James Leander Cathcart: June 1st, 1767 - October 6th, 1843
This journal was commenced two hundred and twenty-three years ago by a youth of seventeen years of age, who had been taken prisoner by the British when a midshipman on board the United States frigate Confederacy, Capt. Seth Harding, and carried into New York with most of the prisoners, on board first the Good Hope and then on the old prison ships, where he remained until, with a fellow prisoner, he made his escape and found employment in the merchant service. The Maria of Boston, on which he embarked, was captured by the Algerians on July 25, 1785, three miles southeast of Cape St. Vincent this being the first American vessel captured by Algerian cruisers.
He became clerk to the Dey of Algiers, being the medium to approach the Dey when consuls could not gain an audience. In 1796, he went back to the United States at his own expense, with dispatches and select articles to secure peace with Algiers.
The United States government employed him for about two years in Philadelphia, after which he returned to the Mediterranean as consul to Tripoli. When war was declared by Tripoli against the United States, he was sent as consul to Leghorn, where he remained seven years, spending about nine years in these different places. He returned to the United States in 1805. In 1807, he was appointed consul to Madeira, where he remained nine years, then returned to Washington, D.C., and soon after went as consul to Cadiz, where he remained nearly three years. He was next employed as United States agent in Louisiana. From 1823 to 1843, he was employed in the Second Comptroller's Office, Washington, D.C.
So faithful to his family and country, he never took a summer vacation until the year he died, passing away on October 6, 1843.
From the Preface of: The Captives
Ali Tablit
Algiers, October 10th, 2011
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