Africa Squadron

by Canney, Donald L.

• ISBN13: 9781574886061
• ISBN10: 1574886061
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-12-27
• Publisher: Potomac Books Inc

Summary

Donald L. Canney's study is the first book-length history of the U.S. Navy's Africa Squadron. Established in 1842 to enforce the ban on importing slaves to the United States, in twenty years' time the squadron proved ineffective. To officers and enlisted men alike, duty in the squadron was unpopular. The equatorial climate, departmental neglect, and judicial indifference, which allowed slavers back at sea, all contributed to the sailors' frustration. Later, the most damaging allegation was that the squadron had failed at its mission. Canney investigates how this unit earned a poor reputation and whether it is deserved. Though U.S. warships seized slave vessels as early as 1800, four decades passed before the Navy established a permanent squadron off the western coast of Africa to interdict U.S.-flag vessels participating in this trade. Canney traces the Navy's role in interdicting the slave trade, Great Britain's pressure on the U.S. government to curb slave traffic, the creation of the squadron, and how individual politicians, department secretaries, captains, and squadron commanders interpreted the laws and orders from higher authorities, changing squadron operations. While famous ships and captains served on this station, none won distinction in the Africa Squadron. In the final analysis, the squadron was unsuccessful, even though it was the Navy's only permanent squadron with a specific, congressionally mandated mission: to maintain a quasi-blockade on a foreign shore. While Canney exonerates southern-born naval captains, who approached their work as diligently as their counterparts from the north, he demonstrates how the secretaries of the Navy'”pro-slavery southern politicians'”neglected the squadron.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	vii
Acknowledgments	ix
Introduction	xi
1. The Slave Trade Outlawed, 1808-1821	1	(14)
2. Sporadic Suppression: U.S. Navy Anti—Slave Trade Activities, 1822-1841	15	(14)
3. The Scene is Set: Webster-Ashburton and the U.S. Navy, 1840-1842	29	(16)
4. Capt. Matthew C. Perry and the First Africa Squadron, 1843-1845	45	(26)
5. Commodore Skinner, the Fever, and the Notorious Pons, 1845-1846	71	(14)
6. Flag Officer Read: The Federal Courts Take a Hand, 1846-1847	85	(12)
7. Bolton and Cooper and the Nadir of the Squadron, 1847-1849	97	(14)
8. The Brazil Squadron and the Slave Trade, 1845-1849	111	(10)
9. Commodore Gregory and Lieutenant Foote Revive the Squadron	121	(20)
10. Captain Lavallette: A Lull in the Trade, 1851-1853	141	(16)
11. Commodore Mayo and the Constitution's Last Capture, 1853-1855	157	(16)
12. Flag Officer Crabbe: Cruising to No Reward, 1855-1857	173	(8)
13. Commodore Conover and Commander McBlair, 1857-1859	181	(20)
14. Flag Officer Inman and the Great Sea Change, 1859-1861	201	(28)
Appendix A U.S. Naval Vessels, 1842	229	(4)
Appendix B Vessels Seized	233	(2)
Appendix C Medium and Small Steam Vessels Available for Service, 1843-1858	235	(2)
Appendix D Secretaries of the Navy, 1842-1861	237	(2)
Notes	239	(24)
Bibliography	263	(6)
Index	269	(8)
About the Author	277