The Pirates Laffite

by William C. Davis

  Of course Pierre spoke of the Surprise, and on its return it was to bring money from the Congress and any specie that could be captured from Spanish money trains between Vera Cruz and Mexico City. The plotters wanted to open two ports to supply their expeditions, he said, one at Tampico in the coming spring, and the other immediately near Matagorda. Humbert and fifty men had already left for the Sabine, where his force would train and wait for Toledo to arrive with five hundred more recruited for what they were told was a "secret expedition." They would be well armed and organized into companies of infantry, cavalry, and artillery, along with two companies of mechanics and artisans, so that they could fully establish the new port. Meanwhile armed vessels would depart New Orleans to clear Spanish shipping. Toledo was to be commander in chief of the movement, and had fifteen hundred military commissions to hand out and a proclamation being printed in his name calling on men of every nation to join him and promising rich rewards. Pierre had heard Toledo say that he expected to enlist more than two thousand men in Louisiana alone, many of them expelled from Cuba and anxious to get even with Spain and make a new nation. Toledo had also met with the leaders of the "former pirates" of Barataria, said Laffite, and promised to issue them letters of marque from the new Mexican regime. Within six weeks he expected to have a new port established at Boquilla de Piedras, and would furnish them with signals for entering the port safely. Any who came with his letters would be commissioned a state armed privateer. Laffite attested that Toledo was working long hours every day with his ministers preparing the regulations of their enterprise and new regime. That Pierre considerably exaggerated the state of Toledo's preparedness in order to enhance his own value to his listeners is clear. It worked, for they were all the more delighted with their catch, not realizing that they were swallowing his bait as well.

  If Spain gave him the protections he asked for, "and could supply the indispensable pecuniary aid" he needed, then even as bad as things were Pierre believed they could thwart Toledo and Herrera. He urged secrecy, and asked that his name not be used in any communication for fear its interception by the wrong parties could compromise him just as Picornell had been compromised. He also now or soon hereafter told Sedella that he thought Spain ought to assign an agent to New Orleans, with the power to make unilateral decisions on behalf of the king, and the financial resources to take action. This made sense operationally for Spain, but it also made sense for Laffite, who could then ply his persuasions directly on a decision maker with instant access to substantial funds. At the end of the meeting Picornell and Sedella thanked Pierre heartily and promised to communicate all he had said to their superiors and to do their best to meet his terms and secure an early decision from Apodaca. Laffite told them this was good enough for him and that, to show his good faith, he would continue to feed them information in the meantime. 33

  Sedella was delighted. A few days later he informed Apodaca that they had secured "a person, that is understood to be very well informed of all up to date plots," and who wanted in return only money and protection. Having taken Pierre's injunction to secrecy seriously, Père Antoine would say no more since "the importance of this project demands the most strict caution and silence." In fact, he sent Ariza to Havana to inform the viceroy orally. He followed this with another urgent petition for acceptance of Laffite, whom he referred to as "the newly converted one," adding, "I am fully persuaded that he will be able to perform most important services for His Majesty in circumstances so critical as those we are in."34 Onís approved Pierre's terms from Washington and promised to secure them from Madrid.35

  Within ten days Pierre began sending Sedella information on the supplies and munitions being shipped to the Sabine. On November 27 Laffite sat with the "associates" as they discussed their final preparations and read correspondence from leaders of volunteers coming from Tennessee and Kentucky announcing that they could not reach New Orleans before December 21. The assembled decided to send Toledo upriver one week earlier to meet them on the road and lead them to the Sabine. The council also determined to send word to Gambi and the corsairs that their new port on the Texas coast would be ready in six weeks, meaning the armada could depart in mid-January.

  That evening or the next morning Pierre visited Sedella and gave him a detailed account of the meeting. The padre immediately wrote to Apodaca. He suggested that a few Spanish vessels cruise the Texas coast, their presence being perhaps enough to retard or discourage a landing. Since it was a little known coastline, he also advised that Spanish captains acquaint themselves with its inlets and bays, for the time when the filibusters actually did make a landing. Pierre told the Spanish to keep an eye particularly on the coast from Galveston to Matagorda, including both bays as possibilities. At the same time Laffite told Sedella the names of the men who had contracted with Toledo to provide arms and munitions. The 29,000 muskets alone, at $12 apiece, came to almost $350,000, and they along with 9,000 saddles were to be delivered to the Mexican coast providing that Toledo promised to buy from no one else. The merchants were Nolte, Duncan, John B. Gilly of Gravier Street, and Thomas Harman of Royal Street. Attorneys Livingston and Grymes were also on the list. Grymes was no longer an officer of the federal court, but collector Duplessis and Commodore Patterson brought to their membership in the "associates" a suggestion of conflict with their professional duties. 36 Patterson's use of the Firebrand called into question his motives, while as an investor at least Duplessis acted as a private citizen, apparently making no use of public funds or facilities to advance an enterprise from which he would profit. Meanwhile he continued his vigilance against smugglers, for everything he captured from them put a percentage in his pocket. Thus Laffite did not betray only the filibuster leaders, but also his fellow merchants, and it is hard not to suspect that he was evening scores with some like Nolte, who had been the loudest critic of the Laffites during the heyday of their smuggling enterprise.

  As Sedella finished his letter to the viceroy, Pierre called on him again, having just learned that the plot's leaders had decided since the meeting of the previous day that an initial landing would take place on the coast between the mouth of the Mermenteau River, thirty miles east of the Sabine, and the mouth of the Nueces, more than 270 miles along the Gulf coast. That span included both Galveston and Matagorda, yet was remarkably unspecific, suggesting that Pierre knew more than he was telling and wanted to parcel out his information in order to exaggerate his usefulness. Indeed, the Spaniards already knew the landing would be at Galveston or Matagorda, and soon enough would know that Perry was already at a place he named Bolivar Point on Galveston Bay. Pierre did tell Sedella, though, that this unspecified point was where Toledo was to bring the Kentucky and Tennessee volunteers when they arrived. In the meeting Toledo said he would decide on the exact landing point after he received word from pilots he sent to investigate the harbors and the depths of the passes connecting them to the Gulf. Pierre promised to pass that news along as soon as he learned of it. Meanwhile he showed Sedella the pattern of the newly designed flag of the Mexican republic, sixteen horizontal oblong blocks of alternating blue and white inside a red border, giving a checkerboard effect. Thus forewarned, Apodaca's vessels ought to be able to identify the filibuster transport and supply ships when they were spotted. And thus Pierre betrayed Gambi and any number of his comrades of past years, many of whom could expect a rope and a yardarm if captured thanks to his information.

  Laffite also gave Sedella a growing list of participants in the mix of merchants and businessmen, military authorities, filibusters, and adventurers who made up the guiding hands of the Texas scheme. Livingston appeared to be the overall head of the Louisianans, who included Grymes, Duncan, Duncan's partner West, Duplessis the customs collector, Morgan, Patterson, Perry and Peire, and Aury's financial agent François Dupuis.37 This only convinced Sedella the more of Laffite's worth, and he implored Apodaca to send a fully empowered confidential aid to New Orleans to satisfy Apodaca of the value of Laffite. This done, Se
della could arrange with Pierre everything they might have to do, as well as arrange for Pierre's payment.38 Sedella also wanted to have Apodaca's agent in New Orleans now that Toledo had returned from Boquilla de Piedras with Herrera and a return voyage with the Firebrand was being planned.39 Sedella would have been a little less agitated had he known that Herrera's faction in the Mexican Congress had been ousted from power and that, as with Toledo before him, Herrera's credentials were now meaningless. Herrera hoped to leave shortly for Washington, but knew already that the mission would probably be fruitless.40

  Pierre's request for a "general oblivion" of his past acts against Spain may have been unnecessary. Ferdinand VII had issued a blanket pardon when he regained the throne of Spain late in 1814, and that had been sufficient for some revolutionaries such as Picornell to switch sides. Never having been a Spanish subject and having been involved with Cartagena, Pierre might have believed he needed a more specific clemency. Probably what he wanted was a pardon that cleared the way for the Laffites if circumstances required that they emigrate to a Spanish possession.

  Within days of Pierre's agreement with Picornell and Sedella, his action in selling the Presidente became more suspect. The ship changed name to the Dos Hermanos, a phrase conveniently Spanish that meant in English Two Brothers, a popular merchant ship name and an almost unmistakable reference to the Laffites. She flew the flag of Cartagena, the republic that had but days to five, and prepared to put out of New Orleans under Fougard for her announced destination St. Bartholomew's. Unfortunately, the authorities suspected ship and cargo.

  On December 5 a mysterious man whom many recognized but could not name approached a drayman on the levee and asked him if he would use his wagon to transport a shipment of arms to Belle Isle off the coast, where the Two Brothers would pick it up. It was probably Pierre Laffite. The next day, Duplessis warned Patterson of the vessel. Though she cleared the customs house identified as the property of Charles Parent, the collector was convinced that the vessel "belongs to Laffite." He thought it likely that she would fit out within United States territorial waters for corsairing, and he asked the commodore to loan him a boat to use in inspecting her before she left. 41 On inspection officers found two arms chests, a magazine, and space for a cannon, but no weapons. There were no separate cabins for officers, a common feature of privateers.42 As for Fougard, it soon became known that he had boasted that he was going to privateer for Cartagena and would not discriminate in taking British and Spanish prizes, though America was at peace with both. This was enough; the authorities seized the vessel on suspicion of unlawfully fitting out.43

  This was not what Pierre had expected. Fougard's comments about taking Spanish ships may well have been part of Laffite's strategy to conceal his arrangement with Spain. Almost at once Laffite and Parent approached Toledo and asked him to buy the ship on behalf of the Mexican junta, which would have legitimized the craft and protected it in court. When Toledo found that the court had no intention of releasing the vessel, however, he pursued the matter no further. What he and Herrera could and did do was to testify that Pierre had not asked them for a Mexican commission.44 That, plus the absence of weapons, would eventually beat the charge of intent to privateer, and the Dos Hermanos would be released to Laffite before the winter was out.

  Meanwhile the information furnished by Laffite percolated throughout Spanish officialdom. By January 6, 1816, all the officials in Cuba knew of the Toledo scheme, and of the role of what Apodaca called "a Frenchman named Laffite" in uncovering it.45 They knew, too, that the Firebrand returned from her second, clearly unlawful voyage to Boquilla de Piedras carrying contracts signed by the Mexican Congress for the purchase of arms. Laffite told Sedella that Toledo and the Petit Milan were scheduled to fulfill the contracts with another arms shipment to Boquilla de Piedras. Meanwhile he reported that Toledo had five vessels preparing for the landing, which he now confirmed was to be at Matagorda, and that Toledo had also contracted for the manufacture of torches and rockets to set Spanish-held towns ablaze. Pierre assured Sedella that he and Picornell could do a lot in the city to stall these preparations if he had money, even convincing the padre that with enough financial support he could single-handedly defeat the planned landing. 46 The news that the Surprise had reached New Orleans on December 20, 1815, with another $13,000 for Herrera only added weight to Pierre's argument that he needed Spanish money to fight rebel money.47 To leaven this diet of bad news, Laffite could only add that the reinforcement of the awaiting invasion forces had slowed, and even suffered one disaster. On November 20 some eighty men were sailing to join Perry at Bolivar Point when their vessel lost its bottom in the shallows around Galveston and most went down with their ship.48

  By early January 1816 the information Pierre gave Sedella and Picornell had also reached Onís in Washington.49 Onís now mounted an offensive against the American State Department, showing damning evidence of the involvement of Patterson, Duplessis, and others. The problem was that negotiations over the Louisiana boundary had resumed along with diplomatic relations between Spain and the United States, making it inopportune to be too strident. In this situation full and accurate intelligence on conditions in that part of Spain's colonies, as well as on the schemes of the filibusters, was absolutely vital. Chance and calculation had placed the Laffites in exactly the right spot at the right time.

  FOURTEEN

  Distant Horizons 1816

  The lip's least curl, the lightest paleness thrown

  Along the govern'd aspect, speak alone

  Of deeper passions; and to judge their mien,

  He, who would see, must be himself unseen.

  WHEN ONÍS AND LATOUR engaged Jean Laffite to accompany the engineer on his expedition into the interior beyond Louisiana, they may not have shared with Jean the full background of the trip. The enemies of Spain—including the United States—might make use of this area to stage or support campaigns against Texas. Spain also hoped to recover some of its lost territory in the vast Louisiana region, an important topic in the coming boundary negotiations, and feared especially the spread of Americans into the portion of the territory to the north called the Arkansas. Already traders from that region were journeying several hundred miles westward to the Spanish mercantile outpost at Santa Fe. Spain needed the post's rich fur and mineral trade. Moreover, Santa Fe was the vital link for trade and communications with Spanish territory in California and with the Pacific. The settlers in Arkansas could well be the first wave of a tide of Americans that would sweep westward, ignoring Spain's territorial rights, and fomenting in Santa Fe the same unrest that now threatened uprisings in Texas and Mexico.

  Spain could not afford to lose Santa Fe, and to that end Onís and his masters needed to ascertain the sentiments of the Spaniards and the Indians there, the extent of the Americans' inroads, and what support, if any, filibusters could expect from the inhabitants. This was Latour's assignment, guised as a geographical survey—though the survey was real, for Spain needed to know more about the defensible parts of the empire and its resources. Latour was the right man for the job, and he needed a job, as he was virtually bankrupt, his architectural business in New Orleans foundering and his as-yet-unpublished book showing little promise of making him rich. And though Laffite may have been recruited chiefly because he was handy and he was Latour's friend, he was for some of the information Latour needed to gather the right man to accompany him.1

  Latour and Laffite probably spent much of their time prior to departure engaging boats and boatmen, waiting for spring rains to raise the river, and devising an itinerary based on Onís's instructions and what they learned talking with Indians and trappers.2 During this brief time in New Orleans, Pierre and Jean exchanged their separate views and experiences leading to their liaison with Spain, Pierre having much to impart on the filibusters' plans and activities during Jean's absence. This update would inform Jean's observations during the expedition, and while Jean was gone, Pierre would continue listening on be
half of both the brothers and Spain, for each could profit from what he heard.3

  Sometime in March Jean left New Orleans, either with Latour or else with plans to meet him up the Mississippi.4 They went to the mouth of the Arkansas, and then up that stream a few miles to the old Spanish settlement of Arkansas Post. Arkansas Post had originally been not much more than a rectangular stockade, sitting about two hundred yards back from the bank, but the fort had been in ruin for fifty years. Now fewer than three hundred people lived in the outpost, and because the low sandy soil was subject to annual flooding and not very good for cultivation, they subsisted mainly by hunting. Each year they sent bear oil, tallow, salted bison, and pelts to New Orleans. 5 The Arkansas River was being intensely worked by trappers, and Arkansas Post attracted ambitious men from all quarters. Even Pierre might have made it this far up the Mississippi during his days as a merchant at Point Coupée, for that Louisiana post received furs from the far west brought down via the Arkansas.6 Arkansas Post was a good place to sound the temper of men living in the region, and those passing farther through, and Laffite and Latour remained through the rest of the spring gathering information from trappers and travelers coming east.