The Pirate Coast(15)
The marabout hobbled up to inspect the Americans; his face showed utter disdain for these Christian prisoners. Were some men being selected to die? To depart Tripoli? After long hesitation, the holy man picked the only black sailor of the crew and ordered him to follow. (Days later, he turned up as a royal cook.)
The rest of the prisoners were then surprised to discover that they were allowed to wander around inside the castle. After twenty-plus hours without food, they approached the Neapolitan slaves and tried to bargain for anything to eat but were told that all that was available was “Aquadiente,” a very strong date palm liquor. Some of the desperate men—despite the chilly weather—traded their jackets or shirts for a bottle. Others, who had succeeded in hiding a few coins, were conned into paying four times the going rate.
The guards reherded the men into another courtyard. As the harbor guns blasted out a chest-beating huzzah of victory, Bashaw Yussef and his admiral, Murad Rais, arrived to interrogate the prisoners. The Americans observed that both men had full beards, wore turbans and billowy pants, and carried curved daggers. They soon heard Yussef speaking Arabic and Italian, but they were stunned when Murad addressed them in English with a fine Scottish brogue. Forty-two-year-old Murad Rais was born Peter Lyle in Perth, Scotland; he had a decade earlier been chief mate of an English ship, Hampden, but after being twice accused of embezzling, he had jumped ship in Tripoli harbor. To gain the protection of the Bashaw, he had converted to Islam the same day and had been immediately circumcised in a rushed ceremony and clothed in Barbary finery. He had taken the Moslem name of a great sixteenth-century corsair, one who had hounded the Pope’s own flagship and terrorized even the Atlantic. Murad was a rinigado, and he eventually became admiral of Tripoli and married the Bashaw’s daughter. (British records indicate that Lyle had apparently left behind a Christian wife and five children in Wapping Old Stairs in London.) He was described as a “slight” man, of “indifferent morals,” with a blondish beard, a foul temper, and an above-average thirst for hard liquor. Reports of his drunken, violent behavior—such as beating servants or cursing strangers—often bobbed up in consular reports. “Hang the d-mned villain if you catch him!” William Eaton once wrote. “Give him a drumhead court martial, and just about enough time to pray God’s mercy on his soul!”
Murad Rais, the former Scot and elfin Moor, conducted the interrogation. He began abruptly: “Do you think your captain is a coward or traitor?” The men in gruff unison responded, “Neither.” Murad/Lyle pressed it: “Who with a frigate of forty-four guns, and three hundred men, would strike his colours to one solitary gun-boat?” According to Private Ray, some of the crewmen explained that after throwing the guns overboard, the officers decided the Philadelphia could not defend itself and would be surrounded and cut to pieces. Murad laughed and said there was no need to throw the guns over because the Americans had only to wait till nightfall when high tide would float the ship free.
Murad the Scot—who seemed to have already had a rum or two—ranted on about the cowardice and stupidity of Bainbridge. The admiral of Tripoli ended with the infuriating claim that the Philadelphia had already floated free in the harbor.
The crewmen looked at each other in disbelief. That meant if they had fought a few more hours till darkness, they almost certainly would have escaped. This was stunning news, if true.
Captain Bainbridge, who was allowed to walk on the terrace of the diplomatic house, would contend in numerous letters that the Philadelphia did not float free until forty hours after beaching. Private Ray, who talked to local sailors, disagreed.
Until now, no independent account has been available. During the early 1800s, Holland was under the dominion of Napoleon and was called République Batave. The National Archives in Amsterdam have recently yielded a long overlooked series of letters by Antoine Zuchet, consul in Tripoli for République Batave, delivering a fresh diary of events. “The sea wasn’t choppy and the bottom was sandy . . . not a single cannonball of the corsairs reached [the Philadelphia] and no one dared approach it. What further verifies the misconduct of the Americans is that the frigate during that same night floated free without any rescue efforts. Panic must have blinded these people.”
Zuchet, a generally fair-minded observer, concluded: “What can possibly justify not waiting till the last possible moment to surrender and not negotiating terms of surrender?”
Zuchet was surprised that Captain Bainbridge and the American officers simply didn’t understand the unusual nature of Barbary warfare. In a pitched battle between the English ships of Lord Nelson and the French ships of Napoleon, sinking the other’s vessels signals a great victory. But on the Barbary Coast, nationalistic rah-rah fell on deaf ears. The attackers clearly chose not to try to sink the Philadelphia. They much preferred to keep alive the hope of capturing the warship intact, along with the men and valuables aboard.