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    The Barbary Pirates
    The Barbary Pirates
    The Barbary Pirates
    Ebook118 pages1 hour

    The Barbary Pirates

    By C. S. Forester

    3.5/5

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    About this ebook

    C.S. Forester, creator of the beloved Horatio Hornblower series, takes young readers on an exciting adventure to the shores of Tripoli in North Africa. That’s where, more than 200 years ago, the United States was threatened by “pirates” who snatched American merchant ships and imprisoned sailors—and the country’s young, untested navy took on the task of fighting the pirates in their home waters.

    This true tale features thrilling ocean battles, hand-to-hand combat, and the first landing on foreign soil by the U.S. Marines, and it’s as fresh and relevant today as when it was first published (1953).
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPapamoa Press
    Release dateJul 11, 2017
    ISBN9781787206137
    The Barbary Pirates
    Author

    C. S. Forester

    Cecil Scott “C.S.” Forester, born in Cairo in August 1899, was the fifth and last child of George Foster Smith and Sarah Medhurst Troughton. After finishing school at Dulwich College he attended Guy's Medical School but failed to finish the course, preferring to write than study. However, it was not until he was aged twenty-seven that he earned enough from his writing to live on. During the Second World War, Forester moved to the United States where he met a young British intelligence officer named Roald Dahl, whom he encouraged to write about his experiences in the RAF. Forester's most notable works were the Horatio Hornblower series, which depicted a Royal Navy officer during the Napoleonic era, and The African Queen (filmed in 1951 by John Huston). His novels A Ship of the Line and Flying Colours were jointly awarded the 1938 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction. C.S Forester died in 1966.

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    Reviews for The Barbary Pirates

    3.5/5

    22 ratings3 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Excellently written history, it was a fun and informative read.
    • 5/5
      Amazing read. Well paced. I didn't know the complexities that went into the Barbary Wars efforts.
    • 3/5
      Well researched and written with Forester's usual engaging style. It is, however, aimed at the younger market.

    Book preview

    The Barbary Pirates - C. S. Forester

    This edition is published by Papamoa Press – www.pp-publishing.com

    To join our mailing list for new titles or for issues with our books – papamoapress@gmail.com

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    Text originally published in 1953 under the same title.

    © Papamoa Press 2017, all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means, electrical, mechanical or otherwise without the written permission of the copyright holder.

    Publisher’s Note

    Although in most cases we have retained the Author’s original spelling and grammar to authentically reproduce the work of the Author and the original intent of such material, some additional notes and clarifications have been added for the modern reader’s benefit.

    We have also made every effort to include all maps and illustrations of the original edition the limitations of formatting do not allow of including larger maps, we will upload as many of these maps as possible.

    THE BARBARY PIRATES

    By

    C. S. FORESTER

    Illustrated by CHARLES J. MAZOUJIAN

    TABLE OF CONTENTS

    Contents

    TABLE OF CONTENTS 3

    1 4

    2 9

    3 15

    4 22

    5 35

    6 42

    7 49

    8 51

    9 59

    10 62

    11 69

    REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER 74

    1

    FOR CENTURIES THE BARBARY PIRATES HAD plagued the world. Long before any settler had set foot in the New World they had begun their raids on merchant vessels.

    Cervantes, who later was to write the story of Don Quixote, was a prisoner of the Barbary pirates a generation before Raleigh’s colonists landed at Roanoke in 1587. More than a century later Defoe, writing about a popular hero of fiction, Robinson Crusoe, told about his capture by, and escape from, the rovers of Sallee in Morocco.

    How did this nuisance begin? Why did the civilized world put up with it for so long?

    It should be understood that the Barbary pirates were not pirates in the real sense of the word. They were the citizens of countries which were at war with other countries. They captured prizes and took prisoners just as any warring nation did. At first the Barbary pirates had a religious reason for their wars: they were Mohammedans and they considered it their duty to make war on the Christians. When the Mohammedans enslaved their prisoners they were not behaving any worse than their enemies did, for in those days there were no international treaties regarding the treatment of captives.

    Later on, when other countries began to observe certain rules in these matters, the Barbary States followed their example to a certain extent. They solemnly declared war and made peace. They kept their prisoners at hard labor and sold them for ransom, but in that hard world of long ago, prisoners could nowhere expect kind treatment. The ransoms that the pirates demanded were like the war indemnities and tribute money demanded in treaties of peace by other countries.

    The name Barbary States came from a term originally used by the Greeks. Two thousand years before, they had called all those who did not speak Greek Barbarians. This name was used in an effort to imitate the strange speech of foreigners, and it came to be permanently applied to the people of North Africa, the Berbers.

    The homelands of these people—the four North African countries of Morocco, Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli—were known as the Barbary States. They were parts of the vast Mohammedan Empire which at one time had threatened to conquer the whole world. Later, this empire fell to pieces of its own weight, largely because it had never been able to build any system of government except a simple tyranny.

    The Arab Mohammedan conquest of North Africa had not been very successful. Local generals, and governors, and religious leaders managed to set themselves up as independent. At the same time they posed as dutiful subjects of the central government at Constantinople. But their rulers did not have an easy life, even if they lived in the midst of great wealth and enjoyed unlimited power.

    The Dey or Bey, Pasha or Emperor, whatever the local ruler called himself, lived only as long as he could remain more powerful than his rivals and enemies. The moment his grasp weakened he could expect to be strangled and to be succeeded by someone else eager to take his place. The truth was that a large part of the people were no more loyal to their rulers than their rulers were to Constantinople. They paid taxes only when the ruler was strong enough to compel them; and they were often hostile and independent under their own chiefs.

    It was only in the walled towns, and along the coastal strip, and in the accessible valleys, that the Mohammedan rulers could enforce their will. The pirate cities were often shut off, with the sea on one side and an enemy countryside on the other. So the rulers living in these seaboard towns came to be dependent for their luxuries, and even for their necessaries, on what they could steal from the outside world. The sea was far more open to them than the mountains and deserts that hemmed them in at their backs. With the loot they could win at sea they could buy their food from neighboring tribes. The slaves they captured could build palaces and fortifications for them, and they were thereby saved from any necessity to do honest work.

    So to sea they went, capturing poorly armed ships, and often raiding the Christian coasts to loot the villages. The shores of Italy and France, sometimes even Ireland and once or twice Denmark, saw the Barbary pirates landing to carry off plunder and slaves. They exercised a certain amount of care not to anger powerful nations who might fight back. Often the pirates were glad to accept money instead of plunder, and ransom for the slaves. Up to a point money was more useful to them than either. But only up to a point.

    The pirates must have war. Otherwise, the world would soon cease to fear them. Furthermore, among Arab pirates it was considered the mark of a gentleman to go out fighting now and then. So the Deys and the Beys went on raiding peaceful commerce. They knew perfectly well that if they stopped, there would be shortages of necessary goods among their subjects. These people would quickly find a ruler who would promise to manage things better.

    Naturally the civilized world did not accept all this looting and piracy without protest. Over and over again European countries sent armed forces to North Africa. Spain and Sicily and France all sent their fleets and sometimes their armies. One of Britain’s best admirals, Blake, was sent by Cromwell in the seventeenth century with a fleet that bombarded Tunis and for a short time brought order to the Mediterranean. Repeatedly, the European powers seized portions of North Africa and held them for a time. This was one of the best ways to control the Barbary States, for any Christian foothold in North Africa broke the chain of coastwise navigation that was important to a country of few roads.

    Portugal provides another example of the struggle against the Barbary States. Before Columbus discovered America, Portugal conquered Tangier and held the city for two hundred years. But the further history of the occupation is unfortunately typical. Tangier had to be occupied by Portuguese soldiers to defend it from the attacks of the Moors. Danger was constant and fighting frequent, and the occupation was expensive in money and men, while the returns in terms of trade were poor. The Portuguese could not make the place pay any more than the Moors could without piracy.

    In 1662 Portugal was glad to rid herself of the burden by giving Tangier to England as part of the dowry

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