The bodies of five American Naval heroes of the Barbary Wars which have been lying unmarked, untouched, and unclaimed for nearly a century and a half have been discovered in Tripoli, North Africa.
The five were among thirteen officers and men who were killed in the explosion of the ketch U.S.S. Intrepid September 4,1804. The graves were found by the American consul in Tripoli with the help of an Arab harbormaster after a painstaking search which was begun by the State Department in 1938.
The overwhelming bulk of circumstantial evidence collected through hundreds of interviews of descendants of inhabitants of the town in 1804, and from other sources points to the fact that the bodies were five of possibly six which were mentioned as having washed ashore after the explosion close to the site where they were rediscovered.
The five bodies were reinterred in the spot where they were discovered, a high-walled cemetery on the outskirts of Tripoli overlooking the harbor. U.S.S. Spokane (CL 120), one of the fleet’s newest cruisers, was dispatched from the Mediterranean to Tripoli where her officers and men paid their final respects to these heroes of yesterday’s Navy before they were lowered into the ground for the last lime, their graves now plainly marked.
The location of the five bodies after all these years recalls to mind one of the most dramatic and heroic chapters of American naval history. The thirteen officers and men —which five of the thirteen these are is not known—had bravely met their death on a mission which was a calculated risk and which, had it been successful, would have blown half the Tripolitan fleet into splinters.
The Tripolitan fleet on that fateful night in 1804 had been anchored close together near the seawall. The Bashaw’s castle stood close by. The Intrepid and her crew of thirteen volunteers was to be sent into the darkened harbor as a “fireship” to be set off amongst the enemy ships. Had the dangerous plan worked, many of the enemy ships would undoubtedly have been sent to the bottom and even the heavily fortified castle might have been seriously damaged.
The scheme was a perilous mission in the finest tradition of the U. S. Navy. Commodore Edward Preble, who at that time was in command of the American squadron in the Mediterranean, knew the risk as did the gallant men who took part in the venture. In addition, there was at least one other man who knew, a man who at the time was in Tripoli, a prisoner of the enemy in the Bashaw’s castle. He was Commodore William Bainbridge who conceived the plan and smuggled his idea to Preble on the outside.
Bainbridge and his officers and men had been captured by the Tripolitan pirates after his ship, the frigate U.S.S. Philadelphia, had run aground on some uncharted rocks while chasing a smaller enemy ship some months before. The Philadelphia had been captured intact by the enemy and Bainbridge and his crew had fallen into the hands of the Tripolitans. They were henceforth thrown into prison, from where, incidentally, they had an excellent view of the harbor.
Once in prison, Bainbridge had been able to get the confidence of Nicholas Nissen, the Danish consul in Tripoli. Through Nissen, Bainbridge was able to smuggle secret letters out of prison, letters which carried an innocuous message in regular ink and another secret message written between the lines in lime juice which was invisible to the naked eye. When a match was run under the paper by Preble, the message immediately showed up.
It was through Nissen that Bainbridge had been able to get a message to Preble suggesting the plan of sending a fireship into the harbor laden with high explosives, there to be exploded among the enemy shipping. According to the plan, the volunteer crew which was to man the fireship should escape out of the harbor in small boats after applying the match to the train.
Preble had tried this type of hit-and-run tactic before, and it had paid off handsomely in that case. That had been several months previously when another volunteer crew had sneaked into the harbor in a ketch and burned the Philadelphia, rendering her useless to the Tripolitans.
Many of the officers and men who lost their lives when the Intrepid exploded had been among the crew of volunteers who had entered the harbor that night to board and burn the Philadelphia. In a fierce battle, they had climbed over the rails of the ship, killed most of her enemy crew and burned her to the waterline. The leader of that earlier encounter was another early American Naval hero, Stephen Decatur.
Now, Preble decided to try these tactics once more, tactics similar to some used by the British and American commandos and raiders in World War II. He put Bainbridge’s idea into action.
He chose the ketch Intrepid for the mission. The Intrepid had been captured originally from the Tripolitans in a running engagement in the open sea and had been converted to an American man-of-war. Perhaps Preble thought that by using a ship whose lines would be familiar to the Tripolitans and by sending her into the harbor on a black night as a friendly merchantman, he could disguise the true purpose of the fireship. In any event, he chose the Intrepid and ordered her to be fitted out as a floating incendiary bomb.
A special compartment was built into the hold of the ketch just forward of her mainmast. One hundred barrels (approximately 15,000 pounds of powder in bulk) were placed in the hold. On top of this lethal load, 100 thirteen-inch and nine-inch shells were stacked, loaded and fuzed, and ready for action.
A tube was run from the powder and shells to another compartment aft in the ship. Inside the tube was laid a train calculated to burn for fifteen minutes—tjme for the volunteer crew to escape from the doomed ship. The compartment aft was filled with combustibles which were to be set afire, in turn setting afire the train. It was thought that the fire in the after compartment would keep any boarders off the ship until it was too late.
Lieutenant William Somers, captain of the brig U.S.S. Nautilus, was chosen as the man to guide this fireship or “inferno,” as it was then called, into the harbor. Somers had acquitted himself well in a battle with enemy gunboats only a few weeks before. When they heard that Somers was to lead the mission, the entire crew of the Nautilus asked to accompany their captain.
Somers, however, chose only four from his own crew. They were Thomas Topline, James Harris, William Keith and James Simms, all seamen. From the U.S.S. Constitution he chose William Harrison, Robert Clark, Hugh McCormick, Jacob Williams, Peter Penner and Isaac Downes, all seamen.
Originally, one other officer besides Somers was to undertake the mission. He was Lieutenant Henry Wadsworth of the Constitution. At the last minute, however, Midshipman Joseph Israel of the Constitution came aboard the Intrepid with a message from Commodore Preble. He pleaded with Somers to take him along, and Somers finally obtained the consent of the Commodore to allow Israel to join the band as its thirteenth member
Somers impressed upon his crew the seriousness and heavy risk of the venture and gave to each and every man the chance to slay behind if he wished. But each of the ten seamen voiced his determination to go and left their respective ships Nautilus and Constitution with a joke on their lips.
“Mind boys,” one said according to the diary of a shipmate, “give a good account of us when you get home!”
All was now in readiness. A light breeze came up on the evening of September 4 and Somers and Preble decided that now was the time to go. At 2000 the Intrepid weighed anchor and got underway. Two of the fastest rowing boats in the squadron accompanied her to take off the crew after they had guided the ship into the harbor and had lighted the combustibles.
The ketch was convoyed to the harbor entrance by the brigs U.S.S. Argus, U.S.S. Vixen and the Nautilus. These vessels then turned back but remained near at hand to watch the result and to pick up the rowing boats upon their return.
Everything seemed favorable for the success of the mission except that three Tripolitan gunboats were seen hovering about the harbor entrance. But the enemy ships disappeared, and the Intrepid approached in the manner of a friendly merchantman bound for an anchorage in the harbor.
It was a dark night, according to the eyewitnesses, and the Intrepid was soon lost to sight to most of those who stood watching on the decks of the American ships outside the harbor. The fireship entered the harbor and drifted slowly toward the anchored ships of war of the Bashaw’s fleet. Several minutes elapsed with no more noise than the lap of the waves.
Suddenly, the sound of guns firing could be heard by the men watching from the ships outside. Almost instantly a jarring explosion reverberated through the harbor and the town and a great blaze of light outlined the Intrepid and the other ships in the harbor.
Lieutenant Charles G. Ridgely was intently watching the spectacle with night glasses from his vantage point on the deck of the Nautilus. Here is his description of the explosion:
“For a moment, the flash illumined the whole heavens around, while the terrific concussion shook everything far and near. Then all was hushed again and every object veiled in a darkness of double gloom. On board the Nautilus, the silence of death seemed to pervade the whole crew; but, quickly the din of kettle drums, beating to arms, with the noise of confusion and alarm was heard from the inhabitants on shore. To aid the escape of the boats, an order was given ... to show a light, upon the appearance of which, hundreds of shot, from an equal number of guns, of heavy calibre, from the batteries near, came rattling over and around us. But we heeded them not; one thought and one feeling alone had possession of our souls—the preservation of Somers and his crew.
“As moment after moment passed by without bringing with it the preconcerted signal from the boat, the anxiety on board became intense; and the men with lighted lanterns hung themselves over the sides of the vessel until their heads almost touched the water—a position in which an object on the surface of the water can be seen farthest on a dark night—with the hope of discovering something which could give us assurance of its (the boat’s) safety. Still no boat came, and no signal was given; and the unwelcome conclusion was at last forced upon us. . . . We lingered on the spot until broad daylight—though we lingered in vain—in the hope that someone at least of the number might yet be rescued by us from a floating plank or spar to tell the tale of his companions’ fate.”
That the explosion of the Intrepid, described in this vivid passage from Lieutenant Ridgely’s notebook, was premature is certain. There was no blaze of combustibles preceding the explosion. It was also evident to those waiting outside the harbor that there had not been enough time to have allowed the ketch to have reached her target and exploded on schedule.
The exact manner of the explosion, however, remains a mystery and will probably never be ascertained for certain. The sound of the firing is said to have come from the enemy shore guns. The most widely accepted theory is that one of these shots from the shore batteries passed through the magazine of the fireship, igniting the concentration of powder and shells and detonating them. Another opinion holds that the Tripolitans sighted the American ship, boarded her, and that Somers and his crew set fire to the train and blew their ship up rather than let it fall into the hands of the enemy.
Bainbridge records that all thirteen of the bodies were recovered following the explosion, but he gives an account which varies somewhat from the bodies that were recently found. Bainbridge, incidentally, had appealed to the Bashaw to allow him to view the bodies as soon as he realized that the explosion he heard had been that of the Intrepid. The Bashaw reluctantly granted permission for Bainbridge and two of his lieutenants to see the bodies after they had been washed up on shore.
Bainbridge states in his diary that two of the bodies were found in the bottom of the ketch itself which grounded on the rocks at the north side of the western entrance to the harbor. Another body was found in one of the two boats that had accompanied the Intrepid and had later drifted ashore to the westward.
Four others were discovered floating near the harbor and the six remaining bodies were found on the beach to the southeast of the town. This would place the latter group near the site of the present high-walled cemetery where they were found.
What has become of the sixth body or whether Bainbridge actually saw six and not five bodies lying on the beach is hard to say. The account he gives is sketchy and he mentions the number but once.
He notes down that all the bodies were so mutilated that it was impossible to identify them. He adds that the six were taken to the top of the bluff overlooking the beach where they were found and were provided with graves and that “they were laid to rest with all small honors that could be given them,” including a funeral service which Bainbridge himself read over the graves.
These facts, except for the exact number of the bodies, which were set down by Bainbridge nearly a century and a half ago, have been borne out as a result of the exhaustive investigation initiated by the Arab harbormaster of Tripoli, Mustafa Burchis, and the American consul in -that city, Mr. Orray Taft, Jr.
The investigation actually got its start in 1938 when, in response to an inquiry from the American embassy in Rome concerning the fate of the men of the Intrepid, Mr. Burchis undertook a meticulous examination of old Jewish records, private Arab collections of letters, papers, and diaries, and interviewed innumerable descendants of residents of Tripoli at the time of the disaster.
The harbormaster set .down in detail the results of his investigations and wrote a complete report of the matter which was then transmitted to the American embassy in Rome. Unfortunately, however, this report was among American state papers which were burned by embassy officials in 1941 upon the outbreak of war. The investigation was revived last year when Mr. Burchis retraced his findings from his original notes. Together with Mr. Taft, he was able once more to piece together the story of the five graves.
“The Intrepid had exploded in a pass located about half way down the length of the present north breakwater and all the pertinent stories he [Mr. Burchis] has heard say that five bodies had drifted up on the beach in front of a cliff,” Consul Taft relates in a report to the State Department concerning his research. “From this beach they were unceremoniously dragged to the cliff and interred in a rough pattern. T questioned Mr. Burchis at length as to his belief in the reliability of his information and could find no flaw in his pattern of investigation,” Mr. Taft adds.
Mr. Taft and Mr. Burchis, together with the American vice consul, went to the cemetery, named the old Protestant Cemetery, on the outskirts of the town and directly above the cliff where Mr. Burchis said the bodies had been dragged. Mr. Burchis then without hesitation picked out five graves located in the northeast corner.
Subsequent to the burial of the bodies in 1804, Mr. Burchis explained, it became necessary to establish the old Protestant Cemetery for the burial of foreigners. Since five Americans were already known to be interred there, a wall was erected around the plot and the whole cemetery was dedicated in a ceremony which was attended by the then present diplomatic and consular officials, including those of the United States.
Upon this identification of the five bodies as being those of five men from the Intrepid, Mr. Taft sent a telegram to Vice Admiral Forrest P. Sherman, USN, commanding the U.S. Mediterranean Fleet, stating that he had substantial evidence that the graves of five American sailors lost on the Intrepid in 1804 had been discovered. Admiral Sherman immediately arranged for a visit to Tripoli of Rear Admiral R. H. Cruzen, Commander, Cruiser Division Two, and the Spokane.
The five unknown sailors who had died so valiantly lighting for their country were given final honors in a colorful ceremony attended by many high diplomatic, military, and government officials. A band of Scottish Camerons played martial music as the detachment from the Spokane as well as a unit of the British Army stationed at Tripoli marched the half a mile from the town to the grave site.
In short addresses, Rear Admiral Cruzen spoke on the early history of the Navy and of its exploits during the Barbary Wars, Captain W. J. Marshall, USN, commanding officer of the Spokane, narrated the Intrepid mission, and Consul Taft told of the research done to identify the graves and unveiled the memorial plaque to the five heroes. Lieutenant E. J. Sheridan, USN, chaplain of tire Spokane, read a short prayer, and an honor guard of Marines fired several volleys over the new graves and played taps.
Interestingly enough, Joseph Karamanli, the present mayor of Tripoli and a direct descendant of the Joseph Karamanli who was Bashaw of Tripoli at the time of the Barbary Wars, attended the ceremony with approximately 50 other guests.
The plaque honoring the five men was placed in the cemetery on the cliff by the officers and men of the Spokane. The money for the markers was collected through voluntary contributions. Individual plaques, which will be replaced at a later date by permanent markers, were placed near each grave.
On each of these individual plaques is written: “Here Lies An Unknown American Sailor Lost From USS Intrepid in Tripoli Harbor 1804”—a worthy tribute to the courageous sailors of the Navy of yesterday from the sailors of the Navy of today.