Also, please help us pay for this free public event by coming to our cash bar/fundraising buffet at nearby Gregory?s Restaurant and Bart right afterwards.
Free Public Ceremony:?? September 13,? 2014 at 1PM at ??Richard Somers Memorial Park, 803 Shore Road and NJ Ave.? Somers Point
Fundraising Buffet ?at 2PM, right after the ceremony at nearby Gregory?s Restaurant/Bar,? 900 Shore Road.? $25 per person, $35 per couple includes lunch buffet with cash bar.
For more than 500 years,? fanatic Muslim sea fighters from the Turkish Empire and North Africa ?attacked ?Christian ships and coastal towns to as far away as Ireland and Iceland. ? Millions of European Christians were captured and sold as slaves.???Blonde, blue-eyed females fetched the highest prices in the slave markets in what is today Algeria, Tunisia, and Tripoli (Libya) in North Africa. ?Rich countries like England, France, and Holland paid tribute and ransoms (bribes) to get some of their people back.
During our first 15 years as an independent nation, we in ?the United States also paid these bribes.?? ?But in 1798, we had enough.?? Americans shouted ?Millions for defense!? Not once cent for tribute!?? We built a new navy to protect our people.? Richard Somers ?of Somers Point was one of the first to join.? In 1801, President Jefferson sent? them oversees.? ??Somers commanded one of those ships at age 23.
Those young Americans amazed and inspired Europe with their skill and courage. ?They ended Muslim attacks on the West? for almost 200 years.?? News of their liberation of European slaves in North Africa, ?intensified efforts to free African-American slaves in this country.
Richard Somers and his entire crew of the ship Intrepid were killed during a daring mission in Tripoli on September 4, 1804.? Henry Wadsworh, the uncle of famous American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow also died on that ship as second in command.
The public ceremony co-sponsored by LibertyAndProsperity.org,? the Somers Point Historical Society, the City of Somers Point, and a grant from the Atlantic County Cultural and Historic Preservation Program.
To help us order the right amount of food for the buffet, please order your tickets in advance at info@libertyandprosperity.org, or (609) 927-7333 or mail or bring your check payable to Liberty and Prosperity 1776, Inc. to our office at 453 Shore Road, Somers Point, NJ? 08244.?? Thanks.
Seth Grossman’s speech dedicating the Richard Somers statue in Somers Point and telling the amazing story of Richard Somers:
http://www.scout.com/story/1422742-america-s-first-war-on-terror
At his President?s House work desk, Thomas Jefferson?s long, freckled face was bent intently over a note that he had just composed. It was March 23, 1801, the 20th day of his presidency. Without consulting his Cabinet, Congress, or the American people, Jefferson had just ordered the Navy to ready a squadron to send to the western Mediterranean.
Jefferson, who in his inaugural address had pledged ?peace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations,? was about to plunge the United States into its first distant foreign war ? in Tripoli, more than 3,000 miles away.
Yusuf Karamanli had become Tripoli?s ruler in 1795 after murdering his oldest brother, Hassan, in front of their mother and then expelling a second brother, Hamet. Yusuf?s great ambition was to supersede Algiers as the leading naval power among the Barbary States of the north African coast, and he had already tripled his warships. In 1800, Yusuf flexed his new naval muscle by seizing the U.S. merchant ship Catherine in the western Mediterranean and then releasing the ship, with an ultimatum: Tripoli would declare war unless America began paying tribute.
Instead, Jefferson was sending warships to Tripoli as he had long wished to do. The new American republic, he believed, had not thrown off one tyrant, England, only to bow before a lesser one.
Note-Photo depicts monument to Richard Somers in Somers, New York. An identical monument was cast and displayed in a new Richard Somers Memorial Park at 803 Shore Road in Somers Point, New Jersey in September of 2013.
Britain’s lost freedoms.
http://youtu.be/3cvfuGhe52E