On September 4, 1804, Richard Somers and twelve others sailed the Intrepid, a small ship packed with explosives, into the harbor of Tripoli in North Africa. Their plan was to light the fuse, escape with rowboats, and then watch their fireship destroy enemy warships that were anchored there.

However, the ship exploded before it was close enough to damage the enemy or for Somers and his crew to get away. But their courage inspired our first Marines to go to “the shores of Tripoli” and continue the fight. Those Americans won the respect of the world and kept Americans safe from Islamic attacks for nearly two hundred years.

This story was once told in schools and told in popular books and plays throughout America. However, it is now cancelled and forgotten. Stories that portray white, Christian males as heroes, and Muslims as villains cannot be told in “woke” America. If we want America to be great again, we must once more tell these stories.

This story began in 1783 when America won its independence from England.  As soon as the war ended, we sent most of our army home and got rid of our entire navy.  Americans believed we didn’t need them.  We had no interest in attacking anyone else, and we assumed that nobody had a reason to attack us. We were wrong.

As soon as Americans overseas were no longer protected by the navy, diplomacy, and bribes of the British Empire, our ships were immediately attacked by warships from Morocco, Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli in North Africa.  Our ships and their cargoes were seized. Their passengers and crew were sold as slaves or held for ransom.

One of them, Richard O’Brien, managed to send a letter to Thomas Jefferson, then our ambassador to France. Jefferson then set up a meeting in London with John Adams, our ambassador to England and the ambassador from Tripoli.

At the time, the ambassador for Tripoli told the Americans, “It is written in our Koran that all nations which do not acknowledge the Prophet Muhammad are sinners. It is the right and duty of the faithful to plunder and enslave them.”

Jefferson and Adams urged Congress to build a navy and fight them. However, Congress refused. It instead spent nearly 20% of its budget to pay bribes and tribute to get captives released and arrange cease-fires.  

In 1789, we became one nation with a new Constitution. When French pirates in the Caribbean also attacked our ships in 1798, Americans had enough. We stopped paying bribes and built a navy. Twenty-year-old Richard Somers was one of the first to join.

First, we fought and crushed the French pirates. Then in 1801, President Thomas Jefferson sent our new navy to North Africa to fight the Barbary kingdoms. Richard Somers was put in command of a warship when he was 23 years old. Most of our other commanders were just as young.

For the next three years, these young Americans fought and defeated fanatic sea-fighters who had terrorized European ships and coastal towns for centuries. In 1804, Pope Pius VI remarked that “America in its infancy had done more to humble those who attacked Christians from the African coast than the European powers have done for ages.”

However, in the summer of 1804, the ruler of Tripoli ordered his warships to avoid the Americans and remain in the safety of his harbor. He expected the Americans to get tired of a long overseas war and go home. So did Richard Somers. He was afraid that Congress would end the war without destroying the last enemy fleet in Tripoli. He and his shipmates agreed that if this happened, all their work and sacrifice would have been in vain. That is why Somers proposed his risky plan to quickly win the war. 

The story of the family of Richard Somers is just as interesting.  However, it is also just as inconvenient to “woke” America.

Somers was descended from Quakers who fled from persecution in England.  Yet they quickly became wealthy in America without stealing land from Native Americans or owning slaves. William Penn did not allow Quakers to settle on any land claimed by Native Americans unless they proved that the land was voluntarily sold to them for a fair price. Most Quakers also opposed slavery and shunned anyone who owned or profited from slaves.  

Quakers prospered in America because their schools taught both girls and boys basic reading, writing, history, arithmetic, and science. After completing eight grades by age 16, most were better educated than most high school and college graduates today. Most children also mastered a useful trade by that age.

Quakers also set up simple and frugal governments. Their only tax was on real estate. Only “freeholders” or landowners who paid that tax could vote on how it was spent. Everybody kept most of what they earned.

In colonial New Jersey, as in most of America, everyone was free to apply their skills to any trade or business they chose. They did not have to pay fees, bribes, or lawyers to get permits from the government like in most of Europe.

Most Quakers were energetic and creative. Besides farming and fishing, James Somers, an uncle of Richard, built a dam across Patcong Creek. It created a pond by his North Field to power his lumber and flour mills. George May built ships by Mays Landing, his landing by the river.  Others heated mud from nearby swamps to refine “bog iron” for nails, pots, pans, and tools.

Telling the stories of their everyday lives is just as important as telling the stories of war heroes like Richard Somers.

Image: Public Domain