The Pirates Laffite

by William C. Davis

  The war against the pirates came at a cost, though. Lieutenant Kearney had to finance victualing his ship from his own pocket at times. Lieutenant Madison and his Lynx, still embarrassed over the Galveston incident, joined in the pirate hunt off Cuba. Madison raised anchor off St. Mary's, Georgia, on January 21, 1821, and set out on yet another cruise, but neither he nor the Lynx were ever seen again. The pirates began to thin out, too, including William Mitchell, who supposedly died May 1, 1821, on Great Corn Island, off Nicaragua. By the fall of the year, however, it was time for a much larger feature in the corsairing firmament to leave the scene.

  Pierre Laffite may not have owned the Nancy Eleanor, and if he did, he changed his mind about converting her into an armed vessel to prey on Spanish shipping. Instead, ironically, she became prey herself. On August 31, on a voyage to Panama, she was taken off Trinidad by a pirate, plundered, and then ransomed for four thousand dollars before being allowed to complete her voyage. 29 For whatever reason, with the Nancy Eleanor no longer at his command, and Jean off cruising with his other ships, Pierre had only a small vessel, probably a felucca, that Jean had taken from Pedro Cupull off Campeche that summer. On her deck the Laffites mounted an eight-pounder, and a Spaniard who saw her described her as a "small, unworthy Mediterranean-type coasting vessel." Laffite had a crew of about seventeen men to work her, almost all Italians except for a Spaniard pilot. They were all pirates so far as Spanish authorities were concerned.30

  Small though she might be, Pierre's vessel was enough to take prizes, and on June 17 off Campeche, with Pierre in command and his old associate George Schumph as master-at-arms, she captured the schooner the Constitution out of Cadiz and bound for Vera Cruz.31 Aboard her Pierre found twelve hundred barrels of liquor, nine hundred bottles of oil, lace and leather goods, and silver to the value of $50,000 to $60,000. The silver he could keep and use anywhere, of course, but Pierre did not have access to a market for other merchandise. He discovered, however, that local fishermen on the island of Cancun just south of Mugeres were inclined to assist him, and that Clemente Cá- mara had a small farm on the island where Pierre could hoard goods pending sale. Pierre delivered the bulk of the Constitutions cargo to the farm in October and then entered into a contract whereby he gave Cámara half of the goods for his own use in return for $6,500 and Cámaras agreement to sell the rest in Yucatán's principal city Campeche across the peninsula. By the end of the month Cámara had taken sixty barrels of whisky and a trunk of belts and handkerchiefs to Campeche, and Pierre was staying at Cámaras farm with Lucia Allen and others awaiting their host's return with the proceeds.32

  Pierre also expected more men to join him at the farm, for he had conceived a plan for substantially greater takings. A relatively new Spanish community had begun at Yalahau, on the Yalahau Lagoon just west of Cabo Catoche, protected from the sea by a couple of barrier islands almost like Galveston. Apparently Pierre believed there was enough wealth in the village to be worth his sailing in and taking it, but he would need more than his small crew to make a successful landing, and more guns than his single eight-pounder. On the evening of October 30 Pierre was waiting at the small farm on Cancun when well after dark, about 10 o'clock, he heard a small group approaching. He sent out men of his own to challenge the strangers, perhaps thinking they were the expected reinforcement, but when Laffite's men heard the leader identify himself as Miguel Molas, commanding a dozen soldados and civilian volunteers, the privateers opened fire in the darkness.

  After hearing several warnings of the pirate gathering, Molas had come to investigate. In the barrage he sustained four superficial wounds, and his nephew was also hit, but the Spaniards soon forced their attackers back. A few privateers were killed, and others wounded. Those who could get away, among them George Schumph, ran into the hilly interior or fled in a canoe. Molas took only five prisoners, but they included Pierre Laffite and his mistress. Full of spirit as always, Pierre told Molas that his armed ship was between the island and the mainland and that Molas's line of withdrawal was cut off. In spite of this the Spaniard loaded his men and his prisoners on his boats and prepared to make for the mainland early the next morning, but at dawn he was barely embarked when he saw that Laffite had not been bluffing. The corsair vessel was in his path. Molas quickly ran his boats to the beach and took refuge behind a sand dune. The ship came in close to shore and sent five charges of grapeshot from her cannon, hitting no one. Nevertheless, all but two of the men with Molas panicked and ran, leaving him outnumbered by his prisoners and with no choice but to abandon them on the beach in order to get away.33

  Pierre may already have been ill when Molas attacked on October 30. Certainly Lucia Allen was unwell. Pierre may even have been one of the wounded.34 In any case, the Spaniards clearly knew their whereabouts, and Cancun would no longer be safe for them. Collecting those of their scattered party that they could, including Schumph, López, and a mestizo named Gregorio, Pierre and Lucia boarded a small fishing boat in order to avoid attention. They sailed north and then west around the peninsula to a small protected lagoon known as Las Bocas, about ten miles from the pueblo of Dzilam de Bravo, a string of houses stretching from the lagoon to the village of Santa Clara.35 By the time they arrived in a tiny village called Telyas, Pierre was terribly ill with a fever, perhaps suffering the same illness as Lucia. For the next several days Gregorio, López, Schumph, and the ailing Allen tended her dying lover. Then, on or about November 9, within sight and sound of thousands of pink flamingos feeding in the lagoon, Pierre Laffite breathed his last.36 He died the pirate he always claimed he never was, and though he escaped the noose or bullet that would have been his fate if captured, his death was the direct result of his chosen trade.37 The others took Pierre's body into the town of Dzilam de Bravo on November 10, and Schumph presented himself before the mayor to get permission to have Laffite buried in the churchyard of Santa Clara of Dzidzantún, an old Franciscan convent that had been attacked by pirates several times in the century past. That day López and Gregorio laid the dead pirate in the ground "with honor" as López remembered it, and with appropriate words from the curate José Gregorio Cervera. When they were done they placed over his grave a rude stone marked with his name, the date, and the hour of his death. That done, Schumph left Lucia in the care of locals while he found a room at an inn.38

  As soon as it was learned who had been buried, Schumph came under suspicion and was quickly arrested. He had to scramble to explain his connection with Laffite without incriminating himself as a pirate. He was a Canadian merchant, he told the authorities, and he had only just come to the island Cancun to discuss some business with Laffite when Molas attacked. Schumph told a dramatic story of jumping into the water to escape the attack, and thereby leaving his trunk behind with his passport in it, to explain his not having traveling papers. No, he had never served on Pierre's vessel, though he did admit being with Jean aboard the General Victoria when Galveston was abandoned. He knew nothing firsthand of the cargo of the Constitution, but had heard that there might be whiskey and other goods hidden on Cancun. To deflect suspicion from Mugeres, he said that he believed he had heard that Laffite's pirate ship normally anchored near Yalahau, the town Laffite supposedly intended to loot. The court was inclined not to believe him, especially when witnesses identified him as having served on Laffite ships. He was held for several weeks until he agreed to provide information on the location of hidden Laffite prize goods. On December 4 Schumph was finally released and sent to the capital at Merida. Lucia Allen chose to remain in Dzilam until she recovered, where she may have died in childbirth deliveri ng yet another daughter of Pierre Laffite's.39

  Jean Laffite probably did not learn of his brother's death for months, and perhaps not until March or April of 1822, because he had suffered a disaster of his own. Sometime in late October or early November, aboard the Minerva or the Blanque, Jean took on a large ship off Jamaica or the Cayman Islands. Instead of feebly striking her colors, she fought back. Still he took th
e prize, at the cost of several of his men killed or wounded, and possibly an injury to himself. As had happened with the Nancy Eleanor, he held the prize for a day or two and then ransomed her to her owners, who agreed to make payment on Cuba near Santa Cruz del Sur on the south coast. When he approached the port, however, two armed vessels came out of the harbor and retook the prize. In the skirmish, Laffite lost his own ship and most of the rest of his crew, barely escaping with a few others when the Spaniards boarded his vessel. 40

  Jean's trials only began with his escape. Either by swimming or in a small launch, he and his companions made the shore close to Santa Cruz del Sur. They were without food or arms, apparently without funds, and in a definitely hostile land. Before long locals spotted them and they were taken prisoner. Jean was fortunate not to be hanged at once, but the Spaniards were devoted to the law, and took him some miles inland to the provincial capital at Porto Principe, where he and his companions were jailed. After a few weeks he either took ill or his wound became worse, and the Spaniards moved him to the hospital of San Juan de Dios. Laffite spent more weeks in the infirmary, where security was considerably less rigid than at the prison. There, a former acquaintance recognized him or he was able to get word of his predicament to someone he knew to be in the community, perhaps even Picornell, who happened to be practicing in town as a physician. On February 13, 1822, with outside help, Jean Laffite escaped from the hospital and hurried back to the coast.41

  Less than fifty miles directly north of Porto Principe Cayo Romano sat off the coast, with a settlement of Cuban pirates operating out of the Old Bahama Channel, chiefly preying on slave ships. If Laffite and his liberators did not know the people at Cayo Romano, they surely knew of them, and within two or three days Laffite could have been safely on the island. Laffite's friends may even have had a ship waiting for him there, for less than a month after he fled the hospital, reports reached Porto Principe that Jean commanded a schooner followed by several small launches and perhaps thirty men operating out of Rincon Grande and cruising the Old Bahama Channel.42

  It was not a good time or place to try to reestablish himself as a corsair. With the gains that the United States Navy had made on pirates from 1819 to 1821, Washington was unwilling to relax the pressure, especially after any sign of an attempted resurgence such as two piratical attacks on New Orleans merchantmen in January. 43 A few weeks later Kearny and the Enterprise took a pirate off Havana, and on a single morning in April he took eight pirate ships and 160 crewmen off Cape Antonio.44 Lieutenant James Ramage cruised the Cuban coast in the Porpoise and took the El Bravo in early February, meanwhile burning the freebooters' shore establishments and destroying three other pirate vessels. Several of the pirates he captured and sent to New Orleans in chains.45 By April the navy had a squadron built around the frigate Macedonian, including four smaller vessels and two hundred marines, ready to sail from Baltimore to deal with the pirates operating out of Cuba. If the government of Cuba would not or could not put an end to the outrages, Washington announced, then the United States would, even if it had to violate Spanish sovereignty by operating in Cuban waters. Washington ordered the navy to establish several small stations from which to watch traffic around Cuban shores, and cut off the pirates.46

  Thus the navy was watching for Laffite when reports came in that he was operating in the vicinity of the Old Bahama Channel in a fleet of four corsairs that included the legitimate Colombian private armed schooner the Cienago. On April 11 Laffite finally stepped across the line he had observed for fully a decade when he took and plundered an American ship, the Jay, off Gibara, on the north coast some distance southeast of the Old Bahama Channel. He also took an English sloop that day, unaware of just how close by was the cordon of American warships. His action was known two days later to the commander of the armed sloop the Alligator; which took the Cienago. Laffite and the rest had retired to the haven of Gibara, where local authorities gave them sanctuary in return for the cheap merchandise they provided.47

  The New York merchantman the Abigail was chasing Laffite when she encountered the Alligator two days later and they joined forces in the pursuit.48 The next day they cruised the coastline so closely that Laffite's schooner and the smaller boats with him could not get out to sea, and then the Americans followed in two launches as the pirate schooner retreated up a river. Three days later they caught it at anchor and took Laffite and seven of his men.49 It was a delicate diplomatic situation, and the Americans unwittingly turned their prisoners over to the same local authorities who were so indulgent of the pirates. When Lieutenant Richard Stockton, commanding the Alligator, sailed into Gibara to meet with the soldados he soon realized that the pirates would likely be allowed to escape, and sent a request to the province's governor at Holguin that the malefactors be turned over to the Americans. The governor let the Gibaran leaders hold on to their prisoners, however, and Laffite was soon at large.50

  By May 1 Laffite was again trying to get his vessels away from the coast only to find the Alligator blocking his passage, this time reinforced by the Grampus. At about 8:30 that morning Laffite saw the Alligator coming after him in a chase that lasted ninety minutes until Laffite ran into shoal water too shallow for the American vessel. As soon as the Alligator dropped anchor, Laffite opened fire and the ships exchanged several shots inconclusively.51 The Americans had already taken three prizes from their captors, and the next day went in close to shore in a light draft vessel with more than seventy men, exchanging volleys with what they believed to be Laffite's men aboard his schooner.52 Once again Laffite escaped.

  Laffite had been captured twice, probably wounded once, and nearly taken again. There was a lesson to be learned from this season of near disasters, and Jean Laffite was no fool. If he needed any further admonition, the news of Pierre's death when it reached him sometime that spring should have been enough. However prepared each brother must have been for such an event given the hazard of their careers, the loss was the greatest of Jean's life. The two had been inseparable for the past decade and more. They thought alike and acted alike, a symbiotic pairing of complementary opposites. The loss of Pierre cost Jean his spiritual anchor, though they had not seen each other for many months.

  It was time to try another tack. Laffite learned that Bolivar was commissioning private armed vessels into the Colombian state service, though no longer granting letters of marque. The distinction was a subtle one. The captains took prizes and shared in the proceeds, but they and their vessels were not free agents, but servants in a naval auxiliary of Colombia. Beluche was in the service now, and so was Laméson.53 By this time most of the surviving old corsairs who had not become outright pirates had been commissioned regular navy officers for Colombia, their vessels nationalized as public property. Jean's notoriety spoke for itself. A commission from Colombia would give him legitimacy and protection, and if he did not make his fortune from prize goods by observing Bolivar's rules, what he did at sea outside the gaze of officials could reward him handsomely.

  After escaping the Alligator in early May, Laffite decided that the Cuban coast was too hot for him, and sailed his remaining schooner south to Cartagena, a bustling metropolis of 170,000 people.54 He probably arrived early in June, within days of the arrival of the forty-ton schooner the General Santander, a Spanish vessel seized and nationalized by Colombia.55 She was named for General Francisco de Paula Santander, vice president of Colombia, and on August 19 she received her commission as a private armed vessel in service of Colombia.56 The Colombian naval authorities gave her to Jean Laffite to outfit, perhaps requiring him to post a bond and absorb some of the cost of converting her. By the first week of September he had her almost ready to leave on her first cruise, armed with a powerful eighteen-pounder, a brass four-pounder swivel gun, and thirty men. Americans in Cartagena who watched her outfitting sent warnings to the United States that "the famous Lafitte" would be on the seas again, and could be expected to prey not only on Spanish vessels but perhaps on American merch
antmen. 57

  Why they would expect Laffite to take American ships they did not say, but Laffite soon demonstrated much less than his former punctiliousness in dealing with American shipping. Less than three weeks after embarking, he had the General Santander off the Dry Tortugas in the Straits of Florida, one hundred miles north of Havana. There on September 28 he sighted the brig the Sampson out of Mobile and boarded her at sea. For eight hours Laffite held the vessel while unloading her cargo, and according to her captain mistreated him physically before releasing the ship.58 If it was Laffite, as the corsair claimed to be, then it was an act of wanton piracy against a merchant vessel of a nation that enjoyed friendly relations with Bolivar and favored his nation building. Had he learned of it, Bolivar would have repudiated the action and rescinded Laffite's commission just as he had spurned Aury the year before.