Eaton swiftly arrested the main New York conspirator, a controversial doctor named Nicholas Romayne (1756-1817), who helped found Columbia’s prestigious College of Physicians and Surgeons. Eaton left Philadelphia on July 10, captured Dr. Romayne with all his secret papers in New York City before 3 A.M., and delivered him back to the nation’s capital by 2 P.M. on July 12. Pickering was impressed.
Eaton’s loyalty and efficiency were soon rewarded. Pickering in 1798 chose Eaton as the new consul to Tunis to stand up for American rights and keep tribute payments as low as possible. Unsurprisingly, Eaton, New England patriot, defier of authority, was appalled within moments of arrival on the north coast of Africa. “Can any man believe that this elevated brute,” he wrote of the Dey of Algiers, “has seven kings of Europe, two republics and a continent tributary to him, when his whole naval force is not equal to two line of battle ships? It is so.” Even before he arrived, former Captain Eaton preferred a military solution.
***
On April 30, 1804, with green leaves starting to bud on the family trees in Brimfield, Eaton—entrusted with a mission to overthrow a Barbary Coast government—said good-bye to wife Eliza. Judging from his ensuing letters, this farewell was probably quite frosty. Family finances were tight, and he warned her to keep an “exact account of all receipts.” He was also taking her teenage son to go to war. His diary reveals that he was once again in possession of that Diana vestal virgin chastity ring he had given her—either she had returned it or he had reclaimed it. That spring morning, the snows of a long hard winter having finally melted, he hugged his youngest two daughters and motioned to his two stepsons to mount up for the twenty-five-mile ride to Springfield.
The forty-year-old man, along with seventeen-year-old Timothy (college bound) and fifteen-year-old Eli (soon to be midshipman), had a pleasant day-long ride, accompanied by a handful of young men from Brimfield, friends of his stepsons.
In a rare simple, happy entry in his diary, Eaton noted: “Dined together in great hilarity and parted with mutual wishes of prosperity.”
After a couple of days in Springfield handling business matters, Eaton sent Timothy back home to deliver some valuables—a gold watch, a jeweled snuffbox—to Eliza to help pay off their debts and keep her Danielson properties from being sold.
William and Eli traveled to New Haven and boarded Lane’s Packet to head to New York, and then they continued south on their weeklong trip to Washington City.
Once there, Eaton, in a buoyant mood, splurged $24 to buy six heavy volumes to fill the long days and nights of the transatlantic voyage. His selection reveals his tastes: Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations, Herty’s Digest of the Laws of the United States, Conductor Generalis (British criminal law procedures), Millet’s General History, Life of Washington (Parson Weems), Telemachus. While Eaton was earnestly choosing his new books, he had no idea that President Thomas Jefferson had received a letter from the Mediterranean and was now having grave second thoughts about sending Eaton on the mission.
CHAPTER 5
Tripoli: Decatur’s Raid
I shall hazard much to destroy [the Philadelphia]—it will undoubtedly cost us many lives but it must be done. I am surprized she was not rendered useless, before her Colours were struck.
—COMMODORE EDWARD PREBLE (USS CONSTITUTION, SYRACUSE HARBOR) TO SECRETARY OF THE NAVY ROBERT SMITH, DECEMBER 10, 1803
ON CHRISTMAS MORNING, one hundred and fifty of the American prisoners, slaves on the coast of Barbary, marched through the eastern gate of the city, passed the shriveled severed hands and feet, and headed out along the shore. Rousted just before dawn, they had not yet tasted a morsel of food. Blustery forty-five-degree winds, typical Tripoli winter weather, chilled the men, clad only in long pants and a shirt; most of them walked barefoot. Veering into the low winter sun, these men, not allowed to celebrate their Christian holiday, cast long weary shadows on the sands.
Turbaned overseers, swinging sticks, hurried the men to a decrepit wreck of a boat, half buried, stuck just offshore. This was not the Philadelphia, then in almost perfect repair in the harbor, but some discarded merchant vessel. For marine private William Ray, this Christmas day ranked high on the list of most miserable days of his life. “It was the coldest season of the year,” he wrote. “We were almost naked, and were driven into the water up to our armpits. We had to shovel sand from the bottom of the water and carry it in baskets to the banks.”
Stooping over in the seawater, the Americans lugged the dripping loads up onto the beach. Over and over again.