Below there was a more prolonged struggle. The Tripolitans, with their backs to the ship’s side, made a fierce resistance, but were clearly overmatched from the beginning; and as it is their practice never to fall alive into the hands of an enemy, those who were not cut down on the spot ran to the ports and jumped overboard, and within five minutes more there was not a Tripolitan on the frigate except the dead and wounded. Not until then did the batteries, the castle, the two frigates moored near the Philadelphia, and the gunboats, take the alarm.
The ketch, however, fastened close under the overhanging quarter-gallery of the frigate, and completely in the shadow, still escaped detection. Lights began to flash about from the ships and the batteries, but not enough could be discerned to justify the Tripolitans in firing upon their own ship. Warning had been given, though, and it was now only a question of a few moments how long the Americans could work undisturbed.
Decatur now appeared upon the quarter-deck to have the powder on the ketch rapidly transferred to the frigate. Lawrence was with him. When the moment came that Decatur must give the order for the destruction of the frigate, his resolution to obey orders almost failed him.
He turned to his lieutenant, and, grasping him by the shoulders, cried out in an agonized voice:
“Ah, Lawrence, why can not this gallant ship be cut out and carried off, a glorious trophy of this night?”
“She has not a sail bent nor a yard crossed,” answered Lawrence firmly. “The tide will not serve to take so large a ship out now; and remember, it is as dangerous to do too much under Commodore Preble’s orders as to do too little.”
“Then, if you value your reputation, give the order at once to hand up the powder!” exclaimed Lawrence. “See! the frigate off the port quarter is lighting up her batteries.”
For a moment or two, as Lawrence watched Decatur’s agitated face, he almost feared that his young captain literally could not give the order to destroy the ship, so intense was his desire to bring her out. But after a moment or two Decatur recovered himself; the opposition of so fearless a man as Lawrence convinced him, against his will, that it was impossible; and by a powerful effort he gave the order, and the men began rapidly hoisting the kegs of gunpowder over the side and carrying them along the decks. In a few moments the gun-room, the magazine scuttle, the cockpit, and the forward storerooms were filled with combustibles, and smoke was already pouring from the ports on the gun deck before those in the lower parts of the ship had time to get up. They ran to the forward ladders, and when the last firing party reached the spar deck the men were jumping into the ketch—all except Decatur and a small party of his own. Two eighteen-pounders, double shotted, had been dragged amidships and pointed down the main hatch, in order to blow the ship’s bottom out; and a port fire, with a train of powder, had been started so as to fire these two guns with certain effect. The sailors then, seeing their glorious work well done, dropped quickly over the side into the ketch, the officers followed, and Decatur, taking one last look at the doomed frigate, now enveloped in curling smoke, was about to leave her deck—his the last foot ever to tread it—when he saw little Jack Creamer trying to drag a wounded Tripolitan across the deck. But the boy was scarcely able to do it, and the man, who was large and heavy, was too badly wounded to help himself, and Decatur stepped forward to assist.