To Americans living along the southeastern coastal shores in the early 19th century, the era's terrorists were the pirates who roamed channels of maritime commerce. Much of the piracy was an offshoot of revolutions in Latin America, where newly proclaimed republics recruited privateers to attack commerce belonging to the estranged mother country, Spain. But many of these raiders robbed indiscriminately.
In early 1819, Congress enacted special legislation to protect American shipping and seize pirates, who faced the death penalty if convicted.1 A key figure in the subsequent antipiracy campaign was Navy Lieutenant Commander Lawrence Kearny, whose two raids on Cabo de San Antonio, Cuba (cited in contemporary documents and here as Cape Antonio) in late 1821 while in command of the USS Enterprise marked the beginning of the end of piracy's last, inglorious epoch in the Caribbean.
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