The Corsair Prince

This pulp magazine issue from 1874 contains The Corsair Prince, a historical adventure serial by Frederick Whittaker (author of Grizzly-Hunters, The Black Wizard, and other dime novels). The story opens in 1803 with the French ship First Consul attacked by a swift North African corsair vessel off the Sahara coast. The ship surrenders after the corsair displays a pirate flag. The corsair's masked leader boards the ship and selects a beautiful seventeen-year-old French creole girl as a captive, dismissing her elderly caretaker only with a warning. The narrative shifts to Naples, where American and English naval officers from frigates anchored in the bay—including Lieutenant Cortlandt and young Midshipman Tommy Trevor—attend a royal palace ball. The war with Tripoli provides historical backdrop to encounters between officers seeking social advancement and romance.