>> history bookshelf features popular american history riders. from 1801-1805, the united states fought its first war and foreign sees a seas against a group that supported privacy. posted byhosted by e. shaver. this is about 30 minutes.

richard: it's my childhood come to life. like a marionette show. also, before i forget, this is the first time my mother has attended one of my readings. and today is her 83rd birthday. >> richard? richard: happy birthday, mom. so i'm going to tell you today about "pirate coast." this is my new book and about thomas jefferson and the first marines and the secret mission of 1805. he had no troops. he had no backing. but he pulled this mission off. this was america's first covert operation against state-sponsored terrorist. right. we have a little bit of a parallel today. when you hear those stirring

marine lyrics -- i usually think of marines, weapons over there had, amphibious launches. it was a covert operation by one man and a marines. it was a rogue operation. this is the story i want to tell you about. you have to know a little bit about the time period to get into the sense of the story. you know how we're on an airplane today and we might complain we don't get two bags of peanuts or something like that. back then you could be sailing on the mediterranean and be made a barbary slave. you could be sailing on your nice ship, your nice summer vacation and these marauders from tripoli sail down on you and sule spend the next five years as a slave. i want you to get a sense how different the world was back then.

washington, d.c. was a swampy outpost with 5,000 citizens, total population in washington. hunters shot quayle near the capitol. there were tree stumps on pennsylvania avenue. the thing i like about washington, you know how buckingham is a name to sort of glorify the place where some people live that are attending here today? attending here today? well, back in washington they had a place called goose creek and they wanted to glorify and make washington a little more important so they renamed it the tiber river. this is like -- washington was desperate to try and get a little more important than it was. if you woke up early enough you could walk over to the president's house and odds are thomas jefferson would greet you and would -- he wouldn't greet you but let new and talk to you. it's just amazing -- the whole state department was 19 people. today it's something like 38,000 people. the united states was just a string of little colonies along the coast. so you have to understand that the reason i'm kind of describing washington and the

government, this mirrored the united states' power in the world. we had no power. it was lack of power. our entire navy consisted of six ships. when the barbary pirates thought about the united states, they lumped us in with cecily sardenia, and denmark. you know we were a small -- we were way behind great britain, france russia. and we actually were paying more in tribute to the barbary pirate nations, algiers, tuna and tripoli than the entire military budget of the federal government. we think about muslims today and we go into iraq and win that war and supposedly win that war quickly. back then those three countries were an enormous threat to the united states. and we were on the smaller end of that stick. we were the ones that the oddsmakers thought would lose that war rment -- lose that

war. it's just hard to get your mind around how small and impotent the united states was once. that's what i'm trying to get across. in fact, this is how impotent. 1800, the day algiers received tribute of watches, daggers and stuff, and he said that's not enough. i want one of your ships to take more tribute to me over to the simultaneous an in istanbul -- to the sultan in istanbul. i wanted the ship to carry 75 female slaves, four lions, four antelopes and 12 parrots as a big, fat present to the sultan in istanbul. and the captain of the u.s.s. george washington agreed to do it. what's worse is they made him fly the algerian flag above the united states flag. he did that as well. that would give you a sense of how small or puny the united states was. so we were that puny but we had big dreams.

there were courageous americans who were furious at the indignity of being bullied by countries like algiers and tripoli. and one of them al eaton, the hero of this book. and he said he would rather be impaled than fly the algerian flag on the masthead of the u.s.s. washington. he was a fearless man and he hated the idea of anyone being slaves. the idea of an american citizen traveling on a summer vacation and winding up a slave in tripoli appalled him. he didn't just complain about it, he did something about it. and we'll find out about his mission. so basically in 1801 tripoli was dissatisfied with the amount of money we were sending them. so they declared war on us. you can imagine if libya was the first country in the world to ever declare war on the united states. and jefferson -- our entire navy was six ships. jefferson went and doubled the navy to 12 ships.

well, 12 ships is still not a lot, you know. and he sent one of those ships to perform a block aid -- a blockade off tripoli. i don't want to get ahead of myself. i want to show you a picture of what it's like to be captured as a barbary slave. i don't know if you can see that, but that's by jean lier. sorry, mom there's some nudity in this performance today. this is what would happen if a female cause captured. they paid a surplus an extra price for virginity, a 12 13 14-year-old girl would go for double or triple the price of anyone else. they had matrons to give a certificate of virginity for these slaves. i find this pretty creepy stuff. these are some of the tortures that were done to barbary slaves. some of this might be

exaggerated but on the other hand, i mean, some of this was performed. this was in the minds of the sailors on these ships thinking this could happen to me. these were forced circumcision. i don't know how many people know muslims circumstance up size as well as jews -- circumstance up size -- circumcize. this is cruise fiction hair on fire -- crucifixation, fires. this is what the rulers dressed like. clothes have changed over the years but not that much. you have a turban and baggy pants and jewel dagger. this is a picture of the man who was willing to allow the u.s.s. george washington to carry those parrots and lions over to istanbul. and this is the captain of the u.s.s. philadelphia who is now performing -- at the time i'm talking about a blockade in tripoli harbor and this is

william bainbridge. i love the hair. it's the napoleon style and it was sloppy. it's like we won't be the perfect courts here with the perfect wig and all the rest of it. so that is actually a style to wear your hair down like that. so anyhow, here we have the u.s.s. philadelphia in tripoli harbor, and it's performing a blockade. and it's about -- it's chasing a tripoli ship into the harbor. and he desperately wants to have a victory because the u.s. military, the u.s. navy has been doing incredibly badly for two years. william eaton said the navy ships were about as warlike as a bunch of quaker meeting houses. he said that one of the commodores took his wife with him on the ship. he said only an american commodore would take his wife to battle and that the next time jefferson should send along a bunch of comedians and a hair emto attract -- a hei

rum. here we have william bainbridge on the u.s.s. philadelphia chasing the ship in the harbor and he realizes i'm getting too deep in the harbor and i better be careful here and he decides to turn the ship out to sea. and of all things, as he turns the ship out to sea it beaches on an unchartered reef in tripoli harbor. 307 american sailors are aboard and are terrified they'll be made slaves in barbary. they've seen pictures and heard stores and they are very nervous. so the ship rides up a few feet on to a reef. pain bridge -- bainbridge, without checking the depths orders full sail ahead. that rides it six feet on the reef, further up on the reef. then they check the depth around the ship and realize there's deep water behind. so they need a way to back up the ship but the wind is going across the ship.

so they have to move -- they move the sails as best they can to try what's called back the ship up, they're trying to back the sails and move the ship backwards. the only problem is when they move the sails that way and the wind hits them it tips the ship over. you have a ship six feet over on the side and hercules on the front, looking drunk, and the gun ports are barely above the water here so now they're thinking, what can we do. so they toss the cannons overboard to lighten the ship. that still won't free the ship. these cannons weigh 2000 pounds each. they shot put the cannon balls off the side. that doesn't help them. they start throwing everything they can over. and then finally decide they have to cut the mast the foremast. they're going to cut it. they want it to fall this way so it will right the ship. but the carpenter makes some kind of little mistake and it falls this way. now the ship is like -- the water is splashing in the gun ports, the ship is tipped this way, hercules is drunk at the front.

things are not looking very good. so bainbridge decides we might have to surrender. what few people realize is bainbridge was the first u. captain to surrender a ship. he surrendered a ship during the french-american war earlier. a few years earlier, the kwasi war it's called. anyhow, so bainbridge decides we'll have to surrender. when he gives the order to lower the flag, the sailors can't believe it. they're stunned. supposedly the sailor disobeyed the order. here they are, only a couple of tripoli ships have come out of the harbor to attack the ship bainbridge would say nine but that includes the others playing with the mast in the harbor. there were only a few ships around at that point. they decide they'll surrender and they lower the flag and put up a white flag and scuttle the ship. they don't want to hand this beautiful ship to the enemy.

what happens is the water starts rushing in the ship and the people from tripoli don't believe it's a real surrender so now bainbridge might surrender his whole crew. and luckily the carpenter didn't come a good job making the holes and they're beached on a reef and the ship doesn't sink and the philadelphia surrenders. so 307 american sailors are now slaves on the coast of barbary. it happened halloween night, october 31 1803. and this was the worst foreign policy crisis in the history of the young nation. and thomas jefferson had to figure out you know what to do at this point. and believe it or not news traveled unbelievably slowly and it took four months -- this is what you have to realize about the stories. it took four minutes for the news to reach washington. now you pick up a satellite phone and it's two seconds. foreign policy gets changed by the fact you cannot communicate at all. so four months later, the news gets back to washington and

there's a guy -- this is william eaton. this is the hero of the book. he's an unjustly forgotten american from new england. william eaton, one of the toughest borderline insane because he would never give up no matter how bad things were. and he went to dartmouth. took him six or seven years to graduate undeterred and kept taking odd jobs once put a bag of trinkets on his shoulder and marched some hundred odd miles to sell the trinkets and pay for college. when they understand 307 slave americans are slaves in tripoli william eaton decides to overthrow the government in tripoli. america's first covert action in the history of the country. eaton suggests he will take the older brother of the ruler the

man on the throne now and he will find him in egypt and he will help launch a civil war and put him on the throne. and jefferson at first is thrilled to have this plan have this second option. but before eaton can even leave, jefferson finds out that hamet is not doing well the name of the prince, has had to flee and he's lost his troops. so jefferson decide this is is a bad option. i'd rather go with the military and diplomacy. so he takes away eaton's ammunition, his guarantee of troops basically all his support. and eaton -- he even said to eaton you don't have to go to the mediterranean. he is so stubborn and hates the barbary pirates so much and hates the idea of the americans being in slave. and he goes anyhow, even though he doesn't have the backing of his own government. and you just have to know what kind of man he was. i mean he had already been

court-martialed out of the army, you know. he'd had a problem with authority with his commanding officer and eaton accused his officer of speculating and the commanding officer got him court-martialed. when he was the consul to tunas, he wrote home it regrets me mortal to see a turk on his sofa with one christian to fan away the flies and one to hold his coffee and a third for the pipe. eaton says why should americans pay taxes to buy oil of roses to perfume a pirate's beard? and eaton was going to go on this mission no matter what. so he leaves on this mission with basically no backing. and that's basically what the heart of the story is. it's mission impossible. it's a covert op. and i think if eaton wasn't a little half crazy he couldn't

have pulled it off. many other men -- he finds prince hamet -- he hears rumors of where hamet is. he's a prisoner in southern egypt in a besieged city with 8,000 troops surrounding the city. 8,000 marmaluke warriors. he has to find him and bring him back. he has no money. he has money from -- he has to borrow from british merchants to go on this mission. he has no money from his own government. when he finally gets hamet up to alexandria he discovers that he can't get hamet into alexandria to catch a ship, so they'll have to march 520 miles across the libyan desert to attack the first city they're going to attack. i mean, any other man would have just -- he didn't have a map. he didn't speak arabic. he didn't know where the guides were -- he didn't trust the guides, the camel drivers were

cheating him. the prince hamet kept trying to run away. here he is trying to put him on the throne and the man is running away. anyhow this is the heart of the story. and what eaton wrote to describe his mission was though my adventure be forlorn and as perhaps as hazardous as anyone has undertaken by an individual, i will carry it into execution or perish in the endeavor. i am convinced our captives cannot be released without ransom. and as an individual i would rather yield my person to a danger of war in any shape than my pride of humiliation with negotiating with a wretched pirate for the ransom of men who are the rightful heirs of freedom. and the amazing thing is he pulled off the mission. he captured the city he forced the negotiations and he freed the -- in effect freed the 307 american sailors that were held hostage. and unfortunately, the story doesn't end so well after that. but at least he got to that point and came home a hero. anyhow, thank you very much.

thanks for listening. i wonder if anybody has any questions or any -- >> i want to know how long it took you to write this book. >> about 2 1/2 years total and about a year and a half of research. and i love the research. i mean -- >> that is the next question. >> i don't know if the camera can pick this up but this is the kind of documents that i deal with handwritten documents, 200-year-old doums. this is a great note. when william eaton arrived in the city of derna, he wanted to attack he sent a polite note to the governor that said i will pay for supplies if you surrender the city. you can be governor after we leave. and all you have to do is just let prince hamet come through your town. and the answer back, which i love at the bottom. answer my head or yours? i loved that. >> where are they kept?

>> in the library in southern california. luckily for me, in 1955 the u.s. marine corps decided since -- this is from the halls of montezuma to the shores of tripoli, they wanted every copy of william eaton's pages and they put all 3000 pages on microfilm. i bought the microfilm and got a reader off ebay of course and independented out 3000 pages. i took notes h to get them out of the handwriting of course and that was the heart of the research. >> were you a historian from college. >> i was a classical greek major. and armed with that i became a house painter for three years. >> i remember that time. >> and i worked for my uncle herbie in the audience here at his pawnshop and pet supply and he was going to put muscles on me unloading the paint. i was a journalist five years for "the new york daily news"." and after that i started writing these books and "pirate

hunters" sold over 500 copies. >> any ancestors of eaton living today? >> quite a few. his family traced back almost to the mayflower. they were one of the third or fourth ships in. so their ancestors are spread all throughout massachusetts and connecticut. in fact there is an eaton ohio. the one year where he was treated the way he believed he should be treated as a national hero, they named a city after him in eaton ohio. i got emails from lots of people who live in eaton ohio and it was nice, nice. email, by the way, is the greatest thing for an author. it is very fun sitting alone in your room to hear from people who read your books. it's great. any other questions? yes? >> first book, which i love very much and quite a change to your second one what got you into the pirate business? >> well, i started with more about sex, frankly sex and history. and my mother was a bit appalled.

and i love doing history. i recounted stories that have been forgotten about joan of arc's virginity tests and allah then particular of the contents of a closet in a bordello in paris in 1776. and i love those kinds of stories. i think it's an embarrassing statement or i might have matured a little bit. my wife says my books are only about 25% sex now instead of 100%. but anyhow. any6 c1 but anyhow. any other questions? >> why is nothing written about him if you read early american history? >> you know what, i think the navy historians took the lead. i mean the marine historians. this story is usually told from the point of view of the navy. steven decatur, the story everyone tells i'll tell it quickly. what happened was the u.s. navy didn't want the ship, the philadelphia to become part of

the fleet of tripoli and were appalled at that thought. so steven decatur was a young lieutenant and agreed to take a tripoli ship, the mastico, and make it into -- what do you call it? sort of like a trojan horse, slip into the harbor disguised and then he succeeded in attacking the tripoli and burning it. and that's considered one of the greatest exploits the early american navy. that is such a great exploit that has overshadowed the likes of william eaton. the other thing i didn't get to say is william eaton unfortunately for him wound up fighting a knock down drag out battle with thomas jefferson. and so jefferson -- and you know jefferson doesn't lose very often. so basically william eaton has been forgotten because jefferson -- i wouldn't call it character assassination, eaton did most of it to himself. but jefferson signed the light on william eaton's flaws and eaton became an alcoholic and a gambler and it didn't go -- he

only lived six years after this great victory. it's kind of a sad story. but you know i hope he gets the recognition at least for what he did accomplish. any other questions? >> what will be your next book? >> since i wrote up a contract, i don't want to say it on national tv, but i do have an idea and i think i have another pirate book up my sleeve after that. but i don't want to just be the pirate guy. don't get me wrong, i like pirates but would like to expand a little bit. it involves a prison and escape. i'll tell you that. >> how did you get so interested in the pirates? >> well i dressed up for halloween, i went to the pirates -- what's this restaurant you guys go to? the well? i climbed down there and you know, they had that sunday that dessert tray i could get anything i wanted. i don't know. it's been -- yeah.

i like the eye patches i like the whole thing. but what i like too is to reveal what pirates are really like. i don't want to romance -- these were evil bullies if i'm traveling with my wife and family and my mother, i do not want to see pirates on the horizon. they are not arrow flynn about to invite me to champagne dinner. it's going to be unpleasant. i want to get that across, also. >> what about presley o'bannon and the marines, how did they conduct themselves on this campaign? >> brilliantly. unbelievably brave. i wish i knew more. unfortunately i only got details on o'bannon and i love -- he carried a violin with him the whole way. he played the fiddle and was from kentucky and used to like to play "nothings -- hogs in the corn field." and he apparently was the life of the party and a very brave and honorable man. and the interesting thing about o'bannon i kept researching him and found out he worked in the liquor distillry of his

brother-in-law. here i am in a basketball weekend with my son in lexington, kentucky and we take a tour of the stillery and there is a sign for old pepper -- he has gone on to use the old distillery. and i brought it up and he said, yeah presley o'bannon worked in this distillery. he has bourbon in his roots and went on and was a state senator and made money in real estate. he had to leave the marines, unfortunately. they didn't promote him quickly enough and he had to join the army for a while. but he was a great hero. >> you're going to sign everybody's book? >> oh, absolutely. >> richard i saw on the discovery channel last night, they had captain kid and black beard. i exoket you to be on -- i expect you to be on the discovery channel. i'm looking forward to it. >> i appreciate that.

rival documentaries. but barry clifford got the discovery channel. i was there in madagascar right where he dove, actually. you order chicken there and it takes an hour and a half to bring it because they're plucking it. it hasn't changed 300 years later. >> anybody? >> i have a question. as a teacher, i'd like to know in your early education, what best prepared you to be a successful writer? >> i'd like to know, too. >> what can you recall growing up during your years of education? >> i would have to say i got to be honest here i wound up being a little disappointed with some of my freshman curriculum. i won't name my university so they don't get mad at me. and i wound up studying languages, classical greek arabic, french and italian at the university. and i think by gaining those languages, that opened so many

doors in research. for instance, the best documents i got for this book were in french, written by a french consul. i had 100 pages of his diary. i could have hired a translator, but it was great to do it mites and pour over it. and word plays. that was great. and of course the wit of my mother helps with the writing part of it. she said nitwit. he said nitwit. i didn't say nitwit. see, there's her wit. any other questions? >> i've got to say something. are you in any leading magazines since i saw you in "the new yorker" the other day? >> no got in "the new yorker" and "the new york times." >> how about tv? >> there was" "the pirate

hunter" has been optioned for the movies. the man who directed "the notebook" has an option for a movie. i'm very much hoping he will do it. i'm rooting for him bigtime. that would be great. i hope this can help. if you're out there watching. and this book is still available. [inaudible] >> tyrone power in "pirate hunter." >> russell crowe is good in all those nautical movies. he'd be great. i guess that's great. thank you very much. thanks, everybody, for coming. >> on history bookshelf, here from the best history riders of the past decade every saturday at four clock p.m. eastern. to watch these programs any time

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