From Captives to Consuls: Three Sailors in Barbary and Their Self-Making across the Early American Republic, 1770-1840

Three white, non-elite American sailors turned their experiences of captivity into diverse career opportunities and influenced America's physical, commercial, ideological, and diplomatic development. This first scholarly biography of American captives in Barbary sifts through their writings to reveal how ordinary individuals in extraordinary circumstances could maneuver through and contribute to nation building in early America, advancing their own interests.

Format: Hardback
Length: 224 pages
Publication date: 13 October 2020
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press

From 1784 to 1815, hundreds of American sailors were held as white slaves in the North African Barbary States. In Captives to Consuls, Brett Goodin vividly traces the lives of three of these men—Richard O'Brien, James Cathcart, and James Riley—from the Atlantic coast during the American Revolution to North Africa, from Philadelphia to the Louisiana Territories, and finally to the western frontier. This first scholarly biography of American captives in Barbary's sifts through their highly curated writings to reveal how ordinary individuals in extraordinary circumstances could maneuver through and contribute to nation building in early America, all the while advancing their own interests.

The three subjects of this collective biography both reflected and helped refine evolving American concepts of liberty, identity, race, masculinity, and nationhood. Time and again, Goodin reveals, O'Brien, Cathcart, and Riley uncovered opportunities in their adversity. They variously found advantage first in the Revolution as privateers, then in captivity by writing bestselling captivity narratives and successfully framing their ordeal as a qualification for coveted government employment. They even used their modest fame as ex-captives to become diplomats, get elected to state legislatures, and survey the nation's territorial expansions in the South and West. Their successful self-interested pursuit of opportunities offered by the expanding American empire, Goodin argues, constitutes what he calls the "captive nation."

Goodin's work is a valuable addition to the growing literature on early American history and the Barbary Wars. He demonstrates how captives could use their experiences to shape their own destinies and contribute to the development of the United States. Captives to Consuls is a must-read for anyone interested in the history of early America, the Barbary Wars, and the role of ordinary individuals in shaping the nation's destiny.

Weight: 464g
Dimension: 162 x 235 x 24 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781421438979