee certainly knew Ceronio, as Morris regularly brought his name up in their meetings. He was also well known to Franklin, who in February 1778 told his father (Giuseppe Ceronio, fl. 17601778) of his son's secret whereabouts. In 1780, Ceronio's brother Angelo (fl. 1780-1785) arrived in Philadelphia, where his brother joined him. Until the end of the American War of Independence Stefano Ceronio resumed his old position as merchant and American agent, this time in tandem with his brother, receiving and assisting American ships and disposing of their war prizes. Their names appeared regularly in the Congressional account books for 1783 and 1785 in conjunction with a certain Nicoleau ("Stephen Ceronio Ange Ceronio, & Nicoleau"). Early in 1784 Stefano Ceronio returned to Philadelphia, where in February he met his sponsor, Morris, and in May married Catherine Hicks (fl. 1763-1808). We do not know whether Ceronio kept contact with Genoa, but he continued to live in Philadelphia, where he was listed as a merchant in 1791-1793, until in 1794 his wife was described as a widow.18 Whether the Ceronio connection was the sign of an active commercial network between Genoa and the United States in the late eighteenth century is impossible to know. In the early 1780s, however, while Ceronio was still being paid by the American government, a number of United States ships called at Genoa - one in 1783 from Philadelphia, one from Virginia in 1784, one from Baltimore in 1788, one from Boston in 1789 and one from New York in 1799 (for perspective, between 600 and 614 British ships arrived in Genoa in those same years out of a total of 15,262 entrances). Furthermore, in 1784 a Genoese entrepreneur, Giuseppe Rati (fl. 1784), asked Franklin to act on his behalf with the French Crown to obtain a special passport to protect him from the Algerian pirates. He needed this to return to New England with his ship, from whence his voyage evidently had originated. In 1794 San Francesco da Paola, bound from Nantes to New York, lost its cargo seventy miles from Philadelphia. In 1798, a brig from San Pier d'Arena (now part of Genoa) on its way to "America" was captured by an Algerian xebec off Barcelona. Its supercargo, a certain Bavastro (d. 1798), was killed along with seventeen of his thirty-one men. Another Genoese ship made it into Genoa on or shortly before 30 January 1799. There may have been some confusion over this last

18

LC, WP, Ser. 4, f. 67r, Stefano Ceronio to Washington (Cap-François), 25 May 1777; Smith, et al. (eds.), Letters, V, 37, 366-367 and 658; The Philadelphia Directory... (Philadelphia, 1791), 21; The Philadelphia Directory and Register... (Philadelphia, 1793), 22; Park M'Farland, Jr. (ed.), Marriage Records of Gloria Dei Church, "Old Swedes, " Philadelphia, 1750-1863 (2 vols., Philadelphia, 1879), II, 103; Worthington C. Ford, et al. (eds.), Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789 (34 vols., Washington, DC, 1904-1937; reprint, New York, 1968), XX, 515; and Elmer J. Ferguson, et al. (eds.), The Papers of Robert Morris, 1781-1784 (9 vols., Pittsburgh, 1973-1999), IX, 149, 772, 781-782, 785, 792, 795, 813 and 883.

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arrival because Frederick Hyde Wollaston (1770-1839), the American consul, on 31 January noted the arrival of yet another ship, Hunter, from New York. 19 Towards the end of the century the increased commercial activity made it advisable to appoint an American consul in the Ligurian Republic. Gaetano Drago (fl. 1790-1796), a Genoese who resided in the United States, offered himself to Secretary of State Pickering in 1796, but the choice was Francis Childs (ante-1785-1830), a Philadelphia-bora printer living in New York. He was appointed on 27 February 1797 but never arrived in Genoa. The final choice later was the English-bora Wollaston, a friend of Mazzei's, who seems to have been approached before the end of 1797 since his first dispatch was dated 6 January 1798. Wollaston was officially received by the Ligurian Republic on 10 May 1799. He came from a family of important Anglican clergymen and scientists from Kent. At the age of fourteen or fifteen Wollaston was already in Genoa, where he was described as a foreign merchant. He probably left Genoa in 1803 bound for the United States, but did not turn up there until 1811.20 The Kingdom of Naples showed some interest in the new Republic in 1778 when it officially invited the United States to take advantage of its ports. More significant prolonged dealings, however, can be gleaned from the 1783 reciprocal applications of Vincenzo Cotini (fl. 1783-1784) and Meuricoffre. 19

NARA, RG 84, IIIA, 1798-1912, Τ 64, I, [No. 1], Frederick H. Wollaston to Pickering (Genoa), 2 March 1799; [No. 2], 18 May 1799; [No. 3], 29 June 1799; and [No. 4], 29 June 1799; Gazzetta Nazionale della Liguria, XXXIV (2 February 1799), 277; Isaac M. Hays (ed.), Calendar of the Papers of Benjamin Franklin in the Library of the American Philosophical Society (6 vols., Philadelphia, 1908), III, 197; Bulferetti and Costantini, Industria e commercio, 166 and 174-181; Giulio Giaccherò, Origini e sviluppi del porto franco genovese II agosto 1570-9 ottobre 1778 (Genoa, 1972), 228-229 and 235, n. 36; and Salvatore Rotta (ed.), "La corrispondenza di Giuseppe Ravara, console generale della Repubblica di Genova presso gli Stati Uniti (1791-1797)," in Giorgio Spini (ed.), Italia e America dal Settecento all'età dell'imperialismo (Venice, 1976), 201. 20 Archivio di Stato di Genova, Archivio Segreto, voi. 2707, Giuseppe Ravara to Ligurian Republic 23 May 1797; NARA, RG 59, Pickering to Gaetano Drago, 7 December 1796; and Pickering to the Directory of the Ligurian Republic, 20 December 1799; RG 84, Wollaston to Department of State, 2 March 1798, 18 May 1799 and 25 July 1803: United States, Congress, Senate, Journal, 5th Cong., 15 May 1797 to 3 March 1799, 249; Margherita Marchione, et al. (eds), Selected Writings and Correspondence of Filippo Mazzei (3 vols., Prato, 1983), III, 462 and 525; and Pierangelo Castagneto, "'...onde consolidare sempre di più i legami che devono unire le due Repubbliche:' The Origins of the Diplomatic Relations between the United States and the Republic of Genoa," in Massimo Bacigalupo and Pierangelo Castagneto (eds.), America and the Mediterranean: Proceedings of the Sixteenth Biennial International Conference, Genova, November 8-11, 2001 (Turin, 2003), 381-395.

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Early that year, Cotini, a Neapolitan businessman who knew French, Italian and English and was knowledgeable "in commerce, politics, and international law," unsuccessfully asked to be appointed Naples' consul to the United States. Cotini appeared to have been more interested in the position per se than in the United States, since he would also have accepted a consulship in the Netherlands or wherever in Europe there was a vacancy. Almost at the same time Meuricoffre asked to represent the United States as consul-general in Naples. Around 1767, at the age of twenty-seven, Meuricoffre had moved to Naples to enlarge the scope of his family business. He belonged to a Swiss mercantile family originally from Frauenfeld in the canton of Thurgau. Meuricoffre's father, Johann Georg Meuricoffre, a native of Sulgen in the Thurgau canton, had moved to Lyon, France, in the mid-eighteenth century, where the family's original name, Mörikofer, had been changed. In Naples, Meuricoffre had created Meuricoffre et Cie., later to become Meuricoffre, Scherb et Cie. 21 Quite willing to take advantage of the new opportunities offered by the imminent signing of the Treaty of Paris, Meuricoffre in Paris first reassured the American minister to France, Franklin ("we are Swiss, Republican, and faithful") and then proceeded to show how Naples was perhaps the most important European city for trade with the new United States (which, perhaps unwisely, he referred to as "your colonies") because the kingdom consumed many items produced there, as well as the "great fertility" of its "happy soil." Meuricoffre attached to his letter two detailed lists of items that the United States could export to and import from the Kingdom of Naples. Among the former, cod was by far the most important, amounting to some 240,000 to 300,000 English quintals (eighty to 100 cargoes) per year, followed by tobacco and sugar. With regard to exports from Naples, olive oil topped the list. Neapolitan oil was produced primarily in the regions of Puglia (Gallipoli), Calabria and Sicily (Milazzo) and compared well with that from southern France (Marseilles and Provence) and the Republic of Genoa (Oneglia). Wines, especially from Pozzuoli, near Naples, and from Siracusa in Sicily (white and red moscato), were also suggested, together with sewing silk and wool cloth. Two export items were said to be of special interest. One was Sicilian salt from Trapani, a favourite return cargo for cod ships from Newfoundland and Norway; the other was liquorice paste, an anti-scurvy remedy used in beer-making in the Netherlands and England. Meuricoffre's formal

21

Archivio di Stato di Napoli (ASN), Esteri, Fascio 4210, [No. 2], fols, lrv2rv, Vincenzo Pantani to Ferdinand IV, 12 March 1783; and [No. 3], fols. lrv-2rv, Vincenzo Cotini to Ferdinand IV, 24 June 1783; Labaree, et al. (eds.), Franklin Papers, XVII, 518-519 and 525-526; and Daniela Luigia Caglioti, Vite parallele: Una minoranza protestante nell'Italia dell'Ottocento (Bologna, 2006), esp. 51.

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application for the consulship also mentioned his well-established involvement in the fish trade and his fluency in several languages.22 Neither Cotini nor Meuricoffre were granted the appointments they sought. In 1784 the heavy financial losses incurred by Neapolitan entrepreneurs involved in the West Indian trade, despite shorter voyages and such potentially profitable imports as cocoa, coffee, indigo and sugar, led the Crown to decide against any commercial scheme with the United States or the establishment of consular relations. Minister Ferdinando Galiani (1728-1787) in Naples wondered whether wine would have been as safe a Neapolitan export item in the new Republic as it was in the West Indies, and doubted whether the United States had anything to offer except tobacco which in his view was not a very profitable article. Despite Brush's enthusiasm and his entreaties with John Francis Edward Acton (1736-1811), the prime minister of the Kingdom of Naples, no treaty was signed. In economic terms, Brush suggested that Naples could import cod, salted fish, ship masts, iron bars, tar, pea and turpentine, and export oil, figs, raisins, almonds, salt, hemp, wine, sulphur and silk.23 In the 1790s, however, American ships docked in the ports of the future Kingdom of the Two Sicilies so often that the volume of trade justified the appointment in 1796 of Giovanni Sabino Michele Mathieu (fl. 1796-1806), of unknown nationality, as the first American consul in Naples. Less than one year later Mathieu, who had been in Naples for a few months, asked for permission to export dried fruits, salted fish, pasta, wine and alcohol, manna, soap and silk on an American ship. Finally, in December 1796 the New York wine merchant John Juhel (ante-1796-1817) claimed a major tax rebate due to a recent fire on board the ship Amicizia in New York City in which he had lost "a quantity of goods" he had imported from Naples. Most likely this was a Venetian ketch, commanded by Captain Luigi Dall'Acqua (fl. 1796-1797) who, contrary to Juhel's claim, on 27 January 1797 reported from New York that the loss had taken place at Long Island at the beginning of his return journey to Málaga and that the "cargo of staves" had been lost. Although no quantitative, aggregate or serial evidence is extant, the available material seems to point to the fact that of the three major Italian port cities examined Naples showed less entrepreneurial initiative with regard to the new opportunities of 22

APS, B/F85, XXVIII, No. 142, fols. lrv-3rv, Meuricoffre to Franklin, 5 June 1783; and XLI, No. 54, fols. lrv-2rv, Meuricoffre to Franklin, n.d. [c. 5 June 1783], 23

ASN, Esteri, fascio 4210, [No. 9], fols. lrv-4rv, Ferdinando Galiani to [Ferdinand IV and Giovanni Beccadelli Bologna (Marquis of Sambuca)], 24 October 1784; and fols. lrv-2rv, E. Brush to John Francis Edward Acton, 25 March 1785; and Giuseppe Castellano, "Relazioni internazionali e politica commerciale estera del Regno delle Due Sicilie nel secolo XVIII con particolare riguardo agli Stati Uniti d'America," Archivi, 2nd ser., XXIII, No. 1 (1956), 22-48; and Nos. 2-3 (1956), 177-210.

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American commerce. Although the appointment of a local merchant as American consul in the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies in 1796 showed that something was indeed brewing, no fewer than forty-three years elapsed between Mazzei's 1775 Norfolk brig and the arrival of the brig Oreto in Boston in 1818. Erroneously hailed by some as the first "Italian ship manned by Italians," Oreto was indeed the first known arrival of a Neapolitan ship in North America. 24 Other Italian states were doubtless involved in American commerce, but they almost certainly were less consistent in their interest than Leghorn, Genoa or Naples. In other parts of the peninsula the uncommitted attitude of the local governments must be balanced against the enterprising curiosity of individual entrepreneurs. This was true of the Kingdom of Sardinia, the Republic of Venice, the Holy See and Trieste, the latter geographically part of the Italian peninsula but for centuries an Austrian entrepôt. Lack of space prevents us from examining these relations, but existing evidence seems to confirm, albeit on a lesser scale, the pattern we have described with regard to the three states that showed more interest in keeping their traditional relations with the United States and British North America or in establishing new ones. Drawing their conclusions from the sparse travel accounts or letters of a few intellectual travellers as being representative, from the lateness of intellectual exchanges regarding legal or constitutional reforms and, finally, from the eventual failures of early diplomatic initiatives, it has become customary to argue that relations between the United States and the Italian states were minimal at least until the Risorgimento era. I contend, however, that by concentrating on a few exceptional individuals, travel accounts and the general failure of diplomatic relations, historians have lost sight of the experience of the hundreds, if not thousands, of people who were constantly crossing the Atlantic well before 1815. More important, by concentrating on individual itineraries and destinies historians have often overlooked the fact that most of these people belonged to international networks based on shared interests. Of course, given the paucity of printed sources, the thoughts of these people are difficult to glean. Still, a reading of the available archival sources allows the historian to perceive the existence of these phantom participants in the relations between the Italian peninsula and the United States in the late eighteenth century. It also 24

ASN, Esteri, fascio 2048, [No. 3], fols. lrv-4rv, Giovanni Fortunato Francesco Mansoni to Tommaso Di Somma (Marquis of Circello), 6 June 1818; [No. 4], fols. lrv-6rv, Circello to Ferdinand I, 25 September 1818; fascio 3196, fols. lrv-2rv, Salvatore Conti to Segreteria di Stato di Guerra, 8 December 1802; fol. lrv, to Supremo Consiglio delle Finanze, 15 Aprii 1797; fols. lrv-2rv, to Ferdinand IV, 15 Aprii 1797; and fols. lrv-2rv, Supremo Consiglio delle Finanze to Giovanni Sabino Michele Mathieu, 15 April 1797); Archivio di Stato di Venezia, Senato III Secreta, filza 140, No. 47, fols. 152rv-153rv, Giuseppe Maria Giacomazzi to Doge and Senate, 28 March 1797; and United States, Senate, Journal, 4th Cong., 7 December 1795 to 3 March 1797, 209.

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shows that employment opportunities and entrepreneurial spirit were among their main motivations. In fact, whatever movement of people, goods and ideas took place at the time did so through business or family webs (often one and the same thing) that were extensions of well-established networks normally centred in London. In the past decade or so, the potential of this approach has been shown much more fully.

American Shipping into the Mediterranean during the French Wars: A First Approach Silvia Marzagalli Early modern Mediterranean ports attracted an increasing number of Atlantic captains. By the end of the sixteenth century, the AÜantic powers had engrossed an increasing share of Mediterranean shipping services and trade. Their merchants were present in all the major ports and dominated the most lucrative markets, although Mediterranean merchants and captains were not completely marginalized.1 The consolidation of North European commercial interests was accompanied by intense diplomacy to establish privileged relations with the nations of the Mediterranean rim and to protect ships and merchants from the exactions of Barbary privateering, either by maintaining a military presence or, increasingly, by negotiating peace and paying tribute. 2 By the eighteenth century, the English, French, Dutch, Swedes and Danes had secure maritime routes and reliable ports, services and business partners along the coasts of the Mediterranean and on its islands.3 New England ships and sailors had been sailing to the western Mediterranean since the seventeenth century under the protection of the British crown. Southern Europe was an important market for Newfoundland cod, as 'Fernand Braudel, The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II, trans. Siân Reynolds (2 vols., New York, 1972-1973), I, 606-642; and Molly Greene, "Beyond the Northern Invasion: The Mediterranean in the Seventeenth Century," Past and Present, No. 174 (2002), 42-71. 2

Our understanding of the relations between European countries and the Barbary States has been enhanced by the path-breaking analysis of Christian Windier, La diplomatie comme expérience de l'autre: consuls français au Maghreb, 1700-1840 (Genève, 2002). 3 Since Braudel's pioneering work, the presence of Northern merchant fleets in the Mediterranean has increasingly attracted scholarly attention. On Scandinavians in the Mediterranean and their relations with the Barbary States, see Leos Müller, Consuls, Corsairs, and Commerce: The Swedish Consular Service and Long-Distance Shipping, 1720-1815 (Uppsala, 2004); and Dan Andersen, "The Danish Flag in the Mediterranean, Shipping and Trade 1747-1807" (Unpublished PhD thesis, 2 vols., University of Copenhagen, 2001).

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well as for grain and naval stores from elsewhere in North America. In compliance with the British Navigation Acts, after selling their cargoes American captains either returned directly home or carried Mediterranean goods to England, where they loaded British manufactured goods and sailed westward across the Atlantic.4 The independence of the United States and the course of international relations in the following decade disrupted many of these shipping patterns and led to specific challenges which required diplomatic and economic responses from the young Republic. The British Navigation Acts, for instance, now prevented the export of Mediterranean goods to England in American bottoms, a factor which pushed American captains to seek extra profits in intraMediterranean tramping in order to sail in ballast to London and to compensate for the trade imbalance through bills of exchange. Within the first decades of independence, the United States also had to find a way to provide a safe passage for its ships near the Barbary coast. Because merchants and captains needed help in dealing with local authorities in major Mediterranean ports, the United States also had to organize a consular service. When war broke out between France and Great Britain in 1793, Americans had to learn not only to juggle commitments to the belligerents but also to take advantage of the conflict to penetrate the Mediterranean and Atlantic carrying trades. Over time Americans did all these things, and despite being relative latecomers, they grasped the opportunities, occasionally even using the diplomatic, commercial and financial services of the European powers to achieve their goals. Although at the beginning of the nineteenth century American trade and shipping with the Mediterranean was part of a much more complex web of relations for both sides, they helped to shape the way the new Republic faced the challenges that needed to be addressed. What policy, for example, should the United States adopt towards the Barbary privateers? What was the best way to organize an efficient consular service? What strategy would best facilitate American entry into the existing web of shipping and trade networks? Moreover, the relationship was reciprocal, for while the Mediterranean was a place for the United States government to cut its diplomatic teeth and a potential market for its merchants, the presence of American ships introduced a competitive aspect into the transport arena that was especially welcome during the French wars when usual shipping services were disrupted. All these factors made American shipping in the Mediterranean between the Revolution and the Napoleonic wars a risky, if potentially lucrative, activity. It was risky because of the difficult relations between the United States and the Barbary States and because of the European wars, but it could be lucrative because the French wars generated an increased demand for neutral carrying capacity. "On these aspects, see John J. McCusker, "Worth a War? The Importance of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean," this volume.

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Despite the existence of many hints about the importance of American shipping and trade in the Mediterranean in the half century after independence, there has been no comprehensive study of this issue, perhaps because it would demand a large amount of research in consular, official and mercantile archives. Such an analysis would also require an historian to abandon the national, bilateral, and linear approaches which have dominated traditional analyses of maritime trade and to concentrate instead on a network-based, relational analysis. An exhaustive study of the evolution of American shipping in the Mediterranean and of the opportunities which were open to American merchants after independence cannot be confined merely to the framework of bilateral relations between the United States and individual Mediterranean countries because, as this paper will show, American shipping in the Mediterranean was embedded in much larger trade patterns. As a first step in a much larger project, this essay relies on American consular records and uses them to examine, first, the perception of priorities for the United States within the Mediterranean and, second, to assess the configuration of American shipping in the Mediterranean and its importance. Establishment of American Consulates in the Mediterranean: A Hint about Priorities Both the ideology of doux commerce as a powerful means to regulate international relations and mercantile interests sustained American attempts to promote trade and shipping around the world after independence. But this aspiration clashed with the existence of national and imperial rules that closed markets to foreigners and restricted their trade to specific routes or areas. If they were excluded from trade within the British Empire and admitted, albeit with major restrictions, to the French West Indies, American merchants could legally and freely trade with other parts of the world, notably the Baltic, Mediterranean and East Indies, where European countries did not hinder the activities of foreign vessels through exclusive systems or navigation acts. The theoretical openness of the Mediterranean, however, met with specific conditions linked to power relations within the region. American shipping and trade, in particular, were heavily conditioned by the possibility of trading safely - or to put it in other words, by the possibility of reducing risks and costs to a level which would allow American ships and merchants to be competitive in comparison with other traders. 5 A strong American commercial

5 In addition to the humanitarian and political considerations, the capture of American ships by Barbary privateers - which began with the taking of Betsey by Morocco in 1784, followed by the capture of Maria and Dauphin by Algerian privateers in 1785 - had an immediate impact on insurance rates and made American shipping to the Mediterranean uncompetitive. On the impact of Barbary privateering on American

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presence in the Mediterranean required the United States government to establish peaceful relations - and eventually to conclude favourable commercial treaties - with Mediterranean countries. These relationships, however, were also dependent upon the multilateral relations among European powers, the Barbary States and the United States which determined, for instance, the possibility of benefitting from the protection offered by European navies against privateering in the Straits of Gibraltar or from the intermediation of European consular services in favour of American interests whenever there was no official American representative on site.6 The effectiveness of America's Mediterranean policy was thus affected by factors which were partially beyond its control. If relations with the Barbary States have attracted a fair amount of scholarly attention,7 the protection of American shipping in the Mediterranean required a more global approach which implied the establishment of consulates on the northern rim of the sea to assist captains, merchants and sailors and to provide information on the state of trade and markets. The decision to establish a consular post reflects the contemporary perception of the importance of a particular place as a destination for American ships and trade. In 1785, the Secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs presented to Congress his suggestions concerning the establishment of consulates. The only Mediterranean ports mentioned were Málaga, Alicante and Barcelona. "Whether the present commerce of the United States with Germany...and the islands of the Mediterranean, calls for Consuls immediately, your secretary cannot determine with certainty," he wrote, but he be-

shipping, see Frank Lambert, The Barbary Wars: American Independence in the Atlantic World (New York, 2005), 56 and 67-68. 'During the War of Independence, American vessels were protected by France. Thereafter, although the relations with the Barbary powers remained unsettled, American ships sailed to the Mediterranean under the protection of Swedish or Danish convoys. From 1790 to 1793, when Portugal was at war with Algiers, American merchant ships also benefited from Portuguese patrols along the Algerian coasts. 7

Lambert, Barbary Wars. On the difficulty for Americans to understand the nature of Barbary diplomacy, see Kola Folayan, "Tripoli and the War with the U.S.A., 1801-05," Journal of African History, XIII, No. 2 (1972), 261-270; Michael Kitzen, "Money Bags or Cannon Balls: The Origins of the Tripolitan War, 1795-1801," Journal of the Early Republic, XVI, No. 4 (1996), 601-624; and Frank E. Ross, "The Mission of Joseph Donaldson, Jr., to Algiers, 1795-1797," Journal of Modern History, VII, No. 4 (1935), 422-433. For more extensive bibliographies, see the other articles in this volume dealing with relations with the Barbary States.

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lieved that "they might at present be dispensed with." 8 Clearly, the perception of opportunities for American trade in the Mediterranean was confined at this point to the Iberian Peninsula, where New Englanders were accustomed to selling fish and grain. This picture is certainly not complete, since Luca Codignola convincingly shows the importance of Naples and Leghorn as markets for American cod. Moreover, American captains were also used to carrying naval stores and grain to Marseille, although not cod, since foreign cod was more heavily taxed than domestic fish. In 1774, eighteen North American ships had called at Marseille when a poor harvest increased demand. Although this represented an absolute peak - from 1710 to 1781 a total of only 103 vessels from "British North America" had arrived at Marseilles, mainly with bray and tar9 - American captains were obviously comfortable in the western Mediterranean.

Figure 1: Source:

American Consulates in the Mediterranean, 1790-1810 United States, Congress, Senate, Journal of the Executive Proceedings. 8

Worthington C. Ford, et al. (eds.), Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789 (34 vols., Washington, DC, 1904-1937; reprint, New York, 1968), XXIX, 831-833, John Jay to Congress, 13 October 1785. 9

See Luca Codignola's article in this volume. For Marseille, see Charles Carrière, Négociants marseillais au XVllle siècle: Contribution à l'étude des économies maritimes (2 vols., Marseille, 1973), I, 564.

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When American consulates were finally established in the 1790s, their locations were not surprising (see figure 1). American consuls were appointed not only for Málaga, Alicante and Barcelona but also for Marseilles, Genoa, Leghorn, Rome and Naples. The choice of a consul for Venice and Trieste in 1797 points to the shifts in Mediterranean trade provoked by the FrancoBritish conflict that began in 1793; as France extended its influence in the Mediterranean and promoted the establishment of "Sister Republics" on the Italian peninsula, merchants diverted trade to the Adriatic in order to introduce British manufactures into continental Europe. Finally, the establishment of consular posts in Tangier, Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli aimed to secure American shipping in the Mediterranean through the presence of diplomatic representatives in the Barbary States. In the following decade, new American consulates were established on several Mediterranean islands to provide assistance to captains and sailors in case of capture by belligerents - as in Malta and Palermo10 - and to back the United States Navy (USN), as in the Balearics. But these insular consulates could also offer a basis for trading outside of the control of the belligerents at a time when Napoleon controlled the continent. If the establishment of a consulate might be the result of political priorities or the sometimes distorted views of the government, their permanence depended largely on merchants' perceptions of their utility. Consuls were to provide assistance to captains and merchants and to facilitate interactions with local authorities. Besides helping American citizens, consuls were to provide information to the Secretary of State on the commercial situation (and any events likely to change it) and to assist the USN." The United States adopted the prevailing system by providing salaries only to the consuls in the Barbary States; all the rest depended upon charges for the services they provided.12 The 10 A captain who had arrived at Newburyport from Malta in September 1807 stated that "[t]he Russian have blockaded the whole South coast of the Mediterranean [...] and a Russian court of prizes has been established at Palermo, for the Western part of the Mediterranean." Newbury Herald, 29 September 1807.

"To assist the navy, American consular services in the Mediterranean were doubled by the establishment of naval agents at strategic points, such as Malta, Syracuse, Naples, Messina and Palermo. By 1807, American naval logistics in the Mediterranean were reorganized, with Port Mahon (Minorca) as its core. See the paper by Miquel Ángel Casasnovas Camps, this volume. It was on its way to Minorca in June 1807 that the USS Chesapeake met Leopard. Their fight considerably worsened AngloAmerican relations and induced the Algerian dey to capture three American ships to hasten the payment of tribute. See James A. Field, Jr., From Gibraltar to the Middle East: America and the Mediterranean World, 1776-1882 (Chicago, 1991), 56-57. 12

On eighteenth-century consular systems, see Jörg Ulbert and Gérard Le Bouëdec (eds.), La fonction Consulaire à l'époque moderne: L'affirmation d'une institution économique et politique (1500-1700) (Rennes, 2006). Most contemporary

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cost of consular services was thus supported by economic actors and were accepted only if merchants recognized the comparative advantage of having a consul as opposed to the disadvantages of not having one. American merchants found out rapidly enough, for instance, that it was much more advantageous to sail to Smyrna under the British than the American flag; a lack of "clients" caused the American consulate there to close one a year after its establishment. 13 It can be therefore assumed that ports where a United States consulate survived for a longer period roughly corresponded with those where American ships were most likely to call. This hypothesis will be checked with existing evidence in order to sketch a first tentative picture of American shipping in the Mediterranean in the first decades after independence. Mediterranean Ports and American Interests Increasing American diplomatic and military involvement in the Mediterranean in the 1790s and early 1800s paralleled the growth of American shipping and trade with European ports in the region.14 Seeking information about American commercial interests, Congress directed Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson in 1790 to report on Mediterranean trade. His report tried to assess the overall importance of such trade before independence.15 Jefferson estimated that the Mediterranean had absorbed about one-sixth of the wheat and flour, onequarter of the fish and some of the rice exported from the Thirteen Colonies. According to the data he could collect, he believed that this trade required between eighty and 100 ships per year. He stated further that "[o]ur navigation...into the Mediterranean, has not been resumed at all since the peace," yet American shipping and trade were far from irrelevant at this time: exports to "Southern Europe," a category which included the whole Iberian Peninsula, just as under British rule, averaged $4 million between 1790 and 1793, or fifteen percent of all United States exports. This figure corresponded to John consuls were merchants; the French consular system, which relied on paid agents rather than merchants, was an exception. See Anne Mézin, Les consuls de France au siècle des Lumières (1715-1792) (Paris, 1997). l3 S[amuel] E[liot] Morison, "Forcing the Dardanelles in 1810: With Some Accounts of the Early Trade of Massachusetts," New England Quarterly, I, No. 2 (1928), 208-225. l4 There is no recent comprehensive study of American trade during the French Wars, but see Anna C. Clauder, American Commerce as Affected by the Wars of the French Revolution and Napoleon, 1793-1812 (Philadelphia, 1932; reprint, Clifton, NJ, 1972). 15

American State Papers: Foreign Relations (6 vols., Washington, DC, 18321861; reprint, Buffalo, NY, 1998), I, No. 44.

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McCusker's estimate of the relative importance of Southern Europe for the Thirteen Colonies in 1768-1772, although it represented twice as much in absolute values because of the general increase in American trade. American trade developed more consistently after 1793 when the Franco-British conflict increased European demand for neutral transport services. News of the peace with Algiers in 1795 - followed shortly by treaties with Tripoli and Tunis - provided a strong impetus to American shipping in the Mediterranean. According to James A. Field, at least eighty American ships passed the Strait of Gibraltar heading east in 1790, although he does not provide a reference for this estimate.16 In addition, some captains might have been spending more than a year engaged in intra-Mediterranean trade. Assessing the importance of this activity is an extremely difficult task and may well be impossible. American authorities recorded export values according to the country of destination rather than to specific geographical areas, such as the Mediterranean. As in colonial times, the category "Southern Europe" in American statistics included Spain and Portugal, but not France. If this is frustrating to historians, it proved unsatisfactory to American policymakers as well. In 1802, "in obedience to the resolution of the House of Representatives," the Secretary of Treasury Albert Gallatin, "respectfully report[ed] that the documents in the Treasury do not discriminate the Exports of the United States to Spanish and French ports, in the Mediterranean, from those to ports of the same nations respectively on the Atlantic." 17 The official American balance of trade is therefore highly unsatisfactory for historians who want to know the relative importance of the Mediterranean. A second major reason why such data are disappointing is that imports and exports represented only part of the business of American ships. As we will see, their transport services comprised an increasing, if unquantifiable, share of the profits of American shipowners. Despite the intrinsic limits of the balance of trade, its evolution over time does point to some interesting trends. By the time Gallatin reported to the House of Representatives in January 1802, the French Revolutionary wars had provoked an enormous boom in American foreign trade. The Secretary prudently confined his report to the value of trade with Italian ports and Gibraltar. The evolution of trade to these ports shows the positive impact of war on American trade. According to contemporary estimates, the number of American ships in the Mediterranean had not increased (a perception that needs to be tested by archival research), so it "Field, From Gibraltar to the Middle East, 40. 17 Letter and Report from the Secretary of the Treasury Accompanying a Statement of the Value of the Exports of the United States to the Ports of Italy, Gibraltar and the Barbary Powers, for Each of the Five Years Preceding the 30th of September, 1801... (Washington, DC, 1802, reprinted in Early American Imprints, Series II: ShawShoemaker (1801-1809) (New Canaan, CT, n.d.).

American Shipping into the Mediterranean during the French Wars

51

can be assumed that the increase in the value of this trade was due to the carriage of more valuable cargoes than before. United States exports of domestic products did not increase, while the re-export trade boomed: American ships introduced into Mediterranean ports West Indian goods which France was no longer able to import directly and to redistribute (see figure 2).

export to Italy reexport to Italy

export to

reexport Is

Gibraltar

Gibraltar

Figure 2:

American Exports and Re-exports to Italy and Gibraltar, 1797-1800

Source:

See note 17.

Figure 3:

United States Foreign Trade, 1790-1815

Source:

Douglass C. North, "The United States Balance of Payments, 17901860," in Trends in American Economy in the Nineteenth Century (Princeton, 1960; reprint, New York, 1975).

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The situation in the Mediterranean reflected in part the overall growth of the American re-export trade during the French wars (see figure 3) when the United States became a major intermediary in commercial relations among the belligerents and one of the major neutral carriers. But the specific chronology of such trade cannot be established with any precision. Individual ports were affected by warfare and maritime blockades, whereas conflicts with the Barbary States could sharply reduce an entire country's shipping. Neutrality was not unproblematic, especially in the Mediterranean where American ships operated amidst overlapping conflicts: the ongoing conflicts with the Barbary States, the maritime and economic war between France and Great Britain and the expansion of France in the Mediterranean after 1796 which provoked frequent military occupations and blockades of major ports that constantly altered regular patterns of trade. As time passed, French attempts to prevent the import of British manufactures led to organized smuggling to which American ships contributed. The establishment of consular services on the Mediterranean islands might well reflect these changes.18 In order to better understand how American merchants and shipowners integrated Mediterranean trade, we need to shift from aggregate data to records concerning ships. These will enable a reconstruction of the volume of American shipping into the Mediterranean, and their routes and shipping patterns will provide clues to enable us to better understand mercantile strategies. The best possible sources to reconstruct American shipping in the Mediterranean are the records of the United States consulates.19 Consuls were required to keep a register of incoming American ships and to record their departures. They were also supposed to keep a record of American crew and of the cargoes carried. These registers were kept at the consulate to enable the consul to provide official statements whenever required. Unfortunately, these registers were never repatriated systematically, but those that were are in the United States National Archives in Record Group (RG) 84. But other series can also be useful. Consuls were supposed to provide the Secretary of State with a biannual list of American ships entering and clearing their port. When these have been preserved, they are in RG 59. Finally, RG 76 (Spoliation

"On the shift of trade routes and transport services during the French wars, see François Crouzet, L'économie britannique et le blocus continental, 1806-1813 (2 vols., Paris, 1958; 2nd ed., Paris, 1987); Clauder, American Commerce·, and Silvia Marzagalli, "Establishing Transatlantic Trade Networks in Time of War: Bordeaux and the United States, 1793-1815," Business History Review, LXXIX, No. 4 (2005), 811844. "Mediterranean port records unfortunately do not indicate systematically the flags of incoming and outbound vessels. Moreover, using them to track American ships would be extremely time-consuming.

American Shipping into the Mediterranean during the French Wars

53

Claims) provides some data for the period of the French wars which were collected to support American demands for reimbursement. As a part of a larger project to create an on-line database, 20 1 have examined the inventories of RG 84 kept at the National Archives and Record Administration (NARA) at College Park, Maryland, for the consulates at Algiers, Alicante, Barcelona, Genoa, Gibraltar, Leghorn, Marseilles, Málaga, Messina, Minorca, Majorca and Ibiza, Naples, Palermo, Port Mahon, Rome, Sardinia, Smyrna, Tangiers, Tarragona, Tunis and Tripoli, Trieste, Valetta (Malta) and Venice - that is, all American consular posts on the Mediterranean littoral. I have also consulted all the consular records which might provide data on the itineraries of American ships in the Mediterranean prior to 1815. Registers of individual ships entered or cleared prior to 1815 were found for Leghorn, Marseilles, Palermo, Port Mahon and Tunis.21 Most of these records do not cover the entire time period from the establishment of the consulate to 1815, so for the present analysis I have chosen to concentrate on the year 1807, for which data exist for Leghorn, Marseilles, Palermo and Tunis. In 1808, Jefferson's embargo and the impact of war sharply reduced or ended American shipping to the ports under Napoleon's direct control, although this increased to Tunis. A register of landing and debenture certificates for Málaga provided additional indirect data on the arrival of American ships in 1807, but only for those arriving directly from the United States.22 A list of arrivals and departures for the first semester of 1807 located in RG 59 for the port of Naples has been used as well.23 20 The Navigocorpus Programme (2007-2011) aims to create an on-line database of merchant shipping in early modern Europe. The program is financed by the French Agence Nationale de la Recherche and is coordinated by Silvia Marzagalli of the Centre de la Méditerranée Moderne et Contemporaine at the University of Nice. 21

United States, National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), Record Group (RG) 84/138, Leghorn (microfilm), Arrivals and Departures of American Vessels, 1798-1817; RG 84/144, Palermo, Shipping Register, 1806-1835; RG 84/13, Port Mahon, Arrivals and Departures of US Vessels, 1809-1832; and RG 84/51, Tunis, Shipping Register, 1806-1857. The register for Marseilles is wrongly classified under RG 84/225, Bordeaux, Ships Journal, 1806-1812. 21

Ibid., RG 84/161, Málaga, 1797-1867. The record does not state the date of arrival but rather the date the vessel began to discharge cargo. 23

I have not yet examined all the correspondence of all Mediterranean consulates before 1815, but my analysis, although incomplete, shows clearly that shipping lists exist for only brief periods; this is certainly the case for Cagliari, Málaga, Malta and Naples. Ibid., RG 59, Τ 187, reel 1 (Cagliari); Τ 217, reel 1 (Málaga); Τ 218, reel 1 (Malta); and T224, reel 1 (Naples). The consular records for Smyrna (T 238, reel 1) contain some manifests but no ship lists.

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Table 1 Entrances of American Vessels in Selected Mediterranean Ports in 1807 Entrances

Port Leghorn Marseilles Palermo Naples (first semester 1807 only) Tunis Málaga (ships directly from United States only)

148

100 79

20 14 13

Sources: See notes 21, 22 and 23.

The data allow us to establish a relative hierarchy of these Mediterranean ports in 1807 (see table 1). By 1807, Leghorn had clearly emerged as the major port for American shipping within the Mediterranean. The trade had increased substantially since the end of the 1790s, with a first peak in 1800 following the end of the second French occupation of the city in July 1799 and before the third occupation beginning in October 1800.24 After the end of the Peace of Amiens in 1803, an increasing number of American ships again sailed to Leghorn, which benefited from the relative decline of Marseilles and from the annexation of Genoa by France in 1805, provoking a British blockade. The Tuscan port, which since 1801 had been part of the Kingdom of Etruria - a dubious ally of Napoleon, which he latter annexed to the French Empire in 1808 - temporarily emerged as the main western Mediterranean port and an essential intermediary for merchants of belligerent countries (see figure 4). By 1806, American ships carried to the Tuscan port goods worth $5.3 million, consisting mainly of West Indian products. Although American ships occasionally left in ballast, their exports of silk, soap and wine were significant, amounting to $2.5 million in 1806.25 Leghorn provided Americans with information, a market, freight and banking services. Americans relied heavily on British merchants established in Leghorn, such as Webb, Holmes and Co., 26 24

See Silvia Marzagalli, "Les boulevards de la fraude:" Le négoce maritime et le Blocus continental, 1806-1813. Bordeaux, Hambourg, Livourne (Villeneuve d'Ascq, 1999), chapter 2. 25

26

NARA, RG 59, Leghorn, Τ 214, reel 1.

The firm in 1796 belonged to the British Factory of Leghorn; Michela D'Angelo, Mercanti inglesi a Livorno, 1573-1737: Alle origini di una British Factory (Messina, 2004), 229. When Leghorn was occupied by the French in June 1796 the firm declared it had American colonial goods worth £8680 in its warehouses; NARA, RG 59, Τ 214, declaration, 26 July 1796. The firm boasted to its correspondents that it was the major consignee of American trade in Leghorn; indeed, in a letter dated 17 November 1800 it claimed that it handled three-quarters of all American trade. See

American Shipping into the Mediterranean during the French Wars

55

which were unmolested not only during the three French military occupations but also after the annexation of the city by France in 1808.

17M

IMO

1801

1801

1803

18M

1MB

1806

1807

180«

Figure 4:

United States Ships Clearing from Leghorn, 1798-1808

Sources:

NARA, RG 84, Leghorn, vol. 138 (microfdm), Arrivals and Departures of American Vessels, 1798-1817; and Charles A. Keene, "American Shipping and Trade, 1798-1820: The Evidence from Leghorn," Journal of Economic History, XXXVIII, No. 3 (1978), 681-700.

Marseilles was possibly the second most important port for American interests in the Mediterranean. The French port had been a significant destination for North American ships in colonial times, and its merchants traded intensively with the insurgents during the American War of Independence. Between 1783 and 1793, 109 ships entered Marseilles from the United States, but less than one in six sailed under the American flag. 27 The Franco-British maritime war beginning in 1793 and the difficult conditions that Americans experienced in the Mediterranean in the 1790s reduced trade with Marseilles: in 1794-1795 only three American ships entered the French port, but there were fifty-three in 1802-1803 and ninety-seven in 1807 according to French sources; indeed, the United States consulate recorded 100 entries in the latter year. 28 Despite this increase, at the beginning of the nineteenth century Leghorn's primacy was unchallenged.

John Carter Brown Library, Brown Papers, European Correspondents, P-E9, box 109, fol. 11. One of the firm's partners, James Holmes, was the American consul at Belfast. "Carrière, Négociants marseillais, I, 564-565. 28

Paul Masson, "Marseille depuis 1789: Etudes historiques," Annales de la faculté des lettres d'Aix, X (1916); and Louis Bergasse, "Les débuts du commerce de Marseille avec les États-Unis," Provincia, V (1925), 31-48.

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56

By 1807, Palermo was also playing a key role for American shipping, possibly because of the political turmoil in the Kingdom of Naples the previous year, when Napoleon settled his brother Joseph on the Neapolitan throne. The Bourbon King, who had been favouring British interests, fled to Sicily, where he enjoyed British protection. The establishment of an American consulate in Palermo in 1805 occurred at just the right time. The consul opened the shipping register on 6 March 1806 and recorded twenty-nine entries of American ships before the end of the year. 29 It goes without saying that the data in table 1 do not reflect the absolute rank of Mediterranean ports for American shipping since sources for many ports are missing. Spanish ports, in particular, were traditionally a major destination for American ships, as was Naples. The total of 240 different ships which can be derived from these sources represents only a portion of the number of American ships in the Mediterranean in 1807.30 Although it is impossible at the present point in the research to provide an estimate, three other sources have been used to assess the degree of completeness of my 1807 database. Half of the forty-four entrances recorded in New York in 1807 from Mediterranean ports are not in the database; nineteen arrived from Spanish ports, for which consular data are particularly incomplete, and approximately the same number came directly from Leghorn (ten) or Marseille (seven).31 Moreover, between 9 April and 16 June 1807, twenty American ships were carried as British prizes to Malta,32 but only three of them appear in the consular shipping records of 1807 that I have examined. The consul at Malta listed for each of these prizes the port of departure and the intended destination. Of a total of forty ports mentioned, United States and Asian ports appeared only once each. Atlantic and North Sea ports occurred eight times. Mediterranean ports prevailed, with thirty mentions. Twelve of these concern Apulian ports, which provided important quantities of olive oil. Leghorn (five) and Marseilles (one) - the only two ports for which we have 29

NARA, RG 84/144, Palermo, shipping register.

^For two vessels to be considered the same, they had to have the same name and a similar name of the captain. Whenever the captains' names differed, the type of ship, burthen and port of registry have been taken into consideration. These 241 ships generated 374 entries in 1807 in the consulates of Leghorn, Marseilles, Palermo, Naples (first semester only) and Málaga (ships coming from the United States only). "NARA, RG 36/903, New York, Record of Foreign Arrivals, 1789-1795 and M 1006, reel 1, 1806-1811. Three New York entries (two from Leghorn and one from Palermo) are not in my 1807 database likely because they left the Mediterranean before the end of 1806 and arrived in New York in February and March 1807. 32 Ibid., RG 59, Τ 218, Malta. A list of these ships was also published in the New York Commercial Advertiser, 28 July 1807.

American Shipping into the Mediterranean during the French Wars

57

United States consular shipping records - represent a minority, while the presence of Smyrna (four) and Trieste (three) show clearly the penetration of American shipping in the eastern Mediterranean (see figure 5).

Number of ships on intended itinewy

Figure 5: Original Itineraries of United States Ships Captured and Taken to Malta, April-June 1807 Source:

See text.

In order to complete the database where consular sources are nonexistent, we can use European and American port records and the shipping news published in American newspapers to fill the gaps. Unfortunately, this is a time-consuming task that I have only started and for which I am unable at this point to provide global results for even a single year. 33 Indeed, no consular or port records can provide a complete itinerary for any given ship, and merchant shipping records are too scarce to permit a global analysis. Each source tells only a part of the story. American port records, for instance, reflect the importance of those Mediterranean ports to which American ships cleared or returned, 34 but they do not provide information on the intra-Mediterranean

"Shipping news is accessible through the America's Historical Newspapers on-line website (www.newsbank.com/readex). 34

A vessel clearing from the United States bound for Lisbon, then entering the Mediterranean and returning to the United States from a northern European port would leave no trace of its Mediterranean tramping in American port records.

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trade carried on by American vessels or on the Mediterranean trade to Northern Europe and Asia which, as we will see in the next section, constituted a consistent part of the activities of American ships. Patterns of American Shipping in the Mediterranean One of the major phenomena highlighted by American consular records is the integration of American shipping within larger patterns of trade and tramping that connected Mediterranean ports with each other and with European Atlantic ports. In 1804, only one ship in six arriving at Leghorn had previously touched a Mediterranean port - often Gibraltar, where captains could get information on political and market conditions within the Mediterranean. In 1807, while the number of incoming American ships had risen three-fold, this was the case for one-third of all vessels. The progressive integration of the Mediterranean carrying trade was also evident when American captains left Leghorn. While the percentage of those sailing back to the United States rose from forty to forty-seven percent - an increase which probably masked the fact that clearances to Asia and the West Indies disappeared in 1807 due to changes in the attitudes of belligerents towards neutral trade - clearances to other Mediterranean ports soared from thirty-two to forty-two percent for ships arriving at Leghorn in 1804 and 1807, respectively. New destinations emerged, as eight vessels in 1807 sailed to the Levant (Smyrna, Zante) and two to Trieste. From Marseilles, half of the American ships that arrived in 1807 sailed to another Mediterranean port (see figure 6).35 American merchants had obviously integrated the nature of their Mediterranean trade, while the new peace with Tripoli allowed it to grow. Just as Swedish merchants did in the second half of the eighteenth century, American merchants were realizing that shipping could be just as profitable as the import-export trade.36 By cross-checking the consular records with information in the shipping lists in American newspapers and United States port records it is possible to reconstruct some of the voyages of American captains sailing into the Mediterranean and to identify some patterns. Three examples will provide an indication of the almost infinite combination of opportunities and mercantile decisions.

35 NARA, RG 84, Leghorn (microfilm) and Bordeaux RG 84/225 (actually Marseille). See Silvia Marzagalli, "La fonction de la place commerciale de Livourne dans l'appropriation de l'espace méditerranéen par les Américains (fin XVIIIe siècle1815)," in Wolfgang Kaiser (ed.), Lieux, Places, Espaces: Les dimensions spatiales des pratiques marchandes en Méditerranée (Moyen âge-époque moderne) (Paris, 2011, forthcoming). 36

See Müller, Consuls, Corsairs, and Commerce, chapter 5.

American Shipping into the Mediterranean during the French Wars

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Figure 6: Last Port of Departure for United States Vessels Arriving at Leghorn and Marseilles Sources:

NARA, RG 84, Bordeaux (actually Marseilles), vol. 225, Ships Journal, 1806-1812; RG 84, Leghorn, vol. 138 (microfilm), Arrivals and Departures of American Vessels, 1798-1817.

Stephen Philipps of Salem, the owner of the 145-ton brig Sukey (see figure 7), apparently used his vessel to trade on his own account in different Mediterranean ports. Commanded by an experienced captain, thirty-year-old Samuel B. Graves, Sukey returned to Salem from Madras on 13 October 1806 after a four-month voyage and left for "Marseille and a market" on 18 November. Part of the Madras cargo was probably re-exported to France, for Sukey arrived at Marseilles on 4 February 1807 with 1622 sacks of pepper and 468 hogsheads of sugar which the captain discharged after spending three weeks in quarantine. The brig left Marseilles on 6 April - officially clearing for Tunis - and arrived at Palermo ten days later after having touched at Cagliari (Sardinia) two days earlier. It is likely that Graves was aware of the difficulty of trading between a French port and Bourbon Sicily; declaring Tunis as a destination made the voyage perfectly legal in the eyes of French authorities, whereas the stop in Cagliari facilitated entrance into Palermo. The brig was primarily in ballast, carrying only some pepper belonging to the shipowner; the majority of the cargo presumably was sold in Marseille. The re-

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60

maining pepper was discharged in Palermo, where the brig spent a week before departing on 23 April for Licata and Scaglietti with a cargo of barilla and brimstone, two typical Sicilian products. The cargo again belonged to the shipowner. The brig came back to Palermo two weeks later from these same ports with the same cargo. It is difficult to say whether the captain was unable to sell his cargo or whether he even intended to do so. He departed from Palermo the day after his arrival, with the same cargo, officially declaring Copenhagen as his final destination. The consul, however, noted Marseilles, in brackets, as a destination. My guess is that all destinations in brackets in the Palermo consular register stated the real destination of the cargo and that the captain took a false clearance to a neutral northern European port in case he encountered British privateers. The brig arrived in Marseilles on 22 May with a cargo of 800 cantares of barilla and 850 cantares of sulphur (brimstone). After two weeks in quarantine, it discharged the cargo and on 14 June left again in ballast for Palermo, again touching on Cagliari. This time the captain took a cargo of wheat and left for Licata and Marseilles, where he entered once more at the end of July. The brig departed Marseilles on 30 September for Salem, where it arrived two months later after touching at Santander in northern Spain. The inward cargo consisted of a valuable shipment of wine (worth $20,000), candles ($3100) and $1350 of "merchandise." 37 The second example is the seventy-ton schooner Fair American of Norfolk which belonged to the captain, Nathaniel Hore, and had a crew of five. The schooner arrived at Norfolk from Jamaica on 2 June 1806 and departed from New York in the summer 1806 but was reported as having put into St. Michaels after eighty-four days due to a lack of water; the schooner then continued to Lisbon. Fair American entered Leghorn on 18 October with a cargo of sugar and coffee valued at $10,000 and then sailed to Gallipoli (Apulia) in ballast on 11 November. The schooner was back in Leghorn from Gallipoli on 13 January 1807 with a cargo of "freight" that no doubt was olive oil, and then departed for Naples at the end of the month. A week later, the vessel entered Naples, from which it proceeded for Manfredonia (Apulia). Fair American was back to Leghorn on 1 April, leaving a week later for Trieste, although it stopped at Naples on the way. It was reported in Trieste at the end of June, ready to sail for Messina. On 4 September, however, the schooner once again entered Leghorn from Corfu in ballast, leaving on 18 October for the United States. Nonetheless, two weeks later the ship entered Messina and Palermo with a cargo of tobacco and cocoa, and departed for Trapani in ballast on 14 November. Thereafter we lose track of the schooner. Significantly, 37

Peabody Essex Museum, microfilm no. 129, Salem Clearances of Foreign Vessels, and microfilm no. 29, reel 5, Salem Impost Book; NARA, RG 84/144, Palermo and RG 84/225, Bordeaux (actually Marseille); The People's Friend and Daily Advertiser, 17 October 1806; and Daily Advertiser, 1 December 1807.

American Shipping into the Mediterranean during the French Wars

61

whenever Fair American entered or cleared Leghorn, with the exception of the first leg, the captain reported he had a cargo of freight. 38 Captain Hore had perfectly integrated the caravane, this lengthy period of tramping characteristic of the early modern Mediterranean which could earn profits from both the carrying trade and by conducting some commerce on the owner's own account. 39

Figure 7:

Schema of the Voyage of the Brig Sukey, Samuel B. Graves Commanding

Note:

Dates indicate arrivals in each port.

Sources:

NARA, RG 84, Bordeaux 225 (actually Marseille) and Palermo 144; People's Friend and Daily Advertiser, 17 October 1806; and Daily Advertiser, 1 December 1807.

While some shipowners were ready to integrate intra-Mediterranean trade, others preferred a simpler shuttle which required a shorter-term investment and incurred lesser costs. The 185-ton Catherina of New York, commanded by Thomas Marshall, managed to cross the Atlantic twice within exactly a year. The vessel left New York on 12 December 1806 and arrived at 38

New-York Commercial Advertiser, 2 June 1806; The Repertory, 17 October 1806; Alexandria Advertiser, 28 September 1807; and the consular records for Leghorn and Palermo cited in note 21. "Gilbert Buti, "Aller en caravane: le cabotage lointain en Méditerranée, XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles," Revue d'Histoire Moderne et Contemporaine, LU, No. 1 (2005), 7-38; and Daniel Panzac, La caravane maritime: marins européens et marchands ottomans en Méditerranée (1680-1830) (Paris, 2004).

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Málaga after a forty-day passage at the beginning of February 1807 with 575 hundredweight of Havana sugar, 930 pounds of cinnamon, 1408 gallons of rum and fifty-five barrels of prime beef. The ship returned to New York on 5 May and sailed again for Leghorn on 9 June with a cargo of sugar, coffee and rum valued at $40,000. Catherina arrived at Leghorn on 24 July, leaving again on 13 September for New York with a cargo of oil and marble valued at $25,000, arriving on 12 December 1807.40 The shipowner, Gomperts and Co., was obviously taking advantage of European demand for West Indian goods which traditionally were imported into the Mediterranean from Santo Domingo by Marseilles merchants. Both the Haitian revolution and warfare combined to disrupt French colonial trade and opened the door to other economic actors. Conclusion At the turn of the nineteenth century the Mediterranean increasingly attracted American shipping. If this did not represent the bulk of American trade and shipping, it was important enough to excite the interest of both statesmen and merchants, and to legitimize a costly war against Tripoli. While the United States government tried to secure the maritime routes and to facilitate commercial relations through the establishment of permanent consular services, American captains and merchants edged their way into a complex, deeplystructured commercial space which they partially knew from the colonial era. We are just beginning to understand the ways in which this occurred. The subject clearly needs more intensive research, but I hope I have begun the process by building a database from various sources and reconstructing the complexities of the trade routes and, beyond them, of merchant strategies. While I have concentrated here on the year 1807, a diachronic analysis will show the degree to which American merchants were able to react to a changing world marked by warfare and eventually the restoration of peace. By assessing the economic interests of Americans in the Mediterranean in the first half-century after independence, we can better understand the reasons why the United States maintained a long-term interest in Mediterranean affairs. Indeed, the United States has maintained a naval force in the Mediterranean almost without interruption since the beginning of the nineteenth century.

40

Baltimore Price-Current, published as Baltimore Weekly Price Current, 18 December 1806; The Public Advertiser, 22 April 1807; New-York Commercial Advertiser, 9 June 1807; and NARA, RG 84/161, Málaga, 1797-1867, and RG 36/903, New York, Record of Foreign Arrivals, 1789-1795 and M 1006, reel 1, 1806-1811.

Notes towards a Franco-American Mediterranean "From Below" Nathan Perl-Rosenthal

Recent work on Franco-American consular and commercial networks in the late eighteenth century has revealed the existence of long-term maritime exchanges between the two countries. T o date, most of the scholarship has concentrated on the elite networks of diplomats, merchants, genüemen and ship's captains. And with good reason: these individuals left the bulk of the records and documents that allow us to recover these interactions. 1 But there existed as well a parallel and probably equally rich skein of transnational networks created by ordinary people in the maritime occupations (including dock workers, fishermen, innkeepers and prostitutes as well as merchant seamen). Some work has been done on these networks in the Anglo-American Atlantic, 2 but as yet there is very little research on Franco-American maritime linkages " f r o m below" in the eighteenth-century Mediterranean.

'See, for example, Silvia Marzagalli, "Establishing Transatlantic Trade Networks in Time of War: Bordeaux and the United States, 1793-1815," Business History Review, LXXIX, No. 4 (2005), 811-844; Stéphane Bégaud, et al., Aux origines d'une alliance improbable: Le réseau consulaire français aux Etats-Unis, 1776-1815 (Brussels, 2005); and David Hancock, Citizens of the World: London Merchants and the Integration of the British Atlantic Community, 1735-1785 (Cambridge, 1995). See also the essays in the special section, "New Perspectives on the Atlantic," History of European Ideas, XXXIV, No. 4 (2008). 2 The best-known studies in this vein are Peter Linebaugh and Marcus Rediker, The Many-Headed Hydra: Sailors, Slaves, Commoners, and the Hidden History of the Revolutionary Atlantic (Boston, 2000); and Julius S. Scott, "The Common Wind: Currents of Afro-American Communication in the Age of the Haitian Revolution" (Unpublished PhD thesis, Duke University, 1986). But see also Paul Gilje, Liberty on the Waterfront: American Maritime Culture in the Age of Revolution (Philadelphia, 2003); Julius S. Scott, "Afro-American Sailors and the International Communication Network: The Case of Newport Bowers," in Colin Howell and Richard J. Twomey (eds.), Jack Tar in History: Essays in the History of Maritime Life and Labour (Fredericton, NB, 1991), 37-52, reprinted in Maurice Jackson and Jacqueline Baker (eds.), African Americans and the Haitian Revolution: Selected Essays and Historical Documents (New York, 2009), chapter 2; and Marie-Carmen Smyrnelis, Une société hors de soi: identités et relations sociales à Smyrne au XVIIIe et XIXe siècles (Leuven, 2005).

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These connections are worthy of scholarly attention. The dominant narrative of Anglo-French relations in the eighteenth century emphasizes warfare and enmity.3 This is not without some justification. Yet evidence of friendly contacts between seamen of the two nations could complicate this narrative. By the same token, stories of contact between French and AngloAmerican seamen reveal a polyglot and transnational maritime world at odds with the single empire, monolingual approaches that still dominate studies of seamen. Finally, the sheer numbers of individuals potentially involved in exchanges "from below" should command historians' attention: there were, after all, about ten seamen for every captain, and perhaps hundreds for every merchant or diplomat who interacted with their counterparts from other nations. 4 This essay offers some preliminary notes towards a cultural history of Franco-American maritime interaction "from below" in the Mediterranean. Its primary goal is to show that Anglo-American and French seamen had culturally substantive contacts in the Mediterranean at the end of the eighteenth century. By culturally substantive, I mean that those contacts went beyond simply serving on the same vessels or visiting the same ports. This paper presents evidence that French and American seamen in the Mediterranean learned each others' languages, developed familiarity with each others' maritime and naval systems and developed friendships that crossed national boundaries. Its goal, nevertheless, is to be suggestive rather than conclusive. It does not try to offer a comprehensive or quantitative social history of such contacts.5 3 This well-known story was retold in a particularly influential manner in Linda Colley, Britons: Forging the Nation, 1707-1837 (New Haven, 2005), chapter 1. Of course, there is considerable truth to this narrative, as suggested by the realization that the two empires were at war for more than half of the long eighteenth century. 4

My approach of looking at maritime peoples "from below" is indebted to foundational studies by Jesse Lemisch, particularly his "Jack Tar in the Streets: New York's Merchant Seamen in the Politics of Revolutionary America," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., XXV, No. 3 (1968), 371-407; and Marcus Rediker, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: Merchant Seamen, Pirates, and the Anglo-American Maritime World, 1700-1750 (Cambridge, 1987). 5

A number of excellent studies have used serial sources, such as crew lists, tax rolls and documents of the French bureau des classes, to develop social profiles of seamen. On the seamen of Dunkirk and Le Havre, see Alain Cabantous, La mer et les hommes: pêcheurs et matelots dunkerquois de Louis XIV à la Révolution (Dunkerque, 1980); and Cabantous, Dix mille marins face à l'océan: les populations maritimes de Dunkerque au Havre aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles (vers 1660-1794): étude sociale (Paris, 1991). On Brittany and the adjacent Atlantic region, see T.J.A. Le Goff, "The Labour Market for Sailors in France," in Paul C. van Royen, et al. (eds.), "Those Emblems of Hell?" European Sailors and the Maritime Labour Market, 1570-1870 (St. John's, 1997), 287-327; Le Goff, "Les gens de mer devant le système des classes (1755-1763):

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I focus here on the period of the American Revolution, roughly from the 1760s until 1790, and on contacts between French and American seamen. This was of course a time of rapidly growing bilateral trade between the United States and France. 6 After the signing of the Franco-American Alliance in 1778, it was also the beginning of an enduring diplomatic relationship. Both the political and the commercial changes over time helped to integrate the American and French maritime worlds more deeply than before. In the short term, though, the Alliance and the war gave rise to the first substantial documentary record of contacts between French and American seamen. Because of the Alliance, such contacts, which had often been illegal earlier, could now take place overtly. As such, instead of being hidden they now became part of the diplomatic and military record. The papers of Benjamin Franklin, an extraordinarily rich collection from which this essay draws heavily, is a storehouse of evidence of these contacts. Yet in spite of the larger volume of documentation available for the years of the Revolution, much still remains unknown. Many valuable sources are still hidden or have yet to be fully exploited. In order to suggest some of this undiscovered richness, I have incorporated into my discussion, as a heuristic device, some evidence of Franco-American contacts "from below" in the Adantic space. Although these stories do not prove that similar things happened in the Mediterranean, they do hint at the kinds of culturally substantive contacts that, with more research, we may be able to document between French and American seamen in that region. Since ancient times, the ships and ports of the Mediterranean have been meeting grounds for sailors of many nationalities. Yet for most of the résistance ou passivité?" Revue du Nord, spécial hors série, No. 1 (1986), 463-480; and Le Goff, "Les origines sociales des gens de mer français au XVIIIe siècle," in La France d'Ancien Régime: Etudes réunies en l'honneur de Pierre Goubert (2 vols., Toulouse, 1984), II, 367-380. That literature is well complemented on the American side by three extraordinary social histories of New England seamen in the eighteenth century: Daniel Vickers, Farmers and Fishermen: Two Centuries of Work in Essex County, Massachusetts, 1630-1850 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1994); Daniel Vickers and Vince Walsh, "Young Men and the Sea: The Sociology of Seafaring in Eighteenth-Century Salem, Massachusetts," Social History, XXIV, No. 1 (1999), 17-38; and Daniel Vickers with Vince Walsh, Young Men and the Sea: Yankee Seafarers in the Age of Sail (New Haven, 2007). There has been no comparable systematic work on French Mediterranean seamen to date, although such a study would undoubtedly reveal a number of transnational contacts. 6 See John J. McCusker and Russell R. Menard, The Economy of British America, 1607-1789 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1985; 2nd ed., Chapel Hill, NC, 1991), 196 and 361. See also Jacob M. Price, France and the Chesapeake: A History of the French Tobacco Monopoly, 1674-1791, and of Its Relationship to the British and American Tobacco Trades (Ann Arbor, 1973).

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eighteenth century, at least, the Mediterranean was far from being an indiscriminate melting-pot. English and American sailors, for example, were far more likely to end up aboard ships or to carouse ashore with the subjects of other Protestant states, especially the Dutch. For their part, the mostly Catholic French tended to be found alongside their Spanish and Italian coreligionists. Captain Jack Cremer's famous diary, which documented several of his Mediterranean voyages, suggests that these divisions not infrequently led to brawls or more serious violence in port. 7 The Irish, both his diary and other sources suggest, occupied an intermediate place in this schema: although politically subject to Britain, they remained religiously bound to the subjects of the Catholic powers. 8 Nor were divisions between French and Anglo-American seamen in the long eighteenth century purely a matter of personal choice. Both powers did their best to legally distinguish and separate "their" seamen from those of the other. Until 1779, for example, the French government prohibited nonFrench seamen from serving aboard vessels of the King's navy. They also seem to have been prohibited from participating in the systeme des classes, the registration system for French seamen which monitored their participation in both naval and civilian maritime professions. 9 The British system was some-

7 For evidence that the confessional divide was important to seamen, see the description of a brawl in John Cremer, Ramblin' Jack: The Journal of Captain John Cremer, 1700-1774, ed. R. Reynell Bellamy (London, 1936), 78. A similar episode in later years is found on 96-97, and his mention of Irish seamen being "of a religion we Suspeckted" (139) offers further evidence. For more discussion of the complex religious beliefs of American seamen, see Simon P. Newman, "Reading the Bodies of Early American Seafarers," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., LV 55, No. 1 (1998), 74-76. My research in the Archives Départementales de la Gironde, Série 6B, turned up a few examples of seamen with English names on board merchant vessels sailing from Bordeaux in the first part of the eighteenth century; the numbers would probably be higher in ports further north. 8

Irish seamen often acted as a kind of bridging population for American seamen in France; see "Papers of Benjamin Franklin Online" (www.franklinpapers.org), Peter Boillat, et al. to Benjamin Franklin, 15 March 1783. See also Louis M. Cullen, "Ireland and Irishmen in Eighteenth-Century Privateering" (paper presented at the Course et Piraterie: Etudes présentées à la Commission Internationale d'Histoire Maritime à l'occasion de son XVe colloque international pendant le XlVe Congrès International des Sciences historiques, Paris, 1975). 9 0 n the manning system of the French navy and its problems, see Jean Meyer and Martine Acerra, Histoire de la marine française des origines à nos jours (Rennes, 1994), 68-70. Only in 1779 did Sartine, at the time Minister of the Marine, permit the hiring of foreign seamen; Jonathan R. Dull, The French Navy and American Independence: A Study of Arms and Diplomacy, 1774-1787 (Princeton, 1975), 144.

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what more open to foreign seamen,10 yet it could be harsh on Britons who did not serve the empire. The eighteenth-century files of the High Court of Admiralty are full of prosecutions of Britons for serving aboard the ships of enemy powers - a charge which, as a form of treason, theoretically carried the death penalty.11 The Franco-American Alliance of 1778 eliminated the legal impediments to joint French and American crews. From that point on there is substantial documentation in the Atlantic of mixed crews aboard ships of war (both the official navies and privateers).12 Those American naval vessels in European waters for which logs survive, including Alliance, South Carolina and Boston, all indicate that between a quarter and a third of their crews at various points were French. 13 And although in some cases there are indications that these French seamen served under bilingual French officers, there is also strong evidence (see below) that they spoke with their American counterparts. There is also evidence of Americans serving aboard French vessels, even naval ships, once the French government lifted its legal prohibition on foreign seamen. When Michael Bright and four other American seamen escaped from Forton Prison in early 1782 by passing out among the exchanged French prisoners, they found themselves under examination by the local commissaire des classes and "Ordered for Brest to go on Board of a Man of 10 See N.A.M. Rodger, The Wooden World: An Anatomy of the Georgian Navy (London, 1986; reprint, New York, 1996), chapter 5.

"See, for example, Great Britain, National Archives (TNA/PRO), High Court of Admiralty (HCA), HCA 1/24/110 and HCA 1/24/116, Criminal Proceedings, 31 October 1780. Both are depositions of witnesses asserting that they found the accused seamen serving aboard enemy vessels. See also the cases of the Americans tried before the HCA cited below. 12

It is likely that most of the known evidence concerns ships of war because their shipboard documents became part of the public record. More research would have to be done in private ship lists to confirm this. l3 See, for example, "A List of French Men Taken in the Lexington Rebel Privateer...," 19 September 1777, in Michael J. Crawford (ed.), Naval Documents of the American Revolution, Volume 10: American Theater, October 1, 1777-December 31, 1777 (Washington, DC, 1996), 874; and "A List of Officers, & Men, belonging to the American Continental Ship of War, Ariel, Commanded, by the Honble, John Paul Jones," in John S. Barnes, The Logs of the Serapis-Alliance-Ariel, Under the Command of John Paul Jones, 1779-1780, with Extracts from Public Documents, Unpublished Letters, and Narratives, and Illustrated with Reproductions of Scarce Prints (4 vols., New York, 1911; reprint, Whitefish, MT, 2007), I, 20-21; and John Hannibal Sheppard, The Life of Samuel Tucker, Commodore in the American Revolution (Boston, 1868; reprint, Whitefish, MT, 2008), 95-97.

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war." 14 It seems likely that French merchant vessels, which recruited from the same pool of seamen and offered higher wages and safer conditions than the navy, also attracted their share of American ex-prisoners after 1778.15 Similar instances of national mixing took place on board ships in the Mediterranean during the war. Although the Continental navy did not reach the Mediterranean, privateers were active in those waters even before the Alliance was sealed. Records survive of at least four requests to American authorities to equip ships for private cruises in the Mediterranean.16 Many of these ships certainly had mixed crews, as indicated by this petition submitted by Captain Pock in 1777: Captain Pock, an American, having a ship called the Benjamin able to be armed as a privateer, requests that the Deputies of Congress give him permission to immediately arm the said ship to cruise against the English...on or near the coasts of Genoa, Nice, Monaco or Villefranche...Captain Pock... will [ensure], if it is found to be desirable, [that] no more than a quarter of his crew [will be] French. 17 The end of this petition is particularly remarkable: Pock's phrasing implies that all other things being equal, more than a quarter of his crew would normally consist of Frenchmen. He expressed his willingness to employ mostly 14 For this story, see "Franklin Papers Online," Michael Bright to James Cunningham, 26 February 1782.

"Indeed, several American merchants at Nantes complained of this to Franklin in 1779: "seamen," they wrote, "are encouraging one another to leave their vessels, taking their two months' advance, and enter French service." See Leonard W. Labaree, et al. (eds.), The Papers of Benjamin Franklin (39 vols., New Haven, 1959-), XXVIII, 434, Gentlemen of Nantes to the American Commissioners, 28 January 1779. 16

For equipping in the Mediterranean, see ibid., XXIV, 133-134, M. Massequan to Benjamin Franklin, 7 June 1777; and XXIV, 388-389, Seth Paddack (Marseilles) to Franklin, 2 August 1777. A proposal from an Atlantic port to cruise in the Mediterranean was put forward in ibid., XXVII, 300, Thomas Read to the American Commissioners, 25 August 1778. 17

"Franklin Papers Online," Captain Pock to American Commissioner or Commissioners, n.d. [1777]. "Le Capitaine Pock Américain ayant un navire nommé le Benjamin propre à être armé en guerre, supplie Messieurs les Députés du Congrès de lui accorder la permission d'armer incessamment le dit navire pour courrir sur les Anglois...sur, ou près de la côte de Genes, à Nice, à Monaco, ou à Villefranche...Le Capitaine Pock...s'obligera, si cela est jugé convenable, à ne recevoir tout au plus qu'un quart de françois dans son équipage."

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Americans as a kind of concession to the American Commissioners in Paris, to whom he addressed the petition. Most likely, he knew that the Commissioners were desperate to find employment for American seamen stranded in European waters and sweetened his proposal for a voyage by offering to ship some of them as well.18 Indeed, the mixing of French and Anglo-American maritime folk that had already taken place before the war helped to facilitate the creation of mixed-crew privateers. In June 1777, M. Massequan, a Frenchman based in Nice, wrote to the Commissioners to ask for an American letter of marque for one of his own ships. "Francis Fowler," he wrote, "a Scot from Aberdeen, commands a settee of mine, and I have proposed that he cruise against the British if you will make that possible. " Massequan assured the Commissioners that he would be the "guarantor" for Fowler, whom he had known for a long time as an "honest, experienced, and brave" officer. 19 For the purposes of recovering culturally substantive contacts between American and French seamen, the evidence of individual stories is even more revealing than the documentation of mixed crews. A number of individual seamen, American and French, ended up stranded, in prison or on trial for piracy during the war years - and in the course of these tribulations they were forced to tell their stories in some detail. These tales, although anecdotal, give us a unique window into the cultural substance of Franco-American maritime contacts in and around the Mediterranean. Cradock Taylor, a Virginian, and William Kentisbear, a Massachusetts man, repeatedly appealed for help to Benjamin Franklin in 1778 and 1779. Both men had ended up free on parole in Aix-en-Provence after being captured by English vessels, pressed into service and then recaptured by French vessels and condemned to prison as "Englishmen." Both began their journeys in the Atlantic: Kentisbear was captured after attempting to get from Halifax to Barcelona on a British ship in order (so he claimed) to desert and return to America. Taylor had been captured while serving on board a Portuguese vessel and "Compelled to Serve his Britanick Majesty against [his] Inclination" before being recaptured by the French. 20

18

A good discussion of these pleas can be found in Catherine M. Prelinger, "Benjamin Franklin and the American Prisoners of War in England during the American Revolution," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., XXXII, No. 2 (1975), 261294. "Labaree, et al. (eds.), Franklin Papers, XXIV, 134, Massequan to Franklin, 7 June 1777. 20

See the numerous letters of William Kentisbear and Cradock Taylor to Franklin in ibid., XXVIII-XXIX. The first letters are from 11 November 1778 (Kentis-

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Taylor's letters, in particular, suggest that he had substantive contact with French maritime folk during his time in prison and perhaps before. In one letter he expressed a willingness to "go in the French [service] provided there is no possabillity of my returning to my Native Country." Such a move, of course, would not have been possible without a working knowledge of the French language.21 Indeed, in contrast to Taylor, Kentisbear explicitly stated that he would not be able to join a French ship because "not understanding French nor Speaking it," he would "not be capable of carrying command nor Obeying it." 22 There are other suggestions as well in Taylor's story that he had formed significant relationships with local Frenchmen during his time in prison and on parole. Attempting to prove that he was an American, and thus deserving of Franklin's help, he wrote that one "Mr. Grégoire (a Merchant of this City who I am perfectly well acquainted with)" could confirm his nationality. This acquaintance suggests a knowledge of French (although it could also be that Grégoire spoke English) and certainly reveals the existence of ties between at least some American seamen and local Frenchmen. Later in their correspondence, when it appeared that he would have to be sent back to England in a prisoner exchange, Taylor revealed to Franklin that he planned to "make a retreat into the Country" rather than join the British navy. Such "retreats," to be successful, required significant help from locals - which Taylor was apparently confident of getting.23 The stories of Robert Farrell and Thomas Abbott, two American seamen prosecuted for piracy before the British High Court of Admiralty in the 1780s, offer similar evidence of substantive Franco-American contact during the war. Both Farrell and Abbott had been captured in the English Channel serving on board French privateers and were tried as subjects of the King of England fighting with his enemies. In his examination Farrell, a New Yorker, explained that before he had joined the privateer he had been aboard the "Merchant Ship Elizabeth bound on a voyage to Genoa & Leghorn & back to Nantz" where he then got "Employ in a french coasting vessel in which he

bear) and 29 June 1779 (Taylor). See also the citations below to their papers in the discussion of contacts. 21

Ibid., XXX, 590, Taylor to Franklin, 25 October 1779.

^"Franklin Papers Online," Kentisbear to Franklin, 26 January 1779. 23

Labaree, et al. (eds.), Franklin Papers, XXXI, 146 ff., Taylor to Franklin, 25 October and 24 November 1779. For a description of one such assisted escape from the press gangs, see Cremer, Ramblin' Jack, 90-91. Others are described in Gilje, Liberty on the Waterfront, part 1; and Rodger, Wooden World, chapter 5.

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continued until about four Months ago." 24 Farrell's service on board a French coaster implied a good working knowledge of French. And since Farrell's enlistment on the coaster was only his second engagement in Europe, it is possible that he picked up French during his round-trip voyage from Nantes to the Mediterranean. Abbott, like Kentisbear a Marblehead man, told a circuitous tale during his interrogation that offers tantalizing hints of a truly transnational career. He began at Ostend, he claimed, aboard an English privateer "on a Cruize to the Mediterranean." During the course of the voyage he was captured and "carried into Malta." From there he returned to the continent aboard "a Genoese Brigantine" and then "traveled thro' Land to Dunkirk where he tarried and went to sea in divers French Privateers" for "a great many Cruizes...and made Prize of divers English vessels." 25 Abbott's success in making his way from the North Atlantic to the Mediterranean and back, and especially doing so overland, strongly suggests skill in French, if not other languages as well. His service on board "French Privateers," where the language of command would have been French, confirms this. And although he gave few details of it in his interrogation, there can be little doubt that Abbott made acquaintances in the course of these peregrinations. The evidence of Franco-American contact is not limited to the accounts of American seamen. We have also the word of Mathieu Martinet, "originally from Marseille," who sought Franklin's aid in the later years of the war. Having shipped out from Marseilles to Boston, he was captured by the English, imprisoned in New York, paroled and then travelled to Boston where "he shipped himself aboard the Tocandessay, Captain Hallois, then aboard two other [ships] and finally on board the frigate Protector... [and] on that same ship took six prizes sent to Boston." Captured again by the English, he was this time sent to prison in England, from where he wrote to Franklin asking for "his share and portion of the prizes that were successfully sent in." 26 Martinet's fascinating petition suggests two ways in which he had integrated into the American maritime milieu. One, of course, is that his service aboard Protector, a ship of the Massachusetts state navy, proves that he had a command of the English language.27 More suggestive, however, was his deci24 TNA/PRO, HCA 1/25, leaf 23, Criminal Proceedings, Examination of Robert Farrell, 15 July 1782. 25

Ibid., Examination of Thomas Abbott, 15 July 1782.

26

"Franklin Papers Online," Mathieu Martinet to Benjamin Franklin, n.d. [post-1781], "Martinet's integration into the American maritime economy is consonant with the behaviour of other French seamen during the war. See, for example, the com-

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sion to write to Franklin to ask for his share of the prize money. This seems at first glance to have been a mistake: Franklin was in no position to help him get money from prizes carried into Boston, and Martinet would have been better served by writing to someone there. The most logical explanation that I can imagine for this very strange choice of intercessor is that he did so at the instigation of the American seamen who were imprisoned with him. After all, they wrote to Franklin almost constanüy seeking his help and often received it. This implies at least a degree of friendship and communication between Martinet and the Americans in prison with him. Pieces of evidence from the Atlantic confirm what these stories from around the Mediterranean suggest. On board the Continental frigate Boston, for example, during one of its Atlantic cruises the captain had to issue strict public orders to prevent his American and French crewmen from arguing with one another. Obviously, this implied a shared language.28 Similarly, the seaman Ebenzer Fox recorded many years later the story of how he and several other Americans were pressed aboard a French ship of war in St. Domingue in 1782. In his memoirs he described the conversations he had with the French press gang and the captain of the vessel, all apparendy carried on in French. 29 Indeed, seamen's ability to communicate and to develop bonds of trust across national boundaries could even lead to one of the things captains most feared: mutiny. In 1782, on board South Carolina, commanded by John Paul Jones, the French crewmen refused to "pull up the anchors" until "they had their wages paid them." Mutiny quickly spread to the crewmen of other nationalities, as noted in the ship's log, with the American and Irish crew members also refusing to do "their duty" until the demands were met. Given that mutiny depended on a level of trust among the conspirators, the participation of French and American seamen together suggests its existence. It took exemplary whippings of several leaders, who tellingly included two French men, a man with an English name and "Severil More" of the crew, to quell the mu-

plaints about French seamen deserting their ships to join American vessels; Archives du ministère des affaire étrangères (Paris), Correspondance Politique: Etats-Unis, Gerard to Sartine, 20 October and 22 November 1778. 28 "[W]hile on my short Cruze some few words would Pass as I understand between the frenchmen & my Sailors but contrary to Orders which they daily had the Perrusal off [sic] and likewise read to them." Harvard University, Houghton Library, Samuel Tucker Papers, MS Am. 812, Samuel Tucker to the American Commissioners at Paris, 12 July 1778. 29

See Ebenezer Fox, "The Revolutionary Adventures of Ebenezer Fox of Roxbury, Massachusetts," in Hugh F. Rankin (ed.), Narratives of the American Revolution (Chicago, 1976), 212-216.

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tiny on board South Carolina?0 A similar revolt, again involving both French and American crewmen, had taken place in 1778 on board Boston?1 Yet as is often the case, it is the least dramatic event that is the most revealing. In October 1780, police in the port of Bordeaux arrested a cabin boy from the Boston vessel Polly who had been trying to sell two gold rings to a jeweller, M. Millerand. By an astonishing stroke of bad luck for the boy, an American named John Martin, these two rings turned out to be "part of six dozen that were stolen from him [Millerand]" earlier that month.32 The jeweller told him to wait a moment and went to fetch the police, who arrested the young man. The authorities then interrogated Martin, as well as several members of the crew, before ultimately releasing him to the custody of his captain. The interrogation reports contain several remarkable details that reveal aspects of substantive Franco-American contact that usually remain hidden. First, the arrest report noted that Martin spoke French (although the interrogation, as legally required, took place via a translator), so here is good evidence of a French-speaking American sailor, not a mere likelihood. Second, the mate of his vessel testified that Martin had left the ship only twice during the past month.33 Somehow he had been able to learn French anyway. This suggests the ease with which seamen could learn languages, although they tended not to leave records of their achievement. Third and most tantalizing, since Martin clearly did not steal the rings himself he must have acquired them from locals who had. This hints at the existence of a subterranean economy through which American seamen came into contact with French men and women on shore. This was an economy about which we know next to nothing today, but which could be, if not reconstructed, then perhaps at least glimpsed in the future. As Martin's story suggests, our knowledge of culturally substantive contacts between French and American seamen is still fragmentary. The stories ^"Log Book of the South Carolina, 4 August 1781 to 21 May 1782," in Robert Bentham Simons (ed.), The South Carolina Navy in the Revolution (Charleston, 1947), 182. "See "Diary of Jennison," in Charles R. Smith and Charles H. Waterhouse, Marines in the Revolution: A History of the Continental Marines in the American Revolution, 1775-1783 (Washington, DC, 1975), 349. 32 His French was described as mauvais, apparently referring to his accent. The deposition said that he had "avoit voulu vendre deux bagues d'or lesquelles faisoint parties des six douzaines qui lui firent volleés le deux du present mois." Archives départementales de la Gironde (Bordeaux), Plaintes et informations de la Cour des Jurats, 12B 365, "Informations contre Jean Martin," 1780, 2e trimestre. 33

Ibid., Deposition of Laban Lynds. "Jean Martin...n'a pas été à terre depuis le trente un septembre jusqu'au quinze d'octobre."

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presented here, however, establish a few basic points that can serve as a basis for further research. First, the evidence clearly shows that American seamen in and around the Mediterranean served on board French and Francophone vessels and that French sailors served aboard Anglophone ones. Although we do not have statistical evidence of the extent of these practices, beyond the muster rolls of a few ships of the Continental navy, the sources suggest that it was not unusual. Certainly Mathieu Martinet, Thomas Abbott and Robert Farrell all regarded their service on board mixed-nationality privateers as unexceptional. This at least suggests that such mixed crews were quite common, perhaps even before the Revolution. Second, it is clear that a number of these French and American seamen in and around the Mediterranean learned to speak one another's languages. Without such language skills, it is difficult to imagine, for example, how an American could serve aboard a Francophone coasting vessel or how a Frenchman could ship himself aboard a vessel of the Massachusetts navy. And in at least one of the cases discussed above, it also seems that the language learning took place during a journey to the Mediterranean. It would be entirely fitting to find that the Mediterranean, which had from time immemorial been a meeting ground for cultures, served as a sort of language school for seamen. Third, the evidence points to the existence of relationships and even friendships between American and French seamen during the period of the American Revolution. American and French seamen aided one another in time of need, mutinied together and helped one another get employment, both legal and illegal. These substantive connections, at least at times, created a transnational maritime milieu "from below" in the years of the Revolution. Similar relationships may have existed before the war as well.34 Yet before the Alliance made them licit and thus knowable, their traces tend to be lost to us. These findings have three main implications for the study of seamen, the Mediterranean and the late eighteenth century. First, they show that nationbased studies of seamen are too limited in scope. More than almost any other group in the early modern period, seamen spoke foreign languages, had personal connections with foreigners and lived substantial portions of their lives far from home. Social historians need to take fully into account the intersecting and intertwining of multiple national histories in the history of maritime labour and culture. Second, the results, however tentative, show clearly that the AÜantic and Mediterranean spaces were integrated by maritime labour. Seamen, whether French or American, did not remain in one or the other maritime re-

done suggestion of this is to be found in the records of the Vice-Admiralty Court sitting in the colony of New York, where one of the cases in the 1760s mentioned that an American seaman had carried a letter from a French sailor back to his former landlady in New York. See Gilje, Liberty on the Waterfront, 17.

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gion: they moved frequently (if not freely) between them. This implies, as has also been suggested by recent work in "global" history, that an "Atlantic" or "Mediterranean" perspective may at times still be too narrow a lens. To understand one of them, at least from the point of view of maritime labour and culture, we need to understand the other as well. Finally, the existence of transnational maritime connections "from below" may have implications for the political history of the Age of Revolutions. I would not follow Peter Linebaugh and Marcus Rediker in identifying seamen as a kind of transnational, trans-racial "Atlantic proletariat." 35 Yet it may be that these connections among seamen of many nations had political consequences. If we can think of seamen as political agents, albeit minor ones, then we need to ask ourselves what kinds of ideas and practices they carried with them, whether from Revolutionary America to Europe or vice-versa, and what difference they made in the political events of the late eighteenth century.36 In order to go beyond these suggestions, much more research will be necessary and much more space will have to be devoted to seamen than I have been able to do in this short essay. In particular, there need to be much more comprehensive studies of serial sources that can inform us about the lives, experiences and cultures of French and American seamen. The French archives conserve a particularly rich cache of sources which may speak to these questions. Ships' muster rolls kept by local offices of the système des classes give evidence of foreign seamen serving aboard French vessels. The inventaires après décès (probate inventories) of seamen who died at sea, kept by those same offices, offer evidence of foreign-language books and may even contain the inventories of some of the less fortunate among the foreigners. Last but not least are the records of merchants, shipping companies and consuls in the Mediterranean. These sources, rich with the texture of daily life, may provide the best hope for reconstructing the hidden history of the Franco-American Mediterranean "from below" in the age of the American Revolution.

"Linebaugh and Rediker, Many-Headed Hydra, 332. 36

I have attempted to explore this theme, albeit with only limited success, in an earlier project: Nathan R. Perl-Rosenthal, "The Tides of Freedom: American Seamen as the Vectors of Revolution, 1763-1789" (Unpublished Senior Honors thesis, Harvard University, 2004).

Consuls and Consiglieri'. United States Relations with the Italian States, 1790-1815 Anthony J. Antonucci

In 1804 the merchant John Belknap placed an advertisement in the Boston Gazette for "Italian Goods... from Leghorn and for sale at 38 Long Wharf, Boston." Among the items Belknap listed were "2 trunks sewing silk, silk handkerchiefs, 4 cases black crapes, 25 bags feathers, 55 boxes Olives, Capers and Anchovies, 12 casks Olive Oil." Within a year he offered "a variety of Italian goods from Leghorn and Naples for sale on liberal terms," including "3 trunks sewing silks, assorted colors, 1 case men's silk hats and ladies bonnets, 3 casks Olive Oil, 3 pipes Marsala Wine, 50 casks Marseilles Claret, and 50,000 Spanish quills." 1 Like hundreds of other merchants operating out of ports up and down the east coast of the United States in the beginning of the nineteenth century, Belknap was engaged in a highly lucrative trade with Italy. During the years of "neutral trade" - a period extending from the outbreak of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars in 1793 through Napoleon's final defeat in 1814-1815 - the virtual disappearance from international commerce of ships from Holland, France, Spain and elsewhere created a voyage in the international trading system that American merchants rushed to fill.2 To enable their large and lucrative trade to operate, American merchants required good relations with local authorities abroad while remaining vigilant and informed about threats to the safety of their ships and crews. In port, weather conditions and market fluctuations could frustrate the ambitions of even the well-run operations. To support its growing networks of commer1

Boston Gazette, 20 December 1804 and 28 October 1805.

2

The literature on American economic development between 1790 and 1815 is substantial. Seminal works include Douglass C. North, The Economic Growth of the United States, 1790-1860 (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1961; reprint, New York, 1966); North and Robert Paul Thomas (eds.), The Growth of the American Economy to 1860 (New York, 1968); Gary M. Walton and James F. Shepherd, The Economic Rise of Early America (Cambridge, 1979); Walton and Shepard, Shipping, Maritime Trade and the Economic Development of Colonial North America (Cambridge, 1972); and Anna C. Clauder, American Commerce as Affected by the Wars of the French Revolution and Napoleon, 1793-1812 (Philadelphia, 1932; reprint, Clifton, NJ, 1972).

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cial activity around the globe, the United States established a Consular Service in 1792. The Consular Act required foreign- and native-born men employed by the Consular Service to provide American merchants with commercial and military intelligence as well as to broker commercial and diplomatic relations with foreign officials. The Act also called for consuls to report to Washington every six months concerning American vessels entering and clearing their respective ports. 3 The consular records thus provide a valuable source for examining the contexts and significance of American interaction with foreign peoples, places, goods and ideas during the early decades of the involvement of the United States in international affairs. This is particularly true of the records left by consuls and consular agents stationed in the various revolutionary and reactionary states of the Italian peninsula between 1790 and 1815. By the beginning of the nineteenth century there were four American consulates on the Italian peninsula: Leghorn (1793), Naples (1796), Rome (1797) and Genoa (1799). Within a few years, consulates were established at Palermo (1802) and Messina (1806). From freeing sailors from Italian prisons after rowdy nights of drunken pleasures to hosting visiting luminaries, negotiating commercial treaties and providing naval intelligence, consuls and consular agents shaped and defined the American experience in Italy at the level of state and non-state relations throughout the period. This essay investigates the records left by United States consuls stationed in Italy between 1790 and 1815 in order to highlight the various ways in which these officials stood at the centre of the complex web of social, political and economic relations that defined the American experience in Italian lands at that time. Offered as an overview of an initial stage of research toward a larger study of the complex networks Americans formed in pre-unification Italy, how they functioned and how they changed over time, this essay stakes out ground for a comprehensive investigation of a topic that until recently has received little scholarly attention.

'The 1792 "Act Concerning Consuls and Vice-Consuls" authorized consular officials "to receive protests and declarations of captains, masters, crews, passengers and merchants who were American citizens; to authenticate copies of documents; to take charge of and settle the estates of American citizens dying abroad and leaving no legal representative; to care for American vessels that might become stranded on the coasts of their consulates; to receive certain fees for authenticating documents and setting estates...and to exercise such additional powers as might result from the nature of the office or from any treaty or convention under which they might act;" United States, Congress, Journals, III, 1360, 14 April 1792. For more on the development and passage of this law, see Emory R. Johnson, "The Early History of the United States Consular Service, 1776-1792," Political Science Quarterly, XIII, No. 1. (1898) 19-40; and Wibur J. Carr, "The American Consular Service," American Journal of International Law, I, No. 4 (1907) 891-913.

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United States Trade with the Italian States The interactions and exchanges of people, goods and ideas between North America and the Italian states was an established part of British North American life long before the Declaration of Independence. Given their knowledge of the wealth that could be made in Mediterranean trade, American merchants were understandably eager to get back into the business of commercial exchange with the ports of the Italian peninsula and its offshore islands as soon as possible after independence. 4 Throughout the eighteenth century, vessels from America sailed to Italian ports with cargoes of dried fish and flour in exchange for wine, oil, spices, silks, marble, citrus fruits, non-perishable foods and other luxury items. 5 As the century drew to a close, American cargoes shifted from domestic products largely from the northeast to re-exported tropical products, primarily sugar, coffee, pepper and timber. Increasing in volume and value over the nineteenth century, the items American merchants imported from Italy fit the now familiar reputation of the Italian lands as a cornucopia of edible delicacies, fine wine and great art. During this period, American commerce with ports such as Livorno, Naples and Messina typically began with the re-exportation of West Indian goods, mainly sugar, coffee, logwood and cocoa. In exchange, American merchants trading in Italian ports obtained olive oil, wine, marble, silks, citrus fruit and art work. Considered regionally, direct trade with the Italian peninsula was largely a New England affair. While Boston and Salem predominated, numerous other ports, including Beverly, Gloucester, Portsmouth, Plymouth, Marblehead and Providence, sent cargoes to Italian ports, with Leghorn and Naples the most popular destinations. When cargoes from Philadelphia, Baltimore and New York are added to the New England vessels, American commercial activity was overwhelmingly based out of northeastern ports. 6

"See John J. McCusker, "Worth a War? The Importance of the Trade between British America and the Mediterranean," this volume. 5

See James G. Lydon, "Fish and Flour for Gold: Southern Europe and the Colonial American Balance of Payments," Business History Review, XXXIX, No. 2 (1965), 171-183. 6 United States consular records show that ninety-three percent of vessels arriving at the Tuscan port of Leghorn between 1798 and 1840 hailed from northeastern ports. United States, National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), State Department Papers, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Leghorn, 1793-1906, reel 1. These dispatches are arranged alphabetically by consulate and appear chronologically. They do not have page or folio numbers, and there is no register or index. For this reason, I note the date of the dispatches in the main body of the text when it is available.

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Leghorn The chief entrepôt of American trade with the Italian peninsula between 1790 and 1815 was the Tuscan port city of Leghorn (Livorno). Located approximately 150 miles northwest of Rome and thirty miles southwest of Florence, Leghorn was the principal port of the Granducato di Toscana, a territory that comprised most of the current Italian region of Tuscany. For most of its 300year history, the Medici of Florence ruled the Granducato. At the end of the sixteenth century, Francesco's successor, Cosimo II, opened his model city to the world by declaring Leghorn a free port. 7 In 1737, Tuscany was taken over by members of the HabsburgLorraine family. Under the reign of Leopold I (1765-1790), or Pietro Leopoldina as he was called by his Italian subjects, Tuscany experienced a period of progressive reform that led to its revival as the most prosperous state in Italy. 8 American interest in cultivating trade and diplomatic ties with Tuscany began shortly after the signing of the Declaration of Independence, and in May 1777 Congress elected Ralph Izard of South Carolina to serve as a special commissioner to the court of Grand Duke Leopold. Izard, a merchant who had spent time collecting art and music in Italy since 1774, was charged with inducing the Italian states to aid the patriot cause by attacking British ships and granting financial support. Although Tuscany initially promised support, fear of British reprisals was ultimately deemed too great a risk. At the same time as Izard's official mission, the state of Virginia also attempted to secure military and financial aid from Tuscany. In this case, Fillippo Mazzei, a Tuscan native and close friend of Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin who had been living in Virginia since 1773, secretly sailed to Leghorn in an attempt to procure Duke Leopold's support. Although he was unable to secure the £900,000 sterling he had been charged to obtain, Mazzei successfully shipped arms to the Virginia rebels for the remainder of the war. 9

7

Called in ancient times Liburnus Portus, the name Leghorn was ascribed to the city Italians called Livorno by English merchants in the sixteenth century. Until Italian unification in 1861 (and in many cases afterwards), English-speakers consistently referred to it as Leghorn. For stylistic purposes, I use the two interchangeably. 8 A singular testament to the progressive tolerance practised in Leghorn was the abolition of the death penalty and the adoption of Beccarian penal reforms beginning in November 1786. See Howard R. Marraro, Relazioni fra l'Italia e gli Stati Uniti (Roma, 1954), 43-102.

'Howard R. Marraro, "Mazzei's Correspondence with the Grand Duke of Tuscany during his American Mission," William and Mary Quarterly, 2nd ser., XXII, No. 3 (1942), 275-301.

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Despite amicable relations, substantial American trade with Leghorn did not begin until after signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1783. By the mid-1790s the city of Leghorn claimed a thriving and diverse population of 50,000 souls. Among the inhabitants were a large number of Jews (perhaps a third of the population), Greeks, Armenians, Turks, North African Muslims, English, French, Spanish and Americans. Although Roman Catholicism was the official religion of Tuscany, others were practised openly. Wealthy and cosmopolitan, the free port of Leghorn was an attractive destination for newly independent American merchants seeking to make their way within the competitive Mediterranean trading system. To encourage this trade, the United States established a consulate in Livorno in 1793. The first American consular agent was a Tuscan-born merchant named Fillipo Felicchi. During his tenure Felicchi wrote regularly to Secretaries of State Edmund Randolph and Timothy Pickering on the conditions of trade at Livorno and other Italian ports. Felicchi's correspondence documents the challenges American merchants faced in the highly competitive and conflict-ridden Mediterranean region and provides a detailed account of early American diplomatic efforts to assert their rights to free trade. Although Felicchi's records do not provide as much detail as those of his successor, Thomas W. Appleton, they contain important information on the earliest efforts of the United States to institutionalize foreign relations with Italy. During the first few decades after independence, American merchants faced persistent threats of seizure, impressments and forced tribute by the major and minor powers of the Mediterranean littoral. The most immediate threat to American interests came from the prédations of the Barbary states of the North African coast. Until the early 1800s, weak American naval capabilities meant that the only viable path to peaceful trade in the Mediterranean was through paying tribute. For example, in September 1795 Joel Barlow, the American envoy to the Barbary states, signed the first Algiers Treaty. This agreement promised security for American merchant vessels in exchange for one million dollars and a "gift" of a thirty-six-gun frigate. 10 From his vantage point on the Italian peninsula, Felicchi observed the aggressions of Barbary corsairs toward United States vessels and recorded the progress of peace negotiations with the Barbary authorities. In October 1796, Felicchi commended the completion of the treaty with Algiers and urged the pursuit of similar pacts with Tripoli and Tunis. Toward this end he recommended a Dutch consul at Tripoli, W. Nathanial Waversman, as an advocate

10

For more information on early American relations with the Barbary states, see Ray W. Irwin, The Diplomatic Relations of the United States with the Barbary Powers, 1777-1816 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1931); Frank Lambert, The Barbary Wars: American Independence in the Atlantic World (New York, 2005); and Richard B. Parker, Uncle Sam in Barbary: A Diplomatic History (Gainesville, FL, 2004).

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for American interests." Following the capture and enslavement of the crew of the frigate Sophia in December 1796, Waversman proved an important negotiator on behalf of American relations with Tripoli. In early 1797 Felicchi reported that Waversman helped to broker a peace treaty with Yusuf Qaramanli, the bashaw (or pasha) of Tripoli for $52,000 and gifts of naval stores. Later that year Felicchi took an active role in negotiations between the United States and the bey of Tunis, Pasha Hamouda.12 The signing of the Barbary treaties in 1796 and 1797 established resident consulates on the Barbary coast. These agreements placed Richard O'Brien at Algiers, James Lander Cathcart at Tripoli and William Easton at Tunis. In the decades that followed, correspondence between United States consuls in Italy and their counterparts in Barbary established a vital link in the American military and diplomatic undertakings in the southern Mediterranean. During Felicchi's time as the United States consular agent at Leghorn, threats to American trade with Italy came by land as well as by sea. Throughout the fall of 1796 Felicchi documented the effects of the French invasion of Tuscany on American commerce. For example, in a letter of 14 September 1796 Felicchi described French abuse of England and American property upon their entry into Leghorn on 27 June. To keep the State Department abreast of French actions, Felicchi provided translations of General Bonaparte's orders for the seizure of English holdings and relayed his efforts to gain respect for American property with the French Consul at Leghorn, M. Belleville. In a letter to President John Adams, Felicchi criticized French treatment of American merchants and complained that "neutral property" had been confiscated: Our commercial houses have suffered a great deal of vexation probably in consequence of all this...Neutral Merchants have had their counting house sealed up and I have seen where booths have been ordered to be sent to the French Commissioner for inspection. The Tuscan Government is merely passive; French Commissioners preside in all the Public Offices; letters are detained and delivered unsealed, bills of exchange taken out and French Soldiers are sent continually to the Houses of those who owe anything to the English.13 "NARA, State Department Papers, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Leghorn, 1793-1906, reel 1. l2 Robert J. Allison, The Crescent Obscured: The United States and the Muslim World, 1776-1815 (New York, 1995; reprint, Chicago, 2000). 13 NARA, State Department Papers, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Leghorn, 1793-1906, reel 1.

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When American sailors continued to be harassed by the French authorities, Felicchi wrote to Washington urging a military response. Between 1797 and 1799, the period of the United States' "Quasi-War" with France, Felicchi's letters demonstrated a pronounced animus toward the French authorities. Even as hostilities died down during the spring of 1798, he continued to express resentment toward France. Over the next year Felicchi's correspondence with Bellville indicated that the two men were in a perpetual state of discord. Felicchi's sudden replacement by an American-born merchant in July 1799 suggests that the future prospects of American trade with Frenchoccupied Italy could not tolerate a representative who was unwilling to work with French officials. 14 In a letter of 14 July 1799 Felicchi expressed his confusion at being dismissed as consular agent. This letter reflected the haphazard nature of early American diplomacy and the degree of tension that this created for United States representatives: Mr. Appleton arrived here about three months ago. Although he had no letters for me and his commission did not mention that my powers were withdrawn, and although I had no official communication of it of any kind, I thought it proper to present him to the Government as without a declaration on my side that I did retire, he could not have been admitted as he had nothing to show that I was recalled.15 Felicchi's successor, Thomas W. Appleton, was born in 1763 in Boston to a long-established merchant family and began working in his father's transatlantic shipping business selling whale oil in Paris in 1786.16 Through a letter from Massachusetts Governor James Bowdoin, Appleton met Thomas Jefferson, then serving as American minister to the court of Louis XVI. 17 This introduction led to Appleton's integration into an elite coterie of American "Ibid. 15

Ibid.

16

Appleton's New England roots stretched back to the arrival of his greatgreat grandfather, Samuel Appleton, arrival from Suffolk, England in 1635. For Appleton's genealogy, see Issac Appleton Jewett, Memorial of Samuel Appleton, of Ipswich, Massachusetts with Genealogical Notices of Some of His Descenderás (Boston, 1850), 1-36; and William Sumner Appleton, A Genealogy of the Appleton Family (Boston, 1874). "Julian Boyd, et al. (eds.), The Papers of Thomas Jefferson (36 vols., Princeton, 1950-), X, 160, James Bowdoin to Jefferson, 22 July 1786.

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merchants and statesmen living and working in France. This web of international contacts provided Appleton with a network of business ties and acquaintances that proved invaluable to his eventual bid for an appointment to the United States Consular Service. The most important relationship to develop out of his time in Paris was with Jefferson himself. Appleton admired Jefferson's cultivation and learning and shared his appreciation for French culture - on 4 July 1789 Appleton was one of eight Americans in Paris who signed a declaration expressing loyalty and gratitude to the American minister.18 Appleton's family ties to Boston's Federalist merchants, combined with his personal relationship with Jefferson and his affection for France, meant that he was uniquely positioned to promote American commercial interests in Italy. With the assistance of letters of recommendation from John Adams and Thomas Jefferson (obtained on his behalf by his father and brother-in-law, the merchant Thomas Perkins), Appleton secured the post of American consul at Livorno on 8 February 1797.19 From his arrival in Leghorn in 1798 until his death in 1840, Appleton faithfully adhered to Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson's dictate that consular officials report to Washington every six months concerning American vessels that entered and cleared their respective ports. 20 As agent for American interests in Leghorn over a sustained period of time, Appleton's writings are a key source on the political and diplomatic conditions that affected trade with Southern Europe during the period of neutrality.21 Appleton's first letter to Secretary of State Jefferson assessed the state of affairs in Italy and around the Mediterranean; he noted the possibility of English troops moving to reinforce the King of Naples against the French and that "many American vessels have been visited by French armed ships in the Mediterranean and suffer to proceed in their voyage not otherwise molesting "Ibid., V, 239-241. "For the confirmation of the appointment, see NARA, State Department Papers, Consular and Agents' Commissions to Foreign Countries from February 10, 1790 to August 18, 1829, 8 February 1798. 20

Jefferson established this reporting procedure in his circular to the consuls on 26 August 1790. See Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XVIII, 423. 21

Appleton's dispatches are located in NARA, State Department Papers, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Leghorn, 1793-1906. His account book is in Boston Public Library, MS No. G.31.44, accession 26,937. Although I have not seen it, Appleton's diary is reportedly preserved in the State Department Papers under the title, "Register of Events in the Consulate of Leghorn Containing Events such as Arrival of Vessels of War & Deposits, etc., from Commencement of the Consulate to 1828." Appleton's voluminous correspondence has been published in many places, but the majority are part of the Presidential Papers collections of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams.

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them it seems generally." 22 In this letter, Appleton asked about his "application for the consulate of Paris," an indication that Leghorn was not his first choice. Nonetheless, Appleton appears to have found Livorno tolerable enough; from the time of his appointment onward he never again set foot on American soil. During his long tenure, Appleton energetically advanced the expansion of American interests in Italy. In July 1801 he wrote to Secretary of State James Madison on the progress of American trade during his first four years at Leghorn: The commerce of Italy, although not perhaps so extensive as some branches pursued by our American merchants, has been for nearly four years, I may without fear of contradiction pronounce, the most lucrative - If it has been less followed, it has arisen from that want of information of the resources and productions of this country, which are so well calculated for the rest and would also greatly facilitate our commerce with West Indian Islands - The principal exports here are Olive oil of Lucca and Tuscany, wines, marbled soap, silks of all qualities, writing paper and the drugs and dyes, copper in sheets, and as this is the general mart of the Mediterranean, the productions of Sicily, the islands in the Adriatic, and the rest of the archipelago are purchased at this port on equally advantageous terms as on the soil where they are produced. A year later Appleton argued that American commerce with Italy would be greatly enhanced by his promotion to Consul General, a position which would have granted him the authority to appoint consular agents in other Italian ports. Although he was not promoted to Consul General, his recommendation that the United States establish consulates in other Italian ports was taken seriously. Between 1799 and 1802 Appleton's advocacy for the expansion of American trade led to the establishment of consulates at Naples, Palermo, Genoa and Rome. One of the primary duties of United States consuls was to care for lost, sick, and distressed American seamen. Appleton's account book and letters show that these duties occupied a great deal of his time and money: As it very frequently happens that Seamen are left in the ports where they arrive at, whether from sickness or from choice and that they travel afterwards the whole extent of Italy in search of a convenient vessel to embark in there being one 22

NARA, State Department Papers, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Leghorn, 1793-1906, reel 1.

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American vice-consul from hence to Naples and who is totally unacquainted with our language many instances have occurred that these unfortunate men have been forced to crime and stealth to prevent their perishing by hunger... 23 Consuls were also required to interpret and translate local laws for American citizens visiting or doing business in their ports. Most often this involved updating American merchants on local health regulations aimed at preventing plagues. As sailors approached Leghorn from the sea the first thing they saw was the lighthouse and lazaretto, the stone quarantine building located on an outcropping a mile outside the city's outer harbour. Hailing from an "unknown" land, American sailors were frequently required to spend the maximum amount of time in the lazaretto awaiting a clean bill of health. If there were any signs of sickness among the crew, they might be detained up to a month. For American merchants eager to enter and exit the port, the length of detention in quarantine threatened profits. Responding to a petition from American merchants about the Leghorn quarantine, Consul Appleton wrote to Secretary of State Timothy Pickering in June 1799 requesting literature that would "prove the perfect conditions of health in the United States." Appleton's meeting with Leghorn's governor the following fall convinced Tuscan authorities that American ships were not contaminated with yellow fever, so authorities reduced the standard quarantine to only ten days.24 In 1806 Appleton translated the 234 articles of the "general and particular instructions for the three lazarettos of St. Rocco, St. Jacopo & St. Leopoldo in the environs of Leghorn" and sent two copies to the Secretary of State.25 Free from the lazaretto, United States vessels could enter Leghorn's outer harbour. From this vantage point crewmen first beheld Leghorn's colourful, busding port, which consisted of "two havens, one for the duke's galleys, and the other for merchant ships." Before reaching the inner harbour they passed "a fine statue of Duke Ferdinand, with four Turkish slaves, in bronze, chained to the pedestal." 26

*Ibid. 24

Ibid.

25

Ibid.

26

This description is culled from the Leghorn entry in the 1797 edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica. The statue remains a fixture in Livorno's historic port to this day.

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Appleton's records reveal that the average time in port for all American vessels was fifty-two days.27 For sailors, this was a time to blow off steam and enjoy the city's many pleasures. Consular dispatches record numerous incidents of American seamen entangled with local authorities over drunken escapades involving petty theft, fistfights and "procuring the services of prostitutes outside the officially demarcated area without a note from the commissary." 28 For supercargoes in the employ of merchants like William Grey of Salem or John Belknap of Boston, time in port was spent making connections with local merchants, buying and selling goods and gathering information about distant markets. To keep American merchants apprised of their ability to trade safely in Mediterranean waters, consuls provided the latest news about the movements of potentially hostile vessels. Appleton's reports indicate that Leghorn continued to be a vital point for the United States' military intelligence network in the Mediterranean, particularly during the years leading up to and during the war against Tripoli (1801-1805).29 When Thomas Jefferson was inaugurated as the third president of the United States in 1801, Yussif Karamanli, the bashaw of Tripoli, demanded $225,000 from the new administration. Jefferson, a long-time critic of paying tribute to the Barbary powers to secure the freedom to trade in the Mediterranean, rebuffed this request. In May of that same year, Karamanli declared war on the United States by cutting down the flagstaff in front of the American consulate, although neither Algiers nor Tunis followed suit. In response, Jefferson sent a group of frigates to defend American interests. Although Congress never voted a formal declaration of war, it did authorize Jefferson to instruct the commanders of armed American vessels to seize all ships and goods of the pasha of Tripoli "and also to cause to be done all such other acts of precaution or hostility as the state of war will justify." 30 The following year Jefferson increased the presence in the region of the fledging navy, which 27

The total number of sailors on board vessels of the United States at this time was 7051. It is not clear what percentage of these were American citizens. 28

NARA, State Department Papers, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Leghorn, 1793-1906, reel 1. 29

To date, few scholars have acknowledged the centrality of Italy or American relations with the Italian states in the history of American conflicts with the Barbary states. As a primary node in the constellation of transatlantic trade that the United States sought to protect from the corsairs, as well as a military staging ground and primary depot and transfer station for military, political and commercial information, the Italian states were an integral part of the strategic and tactical execution of the Barbary wars. '"Cited in Allison, Crescent Obscured, 187.

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grew to include the warships Constitution, Constellation, Philadelphia, Chesapeake, Argus, Syren, and Intrepid under the overall command of Commodore Edward Preble. After conflict erupted in August 1801, Appleton's exchanges with his counterpart in Tripoli, James L. Cathcart, demonstrate that Italy was a critical component of American naval operations against the Barbary powers. 31 On 5 March 1801 Appleton wrote that he had advocated on behalf of Cathcart and American interests by urging Belleville, the French charge d'affairs, to solicit the advocacy of the French consul in Tripoli to help plead the American case in order to prevent forestall action by the bey. In this letter Appleton displayed the amicable relationship he developed with Belleville over the advancement of American interests in the Mediterranean: Being on friendly terms of intercourse with Möns. Belleville charged with the affairs of France in Italy, a man of extensive abilities joined to the distinguished regard of Bonaparte, I mentioned to him by apprehensions that the residence of the presents might not arrive at the time limited by the bey, presuming that Cathcart had no one to mediate...I proposed to Belleville that he should write to the French charge d'affairs in that regency which he most willingly agreed to. The copy of his letter you will find enclosed.32 Despite French intervention, the United States was unable to obtain a diplomatic solution. A letter to Appleton from Tobias Lear on 11 May 1801 announced the bashaw's declaration of war. Upon receipt of this letter Appleton was instructed to pass it on to the Secretary of State and other consuls in Mediterranean ports. On 9 July Appleton wrote to Secretary of State Madison that other consuls had placed an embargo on American ships in their ports due to the declaration of war but that this was their judgment and not based on his instruction. In this correspondence Appleton characteristically took the opportunity to record his efforts on behalf of American interests: As I forwarded copies of the circulars I have from time to time received from M. Cathcart to the ports of Italy, France, Holland, Hamburg, and London I am satisfied that in no port of Europe can ignorance of our situation with Tripoli be

31

NARA, State Department Papers, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Leghorn, 1793-1806, reel 1. n

Ibid.

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plead, as an apology for hazarding themselves in the Mediterranean.33 After American successes in the battles of Tripoli Harbour and Derna, and a covert attempt by the United States to restore his deposed older brother, Hamet Karamanli, as ruler, the bashaw signed a treaty to end hostilities on 10 June 1805.34 Even as Appleton described the threats American merchants encountered as they attempted to load and unload goods, his letters demonstrate the overwhelming success of American commerce at Livorno during his time as consul. This point is brought into sharp relief when American interests are compared to the experience of British merchants attempting to trade at Leghorn during the period of Tuscany's French occupation. On 21 March 1801 the signing of the Treaty of Aranjuez between France and Spain consolidated French rule in Tuscany until the Congress of Vienna in June 1815. Reorganized as the "Kingdom of Etruria," Tuscany was placed under the control of King Louis I of Etruria (Louis Francis Philibert of Bourbon, also the Duke of Parma) as a compensation for the French occupation of Parma since 1796. When he died in May 1803, rule passed to his son Charles Louis (Carlo Ludovico di Borbonne Parma), who as Louis II ruled until 1807 when Napoleon annexed his kingdom as the French departments of Arno, Mediterranee and Ombrane and handed them to his sister, Elisa Bonaparte, the honorary "Grand Duchess." 35 Appleton's dispatches show that while rulers changed, the day-to-day operations of the port of Livorno remained consistent. The positive relations between American merchants and local Italian authorities ensured the continued safety and security of commercial operations when confronted by French troops. A series of letters from Appleton to Secretary of State Madison between March and July 1801 provide evidence of the cordial atmosphere at Leghorn and highlights the advantages that American merchants had over the British at this time.36

33

Ibid.

^Joshua E. London, Victory in Tripoli: How America's War with the Barbary Pirates Established the U.S. Navy and Built a Nation (Hoboken, NJ, 2003); and Michael L.S. Kitzen, Tripoli and the United States at War: A History of American Relations with the Barbary States, 1785-1805 (Jefferson, NC, 1993). 35

NARA, State Department Papers, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Leghorn, 1793-1906, reel 1. ^lbid.

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In a letter of July 1801, Appleton reported that under his direction, a lucrative state of calm had been restored to American trade at Livorno; "the political appearance of Italy has experienced no alteration since my last letters to you. The king of Etruria is daily expected but I have no reason to believe it will in any way effect our political or commercial situation." He then relayed the details of how two American vessels, the ship Columbia and the schooner Raven, were "a short time since seized by the commander of the city under the pretext that they were English property - On my application to the city Governors he ordered the ships restored, unexamined on my assurance that they were American property." Explaining that the French embargo of the city, aimed at discrimination against British vessels, required that all crews and cargos were to be positively identified by their consuls, Appleton boasted that "our ships were liberated and restored before those of any other nation." He concluded by commenting, "Sir, if I mention these details which perhaps are not of importance it is only to show you that our flag is in truth more highly respected than that of any other in the parts of Italy which the French occupy." 37 At times, however, Appleton expressed frustration with the political future of Italy. For example, in June 1802 he quipped that "the political face of Italy so frequently changes its features that it is difficult with any precision to say what may become its permanent form." 38 Nonetheless, throughout the period between 1798 and 1808 Appleton routinely praised the French occupation of Tuscany and often expressed a particular admiration for Napoleonic administration. In 1806 he reported: On 1st May the Napoleonic Code is to take affect throughout the Kingdom. This is an event I am persuaded will infinitely find to the real happiness of the country for the mild and lenient laws established by Leopold are found totally insufficient for the subdety of the Italians - on the whole the dominion of Napoleon cannot fail ultimately to ameliorate the situation of the Tuscans. The sale of church lands will be only of such as would be better lopped off, than retained - they will make soldiers of those who are now vagabonds. They will introduce a code of efficient laws, instead of a system of jurisprudence which they now labor under which neither defends life nor property from the parricide and the paltry thief.39

^Ibid. x

Ibid.

39

ibid.

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When war between England and France escalated between 1806 and 1808, neutral vessels faced increased threats from both sides. By 1806, Napoleon's armies had overtaken most of continental Europe, effectively isolating the United Kingdom. But the defeat of the French and Spanish navies at the Battle of Trafalgar the previous year ended French prospects of invading Britain. In an effort to subvert British commercial strength, Napoleon resorted instead to a policy of economic warfare known as the Continental System.40 Among these measures, the Berlin Decree of 1806 forbade French, allied or neutral ships from trading with Britain. On 11 November 1807, the United Kingdom responded in kind with the orders-in-council which prohibited French trade with the United Kingdom, her allies or neutrals, and instructed the Royal Navy to blockade French and allied ports. Napoleon retaliated with the Milan Decree, declaring that all neutral shipping using British ports or paying British tariffs would be regarded as British and liable to seizure. The number of American vessels and sailors captured by both sides rose, rendering trade with the Mediterranean both increasingly dangerous and more profitable. 41 Throughout 1807, Appleton issued regular reports on the movements of British vessels. His dispatches recorded British confiscations of American crews and cargoes and displayed a growing anti-British sentiment. By contrast, he reported only one instance of French hostility toward American property an incident, he assured Madison, which was quickly resolved. Appleton's exultation of the joint mobilization of the French and Russian fleets in the Black Sea provided further evidence of his pro-French position during the year leading up to the temporary end of United States trade with Italy.42 On 14 December 1807, President Jefferson signed the first in a series of laws that abruptly halted American overseas trade. 43 The sequence of Embargo Acts passed by Congress between then and 24 April 1808 forbade American vessels from exporting any goods by land or sea. Aimed at the protection of American interests, the Embargo Acts effectively destroyed the shipping of the United States and provoked the enmity of Atlantic merchants and their political backers, particularly in Federalist New England. In compliance with the order that American vessels return to their home ports, on 8 April 1808 Appleton informed Madison that "[a]ll vessels that were ready for sea, or that were not detained by authority, under some

•"Clauder, American Commerce, 27-92. "Ibid., 120. 42 NARA, State Department Papers, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Leghorn, 1793-1906, reel 1. 43

Clauder, American Commerce, 132-148.

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form or other of arrest departed immediately on the embargo being raise'd." 44 Through the end of 1808 he corresponded with Washington twice more. In November he prosecuted the crew of the ship John of Baltimore for violating the Embargo Act and sent a copy of the proceedings to Madison. In December Appleton dispatched an update on the political situation in Tuscany and, in anticipation of the lifting of the embargo, argued for a return to trade with Leghorn: His majesty the Emperor, has lately by a special decree declared the city and port of Leghorn free; a privilege that neither Genova or Marseilles has been able to obtain: in short, it appears that he is disposed, singularly to favor Leghorn and whenever commerce shall be gain open, this place must have infinite advantages from the protection of the new sovereign. 45 Naples and Sicily During the period of his consulship in Livorno, Appleton's concerns ranged far more broadly than merely the region of Tuscany. Indeed, in a letter to Madison in June 1802 he singled out Naples and Sicily as two places where American commerce was likely to be fruitful: My motive in this detail is to show you the extent of the commerce and the resources which Italy offers - Naples from its various manufactures would become nearly as beneficial as Leghorn were the advantages as generally known, though most assuredly not a third part of the number of American ships have hither to entered that port. The island of Sicily likewise offers a variety of productions suitable to the American market. In 1733 King Philip V of Spain installed his son Charles, the Duke of Parma, as King of the United Kingdom of Naples and Sicily. When Charles inherited the Spanish throne from his older half-brother in 1759, he left Naples and Sicily to his son, Ferdinand IV. 46 The United States established consular relations with the Kingdom of Naples through the appointment of John S.M. "Ibid. 45

Ibid.

•""Despite the two kingdoms having a single ruler from 1735, they remained constitutionally separate in a personal union under the Bourbon kings until 1806.

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Mathieu, a Frenchman resident in Naples, as consular agent of the United States on 20 May 1796.47 From the beginning, controversy surrounded Mathieu's appointment. A series of letters from Boston-based merchants M. Dogen, Sam Helles and the company of Andrews and Belknap to Secretary of State Pickering expressed concern about Mathieu's character and his ability to advance American interests in southern Italy. According to these men, Mathieu lacked the "necessary knowledge of the country and its productions" to properly support American commerce at Naples. Nonetheless, Mathieu assumed his post in the summer of 1796 and began a terse, but regular, correspondence with Washington.48 In his reports to Secretary of State Mathieu he listed the arrival and departure of American vessels that entered the port of Naples every six months and provided briefs on the political and military situation in southern Italy. In late 1798 Ferdinand was expelled from the mainland by French Revolutionary forces and fled to Sicily. According to Mathieu, this event had a negative effect on trade with Naples because the presence of French troops stifled traffic between the port and the countryside.49 The next year a counter-revolution inspired by the clergy destroyed the short-lived "Parthenopaean Republic," allowing King Ferdinand to return to his capital. The return of the Bourbon monarch revived commerce, and the number of American vessels trading at Naples increased. The growing presence of American merchants at Naples also meant more work for Mathieu: there were sick sailors to look after, port regulations to translate, introductions to make, favours to curry and cargoes to list. According to American merchants trading at Naples, Mathieu failed to perform the duties expected of his office. On 1 September 1803 thirty-two men, including prominent New England merchants such as John Prince and Elias Hashmet Derby of Salem, John Belknap and Stephen Gorham of Boston, and John Harod of Newburyport signed a petition calling for Mathieu's dismissal. Complaints against him included "negligence, rudeness of manner and corruption." Mathieu nonetheless maintained his post for another five years. 50 Between 1801 and his eventual replacement in 1806, Mathieu recorded the movement of American and other vessels in and around the port of Naples and noted his own efforts to improve the commercial prospects for American merchants. Like Appleton in Leghorn, Mathieu's correspondence describes the difficulties American vessels faced as representatives of a new 47 NARA, State Department Papers, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Naples, 1793-1906, reel 1. 48

Ibid.

i9

Ibid.

*>Ibid.

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and largely unknown nation trading in the competitive arena of Italian ports. His dispatches show that local health codes were as much of a hurdle to American crews and cargoes at Naples as they were in Tuscany. For example, in February 1804 Mathieu complained to Secretary of State John Marshall that an outbreak of yellow fever in Malaga, believed to have been brought to that port by an American vessel, had alarmed the Neapolitan health office to the point that it would not receive ships coming from the southern United States, and even those from the northern states were subject to a twenty-one-day quarantine. Mathieu closed his letter with a postscript that explained, "in this very moment I have received advice that Government here has sent orders to Sicily to admit no American ships whatsoever coming form Philadelphia or other southern states because the Masters of Ships, knowing that there the Health Office was more indulgent than here, used to touch there before coming to this Port." In response to this situation, Mathieu requested official assurances about the climate and health of American cities, which he promised to translate into French and Italian and share with the port authorities.51 While Mathieu did take note of American clashes with Barbary corsairs, his observations of naval activity in the months leading up to the American war with Tripoli were understated. A letter of 25 September 1804 illustrates the limited extent of Mathieu's intelligence gathering operations at this time: Commodore Preble has fixed his head quarters at Syracuse in Sicily. I often forward dispatches to him which are sent for same. I have nothing material to advise him from here, though I am happy to hear that Congress is come to the resolution of sending a superior force into these seas, to awe the vile Powers of Barbary into a sense of justice and humanity... We have no well-founded news in this place, only that many Russian troops from the Black Sea came into the Ionian Islands last month.52 In 1805 King Ferdinand's decision to ally with the Third Coalition against Napoleon proved damaging. In 1806, following his victory over the allied armies at Austerlitz, Napoleon installed his brother, Joseph, as King of Naples. When Joseph was sent off to Spain two years later, he was replaced by Napoleon's sister, Caroline, and his brother-in-law, Marshal Joachim Murat. The United States Department of State decided that Mathieu's ties to the Bourbon court would not aid American interests under the new French regime. The 5i

Ibid. 59

Ibid.

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result was that on 17 December 1805 Fredrick Dogen, an American naval agent already resident in Italy, was appointed the new consul at Naples.53 In April 1806 Dogen wrote to Secretary Madison that his official commission had not yet arrived but that he had nonetheless proceeded to take up the duties of the office. His report included an update of the political situation in the Kingdom of Naples upon his arrival: "The fate of this kingdom is already decided by the Emperor of the French - Prince Joseph Bonaparte will soon be crowned as king of Naples - he is at present in Calabria where it is presumed he will treat with the late King for the cession of Sicily. This county is now entirely occupied by the French forces." 54 In June Dogen informed Madison that "I have the honor to acquaint your Excellency that Mr. John Mathieu has officially resigned to me and delivered me the Seal of Consular Office of the United States of America...our port continues to be closely blockaded by a strong English squadron, and the fortress of Gaeta still holds out - the English continue to garrison Sicily." Since February 1802 American interests in Sicily had been represented by the consul Joseph Barnes. Barnes' slim correspondence indicates that there was little American activity in Sicily prior to 1804. Barnes appears to have got on favourably with the Bourbon court in exile at Palermo and championed commercial relations between the United States and Sicily. In a letter in June 1803, Barnes remarked: As the commerce of the Untied States will now become an object of great importance in the Mediterranean, Adriatic and Levant, I need only remind Mr. Jefferson, that should the powers suggested in my post& M. Jay be sent out, I would pledge myself that we shall obtain in those ports of the globe much more preponderance than we have reason to export: The two great powers who could interrupt or frustrate our views being engaged in war, we should seize the moment and extend our influence to the utmost. The British are in possession of Sicily, and the French of Naples; we should avail ourselves of their influence and power, and the imbecility of the Neapolitan government, as far as expediency will admit, to effect our objects.55 To promote American interests in southern Italy, Barnes added that "to obtain the signature as far as concerns the Kingdom of Naples, a little bribery may be "Ibid. *Ibid. *>Ibid.

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required. I would trust to M. Jefferson on seeing the advantages to reimburse me should occasion arise. " 56 Barnes' correspondence shows that he was an ardent admirer of Sicilian products. He was particularly fond of Sicilian wines, and recommended them eagerly to President Jefferson: It helps to have the wine bottled, corked and stored horizontally in cases - it is unquestionably the best and surest means of preserving the wine. Therefore should Mr. Jefferson approve of this wine, a regular supply may be got every year from the same house...57 Despite his efforts to win favour with the Administration, President Jefferson asked for Barnes' resignation in March 1805. While the reasons for his dismissal are unclear, they may have stemmed from his frequent absences from his post. Between 1802 and 1805 Barnes sent consular dispatches from Paris, Leghorn, Malta and Marseilles, and only once from Sicily itself. The result was that on 20 March Jefferson appointed Abraham Gibbs and John Broadbent as consuls at the Sicilian cities of Palermo and Messina, respectively; the Senate confirmed these appointments on 3 January 1806.58 In November 1806, Gibbs and Broadbent expanded American representation in Italy by appointing three new consular agents around the island: "Mr. William Woodhouse for Marsala and Mazzara, Mr. Ignario Maria Polizzi for Trapani; Mr. Gaetano Maria Sterlini for Girgenti., and Mr. Constantine S. Rafineque a long time resident in America, as Chancellor of this Consulate." 59 As at Tuscany, the escalation of war between France and England throughout the next two years created a volatile situation for American vessels trading with southern Italy. Between 1807 and 1812 the Napoleonic regime promulgated a series of decrees authorizing the seizure and confiscation of American ships purported to be carrying English goods into Neapolitan waters. In July 1807 Consul Dogen reported the capture of the brig Fitz William of Boston by a Neapolitan gunboat as it made its way to Naples from Leghorn through the port of Messina. In a letter to Madison he announced that "These proceedings will put a momentary stop to all of our commerce in this country. Our communications with Sicily continue to be entirely interrupted as

56

lbid.

51

Ibid.

5

*Ibid.

59

Ibid.

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the insurrections in some of the provinces have not yet ceased port." 60 Dogen's predictions proved correct - on 31 March 1809 Joachim Murat, Napoleon's appointed King in Naples, declared that his government would not molest ships of neutral nations bringing certain articles to Naples.61 On 30 June Murat decreed that American vessels in particular would be exempt from the laws of blockade and could freely import the articles mentioned in his previous order. 62 Yet on 12 March of the following year, Murat issued a decree confiscating thirty American vessels and their cargoes valued at over two million dollars.63 Over the next twenty-five years these confiscations were a major point of tension between the United States and the rulers of the regime that replaced Murat in 1816 in what became the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. This dispute was finally resolved in favour of the American claimants through an agreement signed by Secretary of State John Forsyth and Chevalier Dominico Morelli, His Sicilian Majesty's Consul-General to the United States on 26 December 1835.64 Despite these hostilities, Gibbs' and Broadbent's records indicate that American trade continued throughout the period of Napoleonic rule in Naples. In fact, commerce in and out of Sicilian ports does not appear to have stopped during the years of the embargo: Gibbs' and Broadbent's reports show that American vessels continued to move goods from Palermo and Messina to other points around the Mediterranean in 1808 and 1809.65 In the following years American success at Palermo and Messina would continue, and by the 1820s M

Ibid.

61

An order-in-council dated 26 April 1809 accepted the condition. The approved items were, rice, staves, Peruvian bark, Georgia and Louisiana cotton, coffee and sugar. K

To make certain of the American response, on 1 July he caused his Secretary of Foreign Affairs, Gallo, to address an official letter to Fredrick Dogen, the American consul in Naples. This concession encouraged American businessmen to resume trading with Naples since "it was declared to be the intention of His Majesty, as a general measure, freely to admit American vessels coming directly into his port." Dogen promptly forwarded the invitation to American shipping concerns. 63

Cited in John Bassen Moore, History and Digest of the International Arbitrations to which the United States Has Been a Party, Vol. 5 (Washington, DC, 1898), 4575-4586. "The agreement appears in The Statutes at Large of the United States, Vol. 3 (Boston, 1846), 680. 22

NARA, State Department Papers, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Leghorn, 1793-1906, reel 1.

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and 1830s Sicily supplied Boston and Salem merchants with the bulk of the oranges, lemons and nuts they imported into the United States. 66 Sadly, the times were not as kind to Abraham Gibbs, who in July 1816 committed suicide in Palermo. A letter to Secretary of State James Monroe from Gibbs' assistant, Andrew Anzon, described the circumstances of his death: As acting Vice Consul of the United States I consider it a duty incumbent on one in such capacity to communicate to you the suicide of the late consul at this city Abram Gibbs esq. On the Morning of the 16th Just he was found shot with a pistol by his own hand. On his desk was found a note in his proper hand writing of the tenor following: "I have been so indulgent to those who have been ungrateful to me and the real state of my affairs I have not be able to discover till now, four the multiplicity there of - I was in hopes of repairing my loses; I cannot pardon myself, nor do I find myself able to remain another moment in existence." 67 Preliminary Conclusions The political world that American consuls and other diplomatic officials entered as they took up their various posts in Italy was complex and was subject to frequent changes in regime, personnel and policy. From Napoleon's first invasion of the peninsula in 1796 through the Restoration in 1815, the various Italian states were ruled by a range of regimes that instituted diverse governments that presided over an often-changing set of political borders. Whether operating in the Republic of Genoa, the Gran Ducato di Toscana, the Kingdom of Naples or the various Napoleonic regimes up and down the peninsula between 1796 and 1814, American agents formed alliances, curried favour and carried out the day-to-day work of promoting the interests of the United States within the complex matrix of Italian politics. The overriding mission of the American consuls in Italy was to promote commerce, and they were successful enough that American imports and exports grew during these years. Moreover, the consuls comprised a valuable network for gathering and transmitting vital information on the political, economic and military affairs of the peninsula, as well as the wider Mediterranean region. At other times, they served as key conduits for negotiating the use of Italian places as bases for staging military actions in defence of United States "Ibid. 59

Ibid.

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economic interests around the Mediterranean littoral, as was the case during the American war with Tripoli. Numerous less momentous matters - such as the rescue and support of stranded, abandoned, distressed or imprisoned American seamen and travellers - also required constant attention. As the sole American officials in residence at the international ports that made up the young Republic's growing system of overseas trade, consuls stood at the centre of the complex networks of personal obligation and political alliance that defined American interests abroad. 68 While not a high-intensity duty during the years prior to the Congress of Vienna, after the cessation of the Napoleonic wars American tourists began to flock to the Italian states, and problems arising in connection with many commercial, diplomatic and personal matters increasingly occupied the attention of American chargés d'affairs and consuls. In sum, this examination of United States consular dispatches from Italy bears witness to the complex social and political worlds occupied by American consuls in Italy between 1790 and 1815. In so doing, it provides a window into how the consuls forged and orchestrated local, national and international networks linking state policies with the everyday interactions of Americans and others on the Italian Peninsula and its offshore islands. Nonetheless, the findings should be treated as suggestive rather than conclusive of the multiple ways in which American consuls helped forge the political, social and economic networks that brought together the lives of Americans, Italians and others throughout the Mediterranean at the turn of the nineteenth century. Only through further study of the rich documentation left by United States consular officials during this period will the mutual influence of Americans and Italians upon each others' social, cultural, political and economic development be more fully assessed. Such a project would examine the relationships formed by disparate peoples living, working and travelling in Italian lands in the decades leading up to the period of Italian unification (1861-1871). It would explore how peoples' lives, activities and ideas moved above, below, through and around the American nation-state and the sovereignties of the various Italian states, sometimes intersecting with and overlapping those entities, and at other times moving on different planes. It is toward the facilitation of this larger project that the present study has aimed.

^Between 1780 and 1820 the number of diplomatic posts grew from four to seven. During the same period, the number of consular posts went from three to eightythree - in 1790 there were ten; 1800 there were fifty-two; and in 1810 there were sixty. A table charting the number of diplomatic and consular posts between 1790 and 2007 can be found at www. state .go v/r/pa/ho/faq/#origins.

Old and New Republics: Diplomatic Relations between the Republic of Genoa and the United States of America Pierangelo Castagneto

After the signing in 1783 of the Treaty of Paris, the Continental Congress intensified its efforts to negotiate treaties of amity and commerce with the major European states. In May 1784 a special commission comprised of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams was appointed to carry out this mission. The Ministers Plenipotentiary met in Paris and began to contact the diplomatic representatives of various European countries, submitting to each the general form of a proposed treaty.1 None of the Italian states they consulted - the Reign of the two Sicilies, the Reign of Sardinia, the Papal States, the Grand Duchy of Tuscany and the Republic of Venice - responded positively to the American offer. 2 Although the Republic of Genoa, like the other Italian states, did not reach an agreement, it moved on its own initiative. In fact, just before the three American ministers had officially submitted their proposal, the Serenissimi entrusted Cristoforo Vincenzo Spinola, the Genoese Minister in Paris, with the task of sounding out Franklin on the possibility of dispatching "a consul or an agent to Boston who would assist as far as possible in all circumstances the ships arriving and trading to the [United] States of America." 3 On 13 September 1784 Franklin replied to Spinola, informing him that 'The proposal was also addressed to the representatives of the Barbary powers: Algeria, Tunis and Morocco, as well as to the Sublime Port. 2

See Dante Visconti, Le origini degli Stati Uniti d'America e l'Italia (Padova, 1940); Howard R. Marraro, Relazioni fra l'Italia e gli Stati Uniti (Roma, 1954); Nino Cortese, "Le prime relazioni tra gli Stati Uniti d'America e gli Stati Italiani," Rassegna Storica del Risorgimento, LVIII (1971), 3-20; Luca Codignola, "Religione e affari tra Italia e Stati Uniti, 1785-1847: alla ricerca dei Filicchi," Il Veltro, XXXVI, Nos. 1-2 (1992); and Raffaele della Vecchia, "Il dibattito sull'istituzione di un consolato degli Stati Uniti a Napoli alla fine del Settecento (1783-1796)," in Daniel Spikes (ed.), Stati Uniti a Napoli: Rapporti consolari (1796-1996) (Napoli, 1996), 23-37. 'Archivio di Stato di Genova (ASG), Archivio Segreto (AS) 2259, Cristoforo Vincenzo Spinola (Parigi) to Serenissimi, 6 September 1784.

101

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Castagneto

previous to the appointment of a Consul, some convention will be necessary, that may ascertain his powers, privileges, and that such a convention will most naturally follow a Treaty of Amity and Commerce; we take this occasion to inf o r m you of our having full powers for making such Treaties; and that we are willing and ready to enter into a negotiation for that purpose with the Most Serene Government of Genoa, whenever it shall be to them agreeable. 4 Based on Franklin's favourable response, 5 and on the grounds of the treaties previously signed by the United States with France (1778), Holland (1782) Sweden (1783), as well as that signed between the Republic of Genoa and Denmark (1756), 6 in the spring of 1785 he drafted a Progetto di Trattato d'Amicizia, Commercio, e di Navigazione fra la Serenissima Repubblica di Genova e i Stati Uniti dell'America Settentrionale [Project of a Treaty of Amity, Trade and Navigation between the Most Serene Republic of Genoa and the United States of North America]. 7 In this document Spinola was concerned i The Diplomatic Correspondence of the United States of America, from the Signing of the Definitive Treaty of Peace, September 10, 1783, to the Adoption of the Constitution, March 4, 1789 (3 vols., Washington, DC, 1833-1834), I, 506-507. 5

ASG, AS 2259, Spinola (Parigi) to Serenissimi, 13 September 1784. "Mr. Franklin replied to me that he was persuaded not only of desire of the Republic and of the interest of the United States that he represented, but also of the cooperation that they [the US] will not fail to provide in choosing a consul who would reside in Genoa." This and all other translations are by the author. 6 Ibid., Spinola to Serenissimi, 7 March 1785. "I believe that for the moment I cannot better reply to the just attentions of the Serenissimi with regard to these objects that by recalling the expedition I took the liberty to undertake in July 1783 of a book in French that Mr. Franklin had given me entitled Constitutions des treize Etats Units del'Amerique in which one can find the treaties of amity and commerce that the United States have ratified with France, Holland and Sweden." 1 Ibid., AS 2760 A. "The Most Serene Republic of Genoa and the Thirteen United States of North America, that is New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, the Counties of New Castle, Kent, and Sussex on the Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, sincerely wishing to establish a permanent and solid amity and a perfect intelligence, have judged it necessary in order to obtain such a desirable goal to settle in a stable and equitable manner the rules which should serve as method for the correspondence and trade that the two parties have judged necessary to settle between their respective countries, States, subjects and inhabitants. The Most Serene Republic of Genoa and the Thirteen United States believed that they could no better comply to this object than by establishing as basis of their measures the equality and most perfect

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mainly that the articles matched "the constitutions of both countries and for the common advantage of their respective subjects" and that nothing should "be prejudicial to these public customs, and contrary to the general rules of this free port." 8 Notwithstanding the mutual good will, even this well-intentioned attempt failed to produce positive results, and Genoa, like the other Italian states, did not reach a settlement with the American Ministers. We can only speculate on the reasons for this - perhaps it was Franklin's departure or the growing threat of the Barbary pirates to American vessels in the Mediterranean; more likely, as in the case of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, it simply proved impossible to reach an agreement on specific clauses in the treaty. But the prospect of concluding a treaty did not vanish; indeed, only a few years later the occasion arose to establish diplomatic relations between the two republics. A key participant was the young merchant Giuseppe Ravara, who at the end of 1790 arrived in Madrid from Philadelphia, where he had made his mark at Willing, Morris and Company, one of the most important American commercial enterprises. From Madrid, Ravara sent an offer to fill the post of consul for the Republic of Genoa in the United States.9 In February 1791 the Serenissimi, "wishing that our subjects, merchants and others of our nation who trade and work in the city of Philadelphia, and particularly captains and shipowners of our flag who might show up there, to be helped, protected and defended," granted him the consular patent for a term of ten years.10 Ravara, who was officially received by President George Washington on 1 November 1791, became the first Italian consul in the United States." In the seven years that he actually served, he sent only thirteen dispatches to Genoa,

reciprocity, avoiding all onerous preferences which are generally a source of discussions, embarrassment and dissatisfaction, and leaving to each party the liberty to establish the inner rules concerning trade and shipping that they will judge it most proper." s

Ibid., AS 2259, Spinola (Parigi) to Serenissimi, 21 March 1785.

9 On Ravara, see Salvatore Rotta, "La corrispondenza di Giuseppe Ravara, console generale della Repubblica di Genova presso gli Stati Uniti (1791-1797)," Italia e America dal Settecento all'età dell'imperialismo (Venezia, 1976), 169-217. 10

u

ASG, Giunta di Marina 12.

Ibid., AS 2707, Giuseppe Ravara (Philadelphia) to Serenissimi, 2 November 1791. "Yesterday, 1st of November, at 3 p.m., I was introduced to General Washington, President of the United States, by the Secretary of State and was received with pleasure and consideration...The President with his pleasant natural gravity asked me various questions on our Most Serene Republic and I answered briefly. As he knew I had been in Peru and China, he asked a few superficial questions on those countries."

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Castagneto

yet all of them are full of detailed information about the political life of a country he considered to be "troppo felice" ["too happy]." 1 2 Unfortunately, Ravara's diplomatic mission in the United States had some negative aspects. In M a y 1793 he was arrested in Philadelphia and accused of having written some blackmail letters to George H a m m o n d , the British Ambassador to the United States, threatening him with death if he did not pay the sum of $200. T h e case aroused American public opinion. A careful examination of the documents from his trial seems to suggest that the Genoese consul, an ardent Jacobin with many friends among the DemocraticRepublicans, was framed. 1 3 A plot was organized by some figures close to the Federalist camp to discredit the young man f r o m across the ocean. A year later, when his trial ended in a conviction, Ravara was sentenced to six months in prison. But on the day that the sentence was handed down, he was pardoned by President Washington due to "sentiments of respects for the said Republic of Genoa, and f r o m other good causes and considerations," in the words of the presidential pardon. 1 4 Despite this controversial 12

Ravara took the occasion to explain the significant transformations which had taken place in the American constitutional system; ibid., Ravara (Philadelphia) to Serenissimi, 16 October 1791. "Under the past constitution, the power of the Congress was so limited that it was not even authorized to levy taxes, so that the national debt remained for thirteen years without enough provisions to pay the interests, which provoked a drop in public credit. The new Constitution made known the necessity of providing more energy to the legislative and executives departments of the Congress, which provoked a complete change of the ancient system, by which the different States have individually kept the power which they judged essential to their own particular interest such as they conceived it." The Genoese consul was not only a brilliant observer of American political life; this is the description of the celebration of Columbus Day, on occasion of the third centenary of the discovery of America: ibid., Ravara (Philadelphia) to Serenissimi, 20 November 1792. "I visited the North and the South and I found myself in New York on the anniversary of the celebration of Christopher Columbus, where the Genoese flag was raised and tribute was paid to the coat of arms of a nation which gave birth to such a famous man. Such a day was marked in Philadelphia and in many other parts of the Union with signs of joy and affection." "According to article III, section II of the US Constitution, the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court was extended to all cases "affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls." Because of his diplomatic status, Ravara was tried by the US Supreme Court, at that time presided over by John Jay. In the evolving American party system, the Democratic-Republicans were coalescing around Thomas Jefferson, while Alexander Hamilton, Washington's Secretary of the Treasury, was the titular leader of the Federalists. '"United States, National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD (NARA), Record Group (RG) 59, State Department, General Records, copies of Presidential Pardons, 1794-1893.

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episode, during those years the American Congress continued to consider sending an envoy to Genoa. This intention became manifest when Gaetano Drago, a Genoese merchant with economic interests in Liverpool, Amsterdam and Boston, indicated a willingness to lend his mercantile experience to the service of the United States by becoming consul for the "Thirteen United Provinces, the Republican constitution of which has so much analogy with our republicks [sic]." To make his case, he first wrote several letters to Congress and later to both Washington and Jefferson. 15 In December 1796 Secretary of State Timothy Pickering answered one of the letters Drago had sent to Thomas Jefferson, dated more than three years earlier (11 March 1793), in which the Genoese had reiterated his desire to be appointed Consul of the United States to the Republic of Genoa. Pickering on the one hand acknowledged "the utility of the appointment of a Consul in that city to the citizens of the United States trading in Italy" without forgetting, on the other hand, that "the precarious footing on which our commerce in the Mediterranean has rested for several years, and the unsettled condition of our negotiations with the Barbary powers have hitherto forbid any solicitude on our part to make such consular establishments." Nevertheless, he continued, "our prospects are now brightened, and we hope consular appointments will soon become necessary in the great Italian ports, and among them in Genoa." In addition, the Secretary urged Drago to "transmit letters to this department from gentlemen whose characters are known among us recommending your appointment: for instance Mr. Filicchi, our Consul at Leghorn, Mr. Cathalan, our Consul at Marseilles, Mr. Montgomery our Consul at Alicante, or from other persons of reputation known in the United States." Pickering coldly concluded by notifying Drago that "you mention Mr. Ravara, residing here, as your friend: but I am sorry Sir, to inform you that his own reputation has not been so supported as to render his recommendation of sufficient weight to ensure an appointment. " 16

"Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, George Washington Papers, series 7, Applications for Office, 1789-1796, Gaetano Drago (Genoa) to Congress, 4 May 1789. Drago wrote that "I make bold to expose my humble petition for said place, which I could wish to obtain not only for the natural inclination that I have to serve, well understood without any view of interest, your new rising republic as also because I am sensible that the establishment here of a representative would contribute to the advancement of its commerce without reckoning those of the negotiations so familiar to this place, and the probability of making a truce with the Barbary Regencies by means of a contribution far inferior to the advantages that would accrue from free navigation." I6

NARA, RG 59, State Department, Central Files, Diplomatic and Consular Instructions of the Department of State, 1791-1801, microfilm M-28, roll 3, Timothy Pickering (Philadelphia) to Drago, 7 December 1796.

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Nothing else is known about the fortunes of Drago, but what we do know is that the intent expressed by Pickering would soon bear fruit. In his last correspondence on 23 May 1797 Ravara, who was leaving his office, expressed his belief that "by now, the American Consul at our Most Serene Republic, a certain Child, has certainly arrived." 17 Despite his optimism, the Serenissimi would wait in vain for Francis Childs, the first American Consul who was appointed, according to the official documents, on 27 February 1797. Indeed, Childs would never come to Genoa.18 A fairly invisible man - his name is absent from the compendious Dictionary of American Biography Childs moved from his native Philadelphia to New York, where in 1785 he became the printer of the Daily Advertiser, one of the three Federalist-leaning newspapers in whose pages Madison, Hamilton and Jay published some of the famous eighty-five articles, signed with the pseudonym "Publius," which soon became known as the Federalist Papers. Little else is known about him: at the time of his consular appointment he was "residing in Europe," in England according to the Executive Journal of the United States Senate. In 1789 he was entrusted by Congress with printing the Laws and Journals of the United States. After his first ill-fated diplomatic office in Genoa, he served later as government agent in France and Germany, and he died in 1830 in Burlington, Vermont.19 The reasons for Childs' non-arrival may be reasonably inferred; it almost certainly had to do with the fall of the aristocratic Republic of Genoa as a consequence of the Montebello Convention (5-6 June 1797) and the subsequent formation of a provisional government, clearly inspired by the French Directory. This understandably caused some indecision and likely persuaded the United States government to take some time to evaluate the evolution of the Ligurian political situation before sending a diplomatic representative.20 Furthermore, after the Jay Treaty (1794), which marked a reconciliation between the United States and Great Britain, and because of the famous diplomatic scandal known as the "XYZ Affair," which in 1798 called into question the Franco-American treaties of 1778, relations between the United States and France progressively deteriorated, pushing the two countries into a state of 17

ASG, AS 2707, Ravara (Philadelphia) to Serenissimi, 23 May 1797.

18

NARA, US Consuls-Genoa, microfilm M-587, roll 8.

I9

0n Childs, see James B. Childs, "'Disappeared in the Wings of Oblivion:' The Story of the United States House of Representatives Printed Documents at the First Session of the First Congress, New York, 1789," Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America, LVIII (1964), 91-100. 20 See Giovanni Assereto, La Repubblica Ligure: Lotte politiche e problemi finanziari (1797-1799) (Torino, 1975).

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semi-belligerence. It is likely that this political uncertainty persuaded the American government to modify its choice: instead of a diplomatic envoy sent directly from the United States who would likely be ineffective in such a chaotic situation, following the usual practice of the time it placed its confidence in an individual who was already in residence. In this context, it is easier to understand the selection of Frederick Hyde Wollaston as consul. Wollaston, a British citizen, had been living in Genoa and engaging in commercial activities there since the early 1780s. His official appointment as consul dated back to 10 July 1797, but he almost certainly did not assume his office until the following year. 21 The first dispatch in the National Archives sent by Wollaston to the government in Philadelphia bears the date 2 March 1799, but its contents suggest that the consul actually was performing his duties in early January of the same year. Given that for logistic reasons several months normally elapsed between the official appointment and the effective installation of a consul, and that war and communication difficulties might have delayed matters even further, it can be reasonably assumed that Wollaston had started to fulfil his consular functions sometime during 1798.22 A letter from Wollaston to Lord Hawkesbury, the British Chancellor of the Exchequer, dated 12 July 1802, seems to confirm this. "When in 1796, I made application," he wrote from Genoa, "to my Lord Grenville to replace him [John Brame, at that time in office as British Consul in Genoa] but being unsuccessful, I went shortly after to America where I was appointed by John Adams Esq. to the consulate of the United States at Genoa, and [I] returned here early in 1798."23 It is certain that Genoa was the third Italian city to host an American consulate, after Leghorn (Philip Filicchi was appointed on 10 December 1794) and Naples (John Matthew was appointed on 20 May 1796). Like Francis Childs, the biographical data on Frederick Hyde Wollaston are scarce. The son of Francis Wollaston, an Anglican minister and a Fellow of the Royal Society (elected for his research in astronomy), he did not inherit the devotion to the natural sciences which made his two brothers, Francis John and William Wollaston, celebrities; instead, he preferred to devote his energy to commerce. His choice of venue was Genoa, and in two different years (1787 and 1799) his 21

NARA, US Consuls-Genoa, microfilm M-587, roll 8.

n

Ibid., Consular Dispatches from Genoa, 1799-1906 (CDG), microfilm T-64, roll 1, Frederick Hyde Wollaston (Genoa) to Department of State, 2 March 1799: "I enclose a copy of my respects 6 Jan[uary] and have now the pleasure to inform you that on the 31 January the first American ship arrived here that has come to this port since my arrival." "Great Britain, National Archives (TNA/PRO), Foreign Office (FO), Wollaston (Genoa) to Lord Hawkesbury, 12 July 1802.

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name, together with that of another brother, appears among the foreign tenants of warehouses of the Genoese Portofranco. As consul, between his appointment and 1803, the year he was replaced, there are ten official dispatches and a few other writings at the National Archives. In addition, there are several letters in the State Archive of Genoa on various topics addressed to representatives of the Ligurian Republic. In the three dispatches sent to the American government in 1799, Wollaston offered an accurate description of the situation in Genoa, reporting that the city and its port were "totally under the control of the French." But he also informed his government that there had been no manifestations of hostility towards him and that, on the contrary, members of the Ligurian government had expressed "the greatest desire to see the trade with U.S. increase here." Although he was still not formally accredited, the Genoese allowed him "to act in every respect in the capacity of consul. " To confirm the favourable disposition of his hosts, Wollaston did not encounter any difficulties in providing the necessary papers to the captain of the American ship Hunter, which arrived in the port from New York at the end of January 1799 and was ready to depart in the spring of that year.25 Notwithstanding these positive signs, Wollaston expressed some anxiety about receiving his credentials from the American government, although he confirmed his willingness to remain in office regardless of what transpired. "I have no doubt of being treated with respect as no change can take place by which I can be considered individually in a more inimical light than at present arising to my being a native of Great Britain." In any case, Wallaston explicitly expressed his desire to be naturalized, trusting that "being employed in a publick [sic] capacity in the service of the United States will be considered by the laws as equivalent to a personal residence. " 26 The delay in forwarding his credentials was overcome by a decree of the Directory of the Republic on 10 May 1799 which officially recognized Wollaston "as consul for the United States in the port of Genoa and its districts." This reassured him, especially in light of the imminent siege of the city by Austrian troops:

24

0n Francis Wollaston, see Dictionary of National Biography, XVII, 778-

779. "We have more detailed information on this vessel from Wollaston's note. Hunter arrived in Genoa from New York on 31 January and cleared on 29 May 1799. Its capacity was 340 tons, and its inward cargo consisted of whale oil and logwood, while the outward cargo comprised wine, silk and brandy. NARA, CDG, Wollaston (Genoa) to Department of State, 2 March 1799. 26

Ibid.

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I am the more pleased at this resolution of this Government as the late successes of the Austrian armies against the French have given serious cause of alarm in this city, detachments of Austrian troops having appeared within 12 miles of the town and have met no resistance whatever and the French have drawn off not only their own garrison but also the whole of the regulars of this Republick [sic] to defend Alexandria, in so much that the town being guarded solely by inexperienced militiamen, the Directory Councils I am credibly informed have resolved in case the Austro Russians come down in any force to surrender without resistance and I understand a deputation is already appointed to that effect.27 On the other hand, in his last dispatch of 1799 Wollaston did not give too much credit to a victory by the French army: We are here again in the very same precarious state when I addressed you in May. The French who had rallied their army tho' small has taken some advantageous posts in the line of mountains that back this state and had begun to act offensively in the plains of Lombardy, but the far superior numbers of the Austro Russians have beat them on all quarters and they are now retreating to their former strongholds with far inferior forces and it appears very doubtful if they will be able to maintain themselves there, there being great prospect of thus being cut off by the Austrians by land and the British Squad of 34 sail by sea which is cruising in this Gulf to intercept the French convoy with provisions of which we are here very short.28 At the end of 1799 Wollaston's pressures for the regularization of his position finally produced results. In a letter dated 20 December, Secretary Pickering informed the Directory of the Ligurian Republic that the President, "by and with the advice and consent of the Senate," had appointed Wollaston "Consul of the Port of Genoa, and its dependencies." Pickering also assured

21

Ibid., Wollaston (Genoa) to Department of State, 18 May 1799.

u

Ibid.,

Wollaston (Genoa) to Department of State, 29 June 1799.

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the Ligurian government that "the United States of America will ever be ready to reciprocate the like good offices to your Republic. " 29 Unfortunately, only one dispatch from 1800 has survived, but its date, 27 June, is significant. Wollaston informed the American government that "this place after two months siege had at last surrendered to the allies who had entered here on the 5th." The heroic resistance of General Massena, however, turned out to be crucial strategically. A few days after the Austro-Russians entered Genoa, the French victory at Marengo reversed the situation; the Austrian troops were "so totally defeated that General Melas the commander in chief was obliged to sign a capitulation." Wollaston considered these events important enough to send a message by courier to Rufus King, the American Minister Plenipotentiary in London, and the three commissioners dispatched to Paris by President Adams to attempt to restore amicable relations with France (a goal ultimately achieved with the Treaty of Morfontaine on 30 September 1800). Even in a time of great turmoil Wollaston did not neglect to remind his superiors of the difficulties caused by not having his formal credentials, especially when after the return of the French a new government was "about to be established."30 Indeed, with the arrival from Paris of the French Minister Plenipotentiary Dejan, who was instructed by Napoleon to reorganize the institutions of the Republic, Genoa virtually lost its political autonomy. Meanwhile, Wollaston rejoiced at the Franco-American agreement and forwarded the news to Citizen Bartolomeo Boccardi, the Minister of Foreign Affairs for the Ligurian Republic, expressing the hope that the renewed stability of Franco-American relations might "consolidate even more the links which have to bind our two Republics."31 It was perhaps no coincidence that at the end of 1800 Wollaston's long battle for accreditation was successful. In one of the last acts of his presidency, John Adams on 8 November signed Wollaston's official appointment to the Genoese consulship.32 During the two and half years in which Wollaston filled his consular office, assisted by his vice consul, the Englishman Joseph Walsh, he carried on routine duties, mostly concerning the presence in the port of American ships. He did so in an atmosphere marked by the "most amicable disposition on the part of this Government to the United States." In July 1802 Wollaston proudly described his activities. "I have been a constant resident here," he wrote, 29

Ibid., Pickering (Philadelphia) to Citizen Directors of the Ligurian Republic, 20 December 1799. 30

Ibid., Wollaston (Genoa) to Department of State, 27 June 1800.

31

ASG, AS 2951, Wollaston (Genoa) to Bartolomeo Boccardi, 7 November

1800. 11

Ibid., AS 2798 B.

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"even since thro' out all the political changes and disasters, and altho' I have brought a quite new branch of trade to this port by the importation of 67 cargoes of East and West India produce in 2 years under the American flag which was not known here before." The ending of the naval blockade of Genoa and the establishment of "a regular form of government here" in the wake of the Peace of Amiens signed between France and England in March 1802 meant for Wollaston the prospects of new commercial openings. As a result, Wollaston offered his services to his mother country as British consul in the port of Genoa, a position that had been vacated de facto after "the British consul [John Brame]" had been "attacked with the palsy." 33 In addition to the unstable political situation in Europe, the persistent threat from the Barbary pirates to the navigation and maritime trade in the Mediterranean remained for the American government a question of the utmost gravity. In February 1800 Wollaston, in a letter addressed to Gio Batta Rossi, Chargé of Foreign Relations for the Ligurian Republic, referred to "the imminence of a breaking-off between the Pasha of that Regency [Tripoli] and the United States as a result of certain unjust and humiliating pretentions for a nation which is [as] free as our one." 34 A year later the American consul again informed Rossi that all the efforts had turned out in vain, and that the Regency of Tripoli had officially declared war on the United States.35 In another dis33

TNA/PRO, FO, Wollaston (Genoa) to Lord Hawkesbury, 12 July 1802.

^ASG, AS 2953, Wollaston (Genoa) to Rossi, 14 February 1800. i5 Ibid., Wollaston (Genoa) to Rossi, 18 April 1801. In the first months of the year the situation deteriorated rapidly: "I had the honour to inform you in my circular letters of November 1800 and 3 January 1801 of the state of our affairs with this Regency. I have now to add that all hope of accommodation has subsided. I therefore request you to detain all merchant vessels navigating under the flag of the United States in port, and by no means to permit any of them to sail, unless they are under convoy, as I am convinced that the Bashaw of Tripoli will commence hostilities against the United States of America in less than sixty days from the date hereof and I am persuaded he has made his demands upon the United States for no other reason than to have an unjust excuse for capturing our vessels and enslaving our fellow citizens, they being of such a nature that none but the President of the United States, and with the consent of the Senate, can agree to; and I having offered him the sum of thirty thousand dollars merely to state his demands, and to wait until answers arrive from the President which he has refused to accept, is sufficient proof that his intentions are as I have stated them, and dictates the necessity of taking every precaution in order to prevent our vessels from falling into their hands. James Leander Catheart, Chancery of the United States of America at Tripoli in Barbary 21 February 1801." (Ibid., "Circular to All Agents and Consuls of the United States of America Residing in the Different Ports of France, Spain and Portugal, Italy and Barbary States, and British Garrisons in the Mediterranean and Others Whom it Doth, or May Concern"). Wollaston added that a naval squadron of seven ships, armed with 106 cannons and manned by 850 men,

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Pierangelo Castagneto

patch, dated 10 June 1801, Wollaston suggested that "a very small squadron well commanded would suffice not only to scour these seas of those pirates" but also would oblige them to look for a rapid conclusion to the conflict, "which would be of most essential consequence to the trade of U.S. by keeping the other Barbarian Potentates in aide." 36 Jefferson's show of military force in opposing the pirates produced some immediate results, but when in October 1803 the United States suffered the humiliating loss of the frigate Philadelphia and the capture of its captain and crew, the situation again became critical. Ironically, only a few days before that dramatic event Wollaston had drawn up a detailed aide-memoire in which he proposed a plan for intervention that he believed would have won the support of the Ligurian Republic. The growing presence of the United States in "all quarters of the globe and in particular in the Mediterranean," wrote Wollaston, seems to render it worthy of the solicitude of Congress to form a treaty of amity and commerce with the Grand Seigneur of the Ottoman Empire which would pave the way to a very considerable and advantageous branch of trade to the Levant and would at the same time greatly contribute to the stability and permanence of peace with the several Barbary States which have been hitherto a great barrier to the extending traffic to those ports.37 In one of his last dispatches Wollaston, referring to a decree of the Ligurian Senate prohibiting entry into the ports of the Republic "of all goods the produce of England and her Colonies," made his economic difficulties known with great regret. "Several considerable losses" had obliged him and his partner in trade "to declare a state of bankruptcy about two months ago." would be sent (ibid., Wollaston [Genoa] to Rossi, 6 June 1801). When Jefferson became President in 1801 he refused to accede to Tripoli's demands for an immediate payment of $225,000 and annual payments of $25,000. Yussif Karamanli, the Pasha of Tripoli, then declared war on the United States. Although as Secretary of State and Vice President he had opposed developing an American navy capable of anything more than coastal defence, Jefferson dispatched a squadron of naval vessels to the Mediterranean. As he declared in his first annual message to Congress: "To this state of general peace with which we have been blessed, only one exception exists. Tripoli, the least considerable of the Barbary States, had come forward with demands unfounded either in right or in compact, and had permitted itself to denounce war, on our failure to comply before a given day. The style of the demand admitted but one answer. I sent a small squadron of frigates into the Mediterranean." 36

NARA, CDG, Wollaston (Genoa) to Department of State, 10 June 1801.

Ibid., Wollaston (Genoa) to Department of State, 8 October 1803.

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Hoping for a rapid solution to his personal difficulties, the consul feared that some "invidious people" might take advantage of the situation to promote their own candidature to succeed him. "I am the more desirous of retaining my post," wrote Wollaston, reminding his government that he was "well acquainted with this place and its resources by 18 years residence." Regardless, he felt compelled to ask for a leave "to visit the United States to setüe some claims and see my friends there for the promotion of trade to this country." 38 Unfortunately for Wollaston, his concerns fell on deaf ears, and in November 1803 the American government decided to replace him with John M. Goetschius. This was not a propitious decision, since the new consul died in Cádiz in September 1804 of yellow fever. It fell to Wollaston to inform Washington of this incident in his last dispatch on 16 March 1805. Several months later, a new - and for the first time American-born consul, Peter Kuhn, Jr., arrived in Genoa at a time when new political changes were shaping the destiny of the Republic: "I seize this opportunity to advise you," wrote the new consul in May 1805, of the sudden change which is on the point of taking place here since the arrival of the French Emperor at Milan. This Senate was suddenly ordered to assemble last Saturday, when the French Minister residing here presented the Emperor letter requesting that this country should demand to be united to France; the Senate after much debate and unless opposition decreed that the Books be immediately opened for the people to sanction the union, and that all those who did not appear would be supposed as favorable votes.39 Though international events restricted and eventually interrupted any further relationship between the United States and the Genoese Republic, which was shortly to be annexed to the Kingdom of Sardinia after the Congress of Vienna, the establishment of an American diplomatic presence had a lasting significance. After the restoration of peace, American trade in the Mediterranean grew rapidly. The Italian peninsula attracted American economic interests, and the port of Genoa in particular enjoyed a preferential association with the United States.40 While from 1799 to 1820 about 120 American vessels arx

Ibid., Wollaston (Genoa) to Department of State, 25 July 1803.

^Ibid., Peter Kuhn, Jr. (Genoa) to Department of State, 25 May 1805. "°See Rosario Battaglia, "Stelle e Strisce" sotto la Lanterna: Il commercio tra Stati Uniti e Genova dalla seconda presidenza Madison alla guerra civile (Messina, 1999), 37-59; James A. Field, Jr., America and the Mediterranean World, 1776-1882 (Princeton, 1969); and Luigi Bulferetti, "I traffici commerciali tra Genova e gli Stati

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Castagneto

rived in Genoa (see appendix tables 1 and 2), from the 1840s to the outbreak of the Civil War the average rose to about thirty ships per year, peaking at 116 in 1861. Similarly, trade with Genoa grew from about $500,000 in 1820 to more than $5,000,000 in 1861 (see appendix table 3). In short, in the first half of the nineteenth century commerce between Genoa and the United States was reshaped and strengthened, restoring the old link that had connected the Old and the New Worlds, and the Mediterranean with the Atlantic. Appendices Table 1 Arrivals of United States Vessels in Genoa, 1799-1820 Year

No. of US Ships

1799 1800 1801 1802 1803 1804 1805 1806 1807 1808 1809 1810 1811 1812 1813 1814 1815 1816 1817 1818 1819 1820

1 12 19 23 4 1 0 3 9 1 0 3 0 2 0 0 5 5 17 10 2 12

Source:

Tonnage 340 2326 3506 3080 522 170 0 378 1187 152 0 370 0 386 0 0 532 1141 1995 1838 233 3200

Cargo Inward whale oil, logwood tobacco, rum, sugar indigo, coffee Idem., cod, furs Idem., wheat Idem., cod Idem., Boston articles Tobacco, sugar, cod Idem., wax, sarsaparilla cod, rum, cocoa cotton, gum, nankeen, indigo assorted West Indies goods

salted fish rice, books, West Indies goods Idem. fish, rum, sugar, tobacco, cocoa cotton, coffee sugar, nankeen

United States, National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD (NARA), Despatches from United States Consuls in Genoa, 1799-1906, Vol. Ill, Comparative Table of the Commerce of the United States and Genoa from 1799 to 1843.

Uniti d'America agli inizi del Regno di Carlo Alberto," Miscellanea di Storia Ligure, I (1958), 415-435.

Old and New Republics 125

Table 2 Clearances of United States Vessels from Genoa, 1799-1820 Year

No. of Ships

1799 1800 1801 1802 1803 1804 1805 1806 1807 1808 1809 1810 1811 1812 1813 1814 1815 1816 1817 1818 1819 1820

1 12 19 23 4 1 0 3 9 1 0 3 0 2 0 0 5 5 17 10 2 12

Source: See appendix table 1.

Tonnage 340 2326 3506 3080 522 170 0 378 1187 152 0 370 0 386 0 0 532 1141 1995 1838 233 3200

Cargo Outward Wine, brandy, silk paper, white lead, oil, iron Idem., soap, marble Idem., dry goods Idem., wine, vinegar Wine, oil, brandy oil, wine oil, wine, soap, silk hats, capers brandy, wine, silk, hats, oil n.a. dried fruit, oil, wine

dried fruit, wine, oil, silk, shoes in ballast wine, oil, silk Idem. Idem. Wine, oil, glass articles

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Pierangelo

Year 1821 1822 1823 1824 1825 1826 1827 1828 1829 1830 1831 1832 1833 1834 1835 1836 1837 1838 1839 1840 1841 1842 1843 1844 1845 1846 1847 1848 1849 1850 1851 1852 1853 1854 1855 1856 1857 1858 1859 1860 1861 Source:

Castagneto

Table 3 United States Trade with Genoa, 1821-1861 No. of United States United States-Genoese Trade Ships (US dollars) 19 563,500 24 766,169 23 628,927 22 672,829 17 561,108 9 689,150 25 597,063 21 637,000 21 494,114 18 501,800 27 585,604 24 798,200 19 588,700 22 756,124 12 228,900 17 516,700 13 411,300 16 450,600 17 742,050 49 1,545,600 24 849,480 37 1,145,722 28 1,115,545 27 1,088,500 33 1,192,637 36 1,709,400 31 1,890,670 33 1,619,750 37 2,045,100 27 1,438,250 18 1,123,000 37 2,997,552 31 1,716,174 45 1,006,920 21 1,064,469 52 3,926,668 22 3,463,112 41 3,914,365 55 4,349,188 67 6,202,966 116 5,517,803 NARA, Dispatches from United States Consuls in Genoa, 1799-1906, Vols. 1-6, Consular Returns, 1829-1861.

"From the Halls of Montezuma, to the Shores of Tripoli:" Antoine Zuchet and the First Barbary War, 1801-1805 Victor Enthoven

Around 1800 Dutch relations with the Barbary States were generally rather cordial. For instance, the Netherlands had renewed its treaty with Algiers in 1794. Since the 1790s the Dutch Republic had representatives in Tripoli; J.G. Kaupe was first vice-consul, and later consul, between 1796 and 1803. Under his guidance the Treaty of 1728 was renewed in 1802. The Dutch Republic agreed to pay Bashaw

Yusef 80,000 piastres fortes

(piaster or peso).

T h e first

20,000 would be transferred by bill of exchange; the other 60,000 would be shipped from the Netherlands in March of the following year. Furthermore, the Dutch would pay the Bashaw 5000 piastres annually. In return, Dutch mariners would be safeguarded from captivity by the Bashaw's subjects.1 Kaupe left Tripoli early in 1803. He was replaced by chargé d'affaires Antoine Zuchet, an Italian from Livorno who was living in Tripoli. In his corrupted French, Zuchet regularly informed his superiors about affairs in Tripoli. 2 Because no Dutch ships entered Tripoli, Zuchet usually used Maltese vessels to send these letters to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in The Hague. Although Zuchet did not speak Arabic, he was well connected and wrote regularly about 'The Netherlands, Nationaal Archief (NA), Archief van het Ministerie van Buitenlandse Zaken, 1795-1813 (MvBZ), No. 356 (1810), Conventie gesloten te Tripoli, 24 September 1802. The 1728 agreement was a treaty of commerce and amity between the two states. The inhabitants of the two countries would be safeguarded and have equal rights in each other's countries. 2 The correspondence of Antoine Zuchet is preserved in NA, MvBZ, No. 356. The box contains seven folders, labelled 1804-1810. Each letter is dated and numbered, e.g., 1804/21, 22 December 1803. This letter was sent by Zuchet on 22 December 1803; it was the twenty-first letter of 1803 but was actually received in The Hague in 1804. For most letters there is a duplicate and sometimes a third copy. In 1804, Zuchet wrote thirty-six letters, of which only Nos. 17-36 have been preserved, starting with the capture of USS Philadelphia·, for the other years the correspondence is complete. The letters are written in a fair hand, but the French is rather corrupted. A Dutch translation was provided by the Translation Section of the Ministry of Defence (Sectie vertalingen van het Ministerie van Defensie).

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Victor Enthoven

118

the Bashaw's court. 3 His correspondence provides, among other things, a detailed account of the war between the United States and Tripoli. This essay will provide an English-speaking audience access to his unpublished account. Tripoli was nominally under the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire and was known as a "Regency," but in practice it was an independent city state. The Turkish Karamanli family ruled Tripoli from 1711 to 1835. Ahmed Karamanli became caïd (chief) of the city and managed to exploit the unstable conditions to expel the Ottoman rulers in 1711 and to establish effective control over Tripoli. In 1722 the Ottoman government confirmed him as Bashaw (a man of high rank or office). 4 Ahmed eventually extended his rule over the regions of Fezzan and Cyrenaica and increased privateering activities. This brought him into contact with the European maritime powers, which were usually willing to buy him off by paying tribute. He ruled until 1745. Ahmed's son and grandson ruthlessly suppressed all opposition and were also accorded recognition by the Ottomans. During the last years of the eighteenth century, however, internal quarrels paved the way for a temporary restoration of Ottoman rule under Ali Burghal. With Tunisian assistance, the Karamanlis returned to power in 1795, and Yusef Ibn Ali Karamanli (17661838) began his long reign (1795-1832). Yusef restored the family's fortunes and contributed to Tripoli's revival. Like the rulers of Morocco, Algiers and Tunis, he encouraged privateering, particularly against the vessels of smaller powers, including the United States of America. 5 Having lost the protection accorded to British shipping after independence, American ships became exposed to the dangers of the Barbary corsairs. By late 1793 a dozen American ships had been captured, their goods seized and their crews enslaved. Peace treaties with Algiers (1795), Tripoli (1796) and Tunis (1797) followed, and the United States agreed to pay Algiers up to one million dollars per year over the next fifteen years for the safe passage of American ships and the return of hostages. Payments in ransom and tribute to the privateering states amounted to twenty percent of the revenues of the United States government in 1800. 3 0 . Schutte, Repertorium der Nederlandse vertegenwoordigers, residerende in het buitenland, 1584-1810 (The Hague, 1976), 368; and Jacs. Wertheim, Verhandeling over het Nederlandsch consulaatregt (Utrecht, 1851), 80-81.

"Since Arabic lacks a "ρ," the Turkish word pa$a (in English, pasha) was pronounced bashaw on the north coast of Africa. In Ottoman usage, this was the rank of governor. 5

Daniel Panzac, Barbary Corsairs: The End of a Legend, 1800-1820 (Leiden, 2005), 137-139; and Encarta Online Encyclopedia, http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_762508852/karamanli.html, accessed September 2009. Yusef lost his throne in a popular uprising in 1832.

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In 1794 Congress voted to create a navy "adequate for the protection of commerce of the United States against Algerian corsairs." Six frigates were commissioned. This new naval force helped to stiffen American resolve to resist the continuation of tribute payments, an action which led to the First Barbary War in 1801 when Tripoli declared war on the United States by cutting down the flagpole in front of the American Consulate. In response, Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) sent a squadron to defend American interests, and Congress authorized him to instruct the commanders of United States Navy (USN) ships to seize all vessels and goods of the Bashaw of Tripoli and "to cause to be done all such other acts of precaution or hostility as the state of war will justify." On 1 August 1801 the frigate USS Enterprise defeated the fourteen-gun Tripolitan corsair Tripoli after a fierce, but one-sided battle. Jefferson pressed the issue the following year, increasing military forces and deploying many of the USN's best ships to the region throughout 1802. The following year, American naval vessels maintained a blockade of Barbary ports and launched a campaign of raids and attacks against the cities' fleets. This was a major experience for the USN; indeed, the "Marines' Hymn," the official hymn of the United States Marine Corps, explicitly refers to the conflict. One of the most dramatic events occurred in October 1803 when Tripoli's ships were able to capture USS Philadelphia after the frigate ran aground while patrolling Tripoli harbour. 6 This was one of the first major events related by the Dutch chargé d'affaires Zuchet, who witnessed first-hand the ordeal of Philadelphia and its crew. Indeed, the First Barbary War (1801-1805) is a well-documented conflict. For instance, most American naval documents have been published in six volumes, and many of the papers relating to American activities during the conflict have been preserved. 7 But since such accounts were produced by a belligerent, they often reflect some bias. The record of the events provided by Antoine Zuchet therefore offers a welcome corrective. Although Zuchet was not necessarily objective, his letters offered the opinion of a neutral party. Zuchet was a keen observer and felt sorry for the American hostages, but he 6

Frank Lambert, The Barbary Wars: American Independence in the Atlantic World (New York, 2005); Michael B. Oren, Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to the Present (New York, 2007), 51-63; Richard Zacks, The Pirate Coast: Thomas Jefferson, the First Marines and the Secret Mission of 1805 (New York, 2005); Martha Elena Rojas, "'Insults Unpunished:' Barbary Captives, American Slaves, and the Negotiation of Liberty," Early American Studies, I, No. 2 (2003), 159186; Patrick Garrity, "The United States and Barbary Piracy, 1783-1805," Comparative Strategy, XXVI, No. 5 (2007), 395-438; and Julia H. Macleod, "Jefferson and the Navy: A Defense," Huntington Library Quarterly, VIII, No. 2 (1945), 153-206. 7

D.W. Knox (ed.), Naval Documents Related to the United States Wars with the Barbary Powers (6 vols., Washington, DC, 1939-1944).

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did not hesitate to stress what he considered to be mistakes in the choices of American naval officers and American diplomacy: in his eyes, the Americans were rather clumsy, at times a bit naive and certainly incoherent in their actions. At the same time, he was critical of Bashaw Yusef Ibn Ali Karamanli, whom he depicted as a brutal leader whose unpredictable rule reflected the characteristics of a tyrant. Zuchet's Account from Tripoli, 1803-1805 The Philadelphia Affair 1 November 1803:8 ...The American frigate Philadelphia with 42 cannons, under captain Bainbridge, was stranded on a sandbank [Kaliusa Reef]. Yesterday, around the clock of 11, the frigate chased a corsair from Bengazi two miles from the coast. The American ship fired its guns excessively. Around noon the Philadelphia struck a sandbank. Despite the fact that they threw overboard 25 canons and much of the heavy equipment, the ship did not come free. Soon many gunboats left Tripoli to attack the frigate. One gunboat, under the command of the British renegade Murat [forty-two-year-old Peter Lyle from Perth, Scotland] shot down the mizzen mast. After a three hour gunfight the Americans surrendered and 307 sailors were captured... The Americans could have easily carried on fighting. The sea was not choppy...Not a single cannonball had hit the hull of the ship [when they surrendered, none of the crew was injured] and no one of the Barbary ships had dared to approach them. What further proves the misconduct of the Americans is that the ship during that same night floated free without any rescue efforts. 9 This morning, Bashaw Yussef, the ruler of Tripoli, celebrated lavishly this great victory and attributed the victory to the holiness of Allah. The fort and all ships in harbour fired their guns in celebration and the Bashaw's contempt and arrogance grew by the minute...

8

NA, MvBZ, No. 356, 1804/17, 1 November 1803; and Zacks, Pirate Coast,

46-48. 'Captain Bainbridge, commanding officer of USS Philadelphia, was unaware that the ship had struck the reef at low tide; according to Zuchet he could easily have escaped in the dark to Zerbi, a small island owned by the Bey of Tunis, because of the favourable wind. Zuchet suggested that panic must have blinded these people. In his next letter, Zuchet was even more critical of Bainbridge's conduct.

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5 November 1803:10 What I am now about to disclose, the conduct of Captain Bainbridge was even worse than we had reported. All shots from the canons had missed because the ordnance was aiming too high and all projectiles, with one exception, landed on land. When the frigate was stranded on the sandbank, 25 guns were thrown overboard, and at the same time the crew were bracing the sails and the ship was manoeuvred even higher up the shoal. Instead, the crew should have lowered the sails and with the use of the stern anchor they should have warped the ship to deeper water; after all the sea was calm and the bottom sandy. The mizzenmast was not hit by a cannonball; the Americans had felled the mast themselves. Actually, not one cannonball had hit the ship. The fact that the ship, without any help, freed itself from the reef that night, underlines once more the strange behaviour of the Americans; probably they were totally upset. At present the frigate is moored in the harbour and is completely destroyed; the thieves not only have robbed everything, but to get there they had smashed everything. Either to get a quick peace, or to disguise the cunning way the frigate was brought into the harbour, the officers are not allowed out of the house, they are not permitted even to sit on the terrace. The sailors are already condemned to hard labour... 16 November 1803:" The Bashaw has ordered to salvage the canons that were thrown overboard. All guns were salvaged, including some other items. The Bashaw was very pleased with this. I am glad that Captain Bainbridge had a justification for his surrender, the contra keel has been brought to the Arsenal; but what explanation can he give for the surrender without a proper fight? Some consuls, driven by ambition, have asked the Bashaw to allow the officers to leave the house, but the Bashaw was not amused. The Swedish Consul has lowered himself by congratulating the Bashaw with the American misery. I have been neutral. I have not written Captain Bainbridge to show my sympathy. The Bashaw, with whom I have to deal very carefully, is well in-

l0

NA, MvBZ, No. 356, 1804/18, 5 November 1803. Zuchet excused himself for using a host to seal the letter. He sent the letter via Malta and was afraid that the smoke used with sealing wax would disclose the true addressee. "Ibid., 1804/19, 16 November 1803. This letter started by mentioning the Maltese ships trading with Tripoli which Zuchet used to dispatch his letters.

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formed about everything going on here and he probably would have insisted to congratulate him first with his victory, as he called this incident...12 What can the United States of America do in this situation? They can turn to violence, but that will be cosdy without achieving much; the town can be destroyed, but then the 307 prisoners will be abandoned and they will be victimized. On the other hand, if the Americans want to settle the case, it will cost them dear: at least a million Spanish piastres [pesos] in my opinion. After all, the Bashaw has the guideline of what the Portuguese had to pay for their prisoners in Algiers... 22 December 1803:13 ...Two American sailors and one Swedish petty officer of the American frigate Philadelphia have become Muslims. The Swede was a captain of a merchantman who had sold his cargo and vessel in America. He will probably shortly become a captain of one of the corsair ships. The Bashaw will probably sell the frigate soon in order to buy building material (timber)... 20 January 1804:14 ...On the 16th of this month the renegade Murat flew his colours on the former frigate Philadelphia, the ship is renamed God's Present. Everybody wonders why the Bashaw will not partially relieve the harsh conditions of the American prisoners. After four months of imprisonment the officers are not allowed to breathe some fresh air, they have to stay indoors in the house of the Consul, which is not very suited to house some thirty prisoners. I do not see the advantages of such a harsh policy, this treatment will not lead to a favourable peace when negotiations will commence...

l2 An American letter, intercepted by the renegade Murat, made a sad day for Bainbridge and his officers. This letter informed the Bashaw that all the Tripolitans held captive by the Americans were confined in the most appalling conditions and that only death would put them out of their misery. This inflamed the Bashaw, who ordered all the officers to be brought to the warehouse where the rest of the crew was housed. They were not allowed any food or drink. That same evening, Secretary Deghies arranged for the officers to return to their house after Bainbridge had promised to write a letter asking for the release of the Tripolitan prisoners. I have the impression that the intercepted letter was fabricated to intimidate the American prisoners. 13

14

NA, MvBZ, No. 356, 1804/21, 22 December 1803.

Ibid., 1804/22, 20 January 1804.

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28 February 1804:15 ...The Americans have just partially erased the shame of Captain Bainbridge's easy surrender of the frigate Philadelphia. It was the evening on February 16 around 10 PM that, by a very determined bravery, they burned the frigate that was anchored in the middle of the harbour. Despite all efforts, the Tripolitans could not slow the voracity of the flames, which continued for 36 hours, leaving almost no remnant of the incineration. Into what fits of rage did this gallant enterprise throw the Bashawl It was necessary that this Prince unleash his fury on someone. So it was the poor artillerymen [of the castle cannons] who felt the sad effects of his rage. He beat them upside down and sideways; except those lucky ones who dared to seek refuge in the mosques. The ¿tas/íaw...who had preened over the capture and had expected to use the frigate to lay down the law to the entire universe, was deeply hit by this misfortune; but his political side required him to try to hide his chagrin and he forced himself, as much as he could, to try to show indifference over the loss, saying that it was only a punishment from Heaven and had nothing to do with the valour of his enemies. The American officers who, a few days prior to the burning of the frigate, had been allowed to walk in the countryside...were once again confined in their prison, and their guard was doubled and soldiers were posted on the roof of their building; the Bashaw, still not satisfied with these precautions, commissioned a new prison house built inside his castle; he ordered an iron grill placed at roof level over the [tall] interior courtyard. He apparently fears that, in imitation of Daedalus, they might escape by flying away into the air... Between Negotiation and Warfare 10 May 1804:16 ...The French Commissar Beaussier has been ordered by the First Consul [Napoleon Bonaparte] to negotiate and to end the controversy between the United States of America and the Regency. This letter was handed over by Commodore Preble. The Commissar visited the frigate to receive the letter. It seems as if the Bashaw does not pay much respect to the First Consul's wishes li

Ibid., 1804/23, 28 February 1804; and Zacks, Pirate Coast, 81-82. To erase the disgrace of the capture of Philadelphia, the Americans undertook a daring raid under Lieutenant Stephen Decatur. In the words of Admiral Horatio Nelson, it was "the most bold and daring act of the age." 16

NA, MvBZ, No. 356, 1804/25, 10 May 1804.

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and nothing can distract him from his outrageous demands, because he has the American prisoners. Based on what Commissar Beaussier implies, it seems that the Americans are more concerned in releasing the prisoners than in getting a better relationship with the Regency. The Bashaw, who is rather shrewd, knows the value of this hand and he only will release the prisoners for a peace treaty... 30 June 1804:17 ...On the 13th of this month [June] arrived Commodore Preble, commanderin-chief of the American naval forces in the Mediterranean, with his frigate, before the harbour, to negotiate. The Bashaw was convinced he came to ask for peace; he [the Bashaw] thought by showing indifference he would strengthen his position, and he responded only after two hours of the ship's arrival. Around 11 A.M. a sloop arrived from the frigate with two officers and the former United States Consul at Algiers, Richard O'Brien. The latter was in charge of the negotiations. The Americans were annoyed by the arrogance of the Moorish pilots, who accompanied them. The American sloop was not allowed to set sail and had to maintain a position left aft of the Moorish vessel. After arriving at the palace, they had to wait for over an hour while anchored at some distance from the shore. After sitting for an hour in the scorching sun, only Consul O'Brien was allowed to disembark. After arriving at the palace he had to wait for another hour, without seeing anyone. Eventually Secretary Deghies arrived and listened to his proposals, which he conveyed to the Bashaw. Because of the discrepancy between what was demanded and what was offered, the talks did not take long. Consul O'Brien advocated peace, but the rather modest offer of 40,000 piastres was deemed insufficient and irritated the Bashaw considerably. O'Brien was sent away with the message: if the Americans wanted peace and the prisoners, they had to pay one million piastres as well as two schooners to compensate for the loss of the burned frigate. The moment O'Brien arrived with this response on board the frigate, the flag of truce was lowered and negotiations were terminated. It appears that peace is far away. The United States of America will never comply with such unfavourable terms. The Bashaw, on the other hand, will not forfeit his demands that easily because he has a very useful collateral, unless he is forced to do otherwise because of violence or an uprising from his

"Ibid., 1804/26, 10 June 1804. By that time there were rumours of an American blockade and bombardment. There was a famine, and the people were discontent. In June the Americans blockaded Tripoli, and Zuchet was forced to dispatch his letters via Zerbi. The arrival of Commodore Edward Preble, commander-in-chief in the Mediterranean, is generally perceived as a turning point. Ibid., 1804/27, 30 June 1804.

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people. Not long ago a British ship from Malta arrived with provisions for the officers and summer and winter clothes for the crew. There are rumours that twelve gunboats, bomb vessels and other warships of all sorts and dimensions have arrived at Malta and Syracuse in order to bombard this city. The Bashaw is ready, but what can he put against all this? His artillerymen are not any good. The vicinity of the city is guarded by hordes of Arabs in fear of an attack. I am under the impression that the severe food shortage in the city only will increase. The Bashaw is very firm in his stance against the Americans, but he regrets he did not moderate his demands a bit. But how can his infinite ambitions be reconciled with the self-righteous Americans, who do not want loss of face and at the same time do not want to retreat from such an insignificant stronghold. The Bashaw will be horrified, if the Americans were to win and their example would be followed by others and his weakness would be disclosed... 4 August 1804:18 ...On July 27, in the afternoon, an American fleet, consisting of the frigate Constitution, three schooners, three brigs, six gunboats, two bomb ships and a transport, under the command of Commodore Preble, anchored on the north side of the harbour just outside artillery reach. The Bashaw, in response, has ordered his eighteen sloops to anchor at musket distance from the round fort, which dominates the harbour. Furthermore he has sent reinforcements to the batteries and the Mameluks [military caste] have been ordered to decapitate everybody who abandons his post during battle. To the contention of the Moors a thunderstorm forced the Americans to retreat. They had the impression that the smaller vessels would not survive this God's ordeal and they spread the rumour that many Americans had drowned. On August 3, however, the American fleet reappeared. Immediately the Bashaw did send his ships to the same spot as before. At half past two PM the American ships were in position, at canon shot distance, and the frigate gave the signal for the attack. Three American sloops sailed to the Bashaw's vessels and despite artillery fire from ashore they boarded three vessels. At the same time, American brigs and sloops covered this daring raid. The Americans' valour cannot be praised enough, but they have not profited enough from the chaos to apprehend all the Moors and their vessels. The Moors had panicked and fled in complete disorder towards the harbour. If Commodore Preble had not given the signal for retreat, but had pursued on the attack, with the sloops against the forts until dusk, the Bashaw would have begged for peace. During the fight twelve grenades had been fired, without effect: only three reached the walls, the others plunged into the sea. The Moorish losses were: twenty dead, fourteen l8

NA, MvBZ, No. 356, 1804/29, 4 August 1804.

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wounded, and 56 prisoners. The Americans lost Lieutenant Stephen Decatur and two sailors. On 5 August, Commodore Preble returned the fourteen wounded prisoners via a French privateer, who had left the harbour a day earlier. Preble took the opportunity to present once again the 40,000 piasters peace proposal. He addressed Secretary Deghies whom he offered 10,000 piastres. The Bashaw replied, via the French privateer, that he would never accept such an insult and that he would rather be hit by a canon ball, than to accept. The French Commissar, who had also received a letter from Preble, and who also was instructed by his government to negotiate between the Americans and the Bashaw, tried to convince Commodore Preble that his offer was too low in relation to the Bashaw's bargaining chips [the prisoners]. The next day a vessel with French negotiators on board carried a new proposal from Commodore Preble: 60,000 piastres for the Bashaw, 10,000 piasters for the Secretary, and all Tripolitan prisoners and goods would be returned. The Bashaw declined once again. On 7 August, the American gunboats and bomb ships anchored anew on the western side of the harbour and started to fire on the fort guarding that part of Tripoli. The artillery fired without any effect. This time there were no casualties. On one American sloop some powder ignited. The thirty to forty grenades fired on the city only damaged three to four houses; the majority flew over the city into the sea, while the rest did not explode. The engagement lasted three hours. That same evening a frigate arrived under the command of the young Adams. The Bashaw was disparaging about the engagement: first the grenades where not aimed or had no effect; second he was not concerned about the damages inflicted on his people. His ambitions were blinding him as for the needs of his people. Two days later, the French Commissar started new negotiations. A well-informed and trustworthy person conveyed that the Americans had offered the Bashaw 110,000 piastres and the Secretary 10,000 piastres. The Bashaw was discontent with the offer; his demands are unlimited. Commodore Preble wrote Commissar Beaussier a letter, stating that if the Bashaw declined this offer, he could expect a destructive attack; he [Preble], on the other hand, did not want to shed more blood and he gave the Bashaw another six hours to think it over. The Bashaw decided to stick to his guns and Commodore Preble did not see fit to execute his threat, which harmed his cause deeply. The Bashaw is convinced that Preble does not have sufficient means to force him to comply. Commissar Beaussier suggested that he [the Bashaw] be given 150,000 piastres, but the Bashaw did not give in. I would have given you many more details about the engagement and the manoeuvres of both parties, but that is not possible. The Arabs, who since long occupy this city, do not make a distinction between friend and foe when they are at war with a Christian nation. Everybody clothed as a Christian is despised, and especially when there is some fighting going on, everybody has to hide indoors because of the danger. If I wrote a report based on the Moors'

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statements, it would be very biased. The Americans, who had some successes, would certainly publish it. Despite the fact that the Bashaw is aware of the suffering and discontentment of his people - they cannot farm the land because they have to bear arms - he remains indifferent. He only fears that his weakness and the lack of sufficient combatants will be revealed to the other European powers. He believes they will all then follow the American example and that does not suit his interests. He would like to steal unpunished and be paid handsomely for peace... 27 August 1804:19 On 21 August, the Americans fired some 32 grenades from 2 to 4 AM. No projectile reached the city's walls, despite the fact that the sea was calm and there was a moon. These actions do not contribute to resolve the dispute. At one moment they [the Americans] start fighting, while at the other instant they offer peace. For the Bashaw this proves they want peace, but that they are not able to bring it about. If the Americans want this, they should deploy their forces in such a way as to force the Bashaw to beg for peace. They should not one day act hostile, and the next day try to negotiate. It is clear they are not familiar with the Barbary corsairs' customs... 1 September 1804:20 ...At 4 PM the Americans commenced bombarding the town, raining down eight hundred balls and shells in two hours. The moment the Americans started firing I leaped from my bed in my nightshirt. By what premonition, I don't know, and without stopping, I grabbed my clothes under my arm and left my bedroom. I was halfway down the stairs when a cannon hit the wall in my bedroom and skimmed along my bed to the pillow and then embedded itself in the wall opposite causing more damage...I would have been cut in half. Fifteen other people in town were less lucky and did not survive the bombardment. The next day, the Americans and their inconsequent actions, came to the Bashaw looking if he was interested to conclude a peace and offered him a ,9

Ibid., 1804/30, 27 August 1804.

20

Ibid., 1804/31, 1 September 1804; and Zacks, Pirate Coast, 104-105. Before describing the American attack on Tripoli, Zuchet wrote that the city had become a dangerous place, especially for Christians. He reported the murder of a British merchant and the immediate execution of the murderer. The cause of the assault was unknown to him, but Zuchet suspected that the Bashaw was behind the assassination and that he had asked the British merchant to spy for him in Malta.

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sum of money as tribute. Everybody was astounded by this new approach of Commodore Preble, which only could backfire. Indeed, the Bashaw refused the offer and replied that if the Americans wanted a peace deal, it would cost them 300,000 piastres. I foresee no solution to the conflict in the near future, so we have to brace ourselves for new attacks from Commodore Preble the moment the three frigates arrive which he expects any moment. I am sure that the Bashaw was behind the assassination of the British merchant... 12 October 1804:21 ...On September 2, around 2 PM, Commodore Preble, once again, deployed his forces against Tripoli. Six American gunships chased away eighteen of the Bashaw's sloops and brigs, which retreated under the shelter of the newly erected battery with three guns, some thousand meters west of the "English fort." During this shameful retreat four Moors lost their lives. Commodore Preble stationed two bomb ships north of the city. At the same time, his frigate tacked and fired at the round citadel that guards the harbour. Nobody knows how many shells have been fired, but at least a dozen grenades landed in the city, of which only three exploded, damaging the foundation of three houses. The others landed among the ruins without exploding. Some shells fired by the frigate missed the citadel and hit the City. I do not know the damage they caused, because the Bashaw forbade the Moors to talk about it. The fire fight lasted for two hours. There are rumours that the frigate was heavily damaged and that some eighty Americans had died from attacks by the guns of the round citadel. The Moors boast about their aiming skills. It seems, Commodore Preble had become irritated because of the Bashaw's refusal to sign a peace treaty and that he had wanted revenge. If he had succeeded, nobody would have survived... At 9 P.M. that same Monday, a blaze could be seen between the reefs that frame this port, as if a barrel had caught fire. An explosion was followed by a noise as though several enormous bombs had blown up simultaneously and at the same instant, the air was filled with grenades. The force of this noise was so horrific that it caused the earth to tremble for two kilometres around the city. At first, we didn't know what to make of it all; the next day, we were assured that that it was a small boat that Commodore Preble had tried to slip into the port with the idea, possibly, of destroying all the Bashaw's sloops and gunboats, that were tucked under his castle, as well as to cause the castle to explode in the air. It's impossible to know how the fire got started on the boat which is here dubbed an "Infernal;" apparendy it was accidentally 21 NA, MvBZ, No. 356, 1805/32, 12 October 1804; and Zacks, Pirate Coast, 105. The Americans attacked Tripoli for a third time on 2 September 1804.

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caused by those who guided her. The Bashaw, who went to the spot where the fire was seen in order to try to figure out what had happened, saw there the hulk of the boat sunk to the bottom. The Tripolitans also retrieved 14 dead bodies, including a mutilated one, discovered accidentally along the border of the reefs. The Bashaw ordered all of the bodies to be transported to his arsenal. There, from his balcony, he amused himself by watching his people hurl curses and insults at the corpses. He wanted to share this spectacle with Captain Bainbridge under the pretext of letting him see whether he recognized anyone among the dead. Bainbridge identified an officer [Richard Somers] and begged the Bashaw for permission to bury him in a grave. The request was refused. The remains of these human beings were not buried until after three days later, when the greater part of them had been devoured by dogs. This is what one can expect from a Prince with a character I described earlier. He shows his cruelty: there is always murder, appalling humiliations, and if somebody wants to complain he is beaten with a stick... September 5, the American fleet retreats, leaving behind a frigate and a schooner, blockading the harbour. September 15, three frigates arrive. The blockade is continued by a new frigate and a schooner... There are rumours the Bashaw wants peace with the Americans, and he regrets he has not responded to their many proposals. Maybe at one time he will regret the pretence to look stronger. He is now confronted with insurrections in the province of Derne and Bengazi [Libya]. His coffers are empty, and maybe the Americans can resolve this problem... The people of Tripoli suffer from a severe food shortage. For 2 to 3 days the American sailors are denied their rations, while they have to do hard labour... 16 November 1804:22 ...The Americans are blockading the harbour of Tripoli with two frigates. Despite their visible presence, the Bashaw's corsairs slip away by night. At present three ships are at sea; they are prowling for merchantmen laden with barley and oil to provide this Regency, where those commodities are very pricey at the moment. Despite the poverty and the secession of trade, the Bashaw still resists the Americans, who probably will attack next spring. Large boulders are moved from the city to strengthen the artillery platforms of the citadel and the

22

NA, MvBZ, No. 356, 1805/33, 16 November 1804. Zuchet had been asked to represent the Austrian emperor; Secretary Deghies accepted this without asking for consular presents.

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adjacent battery. He even has sent someone to the Levant to procure artillerymen and gunboats. He is so short of funds he has to fire people... 24 November 1804:23 ...Often the American sailors are starved [because] they do not receive their rations daily. Two of them have paid me a visit. They hail from Amsterdam, which port they had left two years ago. They have begged me for help. On days they did not receive a ration, I have sent each a loaf of bread. I have given them also some clothes. Presumably there is a third Dutchman among the crew, but he has not visited me yet... 28 December 1804:24 ...On 21 December, the wedding of the Bey, the eldest son of the Bashaw, with the daughter of Sidi Ahmed, was celebrated. The following day, the consuls congratulated his Highness the Bashaw and the Bey, but the covetousness of this court is such that they wanted much more than respect; they insisted on luxurious gifts. The ambition, the blind greed of the frustrated Bashaw resulted in a burst of anger and he stated that all Christians were dogs, who gloat over the war with the Americans, but they were his enemies, too, and that they financed this conflict. The Bashaw has announced this nonsense to his people... Despite his problems, the Bashaw remains defiant, and he is only willing to accept a respectable peace: let the Americans send as many frigates as they could, if necessary twenty gun sloops, they will not succeed in getting back their fellow countrymen. In the meantime, the armament of the city is being reinforced. At the same time no action is being taken against the discontented population, exhausted by the protracted war, the result of the unwarranted ambitions of their Lord. This frightened people would already have revolted, if they could... Secretary Deghies has been ill for the past five months, or at least he pretends to be; he receives nobody. Is this part of a policy or a cunning plan? It is assumed, because of the collateral of the officers and men of the Phila23

Ibid., 1805/34, 24 November 1804.

24

Ibid., 1805/36, 28 December 1804. In his letter of 15 December (1805/35), Zuchet mentioned that the Bashaw's constant lack of funds led to a request for the early payment of the annual Dutch tribute. Zuchet also reported that the people in Tripoli still suffered from a lack of food. He also attributed the insubordination of the Bashaw's soldiers to this shortage of money, something which worried Zuchet. The British consul had been beaten by a soldier, but the punishment took some time because the soldiers were the only ones who supported the Bashaw in his struggle against the Americans.

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delphia, that Deghies is the only one who supports the Bashaw in his struggle for a honourable peace... 22 March 1805:25 ...There are rumours, that the President of the United States of America has adopted a plan proposed by ex-Consul William Eaton of Tunis to reinstate on the throne Sidi Ahmed, the oldest brother of the present Bashaw, who was ousted by him. Many resources would have been allocated to this project. I am of the opinion that this plan to expel the present Bashaw is an exaggeration. It is clear that such a project would cost immense sums of money and that the American prisoners in the city would probably pay the ultimate price. On the other hand, the Americans would become the eternal friends of the new Bashaw. However, they would not be safeguarded against the attacks of the other two Regencies. At the moment, the Bashaw takes hostage the children from the provincial governors and other important people to ensure their loyalty... After eight months, Secretary Deghies re-emerged, almost blind, but much friendlier. He stated to be more kindly deposed towards the Dutch... 16 April 1805:26 ...The Bashaw is running out of options in resolving the conflict with the Americans after his refusal last year. He fills the city and the countryside with Arabs; he provides the Levantine soldiers with a lot of money and food; hostages are arriving from the provinces, and he invites their leaders to his table. He visits almost daily the batteries, and he places more guns to protect the harbour. If the Bashaw is forced to leave the city, the American prisoners will be killed. Captain Bainbridge is often threatened in the same manner. Secre25

Ibid., 1805/02, 22 March 1805. Zuchet reported that the Bey, the son of the Bashaw, had tried to commit suicide. Luckily he failed, since otherwise many would have been accused of murder and killed. The Bashaw announced this news and received much sympathy. Zuchet advanced the opinion that the Bey was either insane or could no longer stand the erratic and cruel behaviour of his father. In his first letter in 1805 (7 February) Zuchet reported that a ship from Ragusa had arrived with provisions and worried about the possibility that corsairing might start anew. 26

Ibid., 1805/03, 16 April 1805. In the spring of 1805 the annual tribute of 5000 piastres was due, and Zuchet hoped to receive 5650 pieces of eight from The Hague. Because of the American blockade, however, it was difficult to send money to Tripoli. Since the Bashaw was pressing for early payment, Zuchet borrowed the 5000 piastres from the Jewish banker Leon Farfara, whom the Bashaw would try to poison later that year. Ibid., 1805/11, 9 September 1805.

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tary Deghies urges the Danish Consul to convey these threats to Commodore Samuel Barron [Barron relieved Preble as commander-in-chief in the Mediterranean] in order to persuade him to negotiate and to have peace with the Regency... After an article was published in the Moniteur about the negotiations last year, it seems nobody trusts Commissar Beaussier anymore to reconcile the United States... Lately a ship from Malta arrived with summer clothes for the American prisoners, provisions for the officers, and consular gifts for the British consul, estimated at 4000 pesos. The same source stated that at Malta a ship of the line and a French frigate have arrived, impounded by Admiral Nelson... 8 May 1805:27 ...Despite the fact I never had any problems in this country, and despite the known contemptible behaviour of the Bashaw, I am convinced this is again one of his tricks to show his hatred for the Americans. The incident was witnessed by some people from Malta, in order to spread the rumour that even agents of friendly nations can be victimized... From the Battle of Derne to the Peace Treaty 23 May 1805:28 ...Yesterday there arrived from Derne, after 18 days of passage by camel, dispatches that brought the devastating news to the Bashaw that his brother, Sidi Ahmed, with some 1000 men, infantry and cavalry and 300 Americans commanded by Colonel William Eaton, former US Consul at Tunis, have captured a city in the province of Derne, and that a tribe of Arabs have joined them. This news has produced alarm in the Regency and in the whole country, although the Bashaw deludes himself that his enemies will be soon destroyed by his troops of 5000 soldiers, which is only a little away from Derne. 11 Ibid., 1805/04, 8 May 1805. Zuchet complained about Christian diplomats being insulted and intimidated. He reported that some time earlier he and two others were attacked in the harbour and that a stone had hit his arm. He had asked for the aggressors to be punished, with no result. 2

*Ibid., 1805/05, 23 May 1805; and Zacks, Pirate Coast, 252. The Battle of Derne (April-May 1805) was the turning point in the war. Ex-consul William Eaton and Marine Lieutenant Presley O'Bannon led a mixed force of eight marines and 500 Greek, Arab and Berber mercenaries on a remarkable overland march across the desert from Alexandria to capture the Tripolitan city of Derne. This action was memorialized in the Marines' Hymn: "to the shores of Tripoli."

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Many of the inhabitants of the city who, trying to avoid the bombardment, rented at great expenses villas in the countryside were ordered to return to the city. The Bashaw lavished money and clothes on the Arab tribes camped around the city walls to keep them loyal... 8 June 1805:29 ...Cordial relations between the United States and the Bashaw are recendy restored. On the third day of this month [June] the ensigns on the American frigates were saluted with 21 salvos, [and] the following day that happened again before the Maison Consulaire. Colonel Tobias Lear, US envoy in Algeria, and in charge of the peace negotiations with this Regency, has been admitted to the public audience of the Bashaw. The most striking features of the negotiations are: the American forces will leave the province of Derne; they will try to convince Sidi Ahmed, the Bashaw's brother to retreat to Egypt; the prisoners will be exchanged, with the exception of those who have converted to Islam. The Americans will pay the Bashaw 60,000

pesos.30

How many people must the Bashaw have made discontent with his actions! In the first place himself, the Americans have put a knife to his throat and because they felt sorry for him, they have agreed to pay him 60,000 piastres, half the amount Preble had offered him last year. The Bashaw longed for peace and he believed the Spanish Consul, who is very devoted to him, with his rhetoric skills would convince the Americans to give him large amounts of money. Beaussier, the French Commissar, and Secretary Mohamed Deghies were not informed about this action. The Bashaw had asked the Spanish Consul to find a way for peace, and he had given him a power of attorney sealed with his great seal. Colonel Tobias Lear's frigate arrived in these waters under a flag of truce in the company of a

29

NA, MvBZ, No. 356, 1805/06, 8 June 1805; and Zacks, Pirate Coast, 300.

T h e text of the treaty between Tripoli and the United States of 4 June 1805 is available on the webpage of the Avalon Project, Documents in Law, History and Diplomacy, Yale Law School, http://avalon.law.yale.edu, accessed September 2009. Article 2 states that "[tjhe Bashaw of Tripoli shall deliver up to the American Squadron now off Tripoli, all the Americans in his possession; and all the Subjects of the Bashaw of Tripoli now in the power of the United States of America shall be delivered up to him; and as the number of Americans in possession of the Bashaw of Tripoli amounts to Three Hundred Persons, more or less; and the number of Tripolino Subjects in the power of the Americans to about, One Hundred more or less; The Bashaw of Tripoli shall receive from the United States of America, the sum of Sixty Thousand Dollars, as a payment for the difference between the Prisoners herein mentioned."

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Spanish merchantman. The Spanish Consul immediately boarded the ship and after a short while the deal was done under the above mentioned conditions. The French Commissar was annoyed the Bashaw no longer wanted to use his services. Secretary Deghies was also annoyed, because he was kept out of the negotiations. The spineless Bashaw was intimidated by the threats of the French Commissar and the insolents of his Secretary, and he told the Spanish Consul that at the moment Colonel Lear would get ashore, his services were no longer required. The Danish Consul intervened on behalf of Secretary Deghies. The Americans wanted to get the prisoners on board their frigate before the treaty was signed. They were sent to Syracuse without paying anything... Aftermath 21 June 1805:31 ...The American frigate Constitution arrived with 60,000 piastres and the Tripolitan prisoners 16 June. Captain John Rodgers is commanding officer and he has replaced Samuel Barron, who had a severe liver operation, as commander-in-chief in the Mediterranean. They presented the Bashaw and all the secretaries who had signed the treaty with diamonds, watches, and fabric worth at least 6000 piastres. The ensign of the Constitution was saluted with 21 salvos the day before last. Commodore Rodgers visited the Bashaw yesterday. Colonel Lear, who had conducted the peace negotiations with this Regency, has sailed to Malta, and from there to Algeria. He leaves behind a chargé d'affaires, Dr. John Ridgely, the surgeon of the Philadelphia, a fine gentleman... Commodore Rodger reassured me that, despite the fact the United States of America has now cordial relations with the Barbary states and a period of stability is hoped for, the Americans will maintain armed forces in the Mediterranean, and the warships will show their flag to prevent any harm done to American merchantmen... The Bashaw, much dejected by the unfavourable peace, is afraid the other maritime nations will use the same kind of methods as the Americans. He is aware that the troops he can show are insufficient for his ambitions. These thoughts make him more angry and barbaric. Woe betide the one who will betray him: the slightest error is regarded as lese majesty, and he will execute the punishment himself. Of late, after he had exhausted himself by whipping someone who had used his name in order to buy some wheat, and to vent his rage, he stabbed the man 7 or 8 times in the loins... 31

NA, MvBZ, No. 356, 1805/07, 21 June 1805.

Minorca: The First United States Naval Base in the Mediterranean and the American Consulate at Port Mahon Miquel Ángel Casasnovas Camps

Introduction The port of Mahón1 on the island of Minorca was the first official American naval base in the Mediterranean. Its great natural harbour and strategic position in the western Mediterranean early attracted American attention. As a result, the relationship between Minorca and the United States was intense in the nineteenth century, especially until 1876 after which the American consulate at Mahón lost much of its importance. This essay will analyze four basic aspects of this relationship. First, we will present a synthesis of the historical evolution of Minorca in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to contextualize the reasons for American interest. Second, we will look at the United States consulate in Mahón and its functions. Next, we will examine the role of the port of Mahón as an American naval base. Finally, we will evaluate the social, economic, ideological and cultural influence of the American naval presence on the island. Although some works have been written on this subject, the American presence in Minorca is almost unknown in Spain and even on the island itself.2 Indeed, with the notable exception of Admiral Farragut, who is well known, especially in the town of Ciutadella where he is regarded as an illustrious son, the American role has faded into the mists of history. Minorca and Port Mahon until 1850 Minorca is located in the centre of the western Mediterranean at the intersection of maritime routes between Spain and Italy, on one hand, and France and 'Mao in Catalan; Mahón in Spanish. 2 The main works on this subject are Juan Llabrés Bernal, Menorca y la escuadra norteamericana en el siglo pasado, 1825-1830 (Palma de Mallorca, 1971); Thomas F. Glick, "Maó i els Estats Units al segle XIX: tres esbossos per a una historia," Revista de Menorca, No. 80 (1989), 109-141; Deseado Mercadal, El cuerpo consular en Menorca (Ciutadella, 1992); and Miquel À. Limón, "Petjades ianquis a Γ illa de Menorca," Estudis Baleàrics, Nos. 76/77 (2004), 35-43.

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Algeria on the other. It has an area of 700 square kilometres and had a population of about 31,000 in 1800.3 The value of the island lies in the great natural harbour of Mahón, considered one of the best in the Mediterranean. Early American visitors lauded the harbour's virtues.4 Walter Colton, for example, in 1851 provided a very eloquent description of the security of the port: This harbour cuts its narrow way between bold and broken shores for several miles into the island; affording through its whole length a most secure anchorage...Nothing can surpass the sentiment of quietude and security which one feels riding here at anchor, while the chafing ocean is fretting against the rocky barrier without. It is like a sung seat by the side of a cheerful fire in a cold winter's night, while the storm and sleet are diving against your secure casement. 5 In the opinion of Enoch Wines in 1832, "[t]he harbour of Mahon is proverbial for its excellence. Its depth, capaciousness and security must render it equal, if not superior, to any other in the world." 6 Safety, capacity and strategic location explain why Mahón's harbour and indeed the entire island of Minorca was an enclave coveted by the great European powers since the seventeenth century for its commercial and especially its military significance. Indeed, English ships, with the permission of the Spanish government, utilized Mahón as a base from 1663 to 1679.7

3 The 1797 census recorded a population of 30,990, while the 1805 census reported 31,548. These numbers should be increased by perhaps 3000-4000 people since the census did not record the garrison or the numerous temporary residents in Mahón. See Maria Llui'sa Dubon Pretus, "Expansió i recessió demogràfica a Maó, des de 1741 a 1840," Trabajos de Geografia, No. 38 (1984), 27-40.

"For instance, W.F. Lynch, Narrative of the United States Expedition to the River Jordan and the Dead Sea (Philadelphia, 1849), 30, wrote that Mahón was "one of the most secure and spacious harbours in the world." 5

Walter Colton, Ship and Shore, in Madeira, Lisbon and the Mediterranean (New York, 1851), 199. The port of Mahón has a length of 5.5 km. 6

Enoch Cobb Wines, Two Years and a Half in the Navy or Journal of a Cruise in the Mediterranean and Levant, on Board the U.S. Frigate Constellation in the Years 1829, 1830, and 1831 (2 vols., Philadelphia, 1832; reprint, Whitefish, MT, 2007), I, 102. 'Miquel À. Casasnovas, Historia econnòmica de Menorca: La transformació d'una economia insular (1300-2000) (Palma de Mallorca, 2005), 288-289.

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During the War of the Spanish Succession Minorca attracted the interest of both France and Great Britain. In September 1708, General Stanhope conquered the island for the Archduke Carlos de Austria, and thereafter the British government manoeuvred to obtain sovereignty over Minorca. By the Treaty of Utrecht, Philip V of Spain was forced to transfer Gibraltar and Minorca to Britain.8 In fact, Britain dominated the island between 1713 and 1782, except for the period of French military occupation during the Seven Years' War (1756-1763).9 The Spaniards re-conquered the island in 1782, and a year later, the Treaty of Versailles returned to Spain full sovereignty over Minorca, although not over Gibraltar.10 The British determined to make the port of Mahón into the base for its Mediterranean fleet and consequently built various infrastructure, including shipyards, hospitals, warehouses and docks. Britain also improved the port's defences, expanding the Castle of San Felipe into one of the main fortresses in the western Mediterranean.11 To guarantee supplies for the garrison and the fleet, the British decreed free trade for all of the island's ports in 1713. Moreover, they encouraged the settlement of traders and sailors of various origins. Thus, many Greeks and Jews, in addition to the English, settled in Mahón with their families. Under British rule, Minorca experienced strong demographic and economic growth. This was more remarkable in Mahón than elsewhere on the island. The Mahón district almost tripled its population from 6431 in 1713 to 17,603 in 1802. Trade and industry also experienced a considerable boost, and the inhabitants developed commercial agriculture to provide wine and fresh vegetables to the garrison and warships that wintered in Mahón. The British occupied Minorca again between 1798 and 1802, but the island finally was returned to Spain in compliance with the Treaty of Amiens. 8

See Micaela Mata, Menorca: Franceses, ingleses y la Guerra de Sucesión, 1705-1713 (Mahón, 1979); and Josep Juan Vidal, La conquesta anglesa i la pèrdua espanyola de Menorca com a conseqiiència de la guerra de Successió a la Corona d'Espanya (Palma de Mallorca, 2008). 'There is abundant literature on eighteenth-century Minorca both in Spanish and Catalan. In Minorca, this period is called "the era of foreign rule." The best overall work in English is Desmond Gregory, Minorca, the Illusory Price: A History of the British Occupations of Minorca between 1708 and 1802 (London, 1990). For a synthesis, see Miquel À. Casasnovas, "The British Presence in Minorca during the Eighteenth Century," in Carmel Vassallo and Michela d'Angelo (eds.), Anglo-Saxons in the Mediterranean: Commerce, Politics and Ideas (XVIl-XX Centuries) (Malta, 2007), 43-62. l0

It is a curious coincidence that Spain recovered its sovereignty over Minorca on the same day that Britain recognized the independence of the United States. "The British in San Felipe spent the huge sum of £1 million sterling between 1709 and 1756. See Casasnovas, Història econòmica de Menorca, 101-102.

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Thereafter, Malta replaced Minorca as the principal British naval base in the Mediterranean. The return of Minorca to Spain may have shifted the island's sovereignty but it did not diminish its importance as a naval base. Similarly, trade continued to be very important, although it experienced significant changes due to the restoration of customs duties by the Spanish government and the fact that Minorcan ships now had to sail under the Spanish flag. Broadly speaking, however, the favourable economic trends continued, with some brief exceptions, during the first two decades of the nineteenth century, even during the Napoleonic wars. Indeed, the war years comprised the "golden age of trade" for Minorcan traders, who now engaged in the import and transport of grain from the eastern Mediterranean.12 The ruin of this once lucrative grain trade combined with a lack of markets for Minorcan products in Spain, which was affected by the consequences of the Napoleonic invasion and the loss of its American empire. The economic crisis deepened after 1830. Many Americans who visited Mahón at this time wrote about the decline that had struck the city and, in general, the entire island. William Lynch, for example, wrote that: The soil is thin, yet exceedingly productive; but so great are the trammels, alike on agriculture, commerce, and every branch of domestic manufacture, that the people are deplorably impoverished. Numerous beggars, and the yet more painful sight of abject poverty peeping from beneath the ragged skirts of pride, everywhere greet the eye. Every day present scenes calculated to make the philosopher moralize and the Christian weep. Alas! Poor Spain!13 More significant was Walter Colton's view: Their poverty is attended by simplicity and self-relying struggle at elevation, which move your heart...It is poverty unrelieved by any of these romantic incidents. It is poverty in a city; in a confined town and among a people whose commerce has been crushed; whose resources have been cut off by a despotism that disgraces the age 14 in 12

For a complete overview of the economic structure of Minorca, see ibid.

"Lynch, Narrative, 31-32. '"Colton visited Minorca shortly after the death of Fernando VII, who had restored the absolutist regime. The transition to a liberal and parliamentary regime was difficult in Spain. In fact, there was a long civil war (1833-1840) between supporters of

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which it is permitted to exist. Mahon, with its due privileges of trade, might be a place of a great enterprise and wealth; but under its present onerous and prohibition restrictions, it is doomed to languish on in a life of hopeless poverty. 15 In these conditions, thousands of Minorcan had to emigrate. Their main destination was Algeria, a territory in the process of conquest and colonization by France since 1830. But many settled instead on the Iberian Peninsula or in Cuba. The population of the island, which had reached 38,285 in 1830, fell to 31,443 in 1845. While the economy recovered slowly after 1850, the engine of economic growth was industry rather than maritime trade. 16 The United States Consulate at Mahón Growing American interest in the Mediterranean created a need for a consular officer in the Balearic Islands. Commodore Dale, the commandant of the Mediterranean Squadron until 1801, suggested the establishment of a consulate at Port Mahon.17 John Martin Baker, an Englishman born on Minorca but an American citizen, in 1802 requested the post of American consul. 18 President Jefferson nominated him consul of the islands of Minorca, Majorca and Ibiza on 4 February 1803.19 Although the consulate was established in Palma de Mallorca, the capital of the archipelago, Baker did not fail to remind the government of Minorca. On 28 November 1803 Baker wrote to James Madison, Jefferson's Secretary of State, extolling the favourable location of Minorca and the advantages of Port Mahon. Among the latter were the naval dockyard (considered one of liberalism and the absolutists who supported the pretender Carlos, brother of the late Ferdinand. "Colton, Ship and Shore, 203-204. "Casasnovas, Historia econòmica de Menorca, 219. "Thomas A. Bryson, Tars, Turks and Tankers: The Role of the United States Navy in the Middle East, 1800-1979 (Metuchen, NJ, 1980), 22. 18 Calendar of the Correspondence of Thomas Jefferson (3 vols., Washington, DC, 1894-1903; reprint, New York, 1970), III, 108, John M. Baker to Thomas Jefferson, 20 August 1802. Baker said explicitly that he was a native of Minorca. He was probably born during British rule (1763-1781). 19

Journal of the Executive Proceedings of the Senate of the United States of America (Washington, DC, 1828), I, 441.

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the best in the Mediterranean), the abundance of fresh and cheap provisions and the ease of loading and unloading ships.20 The new consul was so convinced of the advantages of Mahón that in 1807 he appointed a vice-consul for that city, choosing Jordi Teodor Làdico (1775-1847), a descendant of the Greek colony established in Mahón during British rule (see figure 1).

«

> f

Figure I: Jordi Teodor Làdico, c. 1820 Particular Collection, Mahón.

Source:

The Làdicos came from the island of Cephalonia and within a few decades became wealthy through shipowning and trade. At the beginning of 20

National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD (NARA), UD 689, Consular Papers, Port Mahon, Baker to James Madison, 28 November 1803.

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the nineteenth century Jordi Teodor Làdico was one of the leading merchants and bankers on Minorca. In addition, he possessed various farms. Unlike most members of the Greek community on Minorca, his family had not been expelled by the Spanish in 1781 because they were able to prove that they were Catholics. While it is possible that Làdico and Baker had maintained a good relationship for years, the choice of the former as vice-consul might have been for more practical reasons. First, Làdico knew the island and Mediterranean trade well. Second, he already had experience in similar posts, having served as consul for the Republic of Venice, Russia and the Ottoman Empire, largely because of his Greek origins and commercial ties.21 In the early nineteenth century Minorcan merchants had close trade links with the major ports of the Ottoman Empire, where they loaded wheat that was subsequently sold in Spanish coastal cities. Moreover, the United States wanted to strengthen its relations with Istanbul, a factor which also probably influenced Làdico's appointment. The Làdico family remained linked to the consulate for seventy years until it was finally closed. During the years of his consulship, Baker provided important services to the United States. First, he helped to manage the agreement that allowed the Mediterranean Squadron to winter in Mahón in 1815. Second, he worked to extend to American merchant vessels the trade advantages enjoyed by the British in Spanish ports. In his son's opinion, Baker obtained "what had never before been thought of the right of search in favour of American vessels in the ports of Spain, much to the advantage of the merchant and trader of our country." 22 Finally, from his seat in the Balearics Baker after 1812 also took on the United States consulship in Tarragona. 23 Baker had agents on each island and in Tarragona who became especially important when he was absent. In 1818, for example, while in Washington he reported to the Department of State that his agents were Agustín Opiso in Tarragona, Juan Rius Forteza in Palma, Jordi T. Làdico in Mahón and Miguel Serra in Ibiza.24

21

Mercadal, El cuerpo consular, 26-27. Làdico was the consul for Russia and the Ottoman Empire in the Balearic Islands with a seat in Mahón. 22

Louis Baker, A View of the Commerce of the United States and the Mediterranean Sea-Ports, including the Adriatic and Morea (Philadelphia, 1847; reprint, Whitefish, MT, 2010), 46. 21

The Connecticut Register to the Year of Our Lord 1812 (New London, 1812), 143. Among the consuls in the Spanish dominions appeared the name of John Martin Baker, consul at Tarragona and the isles of Minorca, Mallorca and Ibiza. 24 NARA, UD 689, Consular Papers, Port Mahon, Baker to Department of State, 25 August 1818.

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Làdico also served as the American consul during Baker's absences. When Baker asked to transfer to another post in 1818, Làdico was in line to be his successor. In 1820, when Baker was transferred to Matanzas, Cuba, Secretary of State John Quincy Adams appointed Làdico consul in the Balearics based in Mahón, a post he held until 1834.25 In total, he served the United States for twenty-seven years. Jordi Teodor Làdico's consular period was intense, and it was during these years that the port of Mahón became the base of the United States Mediterranean Squadron. The needs of the American ships that since 1825 had spent many months each year in the port represented an additional workload for the consul. Besides strictly consular functions, Làdico had to pay attention to the supply of American warships during their stay at Minorca. Another important function was supplying the warehouse of the United States Navy (USN) and the naval hospital. Indeed, sometimes Làdico had to advance personal funds to meet the needs of the USN. 26 Moreover, the presence in the port of hundreds or even thousands of sailors, both Americans and those from other countries, was a continual source of problems and conflicts. The consul had to assist American mariners accused by Spanish authorities of causing trouble, either with the islanders or the soldiers of the garrison, along with French sailors or those of other nationalities. American deserters were another major problem for the consul, as many sailors left their ships and roamed the island, sometimes getting into trouble in the process. In 1832, for instance, there were about 150 desertions. Làdico had to negotiate their capture with the Spanish military authorities, and once they were arrested, the consul had to provide assistance while they were incarcerated.27 The Spanish government had built a great lazaretto, which became operational in 1817, at the entrance to Mahón's harbour. Barbary and Levant ships heading to Spanish Mediterranean ports, as well as merchant vessels from America, had to be quarantined there if a contagious illness was reported aboard. Consequently, many American vessels had to stop in Mahón even if their final destination was another Spanish port. Consul Làdico had to assist them and resolve their problems, usually produced by the customs authorities. Since the Spanish government maintained a rigid tariff system to control "Baker continued to serve the American government for the rest of his life. He was in charge of consular representation in several South American cities, including Rio de Janeiro. At the end of his life, he retired to the United States. His vast experience enabled him to write a book on United States commerce in the Mediterranean. Baker must have died in late 1846 or early 1847, for it was his son Louis who published the manuscript (see note 22). 26

21

Glick, "Maó i els Estais Units," 120.

Ibid., 121.

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smuggling and to replenish the depleted coffers of its treasury, it is not surprising that the customs officials were only zealous in their duties. The case of the brig Hyperion illustrates the situation. In 1829 the vessel, with a cargo of colonial produce from Havana, was refused admission into Gibraltar and required to enter quarantine. For this purpose, the captain proceeded to Mahón, where after the quarantine had expired he was refused clearance by the customs officials until he paid the duty of one dollar per ton imposed on foreign vessels. Làdico complained strongly about what he considered an illegal exaction since Hyperion was in transit and its arrival in Mahón should be considered forced. The consul also presented the facts to the State Department, which ordered the United States embassy in Madrid to undertake the necessary steps to obtain repayment of these improperly collected duties.28 Two years earlier, Làdico had informed Henry Clay, the thenSecretary of State that the King of Spain, Fernando VII, intended to remove the duties on American ships if the United States agreed to provide Spanish vessels with a similar exemption.29 When this offer of reciprocity did not lead to a treaty, conflicts with customs continued and even affected the consul personally, despite the fact that Làdico was one of the richest and most influential inhabitants of Mahón.30 In 1834 he had a conflict with the customs over the import of four small boxes containing about 400 ounces of quinine sulphate. This drug came from Marseilles and had arrived in Minorca on board of the American frigate Constitution for the navy's depot in Mahón. When Làdico was charged with defrauding the Spanish government, he sought the intercession of the United States embassy in Madrid and the Department of State. After a few months the conflict was resolved in his favour by a court order. 31 There is no doubt that the United States consulate was a considerable workload for Làdico. Moreover, he retained the consular posts for Russia, the Ottoman Empire and Venice while adding to the list the new kingdom of Greece. In addition, of course, he had to tend to his various business interests. To ease the burden, in 1833 he appointed his eldest son, Spiridion, vice-consul 28

Public Documents Printed by Order of the Senate of the United States (Washington, DC, 1835), I, 13, Department of State to Minister Plenipotentiary to Spain, 10 October 1829. 29

NARA, UD 689/1, Consular Dispatches, Port Mahon, Làdico to Secretary of State, 1 January 1827. ^He was even the mayor of Mahón in 1821. See Miquel À. Limón, Los Làdico de Mahón (Ciutadella, 1992), 18. 31

On this issue, there is an extensive correspondence in the consular papers of Mahón. See also the correspondence between the United States Embassy at Madrid and the Department of State in Public Documents, I, 172-182.

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and justified his decision by the multiplicity of tasks handled by the consulate.32 The historian Thomas F. Glick believes that this overload weakened Làdico's position and led to his replacement by an American diplomat with long experience in Spain.33 On 8 October 1834, shortly after the affair over the quinine sulphate, the State Department appointed Obadiah Rich as the new United States consul.34 Obadiah Rich (1777-1850) was a diplomat and an important bibliophile and bibliographer specializing in Hispanic studies. He had been appointed consul in Valencia in 1816 by President Madison. This was followed in 1823 by his appointment as consul in Madrid and in 1825 as secretary of the American legation. In this latter post Rich negotiated with the Spanish Minister of State, Francisco Cea Bermúdez, on the terms of the use of the port of Mahón by the USN. 35 Rich's consulate coincided with the period of greatest activity by the Mediterranean Squadron in the port of Mahón. The provisioning of naval stores and the care of American warships and their crews provided a substantial amount of work that was not remunerated lavishly. Moreover, the consul had to deal as before with American vessels in quarantine at the lazaretto and the legal defence of sailors accused of various crimes by the Spanish authorities. Rich devoted himself with efficiency and discretion to solving the problems. F.P. Torrey, sailing on USS Ohio has provided a profile of the consul, visited the ship with his family on 6 January 1839 and described Rich as follows: "He is nearly 60 years of age, has a fine countenance. He is said to be very correct in his public transactions. He was considerable business, pawing to our ships laying here and all the stores and public matters for the squadron are under his charge. He is much respected by the citizens of Mahón, both in the private and public character." 36 Despite Torrey's favourable judgement, some American officers stationed in Mahón plotted against Rich and tried to discredit him in Washington. Commodore Isaac Hull had to come to his defence, however, and sent a forceful letter to the Secretary of the Navy, E.G. Badger, defending the consul's 32

NARA, UD 689/1, Consular Dispatches, Port Mahon, Làdico to Department of State, 9 October 1833. 33

Glick, "Maó i els Estats Units," 121.

34

Niles' Weekly Register, 11 October 1834.

"James F. Hopkins (ed.), The Papers of Henry Clay (10 vols., Lexington, KY, 1959-1991), IV, 586. 36 F.P. Torrey, Journal of the Cruise of the United States Ship Ohio, Commodore Isaac Hull, Commander, in the Mediterranean, in the Years 1839, '40, '41 (Boston, 1841), 18.

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competence and honesty.37 But Rich's problems were mainly economic. The limited trade by American ships and the few non-military American residents generated few fees to support the consulate. Indeed, on several occasions Rich complained to Washington about the lack of economic resources. 38 When Rich was finally dismissed it was not because of his enemies but rather due to a Congressional decree in 1845 that those in charge of naval stores had to be naval officers. 39 As a result, Obadiah Rich put the consulate temporarily in charge of his son, James, and left Minorca. James M. Rich, in turn, passed the consulate to Junius J. Boyle, lieutenant in the ship Delaware. The Spanish authorities refused to recognize these changes, however, because they had not been made by "normal" procedures and lacked the approval of the Spanish government. Commodore Joseph Smith wrote to the Secretary of State explaining the situation. In his opinion, it was important to have a civil functionary in Mahón, particularly while the port was used as a depot by the Mediterranean Squadron.40 Junius J. Boyle was never officially appointed consul, although he continued to act as storekeeper of the naval depot until 1846. Instead, on 30 May 1845 Nicholas B. Boyle was appointed consul.41 Three years later, during the Boyle's consulate, Mahón ceased to be the base of the Mediterranean Squadron. The withdrawal of the navy led to a sharp drop in the arrival of American warships. As a result, the consulate experienced a significant decline in its activity. Nonetheless, in 1849 the Làdico family again took over the United States consulate in Mahón. The former consul, Jordi Teodor Làdico, died in 1847, at the age of seventy-two.42 His business and consular representations were then managed by his three sons, Spiridion, Juan and Teodor Antipa, who "Boston Athenaeum, Papers of Isaac Hull, 1810-1842, box 13, Hull to Secretary of the Navy, 10 September 1841. 38

NARA, UD 689/1, Consular Dispatches, Port Mahon, Rich to Secretary of State, 1 July 1843. i9

Ibid., Rich to Secretary of State, 1 March 1845.

'"'Commodore Smith, Frigate Cumberland, Mahón, to Secretary of State, 18 March 1845. 41 Lewis Randolph Hamersly, The Records of Living Officers of the United States Navy and Marine Corps (Philadelphia, 1870), 53; and Joan M. Dixon, National Intelligencer Newspaper Abstracts 1846 (Westminster, MD, 2006), 114. Perhaps the coincidence of surnames confused Glick, "Maó i els Estats Units," 122-123, who considered Junius B. Boyle to have been the authentic Balearic consul from 1845 to 1849. 42

Jordi Teodor Làdico was elected senator of the Kingdom of Spain in 1843.

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created the firm Ládico Hermanos. Because of his previous experience as vice consul, the American government appointed Spiridion as the new consul. Spiridion Làdico held the post until 1862. During his time in office there were no significant changes. Without the presence in port of the Mediterranean Squadron, the workload of the consulate was sporadic and mainly routine. In 1862 another American citizen, Houghton B. Robinson, was appointed consul. That year a major change occurred in the economic rewards of the post, since the consul now received an annual salary of $1500. Robinson remained in charge until 1869, and his reports on the political situation on the island are most interesting. In particular, Consul Robinson was assiduous in reporting on Minorcan opinions on the American Civil War and on the rapidly deteriorating Spanish political situation. According to Robinson's reports, most Minorcans were Confederate sympathizers and were hostile to the Union. He believed that this was because many former Minorcans lived in the Confederate states of Florida and Louisiana, as well as because the Minorcan press was favourable to the Southern cause. Robinson also suggested that this was due to the presence of Southern agents, although he could not identify these individuals.43 Possibly, the consul reported, Southern sympathy also in part reflected Minorcan dependence on raw cotton, which had been imported from the South since 1856 for use by a major textile factory in Mahón. The blockade of Southern ports by the Union Navy had cut the supplies of cotton to Europe, and the factory was forced to replace it by more expensive imports from India. As a result, the factory suffered heavy losses during these years and almost went bankrupt.44 The reaction of Minorcans to President Lincoln's assassination in 1865 was thoroughly reported by Robinson. Many liberal people presented their condolences to the consul. In addition, Robinson sent to Washington a letter signed by a Republican Mallorcan committee called "Democracy in the Balearic Islands" which expressed their solidarity with the dead president and identified him with their cause and the ideal of freedom. 45 In these years the monarchy of Queen Isabel II was in crisis. The Moderate Party and the Liberal Union monopolized power. The Progressive Party and the Democratic Party, which were marginalized, decided to try to overthrow the monarchy in 1866 and to establish a democratic regime. On 18 43

NARA, UD 689/1, Consular Dispatches, Port Mahon, Report from Consul Robinson to Department of State, 30 June 1862; see also Glick, "Maó i els Estats Units," 123-124. ""Carles Manera and Miquel À. Casasnovas, "Crecimiento económico y empresa industrial en Menorca durante la segunda mitad del siglo XIX: El caso de Industrial Mahonesa, S.A," Revista de Historia Industrial, No. 13 (1998), 169. 45

For this letter, see Glick, "Maó i els Estats Units," 140-141.

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September 1868, an important sector of the Spanish army rebelled against the queen and her government, forcing Isabel to seek asylum in France. A provisional government was established in Madrid on 28 September. When Minorca joined the revolution, on 30 September Robinson sent a report to Washington explaining the situation. In the following months he continued sending reports on the political situation to the State Department.46 The final stage of the United States consulate at Mahón was managed by consuls James H. Whallan (1869-1873) and John F. Quarles (1873-1876). During Whallan's term, Teodor Antipa Làdico, the youngest brother of Spiridion and a leader of the Republican Federal Party in Minorca, was appointed vice-consul.47 Teodor A. Làdico was elected a deputy to the Spanish Cortes and was even appointed Minister of the Treasury (Hacienda) in June 1873 by President Francisco Pi y Margall during one of the fleeting governments of the First Spanish Republic.48 Because of this appointment, he had to resign as vice-consul, but an employee of Làdico Hermanos named Josep Montanari was appointed in his stead. The consulate in Mahón remained open during this time primarily for political reasons since trade between the United States and Minorca was scarce and visits by American warships were increasingly sporadic. President Ulysses S. Grant appointed the last American consul at Mahón in 1873. He was a black Republican lawyer from Augusta named John F. Quarles, who held the consulate until 1876. While in Mahón he married Maria Jacqueminot, a daughter of the French consul and granddaughter of Napoleon's Marshal of the same surname.49 The presence of a cònsol negre (black consul) in Mahón did not go unnoticed by Minorcans. Indeed, his skin colour was the cause of an incident in 1875 with the senior officers of the Squadron, who initially refused to accept an invitation to dine with him. In the end, this embarrassing incident was resolved through the initiative of R.S. Franklin, a naval officer who agreed to go to the dinner in uniform and persuaded his companions to do likewise.50 When Rutherford B. Hayes was elected presi^Miquel À. Casasnovas, El Sexenni Revolucionan a Menorca (1868-1874) (Palma de Mallorca, 2001). The period between 1868 and 1874 was characterized by severe political instability. 47 NARA, UD 689, Consular Dispatches, Port Mahon, James H. Whallan to Department of State, 31 October 1871. 48 The United States was the only major country to officially recognize the Spanish Republic after the abdication of King Amadeo I. 49

Brooklyn Daily Eagle, 29 January 1885. Quarles died the day before at the age of thirty-eight. ^Samuel Rhoades Franklin, Memories of a Rear-Admiral who Has Served for more than Haifa Century in the Navy of the United States (New York, 1898), 238-239.

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dent, Quarles was appointed to the consulate at Málaga. 51 Josep Montanari remained as a vice-consul in Mahón until the consular office was finally closed in 1898 during the war between Spain and the United States.52 Base of the Mediterranean Squadron The initial purpose for American warships in the Mediterranean was to protect the country's merchant vessels threatened by the privateers of the Barbary regencies. The refusal of the new president, Thomas Jefferson, to pay to avoid attacks on American ships forced him to maintain a naval force in the Mediterranean to fight the privateers. The pasha of Tripoli declared war on the United States in May 1801, and the regencies of Algiers and Tunis soon joined him. This compelled Jefferson to send a squadron to the Mediterranean to defend the nation's interests. But the American problem was maintaining this fleet in a setting far removed from domestic bases and provisioning and repairing their ships, which depended on the good will of other Mediterranean countries. These difficulties became apparent during the blockade of Tripoli, which culminated in the loss of the frigate Philadelphia in October 1803. The war with Tripoli showed the negative consequences of the lack of a permanent base for American warships in the Mediterranean. At the end of the First Barbary War in June 1805, the United States consul in the Balear ics, John Martin Baker, stressed to his superiors the need to negotiate for the use of the port of Mahón as a naval base because of its favourable location. In 1805 Baker sent the president two panoramic views of the port along with a report on its advantages to arouse his interest. Despite these efforts, American warships continued for some years to patrol the Mediterranean without a fixed naval base. Baker visited Washington in the fall of 1807 and again emphasized the convenience of the port of Mahón as a naval base. 53 During those years, some American warships occasionally did anchor in Mahón, but the French invasion of Spain (1808-1814) and the War of 1812 (1812-1814) prevented the regular use of the port. During these years it was the British Royal Navy which used the port of Mahón as an ally of Spain against a common enemy, Napoleonic France. The end of the Napoleonic wars in 1814, which brought the restoration of King Fernando VII to the Spanish throne, led to negotiations to allow the United States Mediterranean Squadron access to the port of Mahón and its facilities, which in part were inherited from the British. The Second Barbary 51 J. Clay Smith, Jr., Emancipation: The Making of the Black Lawyer, 18441944 (Philadelphia, 1993), 218. 52

Mercadal, El cuerpo consular, 29-30.

53

Limón, "Petjades ianquis," 38; and Bryson, Tars, Turks and Tankers, 22.

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War, this time against Algiers (1812-1815), finally convinced the authorities in Washington of the desirability of having a permanent naval base in the Mediterranean.54 Commodore Stephen Decatur, commanding the Mediterranean Squadron, was most interested in the port of Mahón. On 5 November 1815 the frigate United States, commanded by Captain John Shaw, entered the port of Mahón. 55 The governor of the island and the municipal authorities kindly welcomed the American force, and the crew of United States was allowed to use the port facilities and the arsenal in the following months. United States was the first American warship to winter in the port of Mahón. In 1816, consul Baker informed his superiors in Washington that he had received permission to discharge ammunition and supplies in Mahón in order to provision the sick seamen in the lazaretto.56 Finally, Baker's efforts, initiated in 1803, seemed to have succeeded. Many years thereafter his son recalled that "[injustice to the memory of the late Mr. Baker, it is but fair to state, that in 1815, when the squadron was at Mahón, he did, in conjunction with the late Commodore Shaw, USN, obtain all the advantages and privileges which have been so long enjoyed by our squadron in the Mediterranean." 57 Although the consul's son ignored the important role played by Decatur in Madrid in getting the use of the port facilities in Mahón, Baker could be proud of his accomplishments. Yet this was only a temporary concession, since in court circles in Madrid the American naval presence was viewed with suspicion. Many feared that in the long term Mahón could become a kind of "American Gibraltar." 58 The conflict generated by the support of the Monroe Administration for the Spanish colonies in America in their struggle for independence caused a major diplomatic conflict. In this context, it is understandable that the privileges accorded to American warships in Mahón were affected, and the United States began to look for alternatives to the Minorcan base. As tensions in-

M Many naval historians date the birth of the Mediterranean Squadron from 1815. See Craig L. Symonds and William J. Clipson, The Naval Institute Historical Atlas of the U.S. Navy (Annapolis, 1995; reprint, Annapolis, 2001), 64. 55

The Diari de Mahó, a diary written by the Minorcan merchant captain Joan Roca i Vinent and currendy in the Arxiu Històric de Maó, records the arrival and departure of American vessels in Mahón. "NARA, UD 689/1, Consular Dispatches, Port Mahon, Baker to Department of State, 15 April 1816. "Baker, View of the Commerce, 45. 58

Limón, "Petjades ianquis," 38.

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creased over the Floridas, Commodore Isaac Chauncey was ordered to see if the United States could gain a naval base in the Kingdom of Two Sicilies.59 After 1821, however, the Spanish government's position softened. The United States remained interested in maintaining a base in Mahón, and the secretary of its diplomatic mission in Madrid, Thomas Brent, twice asked the government of Fernando VII to grant the United States the privilege of importing goods for the navy into Mahón without duties. The king assented to the request for a period of six months, although this was renewable. Tensions between the two countries re-emerged in 1822, however, when the United States recognized the independence of the former Spanish colonies. Still, a final agreement was reached in 1825. The official pact concerning Mahón was negotiated between the Spanish Minister of State, Francisco Cea Bermúdez, and the American diplomat Obadiah Rich, the future consul at Mahón. Commodore John Rodgers moved to Madrid to monitor the progress of the negotiations. Rodgers was one of the high officers of the USN who was convinced of the excellent qualities of the port of Mahón as a naval base. 60 The agreement included the establishment of a depot with the right to deposit duty-free food and other supplies for the squadron. The 1825 agreement opened a period of maximum American naval activity on Minorca. The port of Mahón became the Mediterranean base for the USN for more than twenty years. At this time, the Mediterranean Squadron was comprised of a ship-of-the-line as its flagship and a variable number of frigates, corvettes and sloops under the command of a commodore. 61 The ships' crews numbered about 2000 men, a number that was sometimes exceeded. After completing their period of duty in the Mediterranean, the ships were relieved and returned to America. Many of them served in the Mediterranean Squadron in different periods. The Mediterranean Squadron was also permitted to use the facilities of the port of Mahón: the arsenal, hospitals, cemetery and some storehouses. The arsenal was located on the north shore of the port. It had been erected in the eighteenth century by the Royal Navy and was now virtually unused by the Spanish. It was useful for the repair and maintenance of warships and was equipped with a large crane for mounting 59

David F. Long, Gold Braid and Foreign Relations: Diplomatic Activities of U.S. Naval Officers, 1798-1883 (Annapolis, 1988), 178. The Neapolitans rejected any naval concession to the US. ""James A. Field, Jr., America and the Mediterranean (Princeton, 1969), 104-113. 61

World,

1776-1882

Symonds and Clipson, Naval Institute Historical Atlas, 64. Among the list of American ships spending long periods in the port of Mahón were the ships-of-the-line Columbus, Washington, Ohio, Delaware and Franklin, and the frigates United States, Java, Constellation and Constitution.

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masts. For many years the USN used part of the new Spanish lazaretto as a hospital, moving there in 1821 after dismantling its hospital in Pisa. In 1839 the Spanish authorities yielded to the Mediterranean Squadron facilities on Plana Island, located at the site of the old lazaretto which had been built in the eighteenth century. Some renowned American doctors served in these hospitals, including Dr. Jonathan M. Foltz, who became Surgeon General of the USN (1871-1872). Minorcan health auxiliaries worked with these American doctors and surgeons.62 Warehouses which housed the ammunition supply depot were another facility used by the ships of the Mediterranean Squadron. They were in the Illa del Rei, known by the English as "Bloody Island" because they had built their naval hospital there in 1711. These stores were in charge of the consul until 1845, when a naval officer took over. Finally, it was necessary to have a cemetery to bury dead sailors. For many years American sailors were buried in the ruins of the Castle of San Felipe.63 But by 1825 a cemetery was built on the north shore opposite the hospital on Illa del Rei (see figure 2). This cemetery is popularly known today as the Cementen dels Anglesos (English Cemetery), perhaps because supervision over its construction and maintenance was given to the British consul at Mahón. All non-Catholics who died in Mahón in the nineteenth century were buried there, although twenty-eight of the forty-four graves identified were for American sailors.64

Figure 2: "Burial of Adam Gillis, Marine of the US Delaware" (1843) James Map Collection, Mahón.

Source:

"Jonathan M. Foltz, The Endemic Influence of Evil Government, Illustrated in a View of the Climate, Topography and Diseases, of the Island of Minorca (New York, 1843). This work is of great interest for those interested in the status of health on Minorca and among the crews of the Mediterranean Squadron in 1840. 63

At present there are no remains of this cemetery, which had a section for of-

ficers. M

José Luis Terrón, El cementerio anglo-americano en el puerto de Mahón (Mahón, 2006).

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The USN was not the only user of the port of Mahón and its facilities. Other navies, such as the British, French and Dutch,65 in addition to the Spanish, used the port and its facilities more-or-less regularly. The French presence was especially notable: their navy used Port Mahon as an advance base during the conquest of Algiers in 1830 through an agreement with the Spanish government. The French also set up warehouses to supply their warships with necessities, including coal, and used the naval hospital for their sick and wounded. An estimated 2500 French sailors and soldiers were treated at the hospital.66 The activities of the French and the interest of King Louis Philippe's government in consolidating its presence at Mahón raised the suspicions of the British in the 1830s. Indeed, the conversion of Algiers into a French colony heightened the rivalry between France and Britain for the control of the western Mediterranean.67 The British were unwilling to compromise on this point because they believed that the French presence at Mahón was a threat to the stability of the Mediterranean. The Spanish government was also very worried.68 As a result, Britain exerted pressure on Spain to revoke the authorization for the French fleet to use the facilities in the port, and in 1841 the government of General Espartero ordered the French to leave. This decision, however, had the unintended consequence of weakening the American presence on Minorca as well. Paris protested the decision to expel the French while allowing the United States to remain and exerted pressure on the Spanish to also bar American ships. At the same time, relations between the United States and Spain were deteriorating because of the Cuban question.69 In addition, the 65

Antonio Cendán, "La escuadra holandesa en el puerto de Mahón," in El hospital de la isla del Rey del puerto de Mahón (Mahón, 2007), 107-137. "Foltz, Endemic Influence, 28-31, referred largely to the French presence in the port of Mahón. 67

0n the other hand, the French authorities encouraged the mass migration of Minorcans to the new colony of Algeria. Between 1830 and 1850 about 8000 people emigrated, and thousands of French are descendants of these Minorca emigrants. The most famous is probably the writer Albert Camus, whose mother was daughter of Minorcans (her surname was Sintes). ''Foltz, Endemic Influence, 30-31. In Foltz's view, "Various proceedings on the part of the French excited the suspicions of the Spanish government, and it did not escape the observations of that vigilant officer, Colonel Fitzgerald, Her Britannic Majesty's consul at Mahon, that France was looking toward an occupation of this group of islands." 69 According to United States Democratic Review, XXXI, No. 5 (New York, 1852), 455, "[w]e were compelled to leave [Port Mahon] on account of the jealousy of

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Spanish government began to consider building a fortress to defend the entrance to the port of Mahón, a move that was finally undertaken after 1848.70 These circumstances forced the administration of John Tyler to seek a new base for the United States Mediterranean Squadron. Madrid finally revoked the agreement with Washington in 1846. In early 1848 Commodore Read dismantled the base at Port Mahon. 71 In its place, Read managed to negotiate a temporary arrangement to land stores at La Spezia, which became the new Mediterranean base for the USN until 1864. Regardless, the American navy continued to use Port Mahon sporadically as a port of call. In fact, American naval officers had not completely lost interest in Minorca. For instance, during the war between Spain and the United States in 1898, Admiral Bradford suggested the restoration of the naval base at Mahón as one of the conditions that Spain had to accept in case of defeat, but this idea was not included in the subsequent armistice. 72 Impact of the American Presence on Minorca It is clear that the prolonged presence of the Mediterranean Squadron in the port of Mahón had a significant impact in diverse ways. But if this influence was manifest in Mahón and its surroundings (especially in the town of Es Castell, the former British Georgetown), it was much more subdued, or even nonexistent, on the rest of the island. We will emphasize four aspects: social, economic, ideological and cultural. For a city which had fewer than 20,000 inhabitants during the period studied, the regular presence for many months of several American warships with crews of about 2000 could not pass unnoticed. During the long months when the ships of the Mediterranean Squadron were anchored in port, crews sought relaxation and recreation. According to the testimony that many sailors have left in their memoirs, Mahón offered both. The taverns, gambling, theatre and women were the usual sources of pleasure for American sailors. In-

our hosts, which was not to be regretted, and owing to our recent relations with Cuba, could not long have been postponed. By the permission of Charles Albert, we took up quarters in the Bay of Spezia soon after the expulsion from Port Mahon." 70

The result was the great fortress of Isabel II (La Mola). Thus, Spain aimed to ensure sovereignty over Minorca which was threatened, according to the Spanish government, both by France and Great Britain. "Andrew C.A. Jampoler, Sailors in the Holy Land: The 1848 American Expedition to the Dead Sea and the Search for Sodom and Gomorrah (Annapolis, 2005), 73. 72

Glick, "Maó i els Estats Units," 119.

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deed, among the sailors of the Old Navy, Mahón had a reputation as being lively and full of entertainment, so much so that it led to outrage among the more puritanical. Torrey wrote that "[tjhere are a large number of handsome females who are prostitutes - in fact the very air of Mahon is polluted with their depravity and vice." 73 These sentiments were echoed by W.F. Lynch, who described Mahón as [a] place famed for the facilities it presents for acquiring, and the cheapness of indulging low and vicious habits: - famed for the circumstance that the senior officers, and all who can be spared from watch, abandon their ships and reside for months on shore; while many of the young and the inexperienced, and some of their superiors, spend much of their time and all their money in the haunts of the dissipated and the vile. I do not mean to reflect upon the respectable part of the population of Mahon, for there is not a more kind-hearted or gende people in the world. But ignorance of the language compels most of our officers to keep aloof from a society, which, if it does not increase the refinement of their manners, should at least protect them from moral degradation.74 Despite these moralist opinions, most officers and sailors of the Mediterranean Squadron appreciated the port. The officers related to the families of the upper classes of Mahón's society and came to their private parties. Officers also went to dances and evenings of opera at the Teatro Principal.15 In return, Mahón's officials and leading families were invited to dances, some in costume, organized by the commandants of the Mediterranean Squadron on board warships. These dances gained notoriety throughout the Mediterranean. Many American officers brought their families to Mahón while they were stationed in the Mediterranean, while others married Minorcan women. The entertainments and low risk of service in the Mediterranean, usually limited to showing the flag sailing from port to port, led many American officers to consider that to be sent to the Mediterranean Squadron "was simply to be included as a member of a perpetual yachting party." 76

73

Torrey, Journal, 17.

74

Lynch, Narrative, 30.

75 The city has always had a great operatic tradition. In 1829 the Teatro Principal was opened, which today is the oldest opera house in Spain. 76

Cited in Symons and Climpson, Naval Institute Historical Atlas, 64.

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But coexistence was not always so easy. In fact, there were frequent fights and other disturbances caused by American sailors, or clashes with Minorcans, soldiers of the garrison or crews of other foreign navies. Such fights sometimes ended tragically, with men injured or even dead. Samuel F. Holbrook described one such brawl in the so-called "Jackass Tavern," where in October 1842, 125 drunken American sailors clashed with 300 Spanish soldiers. In the melee Midshipman John Smith Patterson lost his life. 77 Sometimes, these troubles were reported in the American press through letters sent to newspapers. Numerous deserters also roamed the countryside and committed theft and other transgressions. This behaviour concerned the American consuls and the commanders of the Mediterranean Squadron, as well as the authorities on the island. Commodore Rodgers, for example, tried to correct this by greatly improving the discipline and moral tone of the Squadron.78 The United States always considered Minorca to be a military enclave, useful for its Mediterranean policy, but never seriously thought to turn the island into one of the cornerstones of its trade with Europe. In fact, trade between Minorca and the United States was quite limited and comprised little more than only imports of cotton from 1856 onwards. 79 Merchantmen arrived to pass the quarantine at the lazaretto rather than to trade with the island. Much more important, of course, was the Squadron's economic impact. Many officers rented houses in Mahón, and supplies were purchased on the island, especially when they were cheaper than imports. Those responsible for the Navy depot also commissioned the manufacture of uniforms and shoes for crews from Minorcan craftsmen. 80 Expenditures by the crews were estimated at approximately $150,000 per year, a tidy sum that was vital during the bitter years of economic and commercial decline. As we have seen, the writings of American sailors described very well the poverty among the population. Therefore, the transfer of the Squadron to La Spezia was much lamented on the island.81 "Samuel F. Holbrook, Threescore Years: An Autobiography (Boston, 1857), 131. Serious incidents also took place between the crew of the American frigate Java and French sailors. This came close to causing a diplomatic incident between the United States and France. See Niles ' Weekly Register, XCXVI, 25 May 1829, 206. 78

Charles Oscar Paullin, Commodore John Rodgers, Captain, Commodore, and Senior Officer of the American Navy, 1773-1838: A Biography (Cleveland, 1910; reprint, New York, 1980), 354. Rodgers considered Mahón a gay and dissolute town. 79

Baker, View of the Commerce, 41.

^Casasnovas, Historia econòmica de Menorca, 214. *'Ibid., note 217, Report by Mahón's Municipality to Queen Isabel II, 20 December 1847.

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Many Minorcans enrolled in warships as waiters, cooks, sailors and musicians. Indeed, some worked for many years in the service of the USN. In 1828, for example, an officer named Downes hired twenty-eight local workers for the frigate Java. This reflects both the lack of work on the island and the job opportunities offered by the USN. Especially important was the number of musicians who signed up to play in bands on the American ships.82 Many Minorcans who served in American warships later immigrated to the United States, and several teachers worked for the USN teaching at the midshipmen's academy during the winter. Some of these people later came to teach in the United States, including Pedro J. Rióla Rodriguez, who became Professor of Mathematics at the Naval Academy in Gosport, Virginia.83 Many officers of the Mediterranean Squadron left their impressions of Mahón in travel books and memoirs. Their interest focussed on the port, town and the surrounding area. These books provide details of life in Minorca between 1815 and 1850 from an American perspective, as well as some insights into the relations between the Mahonese and American sailors. But few of them give us much information on the rest of the island, where US officers apparendy seldom ventured. In addition, we should be cautious about accepting some of his statements, for the authors often observed the Minorcans through very different lenses. For them, Spain was a poor, backward country, where despotism ruled and the Catholic Church was intransigent. Nonetheless, these books helped to raise awareness of Mahón in the United States and are a key source for the history of the Mediterranean Squadron on the island.84 These chronicles also provide some references to the language of the Minorcan people, which was an insular variant of Catalan and which the Americans considered barbaric and incomprehensible. Despite the lengthy period of British rule in the eighteenth century and the prolonged presence of the Mediterranean Squadron, few Minorcans knew English language (or even Spanish). To make matters worse, everything suggests that the ability of ^Deseado Mercada], "Los músicos menorquines," Revista de Menorca, No. 70(1979), 97-118. 83

Nineteenth-century Minorcan emigration to the United States has not yet been studied. M

To books already mentioned we might add John Israel and N. Henry Lundt, Journal of a Cruize in the U.S. Ship Delaware in the Mediterranean, in the Years 1833 and 34 (Mahón, 1835; reprint, New York, 1977); Edgar Stanton Maclay, Reminiscences of the Old Navy, from the Journals and Private Papers of Captain Edward Trechard (New York, 1898; reprint, Whitefish, MT, 2008); Charles Steedman, Memoirs and Correspondence, Rear Admiral, United States Navy, with His Autobiography and Private Journals, 1811-1890 (Cambridge, MA, 1912); Francis Schroeder, Shores of the Mediteranean with Sketches of Travel (2 vols., New York, 1846); and A "Civilian," Sketches of a Naval Ufe (New Haven, 1829). This list is not exhaustive.

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American sailors to communicate with the native population was quite limited, although there were some notable exceptions.85

Figure 3: David Glasgow Farragut, Oil on canvas Saló Gòtic, Ajuntament de Ciutadella de Minorca, n.d.

Source:

85

Some authors state that beggars knew some phrases in broken English with which to beg from the Americans.

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From an ideological perspective, the influence of the men of the Old Navy and the American consuls in Mahón was not inconsequential. Significantly, republicanism and democratic ideals became strongly rooted in Mahón. Although only a minority view, these ideas were important in the eastern part of Minorca from about 1860 when the embryo of the Federal Republican Party was organized, and they became much stronger after the Revolution of 1868. It is no coincidence that one of the party's leaders was Theodore A. Làdico, who was closely linked to the American consulate.86 Such ties deserve further investigation. It should also be possible to link the emergence of Protestantism on Minorca with the substantial American presence. It is not surprising that the first Protestant church in the Balearics, and one of the earliest in Spain, was founded at Mahón. Indeed, Consul Robinson had some difficulties because of his involvement with what some considered "Protestant propaganda." 87 The link to Minorca was sometimes strong enough to influence a subsequent generation, as was the case with Admiral David Glasgow Farragut (see figure 3). Farragut's father, Jordi Ferragut Mesquida (1755-1817), was born in the city of Ciutadella during the period of British rule and immigrated in his youth to the English colonies in America, where for some years he commanded his own merchant vessel in the Caribbean. When the American Revolution broke out, Jordi Ferragut changed his name to George Farragut and joined the rebels, using his little ship to supply the Continental Army with arms and ammunition. He participated at the battle of Savannah, but was taken prisoner in Charleston. Once free, Farragut served in the army and fought in the battles of Cowpens and Wilmington. After the war, he participated in the colonization of Ohio. In 1796 he married Elisabeth Shine and established himself in Knoxville. Later, the family moved to New Orleans. 88 His son, David G. Farragut, wanted to visit the land of his father's birth, so in December 1867, when he commanded the American European Squadron, he and his wife spent several days in Mahón and visited Ciutadella, where he was entertained by large festivities. His eighteen-day stay on the island was a special social event that left a deep impression on the Minorcan people.89 Even today, David

^Casasnovas, El Sexenni Revolucionan,

26.

"Marcelino Menéndez y Pelayo, Historia de los heterodoxos españoles (8 vols., Madrid, 1880-1882; reprint, Barcelona, 2008), VIII, 211. 88 For a profile of George (Jordi) Farragut, see Robert J. Schneller, Jr., Farragut: America's First Admiral (Dulles, VA, 2002), 3-8. 89 There is an American report; see James E. Montgomery, Our Admiral's Flag Abroad: The Cruise of Admiral D.G. Farragut, Commanding the European Squadron in 1867-68, in the Flag-ship Franklin (New York, 1869).

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G. Farragut is considered an "Illustrious Son" of Minorca and Ciutadella, a prestigious distinction provided by the Spanish municipalities. 90 Conclusion The establishment of the US consulate on Minorca was due to the political and military importance of the port of Mahón. The capacity and security of this port, with good facilities largely inherited from the days when the island was a British possession, induced Washington, with the agreement of the Spanish government, to establish the base of the Mediterranean Squadron in Mahón between 1815 and 1848. This base was quite important for the United States and enabled the new republic to have a permanent presence in the Mediterranean. It was also very beneficial to Minorca because it softened conditions during a period of commercial decline and economic crisis. The Mediterranean Squadron only left Mahón due to pressure exerted by the French government and a change of attitude among Spanish rulers. As a result, after 1848 the importance of Minorca to the United States declined, although the consulate remained active until 1876. The influence of the American presence on the social, economic and even ideological and cultural life of Minorca was important, albeit only in Mahón and its surrounding areas. For the marines of the Old Navy, Mahón was their "spiritual home" in the Mediterranean. 91 Still, few elements today reflect the significance of the naval base. The so-called English Cemetery is in fact the only remaining visible material artefact. Contemporary Minorcans are well aware of British rule on the island in the eighteenth century, and the British presence is the subject of a number of historical studies and even tourist attractions. The American presence on the island, however, has thus far not attracted similar historical attention.

'"Florencio Sastre, Fills II lustres de Ciutadella de Menorca (Ciutadella, 2003), 63-70. "Glick, "Maó i els Estats Units," 134.

"The Jeffersonian Idea of National Security" Revisited James R. Sofka

When I first published this research a decade ago the Barbary War was, to put it charitably, an understudied backwater of Jeffersonian scholarship. Indeed, at the time the two main English-language studies of the conflict remained those of Gardner Allen and Raymond Irwin from 1904 and 1931, respectively. Even the publication of virtually all relevant documents from the Navy Department in a six-volume edition at the time of the Second World War provided little temptation for further study. When I checked the volumes out of Alderman Library at the University of Virginia in 1994 I noted from the charge records that some were last taken from the shelves during the administration of Lyndon Johnson. Indeed, the Barbary War remains one of those unusual historiographie cases where the bibliographic record becomes an integral part of the conflict itself, at least from the Jeffersonian side. At the highest level of generality, this is due partly to broad trends in American historiography that emerged in the 1960s and 1970s: less focus on diplomatic and military events, a disinterest in "elite" politics and the workings of statecraft, and a tendency to see American history as separate from contemporary European or Mediterranean experience. More specifically, Jefferson scholars had long been frustrated by the war because it does not mate well with received images of Jefferson's diplomatic conduct as either progressive and enlightened or woefully naïve and short on military power. Dumas Malone granted it but a short and uncomfortable chapter in his massive (and hagiographie) six-volume biography, and in their 1990 overview of Jefferson's foreign policy Robert Tucker and David Hendrickson relegated it to a footnote. Ί thank Silvia Marzagalli for her kind invitation to serve on the organizing committee of this conference. The argumentative substance of this essay was first presented in Diplomatic History, XXI, No. 4 (1997), 519-544. This is an abbreviated and updated version taking into account comments and subsequent contributions to the literature, for all of which I am grateful. I particularly thank Andrew O'Shaughnessy and colleagues at the Robert H. Smith International Center for Jefferson Studies at Monticello for their comments when I was invited to lecture on the Barbary War in July 2004. The case study of the Barbary War forms a chapter of my forthcoming book "A Commerce Which Must be Protected: " The International Policy of Thomas Jefferson, 1785-1809. For reasons of space I have kept the notes largely confined to direct quotation and have excluded long citations of secondary literature.

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For those eager to either praise Jefferson's transcendence of European balance-ofpower politics or critique his insufficiendy muscular statecraft, the Barbaiy War represents a difficult obstacle to navigate. While the war has remained discreedy closeted from broad exposure for the better part of two centuries, the terrorist attacks in the United States on 11 September 2001 fuelled an explosive growth in the literature. Since 2002 several popular books and multiple print and Web-based articles have offered appraisals of what one breathlessly described as "America's First War on Terror." 2 Previously, references to the Barbary War were as infrequent as sightings of comets; now a study of the conflict is part of the History Book Club. As with the earlier tendency to avoid the war, the current fascination with its conduct and implications is understandable but not always salutary. Jefferson certainly used American military power unilaterally to attack regimes preying on American interests. He managed the war as an Executive function and did all he could to keep it shielded from Congressional scrutiny. He sought the overthrow of a North African regime by using the United States Marines and to the end of securing a reliable ally. Moreover, he parlayed the conflict into a signal to European powers that the United States had the ability to project its power into the Mediterranean and would become an independent actor in an area previously considered a French and British sphere of influence. Here, though, the parallels to contemporary politics cease. While the war deserved a modern retelling and was certainly critical to shaping a received image of America in parts of the modern Middle East and North Africa, it remains a creature of the early nineteenth century and requires interpretation as such. Heavily "presentisi" accounts are if anything more worrisome and problematic with the Barbary War than in other cases precisely because of its previous obscurity. The historiographie record is far less known and thus more easily defined by popular analysis. In the American context its recent discoverers are more concerned with the broad contours of American foreign policy than the nature of

2

Joseph Wheelan, Jefferson's War: America's First War on Terror (New York, 2004). The Barbary War became a subject of popular discussion again in the spring of 2009 when Somali pirates seized the captain of an American merchantman. After his rescue by American naval forces and the subsequent deployment of international forces to deter future attacks, immediate comparisons with the Barbary War were offered. Yet, as I develop below, the actors on the receiving end of American firepower from 1801-1805 were states and not "pirates." Pirates are maritime criminals operating independently of state authority; the description was appropriate for the Somali case of 2009. Ironically, the rescue operation was carried out from the deck of USS Bainbridge, a destroyer named after William Bainbridge, the captain of USS Philadelphia, which ran aground off Tripoli in 1803 during Jefferson's war.

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the Napoleonic-era international system,3 a focus that blurs many variables that do not fit with modern politics. The objects of Jefferson's venom were not "terrorists" in the modern sense but state actors, part of a long-standing distribution of power in the Mediterranean region. The power and impact of the United States as a military or cultural force were negligible compared with the present day, and America had no pre-existing alliances in the region (such as the modern ties to Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Israel) that would affect perceptions of its interests. Most critically, it is in my view impossible to understand the war independently of Jefferson's broader economic and political strategies for American diplomacy and their antecedents. Whether the conspicuous ignorance the Barbary War previously received was - at least in the sense of protecting it from being popularly misconstrued as precedent - bliss is a question I will leave to others to decide, but it is clearly ignored no longer. After ten years of ftirther research, I am more convinced than ever that Jefferson's statecraft represented an extension, rather than a repudiation of established patterns of eighteenth-century diplomacy, specifically regarding commerce and its importance as a measure and medium of state power. Jefferson's efforts to protect and expand American commerce - which he saw as the foundation of its evolving position in the international system - led him to adopt policies employed in previous decades by European powers and to harness them to America's advantage. Seen through this lens, the Barbary War was the culmination of a strategy Jefferson had developed as early as the 1780s to protect American shipping and erode the monopolistic trading networks of England and France. Jefferson's formulation of American foreign policy had its genesis in the competitive universe of eighteenth-century international relations and contained three principal goals: securing the nation's trade routes, protecting its rights as a neutral power to undertake commerce between European belligerents, and building a naval force sufficient to defend and advance these commercial interests. Taken together these objectives formed a coherent - if at times ambitious - design for America's role in the international system, and all three were conspicuously evident in the Barbary War. In The Spirit of the Laws, Montesquieu observed that most states "have made commercial interests give way to political interests," while England alone "has always made its political interests give way to the interests of its commerce." 4 He might have said the same about the foreign policy of the United States under Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson's use of commerce as an instrument of foreign policy has long been interpreted as an illustration of his alleged pacifism 'Most notably Robert Kagan, Dangerous Nation: American Foreign Policy from Its Earliest Days to the Dawn of the Twentieth Century (New York, 2007), chap. 4. 4

Charles de Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws (Geneva, 1748; reprint, Cambridge, 1989), 343.

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or as evidence of his commitment to a "republican" diplomacy. In reality, however, Jefferson spoke of commerce in the language of Realpolitik. In what stands as his most systematic exposition of this reasoning - the "Report on the Privileges and Restrictions of the Commerce of the United States," presented to Congress on 16 December 1793 - Jefferson articulated this logic in a manner consistent with prior European practice. "As a branch of industry," he argued, commerce is valuable, but as a resource of defense, essential. Its value, as a branch of industry, is enhanced by the dependence of so many other branches on it. In times of general peace it multiplies competitors for employment in transportation, and so keeps that at its proper level; and in times of war, that is to say, when those nations who may be our principal carriers shall be at war with each other, if we have not within ourselves the means of transportation, our produce must be exported in belligerent vessels at the increased expense of war-freight and insurance, and the articles which will not bear that, must perish on our hands. But it is as a resource of defense that our navigation will admit neither negligence nor forbearance. The position and circumstances of the United States leave them nothing to fear on their land-board, and leave them nothing to desire beyond their present rights. But on their sea-board, they are open to injury, and they have there too, a commerce which must be protected.5 Jefferson recognized that a neutral power dependent on customs duties for a large percentage of its national revenue could not compete in the global system as long as its trade was vulnerable to attack, seizure or prohibitive duties. This, of course, was common wisdom among commercial interests in the eighteenth century - indeed, it was a view so common as to be almost nondescript. Like many of his European contemporaries, Jefferson maintained that the "disposition of wealth" was a decisive, if not dispositive, factor in propelling America's gradual ascent to great-power status, and consequenüy "power" and "wealth" became almost synonymous in his diplomatic vocabulary.6 Having grown to political maturity in an era of incessant Anglo-French competition for American resources, it is not surprising that Jefferson would regard the steady evolution of the United States economy as a source of pride and, more importandy, national power. In his own lifetime England and France had 'Julian P. Boyd, et al. (eds.), The Papers of Thomas Jefferson (36 vols., Princeton, 1950-), XXVII, 575, Final Statement on the "Report on the Privileges and Restrictions of the Commerce of the United States," 16 December 1793. 6 Merrill D. Peterson, "Thomas Jefferson and Commercial Policy, 1783-1793," William and Mary Quarterly, 3id ser., XXII, No. 4 (1965), 585.

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fought three wars for control of the North American continent. In Jefferson's view, this provided ample evidence of America's strategic and commercial importance and led him to estimate that the United States was a significant - indeed, in time of war, critical - component of what he perceived as a tri-polar balance of power based almost exclusively on the medium of commerce, which could be manipulated to serve American ends during an Anglo-French war. Jefferson never ceased to maintain that if America's independence, lucrative resources, and freedom from "entangling alliances" were properly managed, it could not only secure its borders but prosper in a polarized international system. Convinced that North America possessed assets too valuable for the European powers to lose, Jefferson embraced a neutral policy that allowed the United States ample latitude to bargain with belligerent states to gain concessions. Jefferson viewed the transatlantic relationship as a "natural" outgrowth of the eighteenth-century international system, one that could not be disregarded by American politicians preoccupied with partisan and ideological cleavages. While he wistfully longed for a "meridian of partition" between the continents and a "divorce" from Britain and France, he was too aware of the workings of the American economy to consider an autarkic policy seriously. In more thorough analyses Jefferson rejected such thinking as theory only, and a theory which the servants of America are not at liberty to follow. Our people have a decided taste for navigation and commerce. They take this from their mother country: and their servants are in duty bound to calculate all their measures on this datum: we wish to do it by throwing open all the doors of commerce and knocking off its shackles.7 This opinion found popular expression in the slogan "free ships make free goods" that American commercial interests, and Jefferson himself, reiterated from the time of the Revolution to the Peace of Ghent. As Jefferson put it in his Notes on Virginia, this economic philosophy meant "giving perfect freedom to all persons for the vent of whatever they may choose to bring into our ports, and asking the same in theirs." The ocean was "the common property of all" and the medium through and upon which America's wealth was to be increased.8 7

Dickinson W. Adams (ed.), Jefferson's Extracts from the Gospels: "The Philosophy of Jesus" and "The life and Morals of Jesus" (Princeton, 1983), 398, Jefferson to William Short, 4 August 1820; and Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXIX, 448, Jefferson to Elbridge Gerry, 21 June 1797; and VIII, 633, Jefferson to G.K. van Hogendorp, 13 October 1785. 8

Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia (Paris, 1784; reprint, Chapel Hill, NC, 1954), 174; and Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXVII, 575, "Report on Commerce."

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Jefferson believed that as long as Britain and France were at war, the United States could benefit by undertaking a neutral trade direcdy between them and their colonies. The profits to be made in this enterprise, he argued, were potentially enormous. During the Nootka Sound crisis of 1790, when war between Britain, France and Spain seemed likely, Jefferson was exultant. "In that case," he wrote, "I hope the new world will fatten on the follies of the old. If we can but establish the principles of the armed neutrality [of 1780] for ourselves, we must become the carriers for all parties as far as we can raise vessels."9 A debilitating European war served America's interests because the exclusionary policies of France and Britain would be forced to yield to American pressure in the face of strained capacities to police remote waters. For this reason Jefferson employed some staple gambits of eighteenth-century commercial diplomacy - such as vociferously promoting American neutral rights, coyly hinting at both American belligerency and neutrality as prices for involvement or non-interference in a European war to both London and Paris, relendessly attempting to gain greater access to the lucrative Caribbean trade and attempting to limit European dudes on American exports - to great advantage for the United States. The strategy of parasitical neutrality expressed by Jefferson in the 1790s was grounded in a merciless realism that bore little resemblance to a "new diplomacy" based on the liberal thought of the Enlightenment. Professions of independence and liberation from "entangling alliances" provided the United States with what Bismarck would later characterize as the "freedom to choose" - the ability to enter into agreements based on immediate exigencies or merely to take advantage of a European war to bargain for greater access to closed markets by the intimation of benevolent neutrality to a rival. This formula was designed to attain what the United States could not yet achieve through a war: a greater share of the lucrative transadantic trade. The importance of this strategic assessment cannot be overstated since Jefferson's vehement feud with Hamilton over foreign policy in the early 1790s was one of its most notable consequences.10 Hamilton argued that the United States was militarily impotent and thus should rely on Britain for maritime protec9 Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XVI, 601, Jefferson to Edward Rutledge, 4 July 1790. Jefferson was referring to the Russian Armed Neutrality of 1780, a policy proposed by Catherine II to unite small traders under Russian naval protection. While formally neutral, Catherine intended the League as a caution to Britain that Russia would challenge restrictive trade practices enacted by London during the American War of Independence. See the excellent study by Isabel de Madariaga, Britain, Russia, and the Armed Neutrality of 1780: Sir James Harris's Mission to St. Petersburg during the American Revolution (New Haven, 1962). 10

I develop this argument in greater detail in "American Neutral Rights Reappraised: Identity or Interest in the Foreign Policy of the Early Republic?" Review of International Studies, XXVI, No. 4 (2000), 599-622.

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tion at the cost of acceding to some of London's trade restrictions; the policy arc derived from this assumption reached its zenith in the Jay Treaty of 1794 which was ratified by the Senate in 1795. Jefferson, on the other hand, saw greater opportunities for America in the Atlantic system and believed that Hamilton's formula would effectively reduce the United States to a "second Portugal." Jefferson was scathingly critical of Hamilton's secret negotiations with British minister George Hammond because such talks compromised American diplomacy by telegraphing its intentions to London. When informed in the spring of 1793 that Hamilton had already admitted to Hammond that the United States would not be a belligerent in the European war, Jefferson filmed to Madison that [m]y objections to the impolicy of a premature declaration were answered by such arguments as timidity would readily suggest. I now think it extremely possible that Hammond might have been instructed to have asked it, and to offer the broadest neutral privileges, as the price, which was exactly the price I wanted that we should contend for. Jefferson's anger at Hamilton's diplomatic transgressions anticipated his stratagem: he had planned to postpone the neutrality proclamation, or not offer one at all, in order to entice England and France to compete for American favour by liberalizing their maritime policies. By openly avowing American intentions, Jefferson argued, Hamilton gave away what he might have sold at a considerable price, specifically a British pledge to respect an expansive definition of American neutral rights during the European War.11 The acrimony of the 1793 crisis convinced Jefferson that there were only two means at America's disposal that could compel rival powers to respect its trade: commercial retaliation and military force. In his negotiations with both great and small powers, Jefferson worked to achieve the promotion and protection of American commercial interests and neutral rights. The means he chose, however, depended on the circumstances in which he found himself as well as the capabilities of the states in question. He recognized that in negotiations with England and France the United States was clearly inferior and that only by adopting discriminatory trade practices and manipulating its neutrality could it gain concessions without the threat of a war it could not win. If diplomatic persuasion - such as he attempted in Paris in the 1780s - or a firm neutral policy (which was under"Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXIX, 403-404, Jefferson to Madison, 29 June 1797. See also ibid., XXV, 597-618. The British Orders-in-Council of March and June 1793 opened neutral trade with the English West Indian colonies but imposed a blockade around French West Indian ports and restricted neutral trade. The Orders also backdated the official declaration of war, and dozens of American vessels were seized. London had followed an identical policy at the time of its official entry into the Seven Years' War in 1756.

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cut by Hamilton in 1793) could not compel the Europeans to take American claims seriously, then the United States had only one remaining option: economic retaliation. In the "Report on Commerce" Jefferson stated this logic with astringent realism: Should any nation, contrary to our wishes, suppose it may better find its advantage by continuing its system of prohibitions, duties, and regulations, it behoves us to protect our citizens, their commerce and navigation, by counter prohibitions, duties, and regulations also. Free commerce and navigation are not to be given in exchange for restrictions, and vexations: nor are they likely to produce a relaxation of them.12 Jefferson's advocacy of "economic" warfare was predicated upon the same unsentimental calculations followed by most European governments since the late seventeenth century, a point he openly avowed in the "Report on Commerce." As he put it, "[t]he materials for maintaining our share of navigation, are ours in abundance. And, as to the mode of using them, we have only to adopt the principles of those who thus put us on the defensive, or others equivalent and better fitted to our circumstances." Jefferson conceded that war with England or France was "not the best engine for us to resort to," at least while the United States remained militarily undeveloped, but he strenuously argued that "nature has given us one in our commerce, which, if properly managed, will be a better instrument for obliging the interested nations of Europe to treat us with justice." He acknowledged that imposing "discriminatory duties" would cause "inconveniences" for American exporters, "but in this, as in so many other cases, we are left to choose between two evils." In his view, These inconveniences are nothing when weighed against the loss of wealth, and loss of force, which will follow our perseverance in the plan of indiscrimination. When once it shall be perceived that we are either in the system, or the habit, of giving equal advantages to those who extinguish our commerce and navigation by duties and prohibitions, as to those who treat both with liberality and justice, liberality and justice will be converted by all into duties and prohibitions.13 i2

lbid., XXVII, 574, "Report on Commerce."

"Ibid.; and XXIX, 405, Jefferson to Thomas Pinckney, 29 May 1797. He went on to argue that "[i]f the commercial regulations had been adopted which our legislature were at one time proposing [1791], we should at this moment have been standing on such an eminence of safety and respect as ages can never recover;" Ibid., XVII, 577, "Report on Commerce."

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Naturally, this policy was based on the idea that America provided a large and lucrative market that neither England nor France would be willing to lose, especially in time of war. Through the use of navigation acts against Britain and France, as well as a firm commitment to neutrality, Jefferson was in essence using American assets as bait to extract favourable commercial treaties from London and Paris. In what may stand as the most elegant summation of his design for America in the world system, Jefferson argued in 1793 that "[i]t is not to the moderation and justice of others, we are to trust for fair and equal access to market with our productions, or for our due share in the transportation of them: but to our own means of independence, and the firm will to use them. " 14 But the policy of commercial retaliation was only useful in dealing with states that enjoyed a large volume of trade with the United States and superior military power. In other instances Jefferson favoured the use of force to protect American commercial interests. As early as 1792 he had championed this policy against Spain in a dispute over navigation of the Mississippi, believing that the United States could easily defeat the weak Spanish garrison if diplomatic efforts to resolve the problem failed. The North African regimes that routinely attacked American shipping, he argued, could best be managed in a similar fashion, as economic embargoes against them would be of little use given the nearly nonexistent volume of trade between the United States and these principalities. In both the Mississippi Valley and the Mediterranean, Jefferson was willing to use military power against states that impeded American trade or placed what he considered to be unfair burdens on its interests.15 The inescapable conclusion of Jefferson's analysis was that the United States required a strong navy to project American power and to protect its interests.16 In a prescient analysis written to John Jay in 1785, Jefferson speculated on what the consequences of America's slow growth to great power status would be. "Frequent wars, without a doubt," was his conclusion. American property, he argued, will be violated on the sea, and in foreign ports, their persons will be insulted, emprisoned, &c. for pretended debts, contracts, crimes, contraband, &c. &c. These insults must be reH

Ibid., XVII, 577, "Report on Commerce."

"Ibid., ΧΧΠΙ, 299-303, Jefferson, "Report on Negotiations with Spain," 18 March 1792. For a development of my argument in relation to the American West, see James R. Sofka, "Thomas Jefferson and the Problem of World Politics," in Peter J. Kastor (ed.), The Louisiana Purchase: Emergence of an American Nation (Washington, DC, 2002), chap. 4. 16

On this point, see especially, Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XVI, 601, Jefferson to Rutledge, 4 July 1790.

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sented, even if we had no feelings, yet to prevent their eternal repetition. Or in other words, our commerce on the ocean and in other countries must be paid for by frequent war. The justest dispositions possible in ourselves will not secure us against it. It would be necessary that all other nations were just also. Justice indeed on our part will save us from those wars which would have been produced by a contrary disposition. But how to prevent those produced by the wrongs of other nations? By putting ourselves in a condition to punish them. Weakness provokes insult and injury, while a condition to punish it often prevents it. This reasoning leads to the necessity of some naval force, that being the only weapon with which we can reach an enemy. I think it to our interests to punish the first insult: because an insult unpunished is the parent of many others. We are not at this moment in a condition to do it, but we should put ourselves into it as soon as possible.17 Stimulated by reports of attacks on American merchantmen in the West Indies and western AÜantic, Jefferson assiduously pressed the Confederation government to authorize a programme of naval expansion program in the 1780s. He argued that while it would be foolhardy to challenge England or France direcdy (although the United States did so in the latter case in the Quasi-War of 17981800, a policy he opposed), London and Paris might take notice of decisive American military action against smaller states pursuing a hostile maritime policy, as they did Catherine ITs Armed Neutrality of 1780. Only then, as Jefferson indicated to Jay, could the United States gain respect as an independent commercial power. The Barbary War of 1801-1805 provides an excellent demonstration of how Jefferson attempted to apply these formulas to America's advantage in world politics. By the close of the eighteenth century, the "Barbary States" - the collective but misleading name frequendy used to describe Algiers, Tunis, Morocco and Tripoli - were increasingly seen by Jefferson as the place where the trajectories of his commercial and national security strategies intersected. Although Tripoli, Tunis and Algiers were nominally under the control of the Ottoman Porte, the decrepit economic and political condition into which the Empire had fallen after the war with Russia from 1768 to 1774 allowed the rulers of these small principalities extraordinary latitude in the conduct of political affairs. As a result, the policy these states adopted in relation to European and American commerce was motivated by domestic political pressures and economic necessity. By ransoming captives and demanding lavish presents in the form of naval stores, frigates or jewels, rulers were able to satisfy both their subjects' appetite for gain and their "Ibid., VOI, 426-427, Jefferson to John Jay, 23 August 1785.

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own desire for internal and external political standing. This led to a vicious circle in relations with foreign powers: meeting a ruler's terms only increased his demands and led to further instances of piracy.18 Moreover, so-called "peace treaties" with these states - the only defence against seizure on the high seas - had to be purchased at prohibitive cost. This chain of events was not entirely local in character or causation. England and France maintained active consulates in North Africa that exploited these political dynamics to their advantage. These states frequendy found it in their interest to pay "tribute" to avoid the inconvenience and expense of deploying naval squadrons against them - all the more so in wartime, when they were needed elsewhere. In so doing, they also encouraged these regimes to prey on weaker rivals - such as the Kingdoms of Sweden, Sardinia and the United States - that could not afford this luxury. As Britain's Lord Sheffield put it in 1783, That the Barbary States are advantageous to the maritime Powers is certain. If they were suppressed, the little states of Italy, & c. would have much more of the carrying trade. The French never showed themselves worse Politicians, than in encouraging the late armed neutrality [against these regimes]. It would have been as hurtful to the great maritime powers, as the Barbary States are useful. Consequendy, the North African regimes were viewed by continental diplomats as important elements of the regional as well as European balance of power. There was much truth in the aphorism Benjamin Franklin reported from London in 1783 that "if there were no Algiers, it would be worth England's while to build one." 19 Until the Revolution, American merchant traffic in the Mediterranean had been protected under the British flag. After independence, attacks on American vessels increased, driving up insurance rates and leading to popular though frequendy exaggerated tales about American sailors taken captive and their vessels seized and converted into privateers. Under these conditions the United States could not develop a profitable trade in the region, which was the precise British intention. As a result, one of the most pressing problems facing the weak Confederation government was to come to terms with these states or risk holding its lucrative Mediterranean trade hostage to these regimes.

18

Raymond W. Irwin, The Diplomatic Relations of the United States with the Barbary Powers, 1776-1816 (Chapel Hill, 1931; reprint, New York, 1970), 8-9 and 189. "Earl of Sheffield, Observations on the Commerce of the American States (London, 1783), as cited in Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XVIII, 373; and XVIII, 375; and Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, 16.

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Although Adams and Jefferson laboured to resolve seizure cases diplomatically from their respective posts in London and Paris, the North African states demanded large sums of money for treaties with the new Republic and ransom for American captives. Adams, who absorbed the maxims of British North African policy during his stay in London, argued that it would be "wisest for us to negotiate and pay the necessary sum, without loss of time" and offered to float a loan in Amsterdam to be used for ransom and tribute.20 Jefferson was appalled by this suggestion. "My faculties are absolutely suspended between indignation and impotence" at the prospect of a purchased peace, he wrote Nathanael Greene in 1785. Jefferson understood the logic deployed against American shipping and realized that these states would continue to demand increasingly extravagant "presents" from the United States. Moreover, tribute in the form of naval stores or ships only provided these governments with additional weapons to be used against American merchantmen. In the long run, therefore, it was less expensive to fight the North Africans than to placate them. Jefferson argued to Monroe in 1786 that if Congress makes peace "by negotiation they must pay a great sum of money for it; if they do nothing they must pay a great sum of money in the form of insurance, and in either way as great a one, and probably less effectual than in the way of force." Politically, such a strategy would be inadvisable as "the tribute to all these powers [will] make such a proportion of the federal [customs] taxes as that every man will feel them sensibly when he pays those taxes."21 Jefferson had no intention of becoming trapped in the vicious circle of escalating ransom demands and insurance rates. From both a political and strategic perspective, Jefferson argued, the policy of paying tribute was ultimately self-defeating. He saw no reason to buy what he could achieve with less cost through a war. Indeed, the latter was more investment than net expense, as it offered a convenient excuse for augmenting American military power and demonstrating its naval capabilities to sceptical European statesmen. Jefferson argued to Monroe as early as 1784 that We ought to begin a naval Power, if we mean to carry on our own commerce. Can we begin it on a more honorable occasion or with a weaker foe? I am of [the] opinion that [John] Paul Jones with half a dozen frigates would totally destroy their commerce: not by attempting bombardments as the Mediterranean states do wherein they act against the whole Barbary force 20

For an overview of Jefferson's and Adams' diplomacy in relation to North Africa, see Boyd, et al. (eds.). Papers of Thomas Jefferson, X, 560-566; and X, 86, Adams to Jefferson, 3 July 1786; and Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, chap. 3. 21

Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, IX, 168, Jefferson to Nathanael Greene, 12 June 1785; X, 225, Jefferson to Monroe, 11 August 1786; and VIII, 419, Jefferson to John Page, 20 August 1785.

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brought to a point, but by constant cruising and cutting them to pieces piecemeal.22 Only sUch an assertive policy could place American shipping on a secure and respected footing in the region. In 1786 Jefferson and Adams conducted extensive correspondence regarding the Mediterranean. In this exchange, Jefferson clearly found the use of force to be the most compelling option for American interests. Specifically, he articulated six reasons for favouring the use of force to obtain security in the Mediterranean: 1. Justice is in favour of this opinion. 2. Honour favours it. 3. It will procure us respect in Europe, and respect is a safe-guard to interest. 4. It will arm the federal head with the safest of all the instruments of coercion over their delinquent members and prevent them from using what would be less safe. I think that so far you go with me. But in the next steps we shall differ. 5. I think it less expensive. 6. Equally effectual. Jefferson based his last point on two principal assumptions. First, he argued that the North African states were unprepared for a "vigorous" naval campaign and that after sustaining losses they would quickly accede to American terms rather than risk the destruction of their fleets, which were the mainstay of their economies. He noted that in 1745 France had pursued this policy against Algiers, which then had "subscribed to the terms" the French dictated within three months. Second, Jefferson maintained that such a policy would signal American determination to secure its trade routes because it would be impossible for either the French or the British to ignore an American military operation conducted in the Mediterranean. Although Jefferson acknowledged that war was always fraught with uncertainty, he weighed this against "the greater uncertainty of the duration of a peace bought with money, from such a people, from a Dey 80 years old, and by a nation who, on the hypothesis of buying peace, is to have no power on the sea to enforce an observance of it."23 Adams acknowledged that Jefferson's letter had "great and weighty Considerations urged in it in favour of arming against the Algerines," but he claimed to be too familiar with sentiments in Philadelphia to recommend Jefferson's ideas. "Congress," he responded,

22

Ibid., VII, 511-512, Jefferson to Monroe, 11 November 1784.

"Ibid., X, 123-124, Jefferson to Adams, 11 July 1786.

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will never, or at least not for years, take any such resolution, and in the mean time our trade and honour suffers beyond calculation. We ought not to fight them at all, unless we determine to fight them forever. This thought is, I fear, too rugged for our people to bear. To fight them at the expense of millions, and make peace after all by giving more money and larger presents than would now procure perpetual peace seems not to be economical. Moreover, he concluded, even the French paid a sum to Algiers after the naval campaign of 1745 cited by Jefferson. Adams did not reject the use of force on principle but rather on his firm belief that the United States was not in a position to compel the terms it desired. Even if the naval construction Jefferson favoured was miraculously approved by Congress, he argued, it would not be combat ready for years, and in the meantime attacks and hostage-taking would continue. From a political standpoint, Adams feared that if such a project failed it would be worse than had it never been attempted. Devoid of resources and divided in their approach, both Adams and Jefferson resignedly concluded that little could be accomplished without stronger backing from the American government.24 Jefferson was undeterred by Adams' criticism. Even before drafting his letter of 11 July to Adams he had conceived a plan designed to secure Mediterranean trade that minimized direct American investment. His plan was to revise the formula of Catherine II's Armed Neutrality of 1780 and apply it to the Mediterranean case by proposing that the smaller maritime powers menaced by these regimes form a league against them. Each state would contribute a quota of ships, sailors and capital, and the campaign would be directed by a council of ministers of the confederated states in a European capital under American supervision. This league would be "in perpetual cruise" until attacks on members' shipping ceased and the offensive capabilities of the North African regimes were destroyed.25 The obvious attraction of Jefferson's proposal was that the United States would only have to contribute one frigate rather than build the sizeable fleet required for a unilateral action. Moreover, by acting in concert with other states, Jefferson hoped to add a gloss of enlightened legality to the American position - as Catherine had done in 1780 - as well as to further weaken the entente between London, Paris and their North African "clients." Since the parlous state of American finances and the lack of political will in Philadelphia made the prospect of an exclusively American campaign unlikely, Jefferson settled on what Lafayette termed the "Antipiratical Confederacy" as a compromise. In his opinion, it was the best 24 Ibid„ X, 176-177, Adams to Jefferson, 31 July 1786. On the failures of Jefferson's and Adams' Mediterranean diplomacy, see Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, 51-53. 25 Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, 46-51; and Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, X, 560-566.

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practicable solution to the Mediterranean problem short of a unilateral declaration of war. The objective of the proposed convention would be to compel a "permanent peace" through the use of robust naval deployments in the Mediterranean. Jefferson was intrigued with the prospect of asserting American commercial rights in the Mediterranean literally under the eyes and guns of the British and French navies in an area traditionally considered their sphere of influence. He argued to Monroe in August 1786 that Such a convention, being left open to all powers willing to come into it, should have for its object a general peace, to be guaranteed to each by the whole...were the honour and advantage of establishing such a confederacy out of the question, yet the necessity that the US should have some maritime force, and the happiness of this as the ostensible cause for beginning it, would decide on its propriety. It will be said that there is no money in the treasury. There never will be money in the treasury till the Confederacy shows its teeth. The states must see the rod; perhaps it should be felt by some one of them. His reference to the Confederation government's inability to tax focussed on the root of Jefferson's frustration with the Articles under which it operated. Nevertheless, he argued that were only a small sum appropriated for the Mediterranean League, it would soon show a strong return on investment in the form of reduced insurance rates. All of the trading powers of Europe, "except France, England, and perhaps Spain and Holland," he argued, "would soon fall into it." 26 After completing their ambitious and controversial commercial agreement in 1786, however, neither Britain nor France was eager to disturb the commercial status quo in the Mediterranean. French Foreign Minister Vergennes warned Lafayette - whom Jefferson had solicited to present his views to Versailles - to "desist" on the project because it could threaten improving relations with London.27 Moreover, while England and France publicly condemned acts of piracy, they covertly encouraged them as a means of forcing small traders out of their commercial networks. Few states would risk joining weak America in a novel experiment in the face of strong British and French opposition, given the "Jefferson went so far as to suggest that American forces capture Turkish sailors as hostages to be exchanged for American prisoners, as the Ottoman rulers of North Africa were treated as "a superior order of Beings" in the region. Such a course, he reasoned, would force Constantinople to exert more authority over its provinces. Boyd, et al.. Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XVIII, 406, Jefferson to Monroe, 11 August 1786; and X, 224-225. 27

On Vergennes' reaction to Jefferson's proposal, see ibid., X, 565.

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ability of these powers to persuade rulers to ratchet up their demands on small traders. Following the icy reception to his ideas in Europe and Philadelphia, Jefferson shelved his proposal and continued to do his best in negotiations with the North African regimes with the meagre resources at his disposal. From 1786 to 1801 American Mediterranean policy remained fairly consistent as the political will for a war against the Barbary States remained absent. A treaty was signed with Morocco in 1795, and one followed the next year with Algiers, even though it cost nearly $1 million. Although Tripoli and Tunis were feted with lavish presents and naval stores, these states were more intransigent in their dealings with the United States. In May 1801 the pasha of Tripoli, Yusuf Qaramanli, declared war on the United States on the grounds that Algiers had received more tribute from the Americans than his kingdom.28 Jefferson, recently inaugurated as President, once again faced a crisis in the Mediterranean. In 1801 Jefferson possessed the political power and naval strength that had eluded him in 1786. He was determined to assert American commercial rights in the Mediterranean in the forceful manner he had long advocated, and in his view the actions of Tripoli provided ample justification for this policy. Within a month of his inauguration Jefferson requested a detailed analysis of the state of the American fleet and its supplies as well as the Navy Department's estimate of the combined naval assets of Tripoli, Algiers and Tunis.29 By the end of April he began to assemble a force consisting of the heaviest frigates in the American arsenal at Norfolk with orders for the Mediterranean. Although word of the formal declaration of war by Tripoli did not reach Washington until late June, reports of Tripolitan attacks on American shipping throughout the spring of 1801 pointed to an obvious conclusion. "The real alternative," Jefferson summarized, "is whether 28

0n the Algerian accords, see H.G. Bamby, The Prisoners of Algiers: An Account of the Forgotten American-Algerian War of 1785-1797 (Oxford, 1966); and Richard B. Parker, Uncle Sam in Barbary: A Diplomatic History (Gainesville, FL. 2004). On the diplomatic relations of the United States and these regimes from 1786 to 1801, see Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, chaps. 4-7; and James A. Field, Jr., America and the Mediterranean World, 1776-1882 (Princeton, 1969), 27-48. The sultan of Morocco declared war on the United States in June 1802, and Jefferson learned of it in August. He responded by sending reinforcements to the Mediterranean to conduct operations against Morocco, but in midSeptember the sultan abrupdy changed his mind and revoked his declaration. The fact that American operations against Tripoli were proceeding well in 1802 may have influenced the sultan's decision. Algiers had launched a series of attacks on American vessels in 1800, but the matter was resolved by a purchased peace authorized by Adams. While Jefferson focused the direct American campaign on Tripoli, the American squadron made frequent visits to Morocco, Algiers and Tunis to gather intelligence and display American naval power to potential belligerents. 29

This was a request that Navy Secretary Samuel Smith fulfilled in exhaustive detail; see Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXXIV, 29-31, Smith to Jefferson, 4 May 1801.

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to abandon the Mediterranean, or keep up a cruise in it." For fifteen years he had steadily maintained that a military solution was the most effective option in dealing with these states. Buying a setdement through tribute was poindess, he argued, and he was "convinced it is money thrown away, and that there is no end to the demand of these powers, nor any security in their promises."30 While Jefferson had been quiedy laying the groundwork for a deployment to the Mediterranean for at least a month, he convened a Cabinet meeting on 15 May 1801 to discuss formally "what shall be the object" of the naval mission. All of the secretaries, Jefferson noted, concurred in the "expediency of a cruise," although he left no record of his own statements at the meeting. In a letter to William Eaton, American consul in Tunis, Madison explained that Jefferson saw this as an appropriate moment to use force in the Mediterranean, as "not only is it a provision against an immediate danger, but as we are now at peace and amity with all the rest of the world, and as the force employed would, if at home, be at merely the same expense, with less advantage to our mariners."31 The purpose of the Cabinet meeting was not to debate the efficacy of a war - as Jefferson had long decided that question - but the manner in which it should be declared and managed. As it was doubtful that a sceptical Congress would provide Jefferson with much political and financial support, the primary reason for the discussion was to evaluate the constitutional and political implications of a Mediterranean campaign conducted almost exclusively through the Executive branch. Treasury Secretary Albert Gallatin argued that a formal declaration of war from Congress was unnecessary since Tripoli, by openly avowing hostilities, rendered such an act irrelevant. "The Executive cannot put us in a state of war," Gallatin maintained, "but if we be put into that state either by the decree of Congress or the other nation, the command and direction of the public force then belongs to the Executive." Madison, who had staunchly supported Jefferson's theory of American commercial policy since 1791 and was as eager as the President to secure a profitable trade in the Mediterranean, did not object to Gallatin's reasoning. According to Jefferson's notes, Madison confined his remarks to the necessity of "openly declaring" the "object" of the deployment to "every nation." This presumably would underscore America's determination to support its rights to any European power that might consider infringing upon them, a position Madison had forcefully articulated against Hamilton in 1791. The meeting ended with a decision to dispatch a squadron of frigates to the Medi-

m

Ibid„ XXXIV, 309, Jefferson to Wilson Cary Nicholas, 11 June 1801.

}¡

Ibid„ XXXIV, 114-115, "Notes on a Cabinet Meeting," 15 May 1801. For a discussion of this meeting, see also Noble E. Cunningham, The Process of Government under Jefferson (Princeton, 1978), 48-50; and Robert J. Brugger, et al. (eds.), The Papers of James Madison, Secretary of State Series (8 vols., Charlottesville, VA, 1986-), I, 199200, Madison to William Eaton, 20 May 1801.

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terranean to cruise against Tripoli and any other state that assaulted American shipping.32 The President subscribed to Gallatin's reasoning and saw no reason to seek a declaration of war, or even extensive consultations, from Congress. "That a body containing 100 lawyers in it, should direct the measures of a war, is, I fear, impossible," Jefferson later observed, "and that thus that member of our constitution, which is its bulwark, will prove to be an impracticable one from its cacoethes loquendi." The war was financed in part by the "Mediterranean Fund" established by Gallatin, which used special loans to defray expenses that overran the appropriated naval budget. This arrangement was strikingly similar to, and indeed modelled after, the "sinking funds" commonly used throughout the eighteenth century by European governments to finance their wars.33 Jefferson conducted his Mediterranean war with a watchful eye toward great power politics. As he argued in 1806, the year after the treaty with Tripoli was signed, the love of peace which we sincerely feel & profess, has begun to produce an opinion in Europe that our government is entirely in Quaker principles & will turn the left cheek when the right has been smitten. This opinion must be corrected when just occasion arises, or we shall become the plunder of all nations. Jefferson reasoned that assertive action in the Mediterranean would persuade England and France to take notice of America's growing importance in the international system. He argued to John Tyler that if the campaign was successful, "we shall be amply rewarded for what we have done" in the Mediterranean in negotiations with the European powers. Moreover, since London and Paris had actively encouraged acts of violence against American shipping, Jefferson estimated that by depriving the Europeans of their Mediterranean clients he could effectively change the balance of power in the region without risking a transatlantic war.34

32

Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXXIV, 115, "Notes on a Cabinet Meeting," 14 May 1801. 33

J. Jefferson Looney (ed.), The Papers of Thomas Jefferson: Retirement Series (6 vols., Princeton, 2004-), IV, 509. Jefferson to Madison, 19 February 1812; and Cunningham, Process of Government, 49-50. On the "Mediterranean Fund," see Field, America and the Mediterranean, 53; and Raymond Walters, Albert Gallatin: Jeffersonian Financier and Diplomat (New York, 1957) 150-152. "Library of Congress (LC), Thomas Jefferson Papers (TJP), reel 56, Jefferson to Thomas Cooper, 18 February 1806; and reel 52, Jefferson to John Tyler, 29 March 1805.

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Once he established the general political and strategic direction of the war in the spring of 1801, Jefferson allowed his naval commanders considerable latitude to operate according to their estimate of the military situation. From 1801 to 1804 the Americans made steady gains in the war of attrition against Tripolitan shipping, despite the loss of the frigate Philadelphia which ran aground in October 1803 and the imprisonment of its crew of three hundred. The conduct of the new United States Navy was sufficiendy impressive to attract European attention, as Jefferson had hoped. Admiral Nelson, upon learning of the burning of Philadelphia by an American team, called it "the most bold and daring act of the age," and the Royal Navy devoted attention to American tactics in the Mediterranean.35 While Jefferson was committed to an independent policy in the Mediterranean, he ftequendy consulted with European powers throughout the course of the war. Borrowing the Russian formula of 1780, Jefferson was eager to mobilize most of the small Mediterranean traders under the American flag. Sweden and Denmark, themselves frequent targets of piracy, offered modest financial contributions to the war effort, and their consular officials frequendy acted as intermediaries in negotiations with Tripoli. The Kingdoms of Sardinia and Naples allowed American vessels to refit in their ports and contributed supplies to the American fleet. In 1804 Jefferson made overtures to Tsar Alexander I in an effort to induce Russia to persuade the Ottoman Porte to restrain the aggressive impulses of its North African satellites. Alexander obliquely hinted, however, that American aid to Russia in its war against Napoleon was a condition of Russian assistance in the Mediterranean. Jefferson rejected this suggestion, believing it would compromise the flexibility, independence and clear neutrality that he considered essential in negotiations with the European powers and would reduce the United States to a client of St. Petersburg in commercial negotiations with the British and French. Although few tangible results were gained from the Russian overture, Jefferson nevertheless regarded it as "momentous," and it demonstrates his awareness of the global implications of the conflict as well as his skills in great power diplomacy.36 While eager to solicit foreign cooperation with - and contri-

35 In a noteworthy exception, Jefferson removed Richard V. Morris, the commander of the American squadron in the Mediterranean, on the grounds of "excessive timidity" in 1804; see Gardner W. Allen, Our Navy and the Barbary Corsairs (Boston, 1905; reprint, Cranbury, NJ, 2005), 134-135. For specific engagements and campaigns, see Dudley W. Knox (ed.), Naval Documents Related to the United States Wars with the Barbary Powers (6 vols., Washington, DC, 1939-1944). For Nelson's remark, see Field, America and the Mediterranean, 60. 36

0n the Russian dimension of Jefferson's Mediterranean policy, see N. Hans (ed.), "Tsar Alexander and Jefferson: Unpublished Correspondence," Slavonic and East European Review, XXXII, No.l (1953), 215-225. For the Russian estimate of the North

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butions to - the American war effort, Jefferson never sought an alliance with the Northern European powers out of fear that they could conclude a separate peace if the campaign went poorly or would attempt to drag the United States into a European war from which it could gain nothing. By remaining free of cumbersome "entangling alliances," Jefferson hoped to gain the tactical independence he considered essential to success in the war. Arguably the most interesting and - from the standpoint of future American relations with the states of the region - critical aspects of the campaign was the American-sponsored coup d'état against Yusuf Qaramanli, Pasha of Tripoli. Jefferson had given his consular officials considerable latitude in "advancing the interests of the United States" in their dealings with the deys. Eaton, from his post in Tunis, took advantage of this discretion and argued to Madison that even if Tripoli were defeated, Yusuf would harbour designs of revenge and the United States would be compelled to maintain a constant naval presence in the region. In a Machiavellian accent, Madison replied that although it does not accord with the general sentiments or views of the United States to intermeddle in the domestic contests of other countries, it cannot be unfair, in the prosecution of a just war, or the accomplishment of a reasonable peace, to turn to their advantage the enmity and pretensions of others against a common foe.37 In late 1803 Eaton outlined to Madison his plan to overthrow Yusuf and replace him with his brother Hamet, whose claim to the throne had been usurped by Yusuf several years earlier. Eaton maintained that if Hamet were restored to his legitimate position, he would be indebted to the United States, would free all American captives and cease attacks on American shipping. Madison and Jefferson, though at first sceptical, approved Eaton's plan as worthy of a "small investment." Returning to North Africa in November 1804, Eaton joined forces with Hamet and, after a spectacular march across the desert with a motley army

African situation, see Norman E. Saul, Russia and the Mediterranean, 1797-1807 (Chicago, 1970), chap. 4. 37

As Madison put it to Eaton, while the objectives of the campaign were set by the President, "the means must be left in a great degree to your knowledge of the local and other circumstances, which cannot be understood at this distance." Brugger, et al. (eds.), Papers of James Madison, I, 200, Madison to William Eaton, 20 May 1801; and III, 505506, Madison to Eaton, 22 August 1802.

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of American marines and Arabs, successfully captured the town of Derna in April 1805.38 Eaton's objective was to march to Tripoli and complete his mission by installing Hamet as pasha with the assistance of the American fleet in the harbour. But Commodore Samuel Barron, commander of the Mediterranean squadron, and Tobias Lear, American consul at Algiers, decided to take advantage of the immediate military situation and moved to conclude peace with Yusuf while the Americans enjoyed naval superiority and while the pasha held three hundred Americans prisoner in the city. Yusuf, eager to retain his throne, concluded an agreement on terms generally favourable to America but insisted on ransom for the crew of Philadelphia. As part of an agreement signed on 4 June 1805 the United States agreed to pay $60,000 for the crew, a decision that caused consternation among Jefferson's opponents in Congress. Critics charged that no money should have been paid while the guns of the American fleet were aimed direcdy at the pasha's palace.39 Jefferson was surprisingly noncommittal on the terms of the peace setdement, as he was unwilling to exacerbate rifts with his Republican allies in the Senate over the agreement. The question as to whether American forces could have obtained more favourable terms had they opted for a direct assault on Tripoli rather than a negotiated setdement has been debated since 1805. On the one hand, incoming reinforcements from the United States would have provided the Americans with a fleet of thirty-one ships, enough to have effectively bombarded Tripoli into submission.40 Nevertheless, both Barron and Lear were eager to conclude peace, especially given Yusuf s sudden willingness to negotiate following the capture of Derna. Barron recognized that the unpredictable fortunes of war - such as the 38

For a better understanding of the personality that conceived this enterprise see Louis B. Wright and Julia H. Macleod, The First Americans in North Africa: William Eaton's Struggle for a Vigorous Policy against the Barbary Pirates, 1799-1805 (Princeton, 1945; reprint, New York, 1969). Madison and Jefferson personally approved Eaton's plan in May 1804. See Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, 143-144; and Field, America and the Mediterranean, 52-53. Dumas Malone, Jefferson and His Time (6 vols., Boston, 1948-1981; reprint, Charlottesville, VA, 2005), V, 40-41, attempts to distance Jefferson from this operation by implying that Eaton acted on his own authority. Eaton, however, readily acknowledged in his correspondence that he had received the President's permission before beginning the coup against Yusuf, and Madison's letters to him remove all seeds of doubt on the issue. See the correspondence between Madison and Eaton in Brugger, et al. (eds.), Papers of James Madison, III, as details evolve considerably. The story of the Derna offensive is well recounted in Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, 146-149; and Allen, Our Navy, chap. 4. 39

Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, chap. 10.

""The case is made most aggressively by Allen, Our Navy, 255; and Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, 157-159.

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capture of another American vessel - could alter the balance of forces in the region and by increasing Yusuf s bargaining power prolong the conflict indefinitely. Moreover, he feared that if an effort were made to invade or bomb the city Yusuf could immediately execute the crew of Philadelphia in retaliation, and thus there was little he could do to ensure the safety of the American captives short of paying ransom. What was most important to him and to Jefferson was that the Tripolitan navy and its ability to commit further acts of piracy had been dealt a serious blow. Eaton, who was still in possession of Derna when the treaty was signed, condemned Jefferson for sanctioning the agreement and abandoning Hamet and his followers. Yet Jefferson and Madison had consistently viewed Hamet as little more than a political pawn and were unwilling to continue the war for the sake of his claim or to settle local political rivalries. Although Federalists and House Speaker John Randolph attempted to create political embarrassment for the President with charges of duplicity over the treatment of Hamet, Jefferson conspicuously ignored them and focussed instead on the implications of war for American commercial rights and relations with Europe. After more than twenty years of constant attention to the Mediterranean problem, Jefferson believed in 1805 that the war had achieved its purpose and that there was no reason to press for more ambitious objectives. He had demonstrated, as Gallatin put it in 1805, that he was "prepared, like the Great European Powers, to repel every injury by the sword." The fact that he did so against regimes long considered irritants only increased the popularity of his action. Even Pope Pius VII, upon hearing of the peace with Tripoli, claimed that the Americans, "with a small force and in a short space of time, have done more for the cause of Christianity than the most powerful nations of Christendom have done for ages."41 In the short term the American naval presence in the Mediterranean led to a significant decrease in attacks on United States shipping and encouraged the North African principalities to open diplomatic relations with the United States, which had been virtually nonexistent before 1805. A potential conflict with Tunis was defused in 1806 through intensive diplomacy with the Tunisian ambassador as well as by the Tunisian government's reluctance to match forces with Barron's fleet. That a North African state dispatched a senior official to Washington - an unprecedented move, as neither Russia nor the Ottoman Empire had a consulate in Washington at the time - confirmed Jefferson and Madison in their belief that the war had created a tectonic shift in the Mediterranean balance of power. Al-

41

On later developments with Hamet, see Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, chap. 10. See Irving Brant, James Madison (6 vols., Indianapolis, 1941-1961), IV, 308-310, for political reactions to the treaty; see also LC, TJP, reel 54, Gallatin to Jefferson, 12 September 1805; and Allen, Our Navy, 214. It is unclear whether Jefferson was informed of the Vatican's endorsement.

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though problems with the Barbary States would recur episodically through 1816, the worst depredations against American shipping ended with the Peace of 1805.42 In conclusion, Jefferson's Barbary War provides a coherent expression of his formula for American national security. The three guiding assumptions of his diplomacy - securing American trade routes, promoting American commercial rights and defending those rights through economic retaliation or military force - were put to the test in the Mediterranean crisis. During the war of 18011805, Jefferson demonstrated his commitment to protecting a vital artery of American trade by dispatching a naval squadron against Tripoli aimed at "cutting them to pieces," as he put it in 1786, as well as orchestrating a coup d'état against a foreign government. The conflict was but one component of a larger geopolitical strategy designed and managed by Jefferson to defend and advance the interests of the United States. Taken in its entirety, this project reveals its debt to European practices of the eighteenth century and was predicated upon a sophisticated assessment of American commercial interests congruent with the mercantilist assumption that national "wealth" and "power" were closely related, if not inseparable, concepts. While in his philosophical musings Jefferson professed abhorrence of the "mean, wicked, and cowardly cunning of the cabinets in the age of Machiavelli," so, too, did Frederick II. Similarly, he denounced the navigation acts of England and France as "the pest of the world," but his own system of commercial retaliation as well as his actions in the Mediterranean demonstrated that he was capable of using these traditional practices of statecraft against the European powers to enact his agenda for American national security during the early phases of the Napoleonic wars.43

42

In an effort to smooth over differences with Tunis, Jefferson and Madison went to extraordinary lengths in their dealings with Melamelli, the Tunisian minister. They eased the ambassador's loneliness in Washington by supplying him with a Greek prostitute and charged her expenses to the State Department budget as "appropriations for foreign intercourse." See Brant, Madison, IV, 306; and Field, America and the Mediterranean, 54-64. Beyond these diplomatic successes, it is important to note that Jefferson's war had increased the size and military capability of the navy. New naval construction benefited from the experience of Mediterranean combat, and commanders and crews developed tactics that would be repeated in the highly successful naval campaign in the War of 1812. Indeed, John Adams informed Jefferson in 1822 that he considered the United States Navy as "Jefferson's child" because it had been "bom" during the Barbary War. Lester J. Cappon (ed.), The Adams-Jefferson Letters: The Complete Correspondence between Thomas Jefferson and Abigail and John Adams (2 vols., Chapel Hill, NC, 1959; reprint, Chapel Hill, NC, 1988), II, 583, Adams to Jefferson, 15 October 1822. 43

Andrew A. Lipscomb and Albert E. Bergh (eds.), The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (20 vols., Washington, DC, 1903-1904), XIII, 230, Jefferson to William Duane, 4 April 1813; and LC, TJP, reel 48, Jefferson to William Short, 23 January 1804.

The Reluctant Warrior: Thomas Jefferson and the Tripolitan War, 1801-1805 Jeff Seiken

While serving as a diplomatic envoy in Europe in the 1780s, Thomas Jefferson argued repeatedly, forcefully, but ultimately finitely for a military response to the predatory behaviour of the Barbary rulers of North Africa. Jefferson believed a naval campaign waged either unilaterally or in conjunction with other nations would break the pattern of submission and tribute to the privateering states that prevailed among the lesser European powers. As president almost two decades later, Jefferson faced a renewed threat to American trading interests when Tripoli declared war on the United States in 1801. He promptly dispatched a naval squadron to the Mediterranean, initiating the first phase of a naval conflict with Tripoli that would continue until 1805. In choosing resistance rather than submission, Jefferson at last appeared to be fulfilling his long-cherished plan to use force to bring the North African regencies to heel. Indeed, many historians have characterized his decision to commit American warships to the Mediterranean in roughly these terms. 1 Yet for all of the apparent continuity between his attitude in the 1780s and his later actions as president, Jefferson's handling of the Barbary crisis diverged in two important respects from the position he had taken previously. First, the goals of his Barbary policy from 1801 to 1805 were much more limited than they had been a decade or more earlier. In the 1780s and early 1790s, Jefferson had wanted to overturn the tribute system by which governments secured the safety of their shipping through payments of cash and gifts to the Barbary rulers. During his presidency, however, his main objective was to convince the pasha of Tripoli and other Barbary leaders to honour their existing treaty arrangements with the United States and accept whatever sums of money and other valuables the American government had agreed to provide. Second, by 1801 Jefferson had also lost something of his former enthusiasm 'See, for instance, David C. Hendrickson and Robert W. Tucker, Empire of Liberty: The Statecraft of Thomas Jefferson (New York, 1990), 194; Joseph J. Ellis, American Sphinx: The Character of Thomas Jefferson (New York, 1997), 203; Merrill D. Peterson, Thomas Jefferson and the New Nation: A Biography (New York, 1970; reprint, Norwalk, CT, 1987), 312-314 and 664; and Robert J. Allison, The Crescent Obscured: The United States and the Muslim World, J 776-1815 (New York, 1995), 2425.

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for seeking a naval solution to the Barbary problem. Jefferson still found the idea of paying tribute to be distastefiil, and he was as anxious as ever to assert American honour. But his martial ardour was tempered by his ambivalence about the costs of fighting the Barbary corsairs. Determined not to let the conflict interfere with his domestic program of fiscal retrenchment, Jefferson instead tried to wage war on the cheap. From 1801 through 1804 he sought to get by with "the smallest force competent" to do the job, to borrow a phrase from his Second Annual Message to Congress. 2 This policy, however, proved frustrating and very nearly self-defeating. Jefferson turned out to be a reluctant warrior who had no stomach for a protracted struggle. Yet the weak display of American naval power not only prolonged the conflict but also risked escalating it by tempting both Tunis and Morocco to enter the war on Tripoli's side. Jefferson's first dealings with the Barbary menace came during the mid-1780s when he took up residence in France as part of a three-man diplomatic commission sent to Europe by the newly independent American Republic. While the commission's main responsibility was to secure commercial treaties with other governments throughout Europe, it was also given the task of negotiating with Morocco, Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli. Congress expected Jefferson and his fellow commissioners to follow the traditional route of paying some form of tribute if necessary to the North African principalities in exchange for their pledge not to molest American merchant shipping.3 Jefferson, though, bristled at the idea of submitting to such extortion. In his letters and reports from Europe, he repeatedly urged the use of a naval force to put an end to the depredations of the Barbary corsairs. As he put it bluntly in one letter, "the motives pleading for war rather than tribute are numerous and honourable, those opposing them are mean and short-sighted." At the time, the American government lacked a naval force of any kind, having quickly disposed of the remnants of the Continental navy at the end of the Revolutionary War. Like many of the founders, Jefferson believed the nation would be hard pressed to survive and prosper in the Atlantic world without a strong seagoing fleet, and he now viewed the threat of Barbary aggression as presenting the perfect pretext to redress this deficiency. "We ought to begin a naval power, if we mean to carry on our own commerce," he wrote in 1784. "Can we begin it on a more honourable occasion or with a weaker foe?" 4 Jefferson's pleas for a 2

Paul Leicester Ford (ed.), The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (12 vols., New York, 1892-1899), VIII, 183, Second Annual Message, 15 December 1802. 3

For background on European and American interaction with the Barbary States, see Ray W. Irwin, The Diplomatic Relations of the United States with the Barbary Powers, 1776-1816 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1931; reprint, New York, 1970), 1-36. "Jefferson expressed his distaste for paying tribute and his preference for a navy in a sequence of letters. See Julian P. Boyd, et al. (eds.), The Papers of Thomas

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navy made little impression on the cash-starved Confederation Congress. Nonetheless, he was not discouraged. Upon his return from Europe in 1788 and during his first few years as Secretary of State in the administration of George Washington, he continued to press the case for armed resistance to Barbary demands, insisting that waging war, either alone or in concert with other European states, was preferable to paying for peace. 5 When Jefferson retired as Secretary of State in 1793, American relations with Barbary were in a state of flux. In 1786 Morocco had consented to a treaty that entailed no regular tribute of any kind from the United States government. 6 Otherwise, despite threats of attack - and in the case of Algiers, the actual seizure of thirteen American merchant vessels - the United States lacked treaties with the other North African regencies. By the time Jefferson became president in 1801, American relations with Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli had entered a new phase, but they were still far from stable. In the second half of the 1790s the United States settled with all three regencies. Generally perceived to be the most powerful of the three, Algiers obtained the most lucrative deal: a cash award of $585,000, presents worth about $40,000 and roughly $22,000 in annual tribute to be issued in some combination of cash and naval stores. Peace with Tunis and Tripoli was less expensive, costing the United States only $107,000 and $57,000, respectively, in cash, presents and stores while requiring no annuities.7 These treaty arrangements, however, were already in danger of unravelling by the end of the decade. The United States failed to deliver on all of its promised payments to the regencies. In addition, the pasha of Tripoli, Yussuf Karamanli, took offense at the meagre provisions of his treaty in comparison to the generous deal given to Algiers and threatened war

Jefferson (36 vols., Princeton, 1950-), VII, 508-513, Jefferson to James Monroe, 11 November 1784; VII, 571, Jefferson to Horatio Gates, 13 December 1784; VII, 637640, Jefferson to Monroe, 6 February 1785; VIII, 417-419, Jefferson to John Page, 20 August 1785; VIII, 426-427, Jefferson to John Jay, 23 August 1785; X, 123-125, Jefferson to John Adams, 11 July 1786; and X, 223-225, Jefferson to Monroe, 11 August 1786. 5

Ibid., XVI, 600-601, Jefferson to Edward Rutledge, 4 July 1790; and XXIII, 361-363, Jefferson to George Washington, 1 April 1792. 'Although according to one source the American consul who secured the treaty handed out gifts worth approximately $20,000 during the negotiations. See Richard B. Parker, Uncle Sam in Barbary: A Diplomatic History (Gainesville, FL, 2004), 48. 7

Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, 61-91.

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unless the United States agreed to pay $250,000 plus an additional $20,000 on an annual basis for a new treaty. 8 This was the situation confronting Jefferson when he took office as president in 1801. In one critical respect, though, Jefferson was in a far better position than previous American leaders who had dealt with Barbary. In the late 1790s the country had finally acquired a navy, building o r purchasing over two dozen warships of various sizes during the undeclared Quasi-War with France. Although the partial demobilization directed by the Peace Establishment Act of 1801 had led to the sale of many vessels, Jefferson still retained under his command thirteen frigates ranging in strength f r o m twenty-eight to forty-four guns and a twelve-gun schooner. 9 By this point in time J e f f e r s o n ' s own views on the value of a navy had changed dramatically - so m u c h so that some members of the defeated Federalist Party feared that he would abolish the navy altogether once he became president. 1 0 They need not have worried. g

lbid., 72-75 and 92-101. For an account that blames the onset of war with Tripoli on the policy of President John Adams, see Michael Kitzen, "Money Bags or Cannon Balls: The Origins of the Tripolitan War, 1795-1801," Journal of the Early Republic, XVI, No. 4 (1996), 601-624. Adams deserves much of the criticism, but the author was perhaps too quick to downplay some of the extenuating circumstances that explain, if not exactly justify, the administration's haphazard diplomacy. For a defence of Adams' conduct against a charge of negligence levelled by earlier historians, see James A. Carr, "John Adams and the Barbary Problem: The Myth and the Record," American Neptune, XXVI, No. 4 (1966), 231-257. 9

Michael Palmer, Stoddert's War: Naval Operations during the Quasi-War with France, 1798-1801 (Columbia, SC, 1987), 128. The number of guns refers to the ship's official armament or rating. In practice, American and European warships carried many more guns than they were rated for. Constitution, for instance, while rated as a forty-four gun ship, was actually equipped with fifty-two cannon during its 1804 deployment in the Mediterranean. See Paul H. Silverstone, The Sailing Navy, 1775-1854 (Annapolis, 2001), χ and 26. 10

In fact, when a tie in the electoral count between Jefferson and his running mate, Aaron Burr, cast the 1800 presidential election into the House of Representatives for resolution, Federalists offered to support Jefferson if he promised to maintain the navy, among other concessions. For accounts of these backroom intrigues, see Dumas Malone, Jefferson the President: The First Term, 1801-1805 (Boston, 1970; reprint, Charlottesville, VA, 2005), 11-16 and 487-493. For more on the evolution of Jefferson's thinking on naval issues, see Jeffrey J. Seiken, "American Naval Policy in an Age of Atlantic Warfare: A Consensus Broken and Reforged, 1783-1816" (Unpublished PhD thesis, Ohio State University, 2007). For a different interpretation of Jefferson that stresses the consistency of his views, see James R. Sofka, "The Jeffersonian Idea of National Security: Commerce, the Atlantic Balance of Power, and the Barbary War, 1786-1805," Diplomatic History, XXI, No. 4 (1997), 519-544; and Sofka, "'The Jeffersonian Idea of National Security' Revisited," this volume.

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While Jefferson had no interest in continuing the ambitious plan of naval expansion begun by his political opponents, he readily accepted the small force bequeathed to him by the outgoing administration of John Adams. Furthermore, as events would soon prove, Jefferson was fully prepared to deploy this force in defence of American navigation in the Mediterranean. Jefferson finalized the decision to dispatch a squadron to cruise in the region after consulting with his cabinet in May 1801. In choosing to respond to the pasha's ultimatum in this fashion, however, Jefferson was not seeking to terminate the tribute system as he had wanted to do earlier in his career. The central purpose of his policy as president was to maintain the status quo in the region and hold the Barbary leaders to the terms of their treaties with the United States. In return, he was ready and willing to continue payment of whatever annuities or gratuities the American government was obligated to deliver. Thus, at the same meeting in which Jefferson and his cabinet officers resolved to send a naval expedition to the Mediterranean, they also agreed to supply the dey of Algiers with the three years of annual tribute that had fallen into arrears. The administration at this time also took steps to expedite the delivery of the $40,000 worth of jewels and other presents that had been promised to Tunis.11 In his efforts to preserve the treaty structure that had been established in the 1790s, Jefferson also showed that he was willing to make limited concessions to the Barbary leaders. For instance, Richard Dale, the commander of the first squadron, carried a cash gift of $10,000 that he was to give to the pasha of Tripoli as a token of American friendship, assuming the latter had not already broken his treaty with the United States.12 A year later, when the emperor of Morocco grew restive, the administration agreed to present him with 100 naval gun carriages and up to $20,000 in cash as a reward for staying out of the conflict with Tripoli.13 The only major point on which Jefferson refused to compromise concerned the question of annual tribute. In early 1802 Jeffer"Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXXIV, 114-115, Notes on a Cabinet Meeting, 15 May, 1801; and Robert J. Brugger, et al. (eds.), The Papers of James Madison: Secretary of State Series (8 vols., Charlottesville, VA, 1986-), I, 423, Madison to William Eaton, 17 July 1801. Jefferson, however, was pessimistic that fulfilment of the treaty obligations would satisfy the Barbary rulers for any length of time. See Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXXIV, 308-309, Jefferson to Wilson Cary Nicholas, 11 June 1801. 12

Dudley W. Knox (ed.), Naval Documents Related to the Quasi-War between the United States and France (Washington, DC, 1935-1938), I, 466, Samuel Smith to Richard Dale, 20 May 1801. 13

Brugger, et al. (eds.), Papers of Madison: Secretary of State Series, III, 141, Madison to James Simpson, 20 April 1802; and IV, 38, Madison to Simpson, 21 October 1802.

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son stated his readiness to offer the pasha peace "on [the] easiest terms," but he was adamantly opposed to any settlement that entailed payment of an annuity to the Tripolitan ruler. The American consuls in North Africa warned the president that yielding to Tripoli on this matter would lead the other Barbary States to demand similar awards of cash or presents on a regular basis.14 By March 1803, however, Jefferson had abandoned his position on tribute. To Robert Smith he admitted that "I have never believed in any effect from a show of force to [the Barbary] powers. Their system is a war of little expense to them, which must put the great nations to a greater expense than the presents which would buy it off." The most that war could accomplish was "to keep the demand of presents within bounds." 15 The following month, Madison authorized the American consul at Tripoli to offer the pasha $20,000 outright with another $8000-10,000 to follow on a yearly basis in exchange for peace. Similar terms were to be offered to the bey of Tunis.16 In fairness to Jefferson, the American proposal was modest compared to the hefty sums European governments were accustomed to doling out to the Barbary powers on the signing of a new treaty. For instance, in October 1802 Sweden ended its war with Tripoli by agreeing to pay $150,000 in addition to $8000 in annual tribute.17 Nonetheless, the administration's new negotiating attitude represented a significant retreat from the "no-peace-for-annual tribute" stance that had formed the basis of Jefferson's Barbary policy from the outset of the Tripolitan War. Jefferson eventually capitulated on the issue of tribute because he ceased to believe the effort of waging an open-ended naval campaign was worth the expense. In the 1780s, Jefferson's letters on the subject of the Barbary corsairs had blazed with the conviction that war was preferable to any kind of peace obtained through bribery. Armed resistance was the more just and principled course of action, he had argued, and it was likely to be cheaper in the long run, too.18 As president, he initially held to the same view. To Secretary of State James Madison, he wrote in 1801, "I am an enemy to all these l4

Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXXVI, 394, Notes on a Cabinet Meeting, 18 January 1802; and Brugger, et al. (eds.), Papers of James Madison, III, 135, Madison to James Leander Cathcart, 18 April 1802. "Library of Congress (LC), Thomas Jefferson Papers (TJP), reel 45, Jefferson to Robert Smith, 29 March 1803. 16

Brugger, et al. (eds.), Papers of James Madison, IV, 494-495, Madison to Cathcart, 9 AprU 1803. "Patrick Garrity, "The United States and Barbary Piracy, 1783-1815," Comparative Strategy, XXVI, No. 5 (2007), 412. 18

See note 4 above.

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douceurs, tributes, & humiliations." He was of the firm opinion that "nothing will stop the eternal increase of demand from these pirates but the presence of an armed force, and it will be more economical & more honorable to use the same means at once for suppressing their insolence."19 Yet as the war dragged on past its first year, Jefferson grew far less certain about the economics of using force to resolve the nation's problems with Barbary. This was especially true once it became apparent that the conflict might jeopardize the programme of debt retirement that was at the foundation of his fiscal policy at home. Jefferson and Treasury Secretary Albert Gallatin shared an abhorrence of public debt, viewing it a "moral canker" that permitted a privileged few to fatten their fortunes at public expense while depriving the government of millions in revenues that could be spent on projects that would benefit the citizenry as a whole. The overriding priority of both men in 1801 was to pay off the $83 million debt they had inherited from the previous administration. At the same time, Jefferson and Gallatin were determined to repeal all the internal taxes that had been enacted in the 1790s.20 The only way the government could accomplish these - in theory at least - incompatible goals was if it practised the most rigid economy in spending. All other concerns, including the exigencies of national defence and diplomacy, would have to take a back seat to these most fundamental of objectives. In the early going, Jefferson was sanguine about the costs of employing the navy to resolve the conflict with Tripoli. He assured one correspondent that most of the expense would be covered by the proceeds from the surplus naval vessels that were to be sold under the provisions of the 1801 Peace Act.21 The same law required the government to keep several frigates in ser-

ajames M. Smith (ed.), The Republic of Letters: The Correspondence between Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, 1776-1826 (3 vols., New York, 1995), II, 1193-1194, Jefferson to Madison, 28 August 1801. 20 For Jefferson and Gallatin's mutual antipathy towards debt and taxes and their commitment to eliminate both in the early 1800s, see Herbert E. Sloan, Principle and Interest: Thomas Jefferson and the Problem of Debt (New York, 1995), esp. chapters five and six. The "moral canker" quote appears in Ford (ed.), Writings of Thomas Jefferson, VIII, 185, Second Annual Message, 15 December 1802. 2 'Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXXIV, 110-111, Jefferson to Thomas Mann Randolph, Jr., 14 May 1801. Jefferson based his comment on the information he had received from Acting Navy Secretary Samuel Smith, who had recently presented him with a memorandum detailing the costs of the squadron being readied for the Mediterranean. Smith estimated that the total expense of the American naval effort would be about $480,000 a year. See Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXXIV, 28-31, Smith to Jefferson, 4 May 1801. In fact, the fifteen vessels sold brought in a little over $275,000. See American State Papers, Class VI: Naval

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vice, and the dispatches sent out to American diplomats in the Mediterranean in 1801 noted that ordering a squadron to cruise in the region would "add but inconsiderably to the expense that would otherwise be incurred" under the Peace Act.22 These statements, however, turned out to be badly off the mark, as were Gallatin's economic projections. Gallatin wanted to limit annual spending on the navy to $670,000 as part of the plan he worked out to redeem the debt in its entirety in sixteen years. But the Tripolitan War played havoc with his calculations - actual naval expenditures averaged well over $1 million per year during the conflict - and put Gallatin squarely at odds with his counterpart in the Navy Department, Robert Smith.23 In an effort to salvage what he could of his budget, Gallatin repeatedly pressed Jefferson to keep a tight limit on naval spending, even if this meant that operations in the Mediterranean would suffer. Smith, for his part, pushed to strengthen the Mediterranean squadron, especially once it became apparent to him that only a strong force would compel the pasha to yield and hold the pretensions of the other Barbary rulers in check. Jefferson leaned strongly towards Gallatin's position, and he sometimes passed on the Treasury chiefs recommendations as his own. But he also tried to steer a course that satisfied both cabinet officers, which led to a pattern of decision making that had an erratic, almost schizophrenic quality. On more than one occasion, reinforcements were dispatched, only to be followed a short time later by instructions ordering the recall of several ships. The overall result, though, was much closer to Gallatin's liking than Smith's. For most of the war, the navy employed only a small portion of its fighting strength in the Mediterranean. Initially, Jefferson and his advisors agreed that just three of the navy's thirteen frigates - Philadelphia, Essex, and Constellation - along with the schooner Enterprize should be dispatched to the Mediterranean. The decision to send such a small force in May 1801 made a certain amount of sense, since at the time the administration only knew that the pasha of Tripoli had been

Affairs (Washington, DC, 1834), I, 80, Robert Smith, "Statement of the Sales of Public Vessels...," 8 December 1801. 22

Brugger, et al. (eds.), Papers of James Madison, I, 200, Madison to Eaton, 20 May 1801; I, 209, Circular Letter to American Consuls, Mediterranean, 21 May 1801; I, 210, Circular Letter to American Ministers, May 21, 1801; and I, 213, Madison to Richard O'Brien, 21 May 1801. "Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXXV, 630-635, Gallatin to Jefferson, Remarks on the Draft Message [on or before 16 November 1801]. For a convenient summary of the Navy Department's annual expenditures, see the table in Davis R. Dewey, Financial History of the United States (7th ed., New York, 1920), 124.

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threatening war, but not if he had followed through on his threat.24 But once the squadron under Commodore Richard Dale reached the Mediterranean, the Americans quickly learned that the Tripolitan ruler had not been bluffing. Soon after his arrival, Dale also realized that his small command was inadequate to its designated tasks. In his very first dispatch to Washington he observed that "there is full Employment at present in the Mediterranean, for all the Frigates belonging to the United States." 25 Dale was perhaps overstating his case, especially as the deep drafts of the frigates limited their effectiveness in the shallow, shoal-strewn waters along the North African coast. Nonetheless, he plainly needed more ships if he was to have any hope of executing the tasks detailed in his written instructions. His primary mission was to blockade the port of Tripoli, but his orders also directed him to deliver letters and tribute to Tunis and Algiers, provide convoys to friendly merchantmen and otherwise do what was necessary "to protect our commerce and chastise [the pasha for his] insolence." Carrying out all these duties on a coastline more than 1500 miles long would have required at least seven vessels - four to maintain a blockade of Tripoli and three more to attend to the other functions listed in his orders and to respond to any contingencies. Since Dale's force was several ships shy of this number, he had little choice but to disperse his squadron. By a stroke of good fortune, he had found the pasha's two strongest cruisers, the twenty-eight-gun Meshouda and a sixteen-gun brig, riding at anchor in Gibraltar when his squadron reached the port in July. Dale left Philadelphia behind to watch the Tripolitan ships and prevent them from escaping out to sea.26 These two ships aside, the rest of Tripoli's seagoing navy consisted of five vessels of various rigs, all of which were poorly armed and manned and posed little direct danger to Dale's warships.27 But the risk to American shipping in

"Although the 1801 Peace Act technically called for six frigates to remain in constant service, Acting Navy Secretary Samuel Smith interpreted this provision in a loose fashion. Smith arranged for three frigates and the schooner Enterprize to be sent out initially, with a second squadron of three frigates to follow in relief after nine months. In this fashion, six frigates would be kept in commission, but only three would usually be at sea at any particular time. See Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXXIV, 28-31, Smith to Jefferson, 4 May 1801. The second squadron was to remain ready to sail on a month's notice, so Smith was not ruling out the possibility of sending reinforcements to the Mediterranean if additional ships were needed. "Knox (ed.), Naval Documents, I, 498, Dale to Smith, 2 July 1801. 2

"Ibid., I, 500, Dale to Captain Samuel Barron, July 4, 1801.

"James L. Cathcart, the American consul at Tripoli, had been reporting regularly on the pasha's naval strength. See ibid., I, 340-341, Cathcart to David Humphreys, 14 December 1799; and I, 368, Cathcart, "Marine Force of Tripoli," 14 Au-

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the Mediterranean was another matter. As the Quasi-War had shown, merchantmen were vulnerable to just about any craft that could float and carry a few cannon. Moreover, there was every reason to believe that the pasha would attempt to augment his naval force by purchasing and equipping additional raiders. Dale first discharged his diplomatic obligations at Algiers and Tunis. Afterwards, in order to provide some security to American traders in the area, he detached Essex with orders to escort friendly merchantmen into and out of the western Mediterranean. Having taken this precaution, the commodore proceeded on to Tripoli with his command reduced to President and Enterprize. If the administration had been hoping to impress the Tripolitan ruler with a formidable display of naval power, a single frigate accompanied by a schooner was unlikely to have the desired effect. Dale lingered in the vicinity of Tripoli for eight weeks, keeping up a half-hearted blockade and engaging in a fruitless exchange of messages with the pasha. By the end of September his growing sick list and dwindling provisions forced him to beat a hasty retreat to Gibraltar, bringing the curtain down on the first act of the war against Tripoli.28 Dale recognized that forceful prosecution of the war demanded a larger naval presence and repeatedly said so in his communications with the Navy Department. Richard O'Brien, the ranking American diplomat in North Africa, chimed in with similar advice in his letters to Secretary of State James Madison.29 The administration, however, had other priorities. In late 1801, at about the same time that Dale was reminding Robert Smith of "the necessity of sending a strong force" to the Mediterranean the following spring, Gallatin was seeking to restrict the navy's 1802 appropriations to $670,000, its lowest level of funding since 1797, to offset an anticipated decline in government revegust 1800. For his most recent estimate, see I, 484, Cathcart to Thomas Appleton, 2 June 1801. 2S

Ibid., I, 552-553 and 580-582, Dale to Smith, 18 August and 25 September

1801. 29

Ibid., I, 498, 520-521, 553 and 615, Dale to [Robert Smith], 2 and 19 July, 18 August and 6 November 1801; and Brugger, et al. (eds.), Papers of James Madison, I, 457, O'Brien to Madison, 22 July 1801; and II, 138, O'Brien to Madison, 26 September 1801. O'Brien was an old Barbary hand and a strong advocate of employing naval power in the Mediterranean. His hard-line attitude derived in part from his own experiences of the danger posed by the Barbary corsairs. Originally a merchant captain, O'Brien had been captured and held prisoner in Algiers from 1785 to 1795. During his many years of captivity and afterwards, he often provided advice and assistance to American traders and government officers on Barbary matters. In 1798 he returned to Algiers in an official capacity as consul general. For background on O'Brien's activities before the Tripolitan War, see Allison, Crescent Obscured, 154-180.

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nues.30 In the fall of 1801, Jefferson did allow the frigate Boston, which had been assigned the task of delivering the new American minister to France, to join Dale's squadron. But the reinforcement was only temporary, as shortly afterwards Smith ordered Dale to send home two frigates over the winter.31 And when the president and his department chiefs gathered in January 1802 to discuss their Mediterranean policy for the year ahead, one of their main concerns was cutting naval spending so that Jefferson could proceed with the program of tax and debt reduction he had just presented to Congress. The meeting ended with the cabinet resolving to send out only two frigates - Constellation and Chesapeake - along with the schooner Enterprize in the replacement squadron, with a third frigate, Adams, to be held in reserve.32 Although the administration subsequently relented and permitted Adams to sail as well, it made no move to expand the American naval presence in the Mediterranean beyond the level of force employed in 1801, as both Dale and O'Brien had recommended. This remained true even after Congress in early February approved a new law empowering Jefferson to mobilize any part of the fleet he wanted for service in the Mediterranean.33 Given carte blanche to intensify the naval war against Tripoli, Jefferson elected instead to stay with the status quo. The orders given to Richard Morris, the commander of the second squadron, were similar to those issued to Commodore Dale, and they were problematic for precisely the same reason. On the one hand, his instructions stressed the importance of intimidating the pasha by appearing off Tripoli with his entire squadron and establishing a close blockade of the harbour if negotiations failed. On the other, he was urged not to neglect the western Mediterranean where an increasingly belligerent Morocco, the big Tripolitan cruiser Meshouda tied up at Gibraltar and the numerous requests for escorts by anxious American merchant captains all demanded some degree of attention. The problem for Morris, of course, was that unless he could find some way for his ships to be in two places at once, he could not act on one part of his orders M

Knox (ed.), Naval Documents, I, 615, Dale to Smith, 6 November 1801; and Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXXV, 630-635, Gallatin to Jefferson, Remarks on the Draft Message [on or before 16 November 1801], "Knox (ed.), Naval Documents, I, 589 and 639, Smith to Dale, 1 October and 15 December 1801. Enterprize had already been sent back in October with dispatches for Washington. 32 Boyd, et al. (eds.), Papers of Thomas Jefferson, XXXVI, 394, Notes on a Cabinet Meeting, 18 January 1802. 33

The "Act for the Protection of the Commerce and Seamen of the United States, against the Tripolitan Cruisers" also authorized American naval commanders and privateers to take Tripolitan vessels as prizes. As well, enlistments for sailors were expanded from one to two years. See Knox (ed.), Naval Documents, II, 51-52.

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without compromising his ability to carry out the other parts. Smith glossed over the contradictions by advising the commodore "to exercise his soundest discretion" as to the exact disposition of his squadron.34 Morris took Smith at his word and used plenty of discretion, although not in the manner the Navy Secretary intended. Arriving at Gibraltar in late May 1802, Morris spent the remainder of the year either dallying in port, usually in the company of his pregnant wife who had been allowed to join him on the expedition, or escorting the occasional merchant convoy. But he kept his distance from Tripoli. While Morris dawdled, Jefferson's department heads argued. From August 1802 onwards, Navy Secretary Smith took an increasingly assertive role in the cabinet deliberations, arguing for a more aggressive approach to the Barbary problem. His stance brought him into direct conflict with Gallatin. The trouble started when word reached Washington in August that Morocco had declared war and that a break with Tunis might also be imminent. In response, Smith proposed readying the frigates New York and John Adams for sea as soon as possible, thereby increasing the number of frigates in service from three to five.35 Jefferson approved this measure after conferring with the other secretaries.36 A few weeks later, the administration learned that both reports had been premature: the Moroccan emperor had rescinded his declaration, granting the United States a six-month reprieve to meet his demands, while the news about Tunis turned out to be of questionable accuracy. Seeing an opportunity to strengthen the Mediterranean squadron, Smith pressed to have the two frigates sail anyway. In a long and sharply worded note, Smith 14 Ibid., II, 92, 99-100 and 130, Smith to Morris, 20 March and 1 and 20 April 1802.

"Ibid., II, 233, Smith to James Barron, 13 August 1802; and II, 250, Smith to John Rodgers, 25 August 1802. In July Smith had been planning to send General Greene to the Mediterranean with $30,000 in tribute for Algiers and 100 gun carriages for Morocco. But General Greene was not suited for combat, and, once apprised of the alarming situation in North Africa, he substituted New York, a frigate that would be a useful addition to Morris' force. See ibid., II, 206, Smith to Isaac Chauncey, 21 July 1802; and II, 217, Madison to Smith, 29 July 1802; and Adams (ed.), Writings of Albert Gallatin, I, 87-88, Gallatin to Jefferson, 16 August 1802. 36

News about the problems with Morocco and Tunis arrived while both Jefferson and Madison were at their respective estates in Virginia, where they usually retired in August to escape the oppressive heat and humidity of the capítol. As a result, most of the deliberations between Jefferson and his cabinet officers were carried out by post, leaving an unusually rich paper trail. The discussion can be followed in Adams (ed.), Writings of Albert Gallatin, I, 83-84 and 87-94, Jefferson to Gallatin, 9, 20 and 23 August 1802, and Gallatin to Jefferson, 16 and 20 August 1802; and Smith (ed.), Republic of Letters, II, 1234-1235 and 1239, Jefferson to Madison, 9 and 23 August 1802; and Madison to Jefferson, 14 August 1802.

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warned Jefferson of the risks the administration was incurring with its minimalist way of prosecuting the war. "A formidable force displayed at this time will make a favourable impression, will repress every disposition hostile to us, and will thus save us great trouble and much expense," he wrote. But "with less force the war may continue for years, which would be playing a hazardous game." 37 Gallatin took a different view. Already inclined to regard the Tripolitan war as a waste of national resources, he was willing to tolerate the departure of New York, but was dead set against dispatching the John Adams as well. At first Jefferson sided with Gallatin and countermanded the sailing orders for John Adams, but he reconsidered once Smith pointed out that provisions for the ship had already been purchased and the crew paid two months' wages in advance. In the end, the argument of financial expediency rather than strategic necessity carried the day, and the frigate was allowed to sail.38 Yet the decision to add John Adams and New York to Commodore Morris' three frigates represented at most a temporary departure from policy. Jefferson assured Gallatin that if the other Barbary regencies besides Tripoli were still inclined for peace, then all of the frigates except two would be recalled before winter. The two men also agreed that the navy's budget should be targeted for further cuts in 1803 provided the situation in the Mediterranean remained stable. True to Jefferson's word, the cabinet in October 1802 determined that Chesapeake and Constellation should leave the Mediterranean immediately, as should Adams if the threat of hostilities with Morocco had passed. Two days after the meeting, Smith issued the requisite orders recalling the two frigates. 39 By the spring of 1803, the country was no closer to ending the war with Tripoli than it had been the previous spring. In fact, instead of winding down, the conflict was in danger of expanding to include Tunis and Morocco. Far from being cowed by the American naval presence in the Mediterranean, both states appeared to be looking to exploit the war to win concessions from the American government. Nonetheless, in Washington fiscal economy continued to be the determining factor in the administration's Barbary policy. Early in the new year, just as Congress was preparing to discuss the question of naval appropriations for 1803, Smith had to fend off an eleventh-hour effort by "Quoted in Christopher McKee, Edward Preble: A Naval Biography, 17611807(Annapolis, 1972; reprint, Annapolis, 1996), 103. 38 Adams (ed.), Writings of Albert Gallatin, I, 96-101, Jefferson to Gallatin, 8, 17, 18 and 20 September 1802; and Gallatin to Jefferson, 9 and 21 September 1802; and Smith (ed.), Republic of Letters, II, 1242, 1245 and 1249, Jefferson to Madison, 30 August and 6 and 17 September 1802.

"Franklin Β. Sawvel (ed.), The Complete Anas of Thomas Jefferson (New York, 1903; Reprint, Whitefish, MT, 2009), 217-218, 21 October 1802; and Knox (ed.), Naval Documents, II, 306-307, Smith to Morris, 23 October 1802.

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Gallatin to reduce funding for the Mediterranean squadron by forty percent. 40 Smith stood his ground, and the budget was submitted to Congress without modification. But the Secretary of the Navy fared less well in March with his own request to send out one of the big forty-four-gun frigates to take the place of the warships returning home. Constellation had just arrived at the Washington Navy Yard, and Chesapeake and possibly Adams were due back at any time, which would leave Morris with as few as two frigates and a schooner in the Mediterranean to renew the contest with Tripoli. Jefferson, however, saw no reason to depart from the arrangement worked out by the cabinet. Although the administration had been bombarded with letters over the past ten months from the American consuls in the Mediterranean pleading for more ships, neither their appeals nor Smith's entreaties made an impression on the president. 41 "[N]o new fact justifies a change of plan," he wrote to Madison, explaining his decision not to authorize the additional frigate. If the naval campaign of the past year had been disappointing, the fault lay entirely with Commodore Morris' passive strategy. "Our misfortune has been that our vessels have been employed in particular convoys, instead of a close blockade equivalent to universal convoy." Jefferson did not doubt that some of the navy's commanders and other interested parties might see things differently, but he discounted their views: "Every officer in the navy, and every merchant in the US would be for [sending out reinforcements] because they see but one object, themselves." 42

""Adams (ed.), Writings of Albert Gallatin, I, 115-117, Gallatin to Jefferson, 18 January 1803; and LC, TJP, reel 45, Gallatin to Jefferson, 22 January 1803. Under Gallatin's revised plan, Congress would allocate $286,000 rather than $476,000 for the vessels in commission. The Navy Department would receive an additional $190,000 should one or more of the other Barbary powers enter the war. Jefferson was receptive to the suggestion, but Smith, who was caught off-guard by Gallatin's actions, was not. With the House Ways and Means Committee impatiently waiting on the delivery of the naval estimates, Gallatin conceded defeat. See LC, TJP, reel 45, Smith to Jefferson, 29 January 1803; and Gallatin to Jefferson, 29 January 1803. 41

The consuls were also critical of the way the navy's commanders were fighting the war, but they all agreed that decisive results could only be achieved with a more substantial naval force. See Brugger, et al. (eds.), Papers of James Madison, III, 244, O'Brien to Madison, 20 May 1802; III, 292-294, Eaton to Madison, 8 June 1802; III, 542-544, Simpson to Madison, 3 September 1802; III, 546, Cathcart to Madison, 4 September 1802; IV, 3, Cathcart to Madison, 8 October 1802; IV, 190-191, William Kirkpatrick to Madison, 15 December 1802; and IV, 296-297, Eaton to Madison, 1 February 1803. 42

Smith (ed.), Republic of Letters, II, 1268-1269, Jefferson to Madison, 22 March 1803; and LC, TJP, reel 45, Smith to Jefferson, 17 March 1803; and Jefferson to Smith, 29 March 1803. Days earlier, Captain Alexander Murray, fresh off Constellation, had delivered a blistering report to Gallatin about the commodore's behaviour.

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The Mediterranean squadron was not completely debilitated by all of these departures, as Morris in an uncharacteristic display of initiative elected to hold on to Adams. But for the third consecutive year, during the goodweather sailing months of March through September the American naval presence in the region amounted to only three frigates and the ever-present schooner Enterprize.43 Morris actually made aggressive use of this force for a change, rendezvousing with all four ships off Tripoli at the end of May 1803 and maintaining at least the semblance of a blockade for the next four weeks. What was particularly notable about this action was that it marked the first time in the war that Tripoli had been visited by more than a single American frigate. The force sent out under Edward Preble to replace Morris' ships at summer's end included four new vessels - the sixteen-gun brigs Syren and Argus, the twelve-gun schooner Vixen, and the fourteen-gun schooner Nautilus.44 The need for additional light, swift ships capable of operating in the shallow waters off the North African coast had been apparent since the first year of the war. In January 1803 the administration sought funding for the ships, and Congress allocated the money a month later. Preble's command was the largest yet deployed in the Mediterranean. Overall, seven ships were entrusted to his charge: the two brigs and two schooners named above, the ubiquitous

Murray informed the Treasury Secretary that peace could have been concluded with the pasha for the nominal fee of $5000 the previous summer if Morris had shown his squadron off Tripoli. See Adams (ed.), Writings of Albert Gallatin, I, 118-119, Gallatin to Jefferson, 21 March 1803. The matter did not end with Jefferson's rebuff of Smith; the Secretary's brother, Senator Samuel Smith of Maryland, got involved and sent Madison a pointed letter warning of the dire consequences if American shipping in the Mediterranean was denied adequate protection by the administration. A week later, Jefferson gathered with his cabinet to discuss the possibility of delaying the return of Adams and Chesapeake. All agreed, however, that it was too late to get new instructions to Morris. Interestingly enough, just a few days before the meeting, Smith had drafted orders informing Morris that he could retain the two frigates at his discretion. It is not clear whether he dispatched the orders or checked with Jefferson before preparing them. See Brugger, et al. (ed.), Papers of James Madison, IV, 472-473, Smith to Madison, 1 March 1803; Knox (ed.), Naval Documents, II, 387-388, Smith to Morris, 6 April 1803; and Sawvel (ed.), Anas, 218-219, 8 April 1803. •"Following the arrival of Adams on 21 July 1802, there were actually four frigates on hand in the Mediterranean, but the number slipped back to three with the departure of Boston in early September. ""For details about the ships, see Howard I. Chapelle, The History of the American Sailing Navy; The Ships and Their Development (New York, 1949; reprint, New York, 1965), 182-189.

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Enterprize, and the heavy frigates Constitution and Philadelphia.45 Although Preble was assigned one fewer frigate than previous squadrons, his force's much greater ability to work inshore and interdict Tripoli's own small cruisers and trading vessels more than compensated for the absence of one of the heavier-gunned warships. Equally important, the greater number of ships at his disposal significantly increased the capabilities of his squadron since he now possessed the resources to mount a blockade while still providing escort to merchant vessels, performing diplomatic errands and carrying out other tasks as required. By mid-September all of Preble's squadron had reached the Mediterranean with the exception of the two brigs, which lagged behind by several weeks. At Gibraltar Preble encountered Commodore John Rodgers, who was under orders to sail home with the two frigates under his charge, John Adams and New York, as soon as Preble arrived. Rather than follow these orders to the letter, the two commanders decided to take advantage of the overlap of their squadrons to bring their combined force to bear against Morocco, which once again appeared bent on war. Preble sent Philadelphia and Vixen ahead to Tripoli, while the rest of his squadron plus Rodgers' two ships remained on station to cruise the Mediterranean and Adantic coasts of Morocco. Over the next few weeks Preble in Constitution paid several visits to Tangier to negotiate direcdy with the Moroccans. In early October Preble and Rodgers rendezvoused with all three frigates along with the schooner Nautilus in Tangier Bay for an audience with the Moroccan emperor. This show of force along with the aggressive American patrolling helped convince the emperor that nothing was to be gained by going to war with the United States. The negotiations concluded with the Moroccan ruler agreeing to reaffirm the 1786 treaty of friendship between the two nations. The crisis averted, Rodgers departed with his two frigates a few days afterwards. 46 This episode is revealing because it provides a glimpse of what could be accomplished with a sizable complement of warships. Preble and Rodgers were able to concentrate their strength in the western Mediterranean and stave off a potentially ruinous break with Morocco. At the same time, Preble had ships to spare to devote some attention to Tripoli. Ironically, at almost the very moment these events were taking place in the Mediterranean, Smith was again coming under pressure from Jefferson to scale back the American naval presence there. The president was hopeful that the addition of more ships of Enterprize's design would finally enable the navy to establish a tight blockade of the port of Tripoli and make the pasha feel the sting of war. Yet, in what by the end of 1803 had become a well45

Knox (ed.), Naval Documents, II, 411, Smith to Preble, 21 May 1803.

46

McKee, Preble, 141-172.

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established pattern, the administration still allowed fiscal concerns to take precedence over the conduct of the naval war. The budget Smith had submitted to Gallatin in October 1803 estimated the navy's total expenses for 1804 at $770,000, a figure that was already substantially lower than the budgets of the past five years. But that amount was not low enough to suit Gallatin, who informed Jefferson that the Treasury was facing a deficit of $300,000 as a result of the interest due on the government stock used to purchase the Louisiana Territory from France. Jefferson feared that asking Congress to raise the money through new taxes might stir up opposition to the agreement with France, jeopardizing its ratification by the Senate. Thus, he was determined to redress the shortfall not by increasing revenues but by slashing expenditures. Gallatin proposed keeping only a single frigate and two or three of the smaller vessels in the Mediterranean in 1804 as one cost-cutting measure. Jefferson concurred and wrote Smith directly, suggesting that $75,000 could be saved if part of Preble's force was withdrawn over the winter.47 Once more, Smith resisted. Although willing to go along with Jefferson's other request to limit the sum spent on repairs, he opposed cutting corners at the expense of the Mediterranean squadron. Exactly what Smith said in response is unknown, but the outcome of their discussion is clear. The revised budget Smith turned over to Gallatin eliminated $120,000 worth of expenses in his department, but the funding for all seven ships in Preble's squadron remained intact.48 If the reduction favoured by Gallatin and endorsed by Jefferson had been put into effect, the offensive capabilities of Preble's squadron would have been seriously diminished, leaving the commodore in much the same predicament as his predecessors, stuck with a force that was too feeble to perform its mission.49 Although Smith's refusal to go along with the idea spared Preble that frustration, a combination of ill luck and poor judgment conspired to deprive the commodore of one of his frigates anyway. In late October 1803, while awaiting the arrival of the rest of the squadron at Tripoli, Philadelphia ran aground on an unmarked shoal in the harbour. The frigate and its entire

47 Adams (ed.), Writings of Albert Gallatin, I, 161-163, Gallatin to Jefferson, 4 and 6 October 1803; and LC, TJP, reel 47, Jefferson to Smith, 10 October 1803. 48

Letter from the Secretary of the Treasury, Accompanying a Report and Estimates of Appropriation for the Service of the Year 1803..., Early American Imprints, 2nd ser., No. 3314. 49 In a further ironic twist, these discussions were occurring just as Preble was embarking on his own letter-writing campaign to Smith asking for additional ships to assist him in the next year's operations. See McKee, Preble, 175-176.

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crew of 307 officers and sailors were seized by the Tripolitans.50 The loss of Philadelphia was a disaster of the first magnitude. It weakened Preble's command while vastly strengthening the pasha's position, since he now held in his hands several hundred American hostages whose release the American government would be anxious to secure as soon as possible. There was also the possibility that the humiliating setback might embolden some of the other Barbary leaders to make war on the United States. Finally, Jefferson was concerned about how the news of the frigate's capture would affect American relations with the European powers. The administration was currendy engaged in delicate negotiations with both Britain and Spain, and Jefferson worried that European respect for America would plummet as a result of the Philadelphia fiasco.51 The desire to avenge Philadelphia and to restore the country's battered prestige at last galvanized the administration into taking decisive action. Within weeks of learning about the disaster in March 1804, Jefferson and Smith resolved to send out a squadron of four frigates under the command of Captain Samuel Barron.52 To underwrite the expanded naval effort, Gallatin worked out a plan with his friends in Congress to raise the duties on select imports and apply the extra revenue to a special account designated the "Mediterranean Fund." 53 As part of the bill creating this fund, Congress also issued an emergency appropriation of $1 million to cover all of the navy's additional expenses through the end of the year. The law also authorized Smith to acquire two more small ships and hire any number of gunboats for service in the Medi-

'"For a detailed and well-researched account of Philadelphia's grounding and capture, see David F. Long, Ready to Hazard: A Biography of Commodore William Bainbridge, 1774-1833 (Hanover, NH, 1981), 71-77. ''Jefferson feared that European views of the event would be adversely affected by the panicky reaction of American officials in Europe and the Mediterranean who responded to the news "as if they thought on the loss of one frigate, that every thing was lost." See Smith (ed.), Republic of Letters, II, 1308, Jefferson to Madison, 15 April 1804; and Ford (ed.), Writings of Thomas Jefferson, VIII, 301, Jefferson to Smith, 27 April 1804. 52

A fifth frigate, John Adams, was also sent out as a store ship armed en flute, meaning that most of its guns were dismounted and stowed in the hold. Smith gave Preble permission to retain the ship if he desired, but he made it clear that he preferred to use John Adams to carry supplies and dispatches between the Mediterranean and Washington. 53

Dewey, Financial History, 121. Duties were raised 2.5 percent, with an additional ten percent levied on imports arriving in foreign vessels.

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terranean.54 All together, the steps taken by the government in the wake of Philadelphia's capture signalled a major change in a policy that for three years had been distinguished mostly by foot-dragging and half-measures. After the loss of Philadelphia, the administration finally agreed to assemble a naval squadron in the Mediterranean that was powerful enough to coerce Tripoli and give the rest of Barbary reason to moderate its posture towards the United States. But even at this juncture in the war, as the navy was preparing to launch a supreme effort against Tripoli, Jefferson was already contemplating reversing course and cutting the country's losses. In March 1805, he indicated that he planned to withdraw every American warship from the Mediterranean save for one frigate and two smaller vessels if peace was not concluded by the end of the summer.55 Due to some unexpected delays, Barron's squadron did not reach the central Mediterranean until early September 1804. By that time, Preble had already accomplished a great deal with his own reduced command. In February 1804 Preble struck back at Tripoli, staging a daring raid on the harbour which destroyed the captured American frigate at its moorings right under the guns of the pasha's castle. Once the weather moderated, Preble maintained a steady blockade of the port through the spring and summer. He also went on the offensive, using his ships plus six gunboats and two bomb ketches on loan from Naples to batter the city and its defences. The Americans mounted five separate attacks, capturing three enemy gunboats in the first assault and inflicting sufficient damage on several other occasions to rattle the pasha and the city's residents.56 Barron arrived at Tripoli too late in the season to participate in Preble's campaign, but before ending operations for the year the two officers set in motion plans to strike at Yussuf through his deposed brother Hamet, who was hiding in Egypt awaiting an opportunity to return to power. William Eaton, the former American consul at Tunis, had been advocating such a venture since the beginning of the war, and he finally secured the administration's

54

See Knox (ed.), Naval Documents, III, 522-524, "An Act Further to Protect the Commerce and the Seamen of the United States against the Barbary Powers," 26 March 1804. Congress passed the law six days after Jefferson delivered a special message explaining what had happened in the Mediterranean and outlining the measures he wanted the legislature to adopt. See ibid., III, 506-507, Jefferson to Congress, 20 March 1804. "Andrew A. Lipscomb (ed.), The Writings of Thomas Jefferson (Washington, DC, 1903), XI, 69-70, Jefferson to John Tyler, 29 March 1805. 56 For the destruction of Philadelphia and Preble's spirited campaign against Tripoli, see McKee, Preble, 189-213 and 235-308; and Glenn Tucker, Dawn Like Thunder: The Barbary Wars and the Birth of the American Navy (Indianapolis, 1963), 249-321.

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backing in the spring of 1804. Eaton spent the first two months of 1805 plotting with Hamet and helping him recruit a band of about 400 followers and hired soldiers. In March 1805, with Eaton at his side and three of the light ships from Barron's squadron providing supplies and naval support, Hamet's small army stormed Derna, Tripoli's second largest city.57 The fall of Derna coupled with the impending renewal of American naval operations against Tripoli were enough for Yussuf Pasha. Preble's bombardment of the city was still fresh in his memory, and he knew he would be assailed by a far more formidable flotilla over the summer. Commodore John Rodgers, who had taken over the squadron due to Barron's continued poor health, now had under his command five frigates and an equal number of brigs and schooners. Moreover, his squadron was about to be reinforced by a substantial number of additional ships. Four gunboats and two light vessels had been purchased in Italy, while another eight gunboats, two bomb ketches and the frigate John Adams were en route from America.58 The Tripolitan ruler, however, never gave Rodgers the opportunity to send his armada into action. Threatened with attack by sea and land, as well as a renewal of the blockade, the pasha yielded in June 1805 and agreed to make peace on terms acceptable to the United States. After the capture of Philadelphia, Yussuf initially had insisted on receiving $3 million in ransom for the prisoners along with some amount of annual tribute as the price of his friendship. By the first quarter of 1805 he had lowered his demands considerably, and in the final treaty he accepted only $60,000 for his captives. Equally if not more important, the treaty contained no provisions for payment of an annuity, although he was promised a gift of a few thousand dollars when the new American consul took up residence in the capital, as was the custom in Barbary diplomacy.59 Shortly after negotiations with Tripoli had been concluded, Rodgers sailed on with most of his squadron to Tunis. The ruler of Tunis, Hammuda Bey, had been threatening war if the United States did not return one of his cruisers and two prize ships that had been caught attempting to run the blockade into Tripoli. For some time, he had also been demanding a thirty-six-gun frigate as a present.

"For Eaton's activities during the Tripolitan war, see Louis B. Wright and Julia H. Macleod, The First Americans in North Africa: William Eaton's Struggle for a Vigorous Policy against the Barbary Pirates, 1799-1805 (Princeton, 1945; reprint, New York, 1969), esp. 100-101 and 147-189. 58

Nine gunboats had actually been dispatched from the United States, but one was lost in the Atlantic. For details on the ships that joined the Mediterranean squadron over the summer, see Knox (ed.), Naval Documents, VI, 35-42 and 71, Thomas Robinson, Jr. to Samuel Barron, 1 and 29 June 1805; and VI, 143, "US Squadron in the Mediterranean" [1806 or 1807], 59

Irwin, Diplomatic Relations, 149-154.

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The sight of the massed American fleet anchored in the Gulf of Tunis led to a dramatic about-face on the bey's part. In a concession unprecedented in the annals of Barbary, he offered to send an emissary to Washington to settle the differences between the two countries. He also renounced his desire for a frigate or any form of tribute and assured Rodgers that his intentions towards the United States were entirely friendly. 60 On that note, the navy completed its mission in the Mediterranean, and the United States found itself at peace with all four of the North African states. In October 1805 Smith wrote Rodgers ordering him to return home with the bulk of the fleet, leaving behind only a token force of three ships to ensure that the regencies remained on good behaviour.61 The dispatch of this letter indicated that the administration considered active campaigning in the Mediterranean to be at a close. In the end, the Tripolitan War turned out to be very similar to the Quasi-War with France. Both entailed the application of American naval power against foes with limited naval resources.62 And while the Tripolitan War was lengthier, less tidy and more frustrating than the Quasi-War for American leaders, it turned out to be every bit as successful. Even during the first few indecisive years, the presence of an American naval force in the Mediterranean avoided a repeat of the disaster of 1793 when Algerian corsairs, taking advantage of a newly concluded truce with Portugal, snatched up eleven American merchantmen. The loss of even a few vessels in 1801 or 1802 would have dealt a serious blow to American commercial prospects in the Mediterranean, panicking merchants, depressing trade and sending insurance rates skyward. The deployment of American squadrons, small though they were, served to protect American commercial interests in the region and helped neutralize a potentially explosive situation with the other Barbary powers. Over the course of the entire war, Tripolitan cruisers managed to capture only a single American merchant vessel. And as a further measure of American success, insurance rates for American vessels remained around five percent, a telling sign of mercantile confidence in the safety of the Mediterranean shipping routes.63

"John H. Schroeder, Commodore John Rodgers: Paragon of the Early American Navy (Gainesville, FL, 2006), 41-50. 61

Knox (ed.), Naval Documents, V, 290-291, Smith to Rodgers, 12 October

1805. 62 0f course, France had a huge navy that was nearly on par with Britain's, but the vast majority of its fleet was either engaged in operations in European waters or blockaded in port. Only a handful of French frigates were active in the West Indies, the primary theatre of the Quasi-War. 63

By contrast, in 1793 insurance rates on American vessels operating in the Mediterranean jumped from three to twenty-five percent as soon as the news of the

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Eventually, a strong show of force settled the war with Tripoli in precisely the way Jefferson hoped it would. The only differences were that the amount of force was greater than he had anticipated and it had taken several years and the loss of Philadelphia before he mustered the resolve to dispatch a squadron with sufficient firepower to accomplish its mission. Although the treaty with the pasha came under attack by some of his political opponents for being too lenient, Jefferson had every reason to be satisfied with the outcome of the Tripolitan War. The United States avoided paying tribute to Tripoli, which had always been the focus of Jefferson's Barbary diplomacy. Moreover, he convinced Tunis and Morocco to respect their treaties with the United States, again without promise of tribute. Jefferson never fully reconciled himself to the costs of fighting a naval war in the Mediterranean, but for a critical period in 1804-1805 he was able to overcome his ambivalence long enough to take full - and effective - advantage of the naval assets at his command. The reluctant warrior emerged from the conflict a triumphant one.

Algerian truce with Portugal became public. See Robert G. Albion and Jennie B. Pope, Sea Lanes in Wartime: The American Experience, 1775-1942 (New York, 1942; reprint, Hamden, CT, 1968), 70 and 131-132.

Slavery as Social Mobility? Western Slaves in Late Eighteenth Century Algiers Christine E. Sears1

In 1785, Algerian corsairs seized their first American victims when they captured Maria of Boston and Dauphin of Philadelphia, both off the Portuguese coast. Taken back to Algiers, the twenty-one crew members were thrown into Algerian prisons (bagnios) where they were held with hundreds of other European, or Western, slaves. Eventually other Americans joined them in Algiers. The Algerian bagnios would hold 130 American men between 1785 and 1796.2 In Algiers, the twenty-one American men joined a cosmopolitan, urban population with whom they interacted regularly. They communicated freely with one another and with Western consuls and merchants, and they sent and received mail and newspapers. Some American slaves used their autonomy to forge and foster connections with American and European diplomats, statesmen and businessmen, while others did so with Algerian leaders. Once free, they drew on these networks and their uncommon body of knowledge about North Africa to gain diplomatic positions beyond the reach of most sailors. Two enslaved Americans, Captain Richard O'Brien and Seaman James L. Cathcart, both captured in 1785, parlayed their Algerian enslavement into American diplomatic posts. They positioned themselves for consular positions by adopting strategies that were determined largely by their class and rank prior to capture. Captain O'Brien maintained and expanded networks outside of Algiers, while Cathcart created connections largely inside. Since the thirteenth century, Barbary corsairs had terrorized Europeans by swooping down on towns and ships, enslaving thousands. Corsairs car'I would like to thank Peter Kolchin, Cathy Matson, John Davies, Jeff Forret, Lyn Causey, Tracey Birdwell, Gillian Weiss, Samuel Thomas and others for their careful reading and thoughtful feedback. An Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Fellowship supported research for this piece at the Library Company of Philadelphia and the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. historical Society of Pennsylvania (HSP), Phi Am. 109, Richard O'Brien, "Remarks and Observations in Algiers, 1789-1791," 19 February 1790, copy of a letter to William Carmichael in Madrid; and John Burnham, "Curses of Slavery," The Rural Magazine or Vermont Repository, I, No. 1 (1795), 121.

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ried their European captives, including some American colonists, to North African urban centres where they were forcibly employed until - or if - they were ransomed. Over these centuries, Europeans and North Africans devised a negotiation system that facilitated ransoming their respective countrymen out of slavery. A few European countries even made diplomatic arrangements, usually requiring the payment of tribute, to prevent their countrymen's enslavement.3 When they ventured into the Mediterranean, newly independent Americans were outside of these long established systems for avoiding corsair capture or for freeing captured men. They lacked North African connections and diplomats who knew local languages and customs. The fledgling United States Navy could not protect its merchant marine, and in the 1780s Americans did not possess the means to supplement this small force. Worse still, they could not afford to pay tribute to North Africans to protect their mariners or to ransom their captured men. Given these circumstances, it would be reasonable to surmise that Americans avoided the Mediterranean, but they did not. They took their chances in the Mediterranean because it was one of the few trade venues open to them in the 1780s and 1790s. Both France and England restricted United States trade with their colonial holdings. In 1784 and 1785, for example, the British barred Americans from trade with the British West Indies and Canada, while the French permitted only limited access to their Caribbean colonies. But merchants might send ships to Spain and Portugal, if they could avoid Barbary corsairs who, unfortunately for the Americans, increased their activities in the late eighteenth century.4 Still, Americans sailed somewhat safely because the Spanish, long at war with Algiers, guarded Gibraltar and contained Algerian ships within the Mediterranean. Thus, Americans traded with Atlantic European ports such as Bordeaux, Porto and Lisbon in safety from corsairs. In 1785, a SpanishAlgerian truce loosed corsairs into the Atlantic, and the Algerian leader, or Dey, declared war against the United States, although he did not announce it to Americans. Algerian corsairs seized Maria of Boston three miles off Portu3 Robert C. Davis, Christian Slaves, Muslim Masters: White Slaves in the Mediterranean, the Barbary Coast, and Italy, 1500-1800 (Houndmills, 2003), 5. 4 Between 1783 and 1792, Algerians took only sixty-seven ships, but this number rose to 172 between 1793 and 1802. A general increase in mercantile traffic, paired with improvements to North African firearms, drove this increase in privateering. Gonçal López Nadal, "Mediterranean Privateering between the Treaties of Utrecht and Paris, 1715-1856: First Reflections," in David J. Starkey, et al. (eds.), Pirates and Privateers: New Perspectives on the War on Trade in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries (Exeter, 1997), 116; and Daniel Panzac, Barbary Corsairs: The End of a Legend, 1800-1820 (Leiden, 2005), 75.

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gal's Algarve coast on 24 July 1785. Days later, the Philadelphia ship Dauphin was captured, also off the Portuguese coast. Algerians took into custody twenty-one American men on the two ships, all of whom were dragged into Algiers and enslaved, including Captain Richard O'Brien of Dauphin and the seaman James Cathcart of Maria.5 O'Brien and Cathcart both used Algerian slavery to climb higher on the occupational and social ladders of the United States. To do so they employed a range of strategies designed to help them first survive slavery and then to land better jobs in America once free (assuming, of course, that they were freed). Each man chose a strategy based largely on his rank prior to enslavement and his status while enslaved. These criteria largely determined who they knew, how seriously political and merchant contacts took them and how willing government officials and businessmen were to support them or to extend them credit. Captain O'Brien, who had already achieved some level of American success, solicited help from European businessmen and statesmen, many of whom he may have known prior to his capture. Amply supported through these networks, O'Brien relied little on Algerians of rank or fellow Western slaves. Indeed, he sought little contact from slaves who had not been officers before being enslaved or did not hold an important position in Algiers. Taken in his early twenties, James Cathcart had few American or European merchant or diplomatic connections. Lacking these networks, he created connections where and with whom he could, with enslaved American officers, well-placed elite Western slaves in Algiers and Algerian officials. He reached out to European and American officials charged with aiding United States slaves, as did O'Brien, but of necessity relied more heavily on people in Algiers. In short, their pre-capture class affected not only their Western connections, or lack thereof, but also their opportunities within Algiers. Captain O'Brien reaped class-based benefits provided by the American and Algerian governments. For example, the United States government rented a small house in Algiers for American officers so that they could live "comfortably" during their enslavement.6 Meanwhile, unaided by their government, sailors like Cathcart were relegated to crowded bagnios where they slept in large, narrow rooms in beds "hung in square frames one over another

'Richard B. Parker, Uncle Sam in Barbary: A Diplomatic History (Gainesville, FL, 2004), 43. 'William Carmichael, the American chargé d'affaires in Madrid, rented a small Algerian house for the officers where they lived comfortably supported by "supplies furnished them" by the consul and their "friends in the palace" like Cathcart. James Leander Cathcart, The Captives: Eleven Years a Prisoner in Algiers (La Porte, IN, 1899; reprint, Chicago, 2007), 17-18 and 178-181; and O'Brien, "Remarks."

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four tier deep." 7 When the American government provided an allowance, captains received eight dollars a month, mates six and mariners three. 8 With a larger allowance, officers had superior purchasing power in a slave system that not only sanctioned but virtually required slave spending. The Algerian Regency spent little on a slave's room, board or clothing. Instead, they allowed and promoted slaves' ability to purchase what they needed or wanted. Even bagnio-held Western slaves could visit Algerian markets after work as long as they reported to their bagnio before it was locked for the night.9 Any Western slave with the means could buy food, clothing, blankets, private rooms and releases from work. Officers had a clear advantage in this market: they were spared the need to spend their government allowance on private accommodations because they already lived in semi-private rooms in a government-supported house. Officers thus spent their allowance on work releases, non-bagnio food and luxury items like American newspapers. If a mariner desired respite from his hundreds of bagnio mates, he would have to commit a portion of his lesser allowance to the Algerian Regency. Doing so might mean that a mariner had to forgo buying food or clothing. Like the American government, the Algerians granted officers privileges that they did not extend to mariners. The Algerian Regency carefully recorded Western slaves' rank when they were captured so they knew to whom concessions could be offered and for whom to demand higher ransoms since officers commanded higher sums than mariners.10 The Algerian government notified European consuls when new captures were brought into Algiers, which allowed consuls to intervene on behalf of their countrymen and arrange non-bagnio housing for officers. When the men were seized in 1785, English consul Charles Logie interceded for Captains O'Brien, Isaac Stephens and 7

That is, if they were lucky enough to have a bed. Overcrowded bagnios forced many to sleep on any open bit of floor. Library of Congress (LC), Papers of James L. Cathcart, 1785-1817 (CP), "Account of Captivity, 1785," 12-14 and 16-17. 8

Between 1793 and 1796 the United States government furnished an allowance for Americans enslaved in Algiers. Ibid., CP, "Extracts from My Journal (Extracts)," 152-153; Cathcart, Captives, 66 and 153; and John Foss, A Journal of the Captivity and Sufferings of John Foss, Several Years a Prisoner at Algiers: Together with Some Account of Christian Slaves When Sick, and Observations on the Manners and Customs of the Algerines (Newburyport, MA, 1798), 122-123. 9

Burnham, "Curses of Slavery," 120; and Foss, Journal, 24-26.

'"Captains' ransom cost as much as 4000 sequins each while mariners went for 2000 sequins or less apiece. A sequin equalled approximately $2.22, making a captain's cost about $8880 and a mariner about $4440; Parker, Uncle Sam in Barbary, 199.

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Zackias Coffin. Logie housed them in the English consular house, though he assigned them domestic work in return for this service. In this way, the three men were freed from bagnio crowding and marine labouring, yet they bemoaned the fact that they were slaves, and, humiliatingly, slaves serving an Englishman. Fortunately, the United States government moved swiftly to rent the American officers a house, a gesture that did nothing for the mariners stuck in the bagnios." Algerians also earmarked officers for papaluna status. For a monthly fee, papalunas coordinated their own living quarters and victuals, moved freely about Algiers and were generally excused from daily labour. Papalunas thus avoided overcrowded bagnios and, for the most part, Algerian supervision. When called to work, they were assigned less physically demanding tasks than bagnio slaves. They were often assigned to the sail loft, for example, while bagnio slaves quarried stone and carried it into the city. When not assigned to work, they chose what to do with their time. As long as they respected Algerian law and stayed within the municipal boundaries, they could move freely around the city.12 O'Brien used his time to visit other papalunas, elite Western slaves and European officials; wrote letters and read American newspapers; and patronized local taverns and other establishments. Unlike the officer-papalunas, bagnio slaves, who encompassed threefourths of the Americans captured, laboured daily from sunrise to sunset at manual tasks and were locked nightly in a bagnio. Prior to the eighteenth century, even bagnio slaves could buy work releases from the Regency, but by the later part of that century only Western slaves with previous rank or class were offered this opportunity. Only these men commanded the money and connections needed to obtain and maintain papaluna status. Since papalunas were not supported by the Algerian Regency, they had the freedom, and the trouble, of finding and paying for their living quarters, food and, usually, their clothing.

"When captives were initially carried into the city, Western consuls had an opportunity to claim any countrymen and contest their capture. Filippo Pananti, Narrative of a Residence in Algiers; Comprising a Geographical and Historical Account of the Regency, Biographical Sketches of the Dey and His Ministers; Anecdotes of the Late War; Observations on the Relations of the Barbary States with the Christian Powers; and the Necessity and Importance of Their Complete Subjugation (London, 1818), 66; "The Diplomatic Journal and Letter Book of James Leander Cathcart, 1788-1796," American Antiquarian Society Proceedings, LXIV, No. 2 (1954), 357; Captain John M'Shane to William Bell, Algiers, 13 November 1793, quoted in Matthew Carey, A Short History of Algiers, with a Concise View of the Origins of the Rupture between Algiers and the United States (Philadelphia, 1794; 3rd ed., 1805), 83; Parker, Uncle Sam in Barbary, 216; and Cathcart, Captives, 17 and 24. 12

1791.

0'Brien, "Remarks," 3 May, 5-11 and 26 November 1790 and 10 January

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By the late eighteenth century, a Western official or merchant had to vouch for each papaluna, promising that the slave would behave, not escape, and that the official would reimburse the Regency if he did abscond.13 Even if Algerians sanctioned mariner papalunas, Western merchants and officials were unlikely to swear that a mariner would behave. More important, neither the Algerian government nor merchants could, with surety, expect compensation from mariners. Officers usually reimbursed consuls or merchants when they spent money on their behalf, but mariners were notoriously short of cash. Neither Algerians nor Western officials expected mariners, their families or their business associates to bail them out.14 With good connections and a steady influx of money, then, a Western slave in Algiers might purchase papaluna status. Officers' class, and therefore their family and business connections, put them in good stead with consuls, in part because their networks gave them access to money, and papalunas needed a steady stream of funds to pay their monthly fee and for food and clothing. Fortunately, the United States government rented a house for the American officers. Captain O'Brien, however, had sufficient connections to spurn that house after the Spanish consul offered him a room. O'Brien thus had a private room, a rare commodity even in the officers' house, and access to the Spanish consul from whom he gathered information and monetary support.15 O'Brien's arrangements made him dependent upon and indebted to the Spanish consul, a situation he did not relish. Most papalunas were similarly ''Algerians restricted papaluna privileges because the Western slave population had dwindled due to reoccurring plagues and several redemptions, leaving too few for marine labour. By Cathcart's time, even papalunas worked when required, though they were usually assigned less onerous work. O'Brien and other officers worked in the sail loft, for example. Possibly derived from pagar lunar, meaning "to pay by month," papalunas paid the Algerian Regency a monthly fee that procured for them a host of privileges. Cathcart, Captives, 54; LC, CP, Account, 138; and Parker, Uncle Sam in Barbary, 10. '"Captains and officers were often older than the average mariner and thus had built their wealth and connections over a longer period of time. They frequently belonged to a higher social class than mariners and may have inherited wealth. Ships' masters often achieved and kept their posts by reputation. Officers formed societies to support their families if they were incapacitated or lost. Sailors, on the other hand, spent their money instead of saving it. Daniel Vickers with Vince Walsh, Young Men and the Sea: Yankee Seafarers in the Age of Sail (New Haven, 2005), 117 and 176; Paul A. Gilje, Liberty on the Waterfront: American Maritime Culture in the Age of Revolution (Philadelphia, 2004), 14-24 and 57; and Marcus Rediker, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea: Merchant Seamen, Pirates, and the Anglo-American Maritime World, 7700-7750 (Cambridge, 1987), 12-13. "Cathcart, Captives, 17-18; and O'Brien, "Remarks," 26 February 1790.

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reliant upon a government and protectors who furnished them with funds and privileges that could be cut off at a whim. Enslaved Americans, for example, received no government stipend between 1787 and 1793. Not surprisingly, these men could afford few privileges during those years, though bagnio slaves suffered the most because they could not afford sufficient food. Papalunas were not free or independent. Their status required the support of others government, family and officials - to enable them to live comfortably while enslaved. O'Brien experienced this lack of personal control when the Spanish consul asked him to vacate his rooms, a request that he believed showed a "Great Deal of Indiferance." To his disgust, his new dirty, walled room had eight small windows, all without glass. Still, his private room was the envy of most Western slaves, and he owned enough clothing to stuff all eight of those windows, thereby blocking prying eyes and inclement weather. In addition, his inconvenience was short-lived: he returned to his old room after thirty days.16 The well-connected Captain O'Brien maintained and initiated links with Western diplomats, merchants and statesmen. Because of these networks and the support they provided, he relied little on Algerians of rank or fellow Western slaves. Instead, he depended upon American and European diplomats. In his copious free time, O'Brien cultivated his outsider networks, writing to any Western officials who might negotiate his release or provide him with funds. He addressed letters to Congress, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Simpson (the American consul in Morocco), William Carmichael (the American consul in Madrid), Robert Montgomery (the American consul in Alicante) and William Short (the American chargé d'affaires in Paris). Most of his correspondence was dispatched to United States consuls and American government officials, but he did not communicate with the Algerian Dey or any of his officers. O'Brien also kept in contact with well-placed American slaves in Algiers, particularly former officers, but he generally ignored mariners consigned to the bagnios. He communicated with former crew members who had been officers or obtained a good Algerian post. He corresponded with and visited Isaac Stephens, Maria's captain, who had also been captured in 1785, and interacted with his former first mate, Andrew Montgomery, when put to work in the sail loft. But O'Brien reached out most to fellow American slaves who he believed might aid him. He penned frequent letters and notes to Philip Sloan, his second mate, and to mariners George Smith and James Cathcart, both crewmen from Maria. All three men worked in the Algerian Dey's palace

16

In contrast, the three-story bagnios had no windows at all, though the top floor did have small, open grates. O'Brien, "Remarks," 10 and 20 December 1790; and Cathcart, Captives, 53.

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and provided crucial insider intelligence that O'Brien forwarded to American and European statesmen.17 In contrast, young mariner Cathcart had few if any connections of note when captured. He therefore built a network composed of Algerian insiders like other elite Western slaves and some of his captors. Fortuitously, he was randomly selected as a labourer in the Dey's garden, a tip-earning position in which he met other palace slaves, such as the Dey's two chamberlains. Cathcart described antagonistic relations with the two men, but knowing them may have helped him later. When transferred into a bagnio almost a year later, he was not sentenced to marine labour with his crewmates but was assigned to work with a carpenter in houses owned by Algerian grandees.18 If knowing the chamberlains did not help him, the eight dollars he earned while working in the Dey's garden certainly did. With two of those dollars, he bribed the Turkish guards to move him from the Bagnio Beylique to the Bagnio Gallera, where the "most respectable slaves" were housed. While American officers were not housed here, many elite Western slaves were. Several elite slave positions in Algiers included private rooms in this bagnio. Clearly a man on the make, Cathcart bribed his way into the Bagnio Gallera so he could rub elbows with "better" slaves. Cathcart also claimed that most American mariners were housed in this bagnio, and he may also have craved the companionship of his fellow countrymen.19 Lacking political and business connections with influential Americans or Europeans, Cathcart forged a transnational coterie of comrades to assist in his upward climb in the Algerian bureaucracy. Unlike O'Brien, Cathcart's contacts were most likely to be located in Algiers. O'Brien sought to rise in American society while the younger and poorer Cathcart, who also hoped his Algerian exertions would place him in good stead with Americans, clambered up any avenue open to him. American society offered few opportunities for a young, uneducated mariner, but Algerians provided openings for men willing to work within their system. 17

Sloan held the position of palace sweeper. LC, CP, Account, 156; New York Public Library (NYPL), Cathcart Family Papers, 1785-1817 (CFP), O'Brien to Cathcart, box 1, correspondence, 1785-1794, 16 July 1793; and O'Brien, "Remarks," 18 and 22 January, 14 February and 7 and 30 May 1790 and 13 March 1791. 18 Cathcart presented the chamberlains as negative counterpoints to his behaviour. They "turned Turk," forsaking their Greek Orthodoxy to become Muslims, whereas Cathcart remained Protestant and a loyal American. LC, CP, Extracts, 29-30, 33, 72 and 137; and Cathcart, Captives, 8-9, 11-12, 14, 22, 31, 59 and 115-116.

''Apparently this bagnio had two tiers of small, private rooms available for purchase. The "better" sort of Western slave could afford to rent these rooms. LC, CP, Extracts, 127; and Cathcart, Captives, 31, 51, 55-56 and 127.

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Cathcart observed how powerfully Algerian connections could aid slaves, even after they were ransomed. For instance, Angiolo Ferraro, who had been captured as a boy from a Neapolitan fishing boat, learned to read and write as a palace slave. After his manumission, he accompanied an Algerian diplomat to Istanbul. Later, he was given important trade concessions from Naples and Algiers which made him very wealthy. Cathcart hoped to find Americans as generous to him and his fellow slaves once they were redeemed. At the very least, he hoped that Americans would employ former slaves "in some station according to our different abilities." In case they did, Cathcart embraced any opportunity to distinguish himself. His determination, paired with "consistent good luck," allowed him to succeed in Algiers, and he gambled that this might translate into American success when he was freed. 20 Cathcart particularly cultivated two Leghornese men he had previously known in Boston, Angiolo D'Andreis and Giovanni de la Cruz, both of whom worked in the Algerian bureaucracy. In 1787, De la Cruz filled an important Algerian administrative post, the Clerk of the Marine. This position included a free private room in the Bagnio Gallera, which De la Cruz shared gratis with Cathcart.21 Perhaps on De la Cruz's recommendation, Cathcart was appointed cofeegi (coffee server) to the Secretary of the Marine in 1787. The cofeegi poured coffee for the Secretary of the Marine and his guests, and by custom each guest filled his empty cup with coins for the cofeegi. As cofeegi, a slave could accrue quite a store of funds, some of which Cathcart might have shared with De la Cruz. The promotion to cofeegi included other benefits. In addition to "some emolument," the cofeegi had Fridays off, was well fed and was subject only to the Secretary's orders. This slave also "superintended other slaves," perhaps the Secretary's six or eight other Western slaves.22 When De la Cruz became ill, Cathcart took over the Clerk's book, and in 1788, when De la Cruz died, Cathcart was installed as Clerk of the Marine. In 1788, Cathcart was also appointed Clerk of the Bagnio Gallera, a position he held until 1791. In the latter post, Cathcart mustered slaves nightly in the bagnio, doled out their bread and oil, reported sick, dead, or missing slaves and was "obliged to report" badly behaving slaves, a duty he appeared not to have found onerous.23 His proximity to De la Cruz may have made him 20

Parker, Uncle Sam in Barbary, 89; and LC, CP, "Journal Commencing January 1st, 1792," 1 January 1792. 2I

LC, CP, Account, 132; and Cathcart, Captives, 59.

22

Cofeegi or qahwaji. Parker, Uncle Sam in Barbary, 90; LC, CP, Extracts, 132 and 134; and Cathcart, Captives, 56-57. 23

De la Cruz died of the plague that hit Algiers in 1792 and reoccurred into the 1820s. According to Cathcart, the plague killed 800 of the 2000 Western slaves in

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familiar with various jobs and certainly brought him to the attention of Algerians who were only too happy to find another Western slave willing to fill these positions. Cathcart's relationship with D'Andreis similarly served him well. D'Andries, whom Cathcart considered "at least half an American" because he married a Bostonian, was a supercargo on a Tuscan ship when captured in 1786. Cathcart later explained that their previous acquaintance accounted for the "greater intimacy...between us during our captivity." Indeed, knowing both men accounted not only for their intimacy but also for Cathcart's ability to occupy superior living quarters and Algerian positions.24 For years D'Andreis held the highest Algerian post open to Western slaves, the Chief Christian Secretary to the Dey. The Christian Secretary assisted the Dey in all matters related to Western powers and maintained records on Western slaves. The job came with a bagnio tavern, better quarters and more control over one's own time. From D'Andreis, Cathcart "obtained the greatest part of information" about the palace, which he passed on to O'Brien and other American slaves.25 When D'Andreis was redeemed by the 1794 Dutch peace treaty, Cathcart was selected to fill his post. Cathcart claimed that the Algerian Dey, recognizing his acumen, saw him as the best choice for Chief Secretary. This may be true. The new Dey had been the Secretary of the Marine under whom Cathcart worked as cofeegi and Clerk of the Marine. Evidently, they had established a good working relationship, but Cathcart initially got the Secretary's and future Dey's attention because of De la Cruz and D'Andreis. 26 1793. Cathcart became Clerk of the Marine when the previous three Clerks died of the plague in less than a month. Panzac, Barbary Corsairs, 305-309; Samuel Calder to David Pearce, Jr., 4 December 1793, quoted in Henry G. Baraby, Prisoners of Algiers: An Account of the Forgotten American-Algerian War, 1785-1797 (London, 1966), 108; LC, CP, Account, 132, and Extracts, 132, 134 and 154-158; and Parker, Uncle Sam in Barbary, 90. 24

De la Cruz and Cathcart also met in Boston. In fact, De la Cruz was chief mate of a Livornese ship anchored in Boston harbour when Cathcart sailed on Maria. D'Andreis married Sarah Moody of Boston, whom he met at Russell's house, and Russell owned the ship on which D'Andreis was captured. LC, CP, Extracts, 132, 134 and 155-156; and Cathcart, Captives, 120-121 and 132. 25

Cathcart, Captives, 138 and 193; and O'Brien, "Remarks," 22 January

1791. 26

The Chief Christian Secretary was automatically freed when the Algerians made peace with any power. By this time Cathcart owned three bagnio taverns from which he earned a steady income. LC, CP, Extracts, 132, 134 and 155-156; Cathcart, Captives, 120-121; and "Diplomatic Journal," 327.

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Cathcart's ability to forge connections within Algiers proved crucial when ascending to the position of Chief Christian Secretary to the Dey. Because the holder of that post was automatically freed when Algiers arranged a treaty, the person filling it had to pay a fee up front to offset the cost of eventual manumission. Here Cathcart's dedication to building Algerian connections really paid off. The Dey himself loaned Cathcart half of the fee, but he forged other connections as well, since the Swedish consul in Algiers and his brother supplied the remainder of the required funds. 27 Both luck and determination aided Cathcart's ascension. Chosen to work in the Dey's palace when captured, Cathcart earned tips, made connections and picked up information that helped him work the system. He placed himself favourably for possible advances and connections with powerful men. His work and good fortune paid off in that he served only a few days in the marine during his eleven years of enslavement. Most of his time was passed in relative ease as an elite slave in the Algerian bureaucracy, one who squirreled away enough capital to purchase a 200-ton, double-decked ship in 1795.28 Cathcart's Algerian networks worked well for him in Algiers, but these connections were potentially dangerous for him in an American context. He feared that fellow American slaves, United States statesmen and the American public perceived his service as disloyal work for the enemy. This posed a problem for the upwardly mobile Cathcart. Like O'Brien, he anticipated eventual freedom and return to America, and, like O'Brien, hoped his Algerian experience would win him a post with the United States government. American officials and merchants, however, knew little of seaman Cathcart, while O'Brien had developed an extensive network prior to capture and corresponded with virtually any American of note thereafter. If Cathcart were to win a consular post, he needed to quash any hint that his Algerian service marked him as a traitor and to gain the positive attention of important Americans. To offset perceptions of disloyalty, Cathcart aided key American slaves and informed United States statesmen of his selfless service to his countrymen. Though he carefully manoeuvred his way upward in Algiers, once he reached the top post he disavowed any scheming to reach such heights. Playing to an American audience, he insisted that God placed him in the position of Chief Christian Secretary so that he could assist his countrymen. He wrote again and again that he held Algerian posts of power solely to aid "fellow

27

The Swedish consul and his brother loaned Cathcart $6000. With this money, Cathcart purchased a prize ship brought into Algiers, loaded with wine, on which he "made good speculation." LC, CP, Account, 134. 2i

lbid., 137.

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[American] Sufferers." As a true American, he desired no riches or power but only to alleviate "the sufferings of my unfortunate fellow citizens." 29 When Algerians captured eleven American ships in 1793, Chief Christian Secretary Cathcart offered some of them immediate assistance. He persuaded the Dey to transfer the officers from the Bagnio Beylique to the Bagnio Gallera where the "best" slaves resided. He advocated for American officers desiring papaluna status. Ten of the masters resided in Cathcart's own ample apartment where he provided them with "every necessary gratis for a considerable time." The other officers he placed in his taverns, while others were "well enough off for some of them had saved some money." He also reacted swiftly to officers' pleas for help. Timothy Newman, master of Thomas, asked Cathcart to "use [his] Interest to Endeavour to get me leave from the Marine." If Cathcart would help him, Newman would "ever feel myself under the greatest Obligation" to him. Cathcart not only saved Newman's note asking for help but also meticulously recorded on the back of it his success. He had immediately obtained permission for Newman to "go where he pleased in the town and pay half a sequin each lunar month. " Cathcart was gratified that American officers solicited his aid, promising their future support in return. 30 Cathcart retained letters from O'Brien along with the note from Newman, but notes from mariners do not appear in his papers. Perhaps Cathcart had no letters from mariners because they spoke to him directly, which seems likely especially for mariners living in the same bagnio as Cathcart. Conversely, mariners may not have made requests once they realized they would not be permitted such arrangements. Or Cathcart may not have bothered saving notes mere mariners wrote to him. He seemed to cater to captains and mates when helping "fellow sufferers" and left the seamen largely to their own devices. He did, however, provide some aid to mariners. He gave some "fellow Sufferers" meals prepared in one of the four taverns he owned; paid to bury American plague victims; and furnished room, board and clothing for an American sailor who went mad. In fact, he would ever, he wrote, "scorn Liberty and glory in the Chains" if it might help America or Americans.31 29 Ibid., 55 and 157; LC, CP, Extracts, 156; Cathcart, quoted in Barnby, Prisoners of Algiers, 229; NYPL, CFP, Papers, box 1, correspondence, 1789-1799, Andrew Montgomery to Cathcart, 9 June 1798. 30 Cathcart figured that half a sequin equalled about ninety-six cents, which was the amount papalunas paid per lunar month. "Diplomatic Journal," 435-436; NYPL, CFP, box 1, correspondence, 1789-1799, note addressed to Cathcart in "Bagnio Galereo," Saturday evening, and undated correspondence, 1795; Cathcart, Captives, 132; and LC, CP, Extracts, 152. 31 James Harnett apparently went mad, and for the four years he lived in a "mad house" Cathcart footed the bill for some clothing and food. NYPL, CFP, Corre-

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Through appreciative word-of-mouth and self promotion, Cathcart's reputation as a philanthropic slave made its way to United States officials. The American consul in Spain, Robert Montgomery, heard how "friendly to the American cause" Cathcart was, "in particular to your unfortunate fellow slaves in Algiers." Most people, Montgomery felt, who "escapefd] from a wretched state of slavery" by becoming the "favorite and useful secretary of a Prince" would have served only themselves, yet Cathcart dedicated himself to assisting fellow Americans. Even O'Brien grudgingly noted Cathcart's attention to the "Remains of our two Deceased brothers." Cathcart revelled in his ability to aid fellow American slaves in Algiers, something O'Brien was not able to do. 32 O'Brien maintained a high profile with his letters to well-placed Americans and Europeans because he needed to show insider knowledge and experience with Algerian systems to gain a consular post once emancipated. Yet as we have seen, Cathcart, not O'Brien, was the true insider. Still, O'Brien portrayed himself as the purveyor of Algerian intelligence when writing to Western officials. He not only failed to explain that he did not know the Dey or his ministers and received information about them from Cathcart and other American slaves but also disingenuously claimed a relationship with the Dey. O'Brien's ploy earned him the American recognition he craved. By 1792, Secretary of State Jefferson recommended him to John Paul Jones' "particular notice" because, Jefferson explained, O'Brien supplied the government with useful information. According to Jefferson, O'Brien was "intimately acquainted" with the "manner in which and the characters with whom our business is to be done" in Algiers. Further, the "zeal" O'Brien "displayed" in his "trying circumstances" distinguished him from most American slaves.33 Both O'Brien and Cathcart captured the attention of American politicians. O'Brien did so with prolific correspondence to Western officials, while Cathcart built networks with Algerian insiders while making sure United States officials knew how he worked from within the system to aid fellow Americans. Because both were perceived as Algerian experts, they, along with Sloan, briefed Joseph Donaldson, Jr., when he opened negotiations with Algeria in 1794. During Donaldson's meeting with the Dey, Sloan and Cathcart - but not O'Brien - were present to explain things to the Dey. Their work contributed to spondence, 1785-1795, O'Brien to Cathcart, 9 March 1794; LC, CP, Extracts, 55, 135-137, 152, 155 and 157; and Cathcart quoted in Barnby, Prisoners of Algiers, 229. 32

NYPL, CFP, box 1, correspondence, 1795, Robert Montgomery to Cathcart, Alicante, 16 April 1795, and correspondence, 1785-1794, O'Brien to Cathcart, 16 July 1793; and "Diplomatic Journal," 326. "Dudley W. Knox (ed.), Naval Documents Related to the United States War with the Barbary Powers (6 vols., Washington, DC, 1939-1944), I, 40, Secretary of State to John Paul Jones, Philadelphia, 1 June 1792.

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the 1795 treaty between the United States and Algiers and the subsequent release of all American slaves in Algiers. Soon after, Cathcart and O'Brien were appointed United States consuls to North Africa: O'Brien in the more prestigious post of Consul General to Algiers and Cathcart as consul to Tunis.34 Though they achieved their positions through different strategies, both Cathcart and O'Brien successfully used their Algerian enslavement to advance in America. The way they earned their positions disturbed some Americans, particularly those unhappy that the United States paid tribute to North African countries. For these Americans, the two men's long-time slave status sat uncomfortably, and they frequently impugned their ability to act independentiy after having been servile for so many years. David Humphreys, the American consul in Spain, for example, admitted that O'Brien knew North African customs and manners but had forgotten that "the representative of the United States should be a person capable of commanding, not being commanded." Having once been slaves, Cathcart and O'Brien might "tremble at the Nod of a Turban" rather than standing firm against Barbary depredations.35 These criticisms aside, both Cathcart and O'Brien served as American consuls for many years. Such posts were rarely filled by sailors, even if they were captains, but during their enslavement the two men had successfully acquired the knowledge, skills and, more important, networks to catapult them into consular positions. Captain O'Brien withdrew from Algerians and connected instead with Americans and Europeans of rank, many of whom he had known prior to capture. Young seaman Cathcart embraced the Algerian systems, Algerians, and anyone else in close proximity who might aid his climb from sailor to Chief Christian Secretary and finally to American consul. Though their networks differed, both succeeded because of connections created and maintained with men able to aid and support them while enslaved and once freed. 34

Freed in 1794, Sloan returned to Algiers as Donaldson's "interpreter," which might have meant cultural mediator. Gilder Lehrman Collections, New York, Algiers Archive Relation to the Capture of John Burnham, GLC 07937, Papers Related to the Pension of Captain Burnham, an Algerian Prisoner, "Narratives of the Proceedings of Donaldson, the Agent of the United States," Burnham, 1793-1796. Both Cathcart and O'Brien held their posts during the 1801-1805 war with Tripoli and provided important insights. David Humphreys wrote Thomas Pinckney that "Consul Cathcart (whom I consider a very faithful and vigilant public officer) took the wise precaution" of advising that Tripoli would declare war and circulating that news so that American merchants might be wary of Mediterranean trade. National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, MD, Record Group 59, Diplomatic Correspondence, 17851900, Miscellaneous Dispatches, 1792-1849, box 3, Miscellaneous Dispatches, Humphreys, Madrid, to Pinckney, 14 April 1801. "Knox (ed.), Naval Documents, I, 357-358, William Eaton, Consul at Tunis, to Secretary of State, 23 June 1800.

Americans in the Mediterranean in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries: Concluding Remarks Elena Frangakis-Syrett

For over three centuries the Levant Company - aided by the British government - struggled to maintain and develop its monopoly over trade between Great Britain and the Ottoman Empire. 1 In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, however, trade in the eastern Mediterranean was undergoing fundamental changes as a result of two prevailing forces: global economic growth and on-going European military conflicts. These two forces undermined the protectionist policies practised by Britain and France in trading with the region and opened markets and sea lanes to two neutral nations, the United States and the Ottoman Empire. It was not only governments in Washington, London or Paris, but the economic actors on the ground that, depending upon their interests, saw either new opportunities or unwarranted obstacles in these changing dynamics. At home, the Levant Company was facing pressure in Parliament to relax its regulations, while in the Levant it was facing the growing threat of American commercial competition. On 15 January 1800 the British merchant community in Izmir through the British consul, Francis Werry, wrote to the Directors of the Levant Company in London that in a General assembly held the 7th instant [this Factory] took under Consideration the Rate of duty that would be most advisable to levy on Merchandise imported to and exported from this Place in American Ships under British protection. After mature deliberation they are of the opinion as the Tariff of Duty levied...is upon as moderate a scale as any Nation

'In 1581, a year after Queen Elizabeth I secured the first charter of British trading privileges from the sultan, which was soon made into a full-scale Capitulation in line with what the French had already secured in 1569, she granted a royal charter to the Levant Company, giving it exclusive rights to the Levant trade. The Company survived until 1825. David MacPherson, Annals of Commerce, Manufactures, Fisheries, and Navigation... (4 vols., London, 1805; reprint, New York, 1972), II, 168-171 and 201-202.

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established here and to avoid giving them an advantage over the Freemen of Your Company in their trade to and from this Place...the same rate of duty should be levied on Merchandize the property of Americans. By so doing they conceive no competition will arise from other Consuls.2 In fact, the consul and the British merchant community in Izmir hoped that such "good treatment" on their part might make the Americans more inclined to send consignments to British houses rather than seeking agents among other European merchants or establishing their own trading houses. Dealing with the merchants from the new Republic, however, went beyond setting a competitive rate of duty. For instance, according to the Company's regulations, the ships of any nation which did not have trading agreements, or "Capitulations," with the Ottoman government had to be protected by the British flag rather than their own once in Ottoman waters. Despite such regulations, in considering "the mode of protection to be given to American ships," Werry reported that the Assembly of the Factory had concluded that as the American flag has been thrice received here it would be highly displeasing to the Americans in future to insist their wearing the English flag while here and believe they would not do it, and would in the end be the Cause of them seeking to fix establishments here which would prove detrimental to this company.3 By the 1790s and 1800s the Levant Company was walking a fine line between not wanting to discourage American merchants and shipowners from seeking British protection when trading to the Levant so that it would gain extra business and not wishing to extend this protection to the disadvantage of its own members. More important, the Company hoped that by protecting the Americans it could control and, if necessary, limit their commercial activities.4 Noting that the Americans found few exports to take back home from Izmir, at the time the principal port for Ottoman trade with the West, Werry hoped that American commercial dealings would not grow. 5 He was proven wrong: although the Americans sent more goods to Izmir than they took from the port, 2 Great Britain, National Archives (TNA/PRO), State Papers (SP) 105/127, Francis Werry, Izmir, to Levant Company, London, 15 January 1800.

'Ibid. 4

Ibid., SP 105/127, Werry to Levant Company, 9 April 1800.

5

Ibid., Werry to Levant Company, 17 May 1800.

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initially under British protection and later under their own consulate, their trade nevertheless continued. For instance, in 1801, during the Peace of Amiens, Izmir imported from the United States 861,429 livres tournois and exported 791,394 livres tournois worth of goods; these figures represented 1.6 and 1.5 percent of Izmir's total trade, respectively. In 1802, only imports to Izmir from the United States were recorded, totalling a modest 242,850 livres tournois, or 0.4 percent: the lack of data on exports to the United States likely was not recorded because they were too small to warrant the effort. 6 In 1818, in the aftermath of the Napoleonic wars, American exports to Izmir were 361,050 livres tournois, or 1.7 percent of total exports to the port from the West. In 1819, a spectacular year in terms of the amount of goods that both entered and left Izmir, American trade also increased in both absolute and relative terms: 15,165,900 livres tournois worth of goods were exported to Izmir from American ports and 7,556,007 livres tournois were imported into the United States from Izmir. These figures represented 7.45 and 5.8 percent, respectively, of Izmir's total trade with the West for that year. 7 Trade between Izmir and the United States continued to grow throughout the early nineteenth century; in 1832 American imports far surpassed its closest rival, Great Britain, and accounted for 49.2 percent of Izmir's total imports from the West. Conversely, American ports received seventeen percent of Izmir's exports, trailing only Britain and Austria as a destination for Ottoman goods.8 The data presently available are admittedly incomplete, and the results reported above are indicative of trends rather than grist for a rigorous quantitative analysis. Other information, however, demonstrates an active American presence in the Ottoman Empire's premier port in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, a time when both Ottoman trade with the West and Izmir's share of it were increasing, a trend which reflected the growth not only of the world but also the American and the Ottoman economies.9 Moreover, there was an additional advantage in this commercial relationship for the 6

Algemeen Rijksarschief (ARA) 168, Total Bedrag van de Invoer te Sminra in de jaren, 1801-1803, reprinted in J.G. Nanninga (ed.), Bronnen tot de Geschiedenis van den Levantschen Handel (2 vols., 's-Gravenhage, 1966), II, 1542-1571. Livres tournois was the unit of account used in the French and Dutch records of the time. 'Archives du Ministère des Affaires Étrangères (AMAE), CCC 35-36, Importation et Exportation de Smyrne, 1812-1820. 11

9

Ibid., CCC 43, Importation et Exportation de Smyrne, 1832.

On the share of Izmir in the Empire's external maritime trade, see Elena Frangakis-Syrett, The Commerce of Smyrna in the Eighteenth Century (1700-1820) (Athens, 1992), 257-260 and 274-279.

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Americans - along with Britain, the United States was the only trading partner to have a positive balance of trade with Izmir. This certainly made the trade important for the United States, a fact of which Americans in business and government were fully aware. Indeed, American trade with the Mediterranean as a whole was in surplus which had a significant effect on the balance of payments of the United States.10 Seen in this light, and coupled with the pressing need to raise revenue to improve the finances of the new Republic, the American desire to overcome the threat posed by the Barbary states to American trading activities in the Mediterranean, as John McCusker argues in his chapter in this volume, makes perfect sense. In the course of the French Revolutionary wars, the consuls of both Britain and France, archrivals in the Levant trade since its inception in the late sixteenth century, reported that American ships were bringing coffee, coarse cottons, sugar, spices and other tropical products to Izmir." These were all goods that were fundamental to Ottoman-Western trade at the time. European manufactured cloth - French before the French Revolution and British, followed by Central European, thereafter - topped the list of exports to the eastern Mediterranean throughout the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Colonial goods came next, with coffee and indigo occupying the second and third positions, followed by sugar and cochineal.12 In the 1780s at least twothirds of the annual imports to Izmir from Marseilles were comprised of cloth and coffee. 13 One of the major reasons for the growth of the American trade in such goods was the inability of the French to export goods from their own colonies, leaving a gap in the market that the United States was increasingly able to fill, as Silvia Marzagalli shows in her chapter in this volume. But American trade with the eastern Mediterranean was not always at the expense of the French. For example, because after 1782 the British were no longer exporting South Carolinian indigo to Izmir, the Americans engrossed that market. Caribbean imports were even more important, as were cod, wheat and tobacco, as John McCusker, Luca Codignola and Silvia Marzagalli show.

'°John J. McCusker and Russell R. Menard, The Economy of British America, 1607-1789 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1985; 2nd ed., Chapel Hill, NC, 1991), 194-197. "TNA/PRO, SP 105/127, Werry to Levant Company, 2 August 1800. 12 Bradford Perkins, The First Rapprochement: England and the United States, 1795-1805 (Philadelphia, 1955), 70-79. 13 Unlike cloth, coffee prices were increasing on the eve of the French Revolution which indicated a growing domestic demand not only in Izmir but also in other Ottoman markets which were regularly accessed by Izmir's extensive commercial networks. Archives Nationales de France (ANF), F/12, 549-550, Importation à Smyrne, 1787, and AE BI 1067-1068, Importation à Smyrne, 1788-1789.

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Remarks

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In 1812, the French Consul General at Izmir reported to Paris that colonial goods were being "exclusivement porteés sur cette échelle par les Anglais et les Américains"u to the extent that he feared that the impending hostilities between Britain and the United States would increase prices for these goods in the eastern Mediterranean. 15 Between 1811 and 1820, American ships arrived at Izmir from Philadelphia, Baltimore, Boston, New York, Salem, Havana, Brazil and St. Bartholomew, as well as from Trieste and Ancona, carrying primarily Caribbean goods and American textiles. 16 In their trade with Izmir American ships used British and Dutch correspondents, including Lee and Sons, Perkins Bros., Woodmass and Offley and David van Lennep and Company. 17 These were all families that were well established in the eastern Mediterranean trade; the Lees and van Lenneps, for example, had been in Izmir for generations. 18 The choice of correspondents shows how well-connected the Americans were to these commercial networks. By 1820 the Americans and British had revolutionized the way Izmir's trade with the West was conducted. In particular, they had displaced the French as Izmir's principal supplier of Caribbean goods. This was a real blow to the French because since the 1770s these goods had been its most profitable trading commodities in its trade with the eastern Mediterranean. 19 American trade with Izmir continued to grow: in 1832 Izmir imported seventy percent of its coffee and five percent of its sugar from the United States. In addition, the United States had a respectable share of the port's lucrative import trade in cloth, accounting for eighteen percent in that year. The American government was anxious to export its own manufactures, as well. Imports into the United States were led by opium, representing 37.4 percent of Izmir's total exports in 14

Ibid., F12/1850A, Consul General M. Fourcade, Izmir, to Minister, Paris, 4 April 1812. ls

Ibid., 12 July 1812.

l6 New York Historical Society, Bradish Papers, List of American Vessels that Arrived in the Port of Izmir from August 1811 to June 1812 and from May 1815 to November 1820.

"Ibid. 18 Elena Frangakis-Syrett, Trade and Money: The Ottoman Economy in the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries (Istanbul, 2007), 221-223. See also Jan Schmidt, From Anatolia to Indonesia: Opium Trade and the Dutch Community of Izmir, 1820-1940 (Leiden, 1998); and Hyde Clarke, "A History of the British Colony at Smyrna," Levant Herald (1860).

"Archives de la Chambre de Commerce de Marseille, MQ 5.1, Deputies of the French Merchant Community to French Consul General in Izmir, 22 July 1820.

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that year; dried fruit came next (22.2 percent), followed by wool (21.3 percent) and wine (1.1 percent).20 The trading patterns in these commodities had been established from the early years of American trade with the Ottoman Empire and, with some variations, in its commerce with the European Mediterranean as well. As John McCusker's analysis demonstrates, the Americans were already trading, initially through Britain and subsequently on their own, with the Mediterranean from the middle of the eighteenth century, and in some instances since the seventeenth century. Thus, they were in a position to discern any shifts in consumption patterns and to seek to accommodate them. When the accelerating economic and demographic growth in these regions in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries led to a growing demand for wheat in the European markets, and for coffee and sugar in the expanding Ottoman domestic market, the Americans were there to meet these demands.21 Further, as the textile sectors of the European economies grew and the demand for raw materials from the eastern Mediterranean and for dyestuffs in both of the above regions expanded, the Americans had the networks and expertise to satisfy the demand and the ships to get the goods to the Mediterranean.22 The emergence of Leghorn as the leader among Italian ports for American trade and shipping, as shown in the chapters by Marzagalli, Codignola, Anthony Antonucci, and Pierangelo Castagneto, makes perfect sense given the pivotal position of that port within the Mediterranean, as well as in the Mediterranean-European Atlantic trade and in the EuropeanAmerican Atlantic trade and merchant banking. Leghorn was indeed a plaque tournante, a market where European, Caribbean, American and Ottoman goods were bought and sold during peacetime and even more so during wars by merchants of all nations through networks and practices that often overlapped. Everyone turned up in Leghorn to do business, from merchants to commission agents, from captain to sailors. Well connected to other active markets in the Mediterranean, Leghorn was always on the list of ports of call for American ships in their tramping activities. It comes as no surprise, then,

20

AMAE, CCC 43, Importation et Exportation de Smyrne, 1832.

21 Silvia Marzagalli, "Establishing Transatlantic Trade Networks in Time of War: Bordeaux and the United States, 1793-1815," Business History Review, LXXIX, No. 4(2005), 811-844.

"For instance, demand for indigo and cochineal in Izmir grew as the exports of dyed cotton yarn to the West continued to rise. The increase in prices of all three commodities at the time reflects such market shifts. Frangakis-Syrett, Commerce, 298, 301 and 325.

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to learn that the early pioneers of the American Mediterranean trade came from, or traded with, Leghorn.23 An important reason for American interest (and success) in Mediterranean trade at the turn of the century was their ability to fill a gap in the carrying trade when the French wars made it too onerous, due to high insurance rates, for most Europeans, particularly the British and French, to undertake it. A number of chapters in this volume illustrate different facets of this highly lucrative economic activity highlighting both the complexities and benefits to be derived from it by the Americans. Enjoying lower insurance rates due to their neutral status, they carried goods primarily to the western and central Mediterranean, including ports in the Adriatic Sea, leaving the Ottoman coastal waters, especially as far as tramping was concerned, largely to local merchants. A number of reasons might account for this, including the competitiveness of Ottoman merchants in their own sea lanes, which emanated from the Istanbul-Izmir-Alexandria axis; the fact that the Ottomans also enjoyed the advantages of neutrality; and the eagerness of both groups to take advantage of the Anglo-French conflict to enter the carrying trade, at times employing similar methods. Although neutrals, the Americans carried French goods only under licence so that they would not be intercepted by the British navy.24 Ottoman Greek captains carried British goods with British licences and false French papers on board, both issued by the British, hoping that, if stopped by either the British or by Napoleon and his allies, they could present whichever

"Silvia Marzagalli, "La fonction de la place commerciale de Livourne dans l'appropriation de l'espace méditerranéen par les Américains (fin XVIIIe siècle-1815)," in Wolfgang Kaiser (ed.), Lieux, Places, Espaces: Les dimensions spatiales des pratiques marchandes en Méditerranée (Moyen âge-époque moderne) (Paris, 2010, forthcoming); Elena Frangakis-Syrett, "Market Networks and Ottoman-European Commerce, 1700-1825," Oriente Moderno, XXV, No. 1 (2006), 109-128; Despina Vlami, Florin, Wheat and Garden Street: Greek Merchants in Livorno (1750-1868) (Athens, 2000, in Greek); and Charles Carrière and Marcel Courdurié, "Les grandes heures de Livourne au XVIIIe siècle: l'exemple de la Guerre de Sept Ans," Revue Historique, No. 254 (1975), 39-80. 24 In retaliation for Napoleon's Continental System the British issued a series of orders in council to prevent goods from entering France or French-controlled countries and took measures to ensure that British and colonial goods reached the markets of those countries. This included a complex licensing system for neutrals to protect them from capture. For example, since neutral ships were most likely to be captured if they were trading at ports where British ships were not admitted, "cruisers were instructed [by the British government] to act with 'great caution,' particularly in the case of ships coming from a restricted port; if they were truly destined for Britain, 'the clearances and papers must necessarily all be false and colourable, in order to elude seizure in the ports of the enemy.'" Richard Hill, The Prizes of War: The Naval Prize System in the Napoleonic Wars, 1793-1815 (Stroud, 1998), 49-50.

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documents were appropriate and thus avoid being seized.25 No matter how neutrality was actually practised, as Marzagalli aptly notes, it had its complexities and pitfalls, as the number of American ships turning up as prizes in Malta in 1807 shows.26 Yet the presence of such prizes also reflects the growing number of American ships employed in the Mediterranean-wide carrying trades. Reconstructing the itineraries of American ships, Silvia Marzagalli has been able to show them "caravanning" among Italian and Spanish ports with an intermediate call at a major market such as Marseilles or Leghorn. American captains were savvy about the business strategies needed to be successful in the Mediterranean. For example, irrespective of what port they declared to the port authorities as their "official" destination, they were ready to go wherever necessary to buy or sell goods or to secure a cargo. To achieve their objectives they required access to local networks of merchants and shipbrokers to procure freights, information and, if necessary, funds. They also needed a good knowledge of the various currencies and instruments of payment as well as the system of credit used in the Mediterranean, since captains customarily carried out, among their other activities, a host of monetary transactions.27 The establishment of American consulates throughout the Mediterranean at the turn of the century was evidence both of the existence of American commercial activities at a level sufficient to warrant them and of the government's desire to facilitate further growth. The extent and speed with which consulates were set up in major port cities on the Italian peninsula and in the Ottoman Empire (including North Africa, Minorca and Spain) soon after 1783 is noteworthy. Why the government did this and the process by which it took place is a major theme in this volume, dealt with in various ways by Antonucci, Casasnovas Camps, Castagneto, Codignola, Marzagalli, McCusker and Christine Sears. Given that consuls underpinned the merchant communities trading in the Mediterranean, regardless of nationality, the consuls of other nations also figure to differing degrees according to the role they played vis-àvis American issues; this is dealt with in the chapters by Victor Enthoven, Nathan Perl-Rosenthal, Jeff Seiken and James Sofka. It is not surprising that the 25

AMAE, CCC 8, Consul E. David, Mémoire, Chios, 1823.

26

See Silvia Marzagalli, "American Shipping into the Mediterranean during the French Wars: A First Approach," this volume. 27

It is precisely this kind of information that was published in commercial newspapers of the time. See, for instance, the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century commodity price lists from eight Mediterranean ports described and discussed in John J. McCusker and Cora Gravesteijn, The Beginnings of Commercial and Financial Journalism: The Commodity Price Currents, Exchange Rate Currents, and Money Currents of Early Modem Europe (Amsterdam, 1991), 439-443.

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same United States consul, often a merchant himself, recurs in more than one of the essays. Such was the case with Filippo Filicchi, the American consul in Leghorn, who started as an Italian merchant in the American trade and in the process acquired strong cultural, family and commercial ties with the United States.28 This recurrence of the various consuls reflects not only their centrality but also the integrated and thematically interrelated approach of this volume. This allows the reader to view a multifaceted picture of the merchants, consuls and others who were part of the cultural and commercial world of the Mediterranean. In this nuanced picture of Americans in the Mediterranean, not only merchants and consuls but also captains and sailors emerge as individuals with their own stories. Christine Sears' vivid account of two Americans from different socio-economic classes, Captain Richard O'Brien and Seaman James L. Cathcart, both captured in 1785 and enslaved in Algiers, showed them able to deal with the Algerian system of government as well as negotiate the value system of its society surprisingly well. A society which by force of circumstances - Algerian privateers captured and enslaved Westerners and others as a source of revenue and maritime manpower - was multi-ethnic, multi-faith and culturally diverse. It was also extremely fluid. As a result, it was perhaps more open to upward social mobility for those who could negotiate it, as was the case with those two Americans, than Western society. That both men became American consuls on the basis of the knowledge they acquired of Algerian society and customs shows the Mediterranean world to be a negotiable milieu even when Americans found themselves integrated into it more than they might have wished. This is further reinforced by the fascinating and meticulously assembled stories of the interaction of individual American seamen with Europeans in situations in which they found themselves immersed as shown in the chapter of Nathan Perl-Rosenthal in this volume. In part as a result of the Franco-American Alliance of 1778, the growing volume of international trade and the on-going military conflicts in a number of theatres, a growing number of American sailors found themselves in the Mediterranean in various circumstances: in search of adventure or having been captured by a privateer, they could be impressed into service by the British navy or offered the preferable and more lucrative alternative of service in a French merchant vessel. There was a great deal of fluidity in their circumstances and lives as well as an intimacy with the Mediterranean society on a personal level. For a while they became part of the Mediterranean world.

28

See Luca Codignola, "Relations between North America and the Italian Peninsula, 1763-1799: Tuscany, Genoa and Naples;" Anthony J. Antonucci, "Consuls and Consiglieri: United States Relations with the Italian States, 1790-1815;" and Pierangelo Castagneto, "Old and New Republics: Diplomatic Relations between the Republic of Genoa and the United States of America," all in this volume.

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What made the Americans able to fit into this environment so well despite fierce competition from all sides and protectionism by the major economies of Britain and France? Certainly the political problems of France and the Europe-wide military conflict that ensued helped. Equally important was the rate of economic growth experienced in the United States after 1792, especially once industrialization had begun to take hold. Ultimately, however, it was their knowledge and experience of international long-distance trade that enabled them to do so well so quickly. Trading with Britain and her colonies in the West Indies using British commercial networks facilitated their initial entry into long-distance international trade, including Atlantic Europe and the Mediterranean. Starting with the export of cod, they later branched in to other trades - grain, tobacco and the re-export of British Caribbean goods - in the process acquiring expertise in commercial practices, the use of networks, markets, commodities, sea routes and communications. Using this knowledge was crucial in facilitating the transition from intermediaries to junior partners and finally to independent merchants. As a result, they learned the benefits, pitfalls, dynamics and rhythm of long-distance commerce, an activity in which it could take up to two years to realize a return on outlay, where a representative had to be directed, instructed and above all trusted often thousands of miles distant and where markets were volatile and capital scarce. Even before Independence, as we learn from Luca Codignola's chapter in this volume, members of New York's Seton and Curson families and the Filicchi and Salucci families of Leghorn crossed the Atlantic in opposite directions to assess market opportunities and to establish trading contacts. Regardless of ethnicity, such families undertook these tasks in a remarkably similar fashion.29 Given the peculiar conditions in the Mediterranean, the postRevolutionary mercantile class in the United States pursued their trading and shipping activities under their own flag. It was a step along a road, as McCusker shows, which had begun decades earlier. If even before Independence the carrying trade to the Mediterranean had been a source of additional profits as a means of balancing trade accounts for Americans, it was even more so in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Certainly, the allure of a positive balance of trade still intrigued governments in both Europe and America; moreover, trade was still seen as the most important source of 29

This was the case whether the latter were British or Dutch trading with Italian and Ottoman port cities or Ottoman Greeks trading from Istanbul, Odessa, Leghorn and Malta with the Mediterranean; following the Napoleonic wars and the relaxation of mercantilist attitudes in Britain and France, it also pertained to trade from Marseilles and London. See, for example, Elena Frangakis-Syrett, "Networks of Friendship, Networks of Kinship: Eighteenth-Century Levant Merchants," Eurasian Studies, I, No. 2 (2002), 183-205; and Ioanna Pepelasis-Minoglou, "The Greek Merchant House of the Russian Black Sea: A Nineteenth-Century Example of a Traders' Coalition," International Journal of Maritime History, X, No. 1 (1998), 61-104.

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state revenue. This was also the period when alongside early calls for "free trade," Physiocratic theories were being expounded on the importance of the balance of payments to the wealth of a nation. These ideas were part of the burgeoning industrial Revolution when the goods a country exported and imported were becoming more important than a positive balance of trade with a specific nation. The debt-reduction policy that the new Republic had to undertake and the chronic scarcity of circulating medium increased the need for a positive balance of payments. It made opening the Mediterranean to American trading and shipping worth fighting for, as James Sofka, Jeff Seiken, and John McCusker all show. As a result, passing the Straits of Gibraltar without being molested by the North African privateers became especially important. It is in this light that the war with Tripoli (1801-1805), as a number of chapters in this volume demonstrate, can be at least partly understood. Jefferson's apparent indecision, which baffled contemporaries, as shown in the eyewitness accounts of the Dutch consul in Tripoli, Antoine Zuchet, included in the chapter by Victor Enthoven, can ultimately be explained, as Jeff Seiken argues, by the changing equation of costs: that is, whether it was more costly to conduct war or to negotiate peace and pay tribute. Yet costs constantly changed not only in absolute terms but also in relation to other factors. Indeed, this was an analysis that also had to consider the changing political dynamics in Congress, American public opinion and in the state of the government's budget. Perhaps the one constant was that insurance rates for American ships going to the Mediterranean remained at around five percent during the war with Tripoli, as Jeff Seiken points out. There were of course other reasons besides economics that impacted the actions of American leaders. These often had to do with power politics, even if it was at the level of perception rather than actual capabilities. In the volatile economic, political and military conditions in the Mediterranean the Americans saw an opportunity to influence the dynamics of power and to be players in the international diplomatic arena, as James Sofka argues. 30 In so doing, they sought to question, if not necessarily to change, the established Anglo-French economic spheres of influence. Whether these spheres of influence were actual or perceived, they led to policies that sought to restrict the carrying trade of commercial rivals. Such objectives were achieved in part through the manipulation of the status quo of bilateral tributary arrangements with Tripoli, Algiers, Tunis and Morocco, all of which were nominally under the sovereignty of the Ottoman Empire. Through such arrangements Britain and France aimed to deflect the privateering activities of these North African regencies toward competitors who could not afford tributary arrangements, as 30

See also James Sofka, "American Neutral Rights Reappraised: Identity or Interest in the Foreign Policy of the Early Republic?" Review of International Studies, XXVI, No. 4 (2000) 599-622.

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Sofka argues. The result for the merchant shipping of their competitors, such as Sweden or Denmark, was either to risk being captured when entering the Mediterranean or to do so only during Anglo-French conflicts. The appearance of the shipping of such nations during the Seven Years' War is evidence that the Anglo-French policies of exclusion were at least partly successful. In confronting this status quo, the Americans had twin objectives: to ensure open routes and markets for their goods while also projecting military, and hence political, power not only against the North African regencies but indirectly also against Britain and France, something which would enhance the image of the new Republic among the other European states. The decision after the war with Tripoli to establish a naval base in the Mediterranean at Port Mahon in Minorca, as we learn from the chapter of Casasnovas Camps in this volume, reflects these two objectives. Global economic growth and on-going Anglo-French conflicts at the beginning of the nineteenth century provided the Americans the opportunity to trade and carry goods in the Mediterranean under their own flag and at the same time gave their government a chance to enter the European diplomatic arena as an independent player. This volume shows how this happened and why it was possible.