Historic Adventures Part 5

The Pasha pretended to be offended, summoned his twenty thousand Arab soldiers and manned his cannon; but when he heard how Algiers and Tunis had already made peace with Decatur, and saw that the Americans were all prepared for battle, he changed his tactics and sent the governor of Tripoli to the flag-ship to treat for peace. The American consul told Decatur that twenty-five thousand dollars would make good the lost prize-ships, but that the Pasha was holding ten Christians as slaves in Tripoli. Decatur thereupon reduced the amount of his claim on condition that the slaves should be released. This was agreed to. The prisoners, two of whom were Danes, and the others Sicilians, were sent to the flag-ship, and by way of compliment the band of the _Guerriere_ went ash.o.r.e and played American airs to the delight of the people.

The American captain now ordered the rest of his squadron to sail to Gibraltar, while the _Guerriere_ landed the prisoners at Sicily. As the flag-ship came down the coast from Carthagena she met that part of the Algerine fleet that had put into Malta when the Americans first arrived in the Mediterranean. The _Guerriere_ was alone, and Decatur thought that the Moors, finding him at such a disadvantage, might break their treaty of peace, and attack him. He called his men to the quarter-deck.

"My lads," said he, "those fellows are approaching us in a threatening manner. We have whipped them into a treaty, and if the treaty is to be broken let them break it. Be careful of yourselves. Let any man fire without orders at the peril of his life. But let them fire first if they will, and we'll take the whole of them!"

The decks were cleared, and every man stood ready for action. The fleet of seven Algerine ships sailed close to the single American frigate in line of battle. The crews looked across the bulwarks at each other, but not a word was said until the last Algerine ship was opposite. "Where are you going?" demanded the Moorish admiral.

"Wherever it pleases me," answered Decatur; and the _Guerriere_ sailed on her course.

Early in October there was a great gathering of American ships at Gibraltar. Captain Bainbridge's fleet, which included the seventy-four-gun ship of the line _Independence_, was there when Decatur arrived. The war between the United States and England was only recently ended, and the presence of so many ships of the young Republic at the English Rock of Gibraltar caused much talk among the Spaniards and other foreigners. The sight of ships which had been English, but which were now American, added to the awkward situation, and more than one duel was fought on the Rock as the result of disputes over the War of 1812.

The Dey of Algiers, left to his own advisers and to the whispers of men who were jealous of the United States' success, began to wish he had not agreed to the treaty he had made with Decatur. His own people told him that a true son of the Prophet should never have humbled himself before the Christian dogs. In addition the English government agreed to pay him nearly four hundred thousand dollars to ransom twelve thousand prisoners of Naples and Sardinia that he was holding. Before everything else the Dey was greedy. Therefore when Captain Oliver Hazard Perry, the hero of the battle of Lake Erie, brought out in the _Java_ a copy of the treaty after it had been ratified by the United States Senate, and it was presented to the Dey by the American consul, William Shaler, the ruler of Algiers pretended that the United States had changed the treaty, and complained of the way in which Decatur had dealt with the Algerine ships. Next day he refused to meet Mr. Shaler again, and sent the treaty back to him, saying that the Americans were unworthy of his confidence.

Mr. Shaler hauled down the flag at his consulate, and boarded the _Java_.

Fortunately there were five American ships near Algiers; and these were made ready to open fire on the Moorish vessels in the harbor.

Plans were also made for a night attack. The small boats of the fleet were divided into two squadrons, to be filled by twelve hundred volunteer sailors. One division was to make for the water battery and try to spike its guns, while the other was to attack the batteries on sh.o.r.e. Scaling-ladders were ready, and the men were provided with boarding-spikes; but shortly before they were to embark the captain of a French ship in the harbor got word of the plan and carried the information to the Dey. The latter was well frightened, and immediately sent word that he would do whatever his good friends from America wanted. The next day Mr. Shaler landed again, and the Dey signed the treaty.

The fleet then called a second time on the Bey of Tunis, who had been grumbling about his dissatisfaction with Decatur's treatment. He too, however, was most friendly when American war-ships poked their noses toward his palace. After that the Barbary pirates let American merchantmen trade in peace, although an American squadron of four ships was kept in the Mediterranean to see that the Dey, and the Bey, and the Pasha did not forget, and go back to their old tricks.

So it was that Decatur put an end to the African pirates, so far as the United States was concerned, and taught them that sailors of the young Republic, far away though it was, were not to be made slaves by greedy Moorish rulers.

V

THE FATE OF LOVEJOY'S PRINTING-PRESS

Ever since the thirteen colonies that lay along the Atlantic coast had become a nation ambitious men had heard the call, "Go West, young man, go West!" There was plenty of fertile land in the country beyond the Alleghany Mountains, and it was free to any who would settle on it. Adventure beckoned men to come and help in founding new states, and many, who thought the villages of New England already overcrowded, betook themselves to the inviting West. One such youth was Elijah Parrish Lovejoy, who came from the little town of Albion, in Maine, and who, after graduating at Waterville College, had become a school-teacher. This did not satisfy him; he wanted to see more of the world than lay in the village of his birth, and when he was twenty-five years old, in May, 1827, he set out westward.

The young man was a true son of the Puritans, brought up to believe in many ideas that were already often in conflict with the views of men of the South and West. He reached the small city of St. Louis, in the pioneer country of Missouri, and there he found a chance to teach school. He wrote for several newspapers that were being started, and in the course of the next year edited a political paper that was urging the election of Henry Clay as President. His interest in politics grew, and he might have sought some public office himself had he not suddenly become convinced that he was meant to be a minister, and determined to prepare for that work at Princeton Seminary. When he returned to St.

Louis in 1833 his friends helped him to found a weekly religious paper called the _St. Louis Observer_.

The editor found time from his newspaper work to ride into the country and preach at the small churches that were springing up at every crossroads. Missouri was more southern than northern, and he saw much of slave-owning people. It was not long before he decided that negro slavery was wrong, and that the only way to right the wrong was to do away with it altogether. He began to attack slavery in his newspaper and in his sermons, and soon slavery men in that part of Missouri came to consider him as one of their most bitter foes.

Lovejoy had married, and expected to make St. Louis his permanent home. But neither all the men who were interested in the _Observer_, nor all the members of his church, approved of his arguments against slaveholding, and when he was away at a religious meeting the proprietors of his paper issued a statement promising that the editor would deal more gently with the question of slavery in the future. When Lovejoy returned and read this statement he was indignant; he was not a man to fear public opinion, and he attacked his enemies more ardently than ever.

The law of the land permitted slavery, and many of the chief citizens in the frontier country approved of it. They hated the Abolitionists, as those who wanted to do away with slavery were called. When men were suspected of having helped to free slaves, or of sheltering runaway negroes, they were taken into the country and given two hundred lashes with a whip as a lesson. Sometimes Abolitionists were tarred and feathered and ridden out of town; often their houses were burned and their property destroyed. Lovejoy knew that he might have to face all this, but the spirit of the Puritan stock from which he sprang would not let him turn from his course.

He went on printing articles against the evils of slavery, he denounced the right of a white man to separate colored husbands and wives, parents and children, brothers and sisters, or to send his slaves to the market to be sold to the highest bidder, or to whip or ill-use them as if they had no feelings.

There was danger that the young editor would be mobbed, and the owners of the _Observer_ took the paper out of his charge. Friends, however, who believed in a free press, bought it, and gave it back to him. Waves of public opinion, now for Lovejoy, now against him, swept through St.

Louis. By the end of 1835 mobs had attacked Abolitionists in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, and the news fanned the flames of resentment against them in Missouri.

Lovejoy had good reason to know the danger of his position. One September day he went out to a camp-meeting at the little town of Potosi. He learned that two men had waited half a day in the village, planning to tar and feather him when he arrived, but he was late, and they had left. When he returned to St. Louis he found that handbills had been distributed through the city, calling on the people to tear down the office of the _Observer_. A newspaper named the _Missouri Argus_ urged patriotic men to mob the New England editor. Crowds, gathered on street corners, turned dark, lowering looks upon him as he pa.s.sed, and every mail brought him threatening letters. He would not, however, stop either writing or preaching against slavery.

His work constantly called him on journeys to small towns, sometimes several days' ride from his home. Late in 1835 he was at a meeting in Marion when reports came that St. Louis was in an uproar, that men who opposed slavery were being whipped in the streets, and that no one suspected of being an Abolitionist would be allowed to stay there.

Lovejoy had left his wife ill in bed. He started to ride back, a friend going some seventy miles with him, half of the journey. The friend urged him not to stay in St. Louis, pointing out that his young and delicate wife would have to suffer as well as he. Travelers they met all warned him that he would not be safe in the city. He rode on to St. Charles, where he had left his wife. He talked with her, and she told him to go on to his newspaper office if he thought duty called him there.

St. Louis was all excitement and alarm. The newspapers had attacked the _Observer_ so bitterly that the owners had stopped printing it. A mob had planned to wreck the office, but had postponed the task for a few days. Men went to Lovejoy and told him he would not be safe in the streets by day or night. Even the men of his church would not stand by him, and a religious paper declared "that they would soon free the church of the rotten sheep in it," by which they meant Elijah Lovejoy and others who opposed slavery.

This Yankee, however, like many others who had gone to that border country in the days when bitterness ran high, had a heroic sense of duty. He wrote and printed a letter to the people, stating that men had no right to own their brothers, no matter what the law might say. The letter caused more excitement than ever.

The owners of the _Observer_ went to Lovejoy and requested him to retire as its editor. For two days it was a question what the angry mobs would do to him. Then a little better feeling set in. Men came to him, and told him that he must go on printing his paper or there would be no voice of freedom in all that part of the country. A friend bought the newspaper from its owners, and urged Lovejoy to write as boldly as before. This friend, however, suggested that he should move the newspaper across the state line to Alton, Illinois, where feeling was not so intense. Lovejoy agreed, and set out for Alton; but while he was preparing to issue the paper there the same friend and others wrote him that his pen was so much needed in St. Louis that he must come back. He did so, and the _Observer_ continued its existence in St. Louis until June, 1836.

There was so much strife and ill feeling, however, in Missouri that the editor decided his newspaper would be better supported, and would exert more influence, in Illinois. Accordingly he arranged to move his printing-press to the town of Alton in July. Just before he left St. Louis he published severe criticisms of a judge of that city who had sided with slave-owners, and these articles roused even greater resentment among the rabble who hated Lovejoy's freedom of speech.

If some of the people of Alton were glad to have this fearless editor come to their town, many were not. Slavery was too sore a subject for them to wish it talked about publicly. Many people all through that part of the country looked upon an Abolitionist as a man who delighted in stirring up ill feeling. Lovejoy sent his printing-press to Alton by steamboat, and it was delivered at the wharf on a Sunday morning, about daybreak. The steamboat company had agreed to land the press on Monday, and Lovejoy refused to move it from the dock on the Sabbath. Early Monday morning five or six men went down to the river bank and destroyed the printing-press.

This was the young editor's welcome by the lawless element, but next day the better cla.s.s of citizens, thoroughly ashamed of the outrage, met and pledged themselves to repay Lovejoy for the loss of his press. These people denounced the act of the mob, but at the same time they expressed their disapproval of Abolitionists. They wanted order and quiet, and hoped that Lovejoy would not stir up more trouble.

The editor bought a new press and issued his first paper in Alton on September 8, 1836. Many people subscribed to it, and it appeared regularly until the following August. Lovejoy, however, would speak his mind, and again and again declared that he was absolutely opposed to slavery, and that the evil custom must come to an end. This led to murmurs from the slavery party, and slanders were spread concerning the editor's character. All freedom-loving men had to weather such storms in those days, and Lovejoy, like a great many others, stuck to his principles at a heavy cost.

The murmurs and slanders grew. On July 8, 1837, posters announced that a meeting would be held at the Market House to protest against the articles in the _Alton Observer_. The meeting condemned Lovejoy's writings and speeches, and voted that Abolitionism must be suppressed in the town. This was the early thunder that heralded the approach of a gathering storm.

The Yankee editor showed no intention of giving up his stand against slavery, but preached and wrote against it at every opportunity. As a result threats of destroying the press of the _Observer_ were heard on the streets of Alton, and newspapers in neighboring cities encouraged ill feeling against the editor. The _Missouri Republic_, a paper printed in St. Louis, tried to convince the people of Alton that it was a public danger to have such men as Lovejoy in their midst, and condemned the Anti-Slavery Societies that were being formed in that part of the country. Two attempts were made to break into his printing-office during the early part of the summer, but each time the attackers were driven off by Lovejoy's friends.

The editor went to a friend's house to perform a marriage ceremony on the evening of August 21, 1837. His wife and little boy were ill at home, and on his return he stopped at an apothecary's to get some medicine for them. His house was about a half mile out of town. As he left the main street he met a crowd of men and boys. They did not recognize him at once, and he hurried past them; but soon some began to suspect who he was, and shouted his name to the rest. Those in the rear urged the leaders to attack him, but those in front held back; some began to throw sticks and stones at him, and one, armed with a club, pushed up to him, denouncing him for being an Abolitionist. At last a number linked arms and pushed past him, and then turning about in the road stopped him. There were cries of "Tar and feather him," "Ride him on a rail," and other threats. Lovejoy told them they might do as they pleased with him, but he had a request to make; his wife was ill, and he wanted some one to take the medicine to her without alarming her. One of the men volunteered to do this. Then the editor, standing at bay, argued with them. "You had better let me go home," he said; "you have no right to detain me; I have never injured you." There was more denouncing, jostling and shoving, but the leaders, after a short talk, allowed Lovejoy to go on toward his house.

Meantime, however, another band had gone to the newspaper office between ten and eleven o'clock, and, seeing by the lights in the building that men were still at work there, had begun to throw stones at the windows.

A crowd gathered to watch the attack. The mayor and some of the leading citizens hurried to the building, and argued with the ringleaders. A prominent merchant told them that if they would wait until the next morning he would break into the newspaper office with them, and help them take out the press and the other articles, stow them on a boat, put the editor on top, and send them all down the Mississippi River together. But the crowd did not want to wait. The stones began to strike some of Lovejoy's a.s.sistants inside the building, and they ran out by a rear door. As soon as the office was empty the leaders rushed in and broke the printing-press, type, and everything else in the building.

Next morning the slavery men in Alton said that the Abolitionist had been silenced for the time, at least. They looked upon Lovejoy, and men of his kind, as a thorn in the flesh of their peaceful community.

There were still a small number of "freedom-loving" people in Alton, however, and these stood back of Elijah Lovejoy. Although two printing-presses had now been destroyed, these men called a meeting and decided that the _Observer_ must continue to be printed. Money was promised, and the editor prepared to set up his press for the third time. He issued a short note to the public, in which he said: "I now appeal to you, and all the friends of law and order, to come to the rescue. If you will sustain me, by the help of G.o.d, the press shall be again established at this place, and shall be sustained, come what will.

Let the experiment be fairly tried, whether the liberty of speech and of the press is to be enjoyed in Illinois or not." The money was raised, and the dauntless spokesman for freedom sent to Cincinnati for supplies for his new office.

That autumn enemies scattered pamphlets accusing Lovejoy and other Abolitionists of various crimes against the country. Although few people believed them, the circulars increased the hostile feelings, and disturbed many of the editor's friends. Some of the latter began to doubt whether the _Observer_ ought to continue its stirring articles.

Some thought it should be only a religious paper. But Lovejoy answered that he felt it was his duty to speak out in protest against the great evil of slavery. He finally offered to resign, if the supporters of the paper thought it best for him to do so. They could not come to any decision, and so let him continue his course.

The third printing-press arrived at Alton on September 21st, while Lovejoy was away attending a church meeting. The press was landed from the steamboat a little after sunset, and was protected by a number of friends of the _Observer_. It was carted to a large warehouse to be stored. As it pa.s.sed through the street some men cried, "There goes the Abolition press; stop it, stop it!" but no one tried to injure it.

The mayor of Alton declared that the press should be protected, and placed a constable at the door of the warehouse, with orders to remain till a certain hour. As soon as this man left, ten or twelve others, with handkerchiefs tied over their faces as disguise, broke into the warehouse, rolled the press across the street to the river, broke it into pieces, and threw it into the Mississippi. The mayor arrived and protested, but the men paid no attention to him.

Lovejoy's business had called him to the town of St. Charles, near St.

Louis, and he preached there while his third press was being attacked.

After his sermon in the evening he was sitting chatting with a clergyman and another friend when a young man came in, and slipped a note into his hand. The note read:

"MR. LOVEJOY:

"Be watchful as you come from church to-night.

A FRIEND."

Lovejoy showed the note to the two other men, and the clergyman invited him to stay at his house. The editor declined, however, and walked to his mother-in-law's residence with his two friends. No one stopped them, and when they came to the house Lovejoy and the clergyman went in, and sat down to chat in a room on the second floor. About ten o'clock they heard a knock on the door at the foot of the stairs. Mrs. Lovejoy's mother went to the door, and asked what was wanted. Voices answered, "We want to see Mr. Lovejoy; is he in?" The editor called down, "Yes, I am here." As soon as the door was opened, two men rushed up-stairs, and into the sitting-room. They ordered Lovejoy to go down-stairs, and when he resisted, struck him with their fists. Mrs. Lovejoy heard the noise, and came running from her room. A crowd now filled the hall, and she had to fight her way through them. Several men tried to drag the editor out of the house, but his wife clung to him, and aided by her mother and sister finally persuaded the a.s.sailants to leave.

Exhausted by the struggle, Mrs. Lovejoy fainted. While her husband was trying to help her, the mob came back, and, paying no attention to the sick woman, insisted that they were going to ride Lovejoy out of town. By this time a few respectable citizens had heard the noise, and came to his aid. A second time the rabble was driven away; but they stayed in the yard, and made the night hideous with their threats to the Abolitionist. Presently some of the men went up to Lovejoy's room the third time, and one of them gave him a note, which demanded that he leave St. Charles by ten o'clock the next morning. Lovejoy's friends begged him to send out an answer promising that he would leave. Although he at first declined to do this, he finally yielded to their urging. He wrote, "I have already taken my pa.s.sage in the stage, to leave to-morrow morning, at least by nine o'clock." This note was carried out to the crowd on the lawn, and read to them. His friends thought the mob would scatter after that, and they did for a time; but after listening to violent speeches returned again. The noise was now so threatening that Lovejoy's friends begged him to fly from the house. His wife added her pleadings to theirs, and at last he stole out unnoticed by a door at the rear. He hated to leave his wife in such a dangerous situation, however, and so, after waiting a short time, he went back. His friends reproached him for returning, and their reproaches were justified, for, like hounds scenting the fox, the mob menaced the house more noisily than ever.

Lovejoy saw that he must leave again in order to protect his wife and friends. This he succeeded in doing, and walked about a mile to the residence of a Major Sibley. This friend lent him a horse, and he rode out of town to the house of another friend four miles away. Next day Mrs. Lovejoy joined him, and they went on together to Alton.

One of the very first people they met in Alton was a man from St Charles who had been among those who had broken into their house the night before. Mrs. Lovejoy was alarmed at seeing him in Illinois, because the mob in St. Charles had declared that they were going to drive Lovejoy out of that part of the country. In order to quiet her fears her husband asked some friends to come to his house, and ten men, well armed, spent the next night guarding it, while he himself kept a loaded musket at his side. The storm-clouds were gathering about his devoted head.