Expeditionary· Second Barbary War
Loss of USS Epervier
A mystery that cost the Second Barbary War its heaviest loss of life.
After the treaty was signed, the sloop USS Epervier was sent home carrying released American captives, the signed Treaty of Algiers itself, and Decatur and Shaler's dispatches reporting the mission's success. She passed Gibraltar westbound around mid-July 1815 and was never seen again. Her entire company was lost, including two Marines of her detachment, presumably when she foundered in a storm somewhere in the Atlantic. The Epervier had her own history: she had been a British warship until the USS Peacock captured her off Florida in 1814. Her disappearance, with the original treaty documents aboard, remains one of the enduring mysteries of American naval history and stands as the worst single loss of the otherwise triumphant 1815 campaign.
Podcast episodes on Second Barbary War
Record no. 260