A 19th-century image of American sailors fighting Barbary corsairs on a gunboat deck in 1804
After five years of fighting, the first conflict fought by the United States of America outside the New World finally ended in 1805. The First Barbary War had been triggered by the practice of piracy and extortion of merchant shipping, with demands for hefty tributes for safe passage, in the Mediterranean by the North African Barbary States (Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli and Morocco). In order to safeguard America’s burgeoning maritime trade and to assert the young nation’s sovereignty, US President Thomas Jefferson had opted to challenge this state of affairs
The war unfolded as a series of naval engagements, with the fledgling US Navy confronting the formidable corsairs of the Barbary coast. Under the leadership of Commodore Edward Preble from 1803, the Mediterranean squadron demonstrated remarkable prowess and determination.