THE
AMERICAN NAVY AND LIBERIA.
AN ADDRESS
BEFORE THE
AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY,
JANUARY 18, 1876,
BY
COMMODORE R. W. SHUFELDT, U. S. N.
WASHINGTON CITY:
Colonization Building, 450 Pennsylvania Avenue.
1876.
ADDRESS.
Gentlemen: It is not inappropriate to this occasion that anofficer of the navy should address your honorable Society,and although your committee might easily have chosen a moreworthy representative of that branch of the public service,they could have found none more sincerely interested in yourcause or more deeply impressed with its importance.
From the first disastrous effort, in 1819, to colonize the negroesfrom the United States at Sherbro, up to the present time,the Navy has contributed with sword and pen to advance theinterests and protect the rights of the Americo-Africans. Inthat year, 1819, the U. S. Ship “Cyane” convoyed to Africathe “Elizabeth,” the first emigrant ship, the “Mayflower” ofthese new pilgrims, and Lieutenant Townsend lost his life inthe duty incidental to landing them. The inexorable marchof time, however, has placed upon the roll of the distinguisheddead most of those whose words and deeds contributedso much to the founding of the Republic of Liberia. Firstamong these, and almost the first in the hearts and memories ofhis naval brethren, stands the name of Stockton. In 1821 Lieut.Stockton took command of the “Alligator,” a vessel sent outby the U. S. Government at the earnest solicitation of JusticeBushrod Washington, President of the Society, and Francis S.Key, one of its managers, for the express purpose of selectinga site on the Western Coast of Africa, better adapted tothe purposes of colonization than Sherbro, a place notoriouslyunhealthy and in many respects undesirable. The first orderissued by Lieut. Commanding Stockton to the crew of his littlecraft, while yet in sight of the shores of America, was tothrow overboard the cat, (the lash was then a legal mode ofpunishment on board of our vessels of war,) informing themthat he intended to exact their obedience by some othermeans. He was wiser than, perhaps, he knew, for, bound on[4]this mission of humanity, there would have been a strange inconsistencyin his conduct had he carried with him into Africathat vile relic of barbarism. Yet this act indicates the characterof the man who in that day, and in the face of currentopinion, dared to vindicate by word and deed the right of man,black or white, to exemption from a barbarous thraldomwhether upon land or sea. December 11th, 1821, Lieut. Stocktonplaced his foot on African soil at Cape Mesurado, and, atthe risk of his life, wrested from savagery that spot whereonnow stands the light-house guiding the mariner to Monrovia,the Capital of a new born Republic, and in its firm foundations,and its light gleaming alternately on land and sea, fitly emblematicof him who ever stood fixed in his strong convictionsof the right, and showed to all men the guiding star of hisbrilliant intellect and spotless character.
Liberia, then only an isolated spot of land, now spreads herselfon the south to the extent of 500 miles from this point.A narrow belt upon the sea-shore, slowly but surely wideningher influence, brightening up the dark cloud in the background,as year by year she struggles and penetrates here andthere, now up a river and then into the forest, like the