Father said in the war with Tripoli, 1803, one of the Barbary States, Captain Bainbridge sailed, in the Philadelphia, to Tripoli and chased one of the pirate boats into the harbor. He ventured a little too far and ran aground. The officers were made prisoners and the crew slaves, to the Turks, and joined their countrymen who had preceded them. But, father said, the Americans were too brave a people to be subjected to slavery. Other Americans rescued them and it was proved that the United States would protect their flag throughout all the world. He often told me of Commodore Decatur and William Eaton. They were among his ideal American heroes. He said that Decatur conceived the idea of retaking the "Philadelphia" and destroying her. He sailed into the harbor of Tripoli at night and up to the "Philadelphia," made his vessel, the "Intrepid," fast to her side and sprang on board. There he had often walked before under very different circumstances, in the light of other days, when thousands of miles away and among his friends. Now how changed the scene! The "Philadelphia" was in an enemy's hands, and her guns loaded, to turn on her former owners at a moment's notice. Decatur was followed by seventy or eighty men, as brave Americans as ever walked on deck. The surprise was complete, and the astonished Turks now saw the decks swarming with Americans, armed and with drawn swords in their hands. Some of the Tripolitans lost their heads, some of them cried for quarters, others tried to climb in the shrouds and rigging of the ship and some jumped overboard. In ten minutes' time, Decatur and his crew were masters of the frigate. Now what grieved him most was that the noble ship, which they had rescued from the barbarous Arabs, had to be burned, it being impossible to remove her from the sandbar where she lay. So they brought, on board the "Philadelphia," combustible material, which they had with them on the "Intrepid," and set her on fire. In a short time the flames were leaping and dancing along the sides of the doomed ship. The devouring fire, greedily burning, cracking and hissing, destroyed the timbers, leaped up the spars, caught hold of the rigging and lighted up the whole place. It could have been, and was, seen for miles. The spectacle was awfully grand as well as sublime. Tripoli was lighted up and hundreds of people could be seen in the streets, by the light of the burning ship.