Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 959

1895 · 16 pages

This weekly Beadle and Adams dime novel (November 1895) serializes "The Four Commanders" by T. J. Flanagan, continuing the author's maritime fiction cycle. The narrative chronicles Commodore Preble's 1803 Mediterranean campaign against Tripoli, featuring young naval officers Decatur, Lawrence, and Spence—initially dismissed by Preble as "children" commanders. The opening chapters depict their unauthorized capture of a Tripolian ketch carrying one hundred female slaves destined for Constantinople, accomplished through seamanship and deception while evading the flagship Constitution. Among the captives are two American orphans, siblings Harry and Laura Lee, whose ship was pirated two years earlier while bound for Madeira. The plot develops with Decatur's proposal to burn the captured frigate Philadelphia, held by the enemy, and introduces the foundlings' potential service value in upcoming operations against Tripoli.

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