On This Day...

[News Crew]

On this day the First Barbary War (1801–1805), also known as the Barbary Coast War or the Tripolitan War, was the first of two wars (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbary_Wars) fought between the United States of America (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States) (briefly joined by a small Swedish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweden) fleet) and the North African (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Africa) states known collectively as the Barbary States (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbary_States). These were the independent Sultanate of Morocco (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morocco), and the three Regencies of Algiers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algiers), Tunis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunis), and Tripoli (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tripoli), which were quasi-independent entities nominally belonging to the Ottoman Empire (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottoman_Empire). In October 1803, Tripoli's fleet was able to capture USS Philadelphia intact after the frigate ran aground while patrolling Tripoli harbor. Efforts by the Americans to float the ship while under fire from shore batteries and Tripolitan naval units were unsuccessful. The ship, its captain, William Bainbridge (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Bainbridge), and all officers and crew were taken ashore and held as hostages. The Philadelphia was turned against the Americans and anchored in the harbor as a gun battery.On the night of February 16 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/February_16), 1804 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1804), Lieutenant Stephen Decatur, Jr. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Decatur,_Jr.) led a small contingent of the U.S.'s first Marines in the captured Tripolitan ketch (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketch) rechristened Stephen Decatur, Jr. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Decatur,_Jr.) made him one of the first American military heroes since the Revolutionary War (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Revolutionary_War). Read all about it HERE. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Barbary_War)

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