File:Decisive battles since Waterloo - the most important military events from 1815 to 1887 (1900) (14594765000).jpg

Identifier: decisivebattless00knox (find matches)
Title: Decisive battles since Waterloo : the most important military events from 1815 to 1887
Year: 1900 (1900s)
Authors: Knox, Thomas Wallace, 1835-1896
Subjects: Monitor (Ironclad) Battles Military history Military art and science Naval battles Naval history Naval art and science Hampton Roads, Battle of, Va., 1862
Publisher: New York : G.P. Putnam's Sons New Rochelle, N.Y. : Knickerbocker Press
Contributing Library: Lincoln Financial Foundation Collection
Digitizing Sponsor: State of Indiana through the Indiana State Library

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Rome were the van-guard of that vast array of foreign slaves who toiledunder Algerine and other. barbaric masters until theFrench conquest of which we are about to speak. Under the Turkish rulers of Algeria piracy becamea well-organized system, and Avas regarded as legitimatea means of obtaining wealth as in our day we regard themanufacture of woollen or cotton goods, or the shipmentof grain or other products to a profitable market. TheMoslems considered it entirely proper to hold all Chris-tians in their power as slaves, and they made no distinc-tion between prisoners of war, the crews of capturedmerchant ships, or unhappy victims of their raids on theEuropean coast and islands. Furthermore, whenever anyEuropean state attempted reprisals, it was the custom ofthe Dey of Algiers to send to the galleys the consul of thatcountry, together with the crew of any merchant ship thatmight have ventured into his ports for purposes of trade.On many occasions hundreds of these peaceful traders 64
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65 66 DECISIVE BATTIES SINCE WATERLOO. were slaughtered in cold blood, simply as a matter of in-timidation to the government to which they owed alle-giance. The consuls were treated with great barbarity;they were burned alive or blown from the mouths of can-nons, and on one occasion on the approach of a French fleetthe French consul was thrown towards them from a mortar.The various European governments made frequent at-tempts to suppress this system of piracy and slavery, butas they were constantly warring among themselves theycould not fix upon united action. Each was generallycontent to see its neighbors preyed upon if it could secureimmunity for itself, and consequently the attempts to thisend were in the shape of tribute, partly in money andvery often partly in cannon, muskets, powder, shells, andother munitions of war. As late as 1771 France boughtpeace with Algiers, and one of the conditions was thatshe should send over some cannon-founders to instructthe pirates in their art. S

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