Since Libya is in the spotlight today, here’s a little trivia question for any of you interested in history. What do Buffalo, Missouri, and Libya have in common? I’ll explain.
In 1801, Thomas Jefferson declared war against Tripoli (modern-day Libya was called Tripoli back then). The war became known as the Barbary War and was started because pirates from the Barbary States were attacking American ships in the Mediterranean or requesting a ransom to not attack. The Barbary States included today’s North African countries of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya. Incidentally, today’s pirates operate out of Somalia, on the East Coast of Africa.
After four years of off and on sea battles that weren’t succeeding, a plan was devised to attack Tripoli by land and reinstate the deposed leader of Tripoli, a friend of America by the name of Hamet. The attack route was a long march of 800 miles across the desert from Egypt to Tripoli. The sandy route was the same as Alexander the Great had taken over 2,000 years before and over the same land that Field Marshal Montgomery would later pursue the German “Desert Fox” Rommel in 1943.
Somewhat similar to today’s NATO coalition against Libya; the 1805 mission included representatives from eleven different nations and amounted to over 1,000 individuals, along with many camels and horses. Amazingly, only nine Americans were involved; William Eaton, the mission leader appointed by President Jefferson; Eaton’s right hand man, Marine Lieutenant Presley O’Bannon; and seven other Marines under O’Bannon’s charge. Have a hint to the answer yet?
To make a long and exciting story short, Lt. O’Bannon and his men led the fight at their destination and overtook the enemy, including suppressing two subsequent attempts by the enemy to retake their fortress. Lt. O’Bannon lowered the flag of Tripoli and proudly hoisted the Stars and Stripes, an incident of historic significance giving O’Bannon the distinction of being the first man to raise the American flag in victory on foreign soil. It was the first and only land conquest made by Americans in the western World until 1918.
Hamet presented O’Bannon with a jeweled sword designed with a Mameluke hilt, which Hamet had carried while serving with the Egyptian Mamelukes. This sword later became the ceremonial sword of the U.S. Marine Corps. The Marine hymn written in the mid-1800s included as its second line “to the shores of Tripoli” in honor of the bravery and accomplishments of Lt. O’Bannon and his fellow Marines.
Okay, the answer to the trivia question is that Lt. O’Bannon’s first cousin, John O’Bannon, settled in Dallas County Missouri in 1840 in an area later named “The O’Bannon Prairie”. John’s son, grandson and nephew organized the O’Bannon Banking Company in Buffalo, Missouri on March 18, 1901, nearly 100 years after their cousin Lt. Presley O’Bannon won America’s first battle on foreign soil.
This history is of personal interest to me, as John O’Bannon is my great-great grandfather on my mother’s side of my family. History bored me in high school, but it is becoming intriguing to me as I explore genealogy. I hope I didn’t bore you and you learned something new from our history.
Lendol Vest – March 2011 (206 years later)