Samuel Davies Heap was an American naval surgeon and diplomat. He served as U. S. Consul in Tunis, North Africa.
Background
Samuel Heap was born on October 8, 1781, at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, United States, the son of Judge John Heap and Margaret (Kerr) Heap. His grandfather, George, was sent by the British government to Pennsylvania as an assistant surveyor-general, and made one of the earliest known maps of Philadelphia.
Education
Samuel graduated from the Jefferson College of Medicine, Philadelphia, in 1803.
Career
Samuel Heap received a commission in the United States navy as surgeon’s mate on April 5, 1804, and on June 17, 1808, was promoted to surgeon. During the following years he was stationed at various times at New Orleans, Norfolk, Boston, and Philadelphia. In 1817 he was ordered to the Mediterranean to take charge of the hospital of the American fleet in those waters. He conceived a desire to enter the consular service at one of the Mediterranean ports, and when Major Stith, American consul at Tunis, retired unexpectedly in 1823, Heap was appointed charge d’affaires.
Arriving at Tunis in December, his first act was to settle with dispatch a troublesome misunderstanding with the local government. At his second audience with the Bey, on January 24, 1824, he took advantage of a favorable opening in the conversation to propose an amendment to the treaty of 1797 between the United States and Tunis, which contained some objectionable clauses. Negotiations went swiftly forward, and exactly a month later the new treaty was signed. This brought him criticism from various quarters. It was asserted that he had had no diplomatic experience; that he was too simple to match his wits against the wily Barbary traders; that a treaty so speedily and informally concluded must be open to suspicion; that he had no authority to negotiate a treaty at all. The administration at Washington officially indorsed his action, however; the Senate ratified the treaty; and it stood without further amendment for eighty years, being superseded in 1904 by a treaty with France, after Tunis had become one of its colonies.
Heap’s first appointment at Tunis was of brief duration. A consul was sent out from Washington and took over the office in December 1824. The following November, however, he received a permanent appointment to the Tunis consulate, which continued to the end of his life except for two intervals when new consuls were appointed in his place. Each of the four times he came to Tunis he was obliged to smooth out a ruffled situation left by his immediate predecessor. When, in 1852, the consul who had displaced him died in office, the Bey of Tunis paid Heap the honor of petitioning the President for his return. He was appointed on March 16, 1853, and proceeded to his post; but late in the summer he was stricken with paralysis, and after a month’s illness he died. He was buried in the Protestant cemetery at Tunis.
Achievements
Personality
Heap was frank, sincere, and scrupulously fair. He walked in a straight line. Although firm when occasion demanded, his manner was warmed by a tolerant sympathy and genuine friendliness, without a trace of the suspicious or patronizing.
Connections
In 1810 Heap married Margaret Porter, a sister of Commodore Porter. Five children were born to them.