With nearly a million copies in circulation, Capt. James Riley's narrative of his two months in captivity in the Sahara Desert, first published in 1817, was one of the best-selling books of the nineteenth century. Its original popularity can probably be traced to America's growing nationalism after the Tripolitan War (1801-1805) and the country's skirmish with Algeria in 1815. It remained in print until the middle of the century, a time when the country was divided over the issue of slavery, probably because of public fascination with the idea of a white man held as a slave by Africans. Abraham Lincoln read Riley's narrative as a child, and it has been suggested that it was one of the principal influences that formed Lincoln's stance on slavery.

Riley was born in Middletown, Connecticut, on 27 October 1777, one of thirteen children of Asher and Rebecca Sage Riley. He left school at age eight...