Ottoman Algeria in Western Diplomatic History with ... - Bibliothèque

encouraged the piratical states to attack our vessels.” 95 The assumption that
Britain was using the Algerian corsairs against the shipping of its rivals and
that it had just unleashed them on American commerce was so spread in
London maritime circles at that time, probably because there was some truth in
it, that a maxim soon found its way among merchants and sailors: “if there
were no Algiers, it would be worth England’s while to build one.” 96 That belief
was so sustained that, two years later, Jefferson wrote a congressional delegate
that, despite treaties, Great Britain was still the enemy of the Americans. 97
Even supposing that no official plan as to the use of Algerian corsairs
against American trade really exited, the British consul Logie was most likely
behind much of the trouble that affected Algerian-American relations starting
from the mid-1780s. O’Brien and Cathcart left accounts in which they charged
Logie personally with instigations that caused the Algerian corsairs to capture
American ships. 98 O’Brien, for example, suspected that the apparent friendship
of Logie masked a duplicitous attempt to undermine American negotiations
which potentially would bring American ships into the Mediterranean thus
loosening British grip on American commerce. 99 He even accused Logie of
spreading exaggerated reports of the dangers of ‘Algerine pirates’ to American
commerce so that the British insurance companies would benefit from it by
95 As cited in Peskin, “Lessons of Independence,” p. 309.
96 DCAR, 7:55, Adams to Robert R. Livingston, July 3, 1783; ibid., 4:149, Franklin to Robert R.
Livingston, July 22, 1783.
97 “Her hatred is deep rooted and cordial, and nothing is wanting with her but the power to wipe us and
the land we live on out of existence,” Jefferson wrote. Jefferson, Memoir, 1: 313, To John Langdon,
September 11, 1785.
98 Rojas, “Insults Unpunished,” pp. 185-86. John Foss, another captive, made the same accusation.
99 EN, 3:193, Richard O’Bryen, Zaccheus Coffin and Isaac Stephens to Thomas Jefferson, June 8,
1786.
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