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Sir Alexander John Ball (1756?-1809), a British admiral and the first British governor of Malta, writes to Charles Biddle (father of future American financier Nicholas Biddle) about his elder son James, a naval officer who had been captured by Barbary pirates, "I beg have to offer you my sincere congratulations on your son's release from Tripolin Slavery, and particularly on his having obtained it by a peace the most honorable for the United States. I am glad to find that his health has not suffered by his exile..." Provenance: A West Coast institution.