Don't Give Up The Ship!*

Pirates in the Indian Ocean off Somalia boarded and captured a US-flagged/crewed ship, but guess what? The crew took it back!

US crew members have retaken their hijacked ship but their captain is still being held by Somali pirates on a lifeboat, reports say.

Pentagon sources and relatives of the Maersk Alabama's 20 crew were earlier quoted as saying the ship was back under control after a struggle.

But later reports emerged that the captain was still in the hands of the hijackers, adrift in the lifeboat.



*"Don't give up the ship!"

Tradition has it that Captain James Lawrence said these heroic words after being mortally wounded in the engagement between his ship, the U.S. frigate Chesapeake, and HMS Shannon on 1 June 1813. As the wounded Lawrence was carried below, he ordered "Tell the men to fire faster! Don't give up the ship!"

Although Chesapeake was forced to surrender, Captain Lawrence's words lived on as a rallying cry during the war. Oliver Hazard Perry honored his dead friend Lawrence when he had the motto sewn onto the private battle flag flown during the Battle of Lake Erie, 10 September 1813.