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Sumatra is well known for its excellent pepper, and throughout history merchants have traveled there to obtain it. The island's coast in the past had been littered with several petty chiefdoms, some of which notoriously raided the same merchant vessels they traded with. On at least two occasions in history the United States enacted redress against Sumatran chiefdoms in response to these raids against merchant shipping.

• First Attack on Quallah Battoo - an amphibious assault in 1832 against the town of Quallah Battoo in response to the massacre of men from the merchant vessel Friendship
• Second Attack on Quallah Battoo
• Attack on Muckie - in 1838 after the massacre of men from the merchant vessel Eclipse an American squadron attacks two chiefdoms and burns their principal villages to the ground.