The Pirates Laffite

by William C. Davis

  Saxon, in his embellishing narrative with the Glasscock letter, suggested that Pierre and Adelaide Maselari were living at the smithy on Bourbon and St. Philip in 1809. Title searches done by the Viaux Carré Commission in the 1930s, and now housed at the Historic New Orleans Collection archives, confirm that this lot has an unbroken title from 1791 to 1833 with no Villard or Laffite ownership, while independent research by the author confirms that there is no record of the Laffites ever owning any property in New Orleans other than the parcel at Royal and Dumaine that briefly belonged in part to Pierre in 1803. Archaeological work at the site traditionally held to be the Laffite smithy revealed none of the debris that would ordinarily be associated with a smithy, suggesting that no such enterprise was ever pursued on that site under any ownership. The Vieux Carré Survey concluded that it is an ancient building but was never a forge and has no connection to the Laffites other than in folklore. It was owned in 1771 by Jean Baptiste Laporte, grandfather of Renato Beluche (Veaux Carré Survey, Square 76, Lot 18806, HNOC).

  The first sure assertion of this true state of affairs came in Edith Elliott Long, "Along the Banquette, Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop Legend or Fact?" an article from an undated issue of the Vieux Carré Courier, clipping in Jean Laffite Vertical File, LSM. Yet in a roundabout way the origins of the lore of the Laffite smithy at this site can now also be confirmed. Across St. Philip, where today stands the Lafitte Guest House at 1003 Bourbon Street, Laffite residence is confirmed by Marie Villard's August 16, 1816, purchase. The association of the Laffites with her and the property, even if one does not assume that Pierre bought it for her in their plaçage arrangement, is confirmed three years later after she sold and then repurchased it in 1819, paying in part with a promissory note guaranteed by Jean Laffite (April 30, 1819, Notary Philippe Pedesclaux, Vol. 7, item 339, NONA). Documentation also supports a relationship between Jean and Marie's sister Catherine, making Jean's backing of the repurchase in 1819 the more logical. Thus, off and on from the time she first acquired it in 1816, this is where Pierre and Jean Laffite would have stayed when they were in New Orleans.

  38. Besides uncertainty on the precise number and names of the Pierre-Marie children, there are conflicting sources on the number of Laffite brothers. Latter-day sources already dealt with erroneously identified Dominique as a third brother, and one refers to an Alexander as an alias of Dominique's. In 1856 Richardson and Company, The Texas Almanac for 1857, with Statistics, Historical and Biographical Sketches Relating to Texas (Galveston, 1856), p. 157, said on the authority of Warren Hall, a Laffite associate in 1819, that there were three brothers, with Jean at Galveston, and the other two—unnamed—remaining in New Orleans to merchandise what Jean sent. This is surely a confusion of Pierre and either Pierre's older son Eugene or else one of the unrelated men of that surname then living in the city. Stephen, or Etienne, Lafitte lived in the city then, and was secretary of the Orleans Navigation Company (New Orleans, L'Ami des Lois, January 31, 1815). Marc Lafitte was a prominent notary, who sometimes did work for the Laffites. Note, however, that neither spelled his name the way the Laffite brothers did theirs. No other Laffites of any spelling appear in the census or the city directories for the period 1805 to 1822.

  39. Summons, February 17, 1816, Pierre Laffite affidavit, February 27, 1816, Petition of Davis and Ducatel, April 9, 1816, Verdict, April 19, 1816, Executors of André Robin vs. Pierre Laffite, Suit #956, Parish Court Civil Suit Records, NOPL.

  40. Pierre Laffite affidavit, July 29, 1816, Pierre Laffite vs. Godefroi Dumon, Suit No. 34, Second Judicial Court, August 17, 1816, Clerk of Court, Ascension Parish, Donaldsonville, LA. The original of this transaction has proven elusive. Many years ago researcher John Howells photocopied a portion of it, but the original is not to be found in the location he gave, and diligent hunting has failed to find it. It was in the past interpreted as an attempt by Laffite to gain control of a canal connecting the Mississippi with Bayou Lafourche, but on the evidence of the partial photocopy, it is a simple suit for collection of debt.

  41. Pierre Laffite to Joseph Liquet, April 10, 1816, Notary Pierre Pedesclaux, Vol. 72, item 193; Pierre Laffite to François Rillieux, March n, 1816, Vol. 72, item 262; Jean Grounx to Pierre Laffite, August 15, 1816, Notary Marc Lafitte, Vol. 9, item 360; Pierre Laffite to Sebastian Hiriart, December 20, 1816, Vol. 9, item 520, NONA.

  42. Picornell to Onís, February 16, 1816, Legajo 42, Archivo de Su Magestad Catolica en Philadelphia, State Department, Madrid, cited in Faye, "Privateers," p. 1035—translation in Stanley Faye Papers, Rosenberg Library, Galveston, TX.

  43. Morphy to Cienfuegos, December 4, 1816, Legajo 1900, AGI-Newberry.

  44. Charles E. Nolan and Dorenda Dupont, eds., Sacramental Records of the Roman Catholic Church of the Archdiocese of New Orleans, Volume 14, 1820—1821 (New Orleans, 1999), pp. 228–29.

  45. Undoubtedly Laffite would have owed the attorneys either a contingency fee or else a percentage of what they recovered. A quarter century later the garrulous and somewhat bibulous Grymes liked to exaggerate this simple business transaction into tales that one local editor who knew him regarded as one of Grymes's "many ridiculous stories, to which we need not further allude than to pronounce their falsehood." One such account had Jean owing each attorney $5,000, and inviting them to come to his lair at Barataria to be paid. (In 1816, when the cases were settled, Jean was in Arkansas and the Laffites' Barataria establishment no longer existed.) Livingston did not trust Laffite to pay him, said Grymes, and thus sold the claim on his $5,000 fee to Grymes for $2,500. Grymes then went to Barataria and was royally wined and dined by Laffite for several days, then sent back to New Orleans in a Laffite boat with $10,000 in gold. This story was complete nonsense, just like Grymes's claim that it was he alone who persuaded Jackson to accept the services of the Baratarians. "Many other stories more apocryphal than this are told of the connexion of the distinguished counsel with his distinguished client," said an editor (New Orleans, Courier, May 9, 1843). Gayarre, Pirate-Patriots, pp. 59–60, took this story and exaggerated the fee to $20,000. In all likelihood, Grymes's stories were simply the tall tales of an old man, getting even with a former legal rival, Livingston, and exaggerating his own importance.

  46. John Chambers to Pierre Laffite, December 2, 1816, Notary Pierre Pedesclaux, Vol. 73, item 685-bis, NONA.

  47. Entry #318, December 3, 1816, Ship Registers and Enrollments of New Orleans, Louisiana, Volume 1, 1804–1820 (Baton Rouge, 1941), p. 49.

  48. Power of attorney, December 14, 1816, Notary Pierre Pedesclaux, Vol. 73, item 705-bis, NONA.

  49. John Rollins to P. L. B. Duplessis, April 2, 1816, Report of all vessels inward bound at the Balize, 1816, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA.

  50. Patterson to David D. Porter, April 24, 1816, Parsons, CAHUT; Indictment of William Wilson Mitchell, May 23, 1816, Minutes, 7RA-119, RG 21, NAFW.

  51. John Rollins to P. L. B. Duplessis, April 2, 1816, Report of all vessels inward bound at the Balize, 1816, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA; Patterson to David D. Porter, April 24, 1816, Parsons, CAHUT.

  52. United States vs. 150 Crates of Earthenware, Case #0912, NAFW.

  53. J. D. Bradburn Oath, April 8, 1816, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA.

  54. United States vs. Bernard Bourdin, Case #0863, NONA.

  55. Patterson to Porter, April 24, 1816, Parsons Collection, CAHUT.

  56. Patterson to Porter, April 24, 1816, Ibid.

  57. Testimony of Robert Fell, December 1815, Deposition of Herrera, December 1815, United States vs. the Schooner Two Brothers, alias the Presidente, Case #0884, NAFW.

  58. Morphy to Apodaca, March 1, 1816, Legajo 1836, AGI-Newberry.

  59. Ibid.

  60. Sedella to Apodaca, April 22, 1816, Legajo 1815, AGI-Newberry.

  61. Onís to Cienfuegos, August 3, 1816, Legajo 1898, Morphy to Cienfuegos, June 21, 1816, Legajo 1900, AGI-Newberry.

  62. Morphy to Apodaca, March 1, 1816, Legajo 1836, AGI-Newberry.

  63. William Johnson to Duplessi
s, September 26, 1816, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA.

  64. Onís to Cienfuegos, August 3, 1816, Legajo 1898, AGI-Newberry.

  65. Rollins to Duplessis, April 21, 1816, George Fram to Duplessis, June 29, 1816, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA.

  66. Report of all vessels inward bound boarded by the Inspr. at the Balize, 1816, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA.

  67. Rollins to Duplessis, October 18, 1816, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA.

  68. Rollins to Duplessis, December 18x6, Ibid.

  69. Mariano Varela to the Baron de Bastrop, February 9, 1816, Provincias Internas, Tomo 239, Archivo General de Mexico, AGI-Newberry; Declaration of Edmund Quirk, February 12, 1816, Blake, XVIII, pp. 22–27, Governor Mariano Valera to Arredondo, March 26, 1816, Supplement VIII, p. 123.

  70. Morphy to Apodaca, March 8, 1816, Legajo 1836, AGI-Newberry.

  71. Onís to Monroe, February 10, 1817, M-50, RG 59, NA.

  72. Morphy to Cienfuegos, December 27, 1815, Legajo 1815, AGI-Newberry.

  73. Morphy to Apodaca, March 1, 1816, Legajo 1836, AGI-Newberry.

  74. Statement, March 23, 1816, Ibid.

  75. Sedella, Picornell, and Ariza statement, April 22, 1816, Legajo 1815, AGI-Newberry.

  76. Sedella to Apodaca, May 4, 1816, Ibid.

  77. Onís to José Pizarro, November 22, 1818, Legajo 1898, AGI-Newberry.

  78. Onís to Apodaca, August 3, 1816, Ibid.

  79. Purchase contract, November 11, 1815, Notary Michel DeArmas, Vol. 11, item 497, NONA.

  80. Castellanos, New Orleans as It Was, pp. 40–42. This episode may not have happened at all, but if it did, it has been much adulterated in the telling. The source has it taking place in 1812–13, yet Humbert was not in Louisiana then, and after his arrival the Laffites could not have been present without risk any time prior to 1815. Saxon, Lafitte, pp. 77—80, misstates the source by saying the event was a birthday party, whereas Castellanos clearly says the event was a French national holiday. Bastille Day, July 14, seems the most likely, as it was recognized by Frenchmen though it was not formalized as a national holiday until 1880. The occasion could also have been one of several religious holidays celebrated in France and by the Creoles in New Orleans, such as Ascension Day. If the episode even occurred, and if it happened in either 1815 or 1816, then the Laffite who escorted Humbert out of the hotel had to be Pierre, not Jean, Jean being absent.

  81. Aury to Maignets, March 15, 1816, Aury Papers, CAHUT.

  82. Robert C. Vogel, "Rebel Without a Cause: The Adventures of Louis Aury," Laffite Society Chronicles, VIII (February 2002), p. 3.

  83. Morphy to Captain-General, July 9, 1816, Legajo 1900, AGI-Newberry.

  84. New Orleans, Louisiana Gazette, July 29, 1816.

  85. In one of his many unreliable assertions based on the recollections or inventions of old Galveston denizens of the late 1800s, Dyer said that Morin de la Porta originally had the idea of starting the privateer outpost at Galveston in imitation of Barataria, and that in 1815 he sold Aury on this and the pair landed on Galveston November 1, 1816 and established camp and admiralty court. Galveston, Daily News, September 19, 1926.

  86. Onís to Cienfuegos, August 3, 1816, Legajo 1898, AGI-Newberry.

  87. Promissory note, July 2, 1816, Pierre Laffite suit, February 17, 1817, Pierre Lafitte vs. Vincent Gambie or Jean Roup, #1346, First Judicial Court, NOPL.

  88. Morphy to Apodaca, July 31, August 2, 1816, Legajo 1900, AGI-Newberry.

  89. Line of Credit, July 1, 1816, Notary Marc Lafitte, Vol. 9, Act 310, NONA.

  90. Sedella to Apodaca, August 5, 1816, Legajo 1815, AGI-Newberry.

  91. Sedella to Apodaca, August 5, 1816, Legajo 1815, Morphy to Apodaca, August 10, 1816, Legajo 1877, AGI-Newberry.

  92. Morphy to Apodaca, August 10, 1816, Legajo 1877; Apodaca to Vallesteros, January 16, 1816, Legajo 1856, AGI-Newberry.

  93. Luis de Onís to unknown, July 25, 1816, Translation of a Memoir which appears to have been intended for the King of Spain, December 23, 1814, United States Department of State Collection, Spanish Affairs, 1810–1816, Library of Congress.

  94. Aury to Victoria Aury, January 14, 1817, Aury Papers, CAHUT.

  95. Faye, "Aury," pp. 632–34.

  96. Power of Attorney, August 30, 1816, Notary Marc Lafitte, Vol. 9, act 378, NONA.

  97. Faye, "Aury," p. 635.

  98. In 1929 Stanley Faye concluded that Mina landed on Galveston on August 3, 1816, which would have been before even Aury made landing. Faye to Frank C. Patten, March 29, 1929, Laffite Collection, Rosenberg Library.

  99. Washington, Daily National Intelligencer, November 21, 1816.

  100. Hubert Howe Bancroft, History of the North Mexican States and Texas (New York, 1884), II, pp. 34–35.

  101. Morphy to Cienfuegos, September 17, 1816, Legajo 1873, AGI-Newberry.

  FIFTEEN

  1. Vogel, "Baratarians," pp. 68–69.

  2. Andrew Forest Muir, ed., Texas in 1837, an Anonymous, Contemporary Narrative (Austin, TX, 1958), p. 4.

  3. William Davis Robinson, Memoirs of the Mexican Revolution: Including A Narrative of the Expedition of General Xavier Mina (Philadelphia, 1820), I, pp. 59–60; Bollaert, "Lafitte," p. 439.

  4. Tom Oertling, "Historical Comments and Observations on the Map 'Bahia de Galveston,'" Laffite Society Chronicles, II (January 1996), n.p.; Charles Hayes, History of the Island and the City of Galveston (Austin, TX, 1974; reprint of destroyed Cincinnati, 1879 edition), p. 36; Galveston, News, October 1, 1921. In the 1920s Stanley Faye found in the archives at the University of Texas in Austin an 1828 map of Galveston by Alexander Thompson, which showed a small island where the causeway leaves Galveston Island. The island has now disappeared.

  5. Deposition of John Ducoing, October 7, 1817, United States vs. the cargo of the Mount Vernon, Case #1070, NAFW.

  6. Harris Gaylord Warren, "Documents Relating to the Establishment of Privateers at Galveston, 1816–1817," Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXI (October 1938), p. 10.

  7. San Maxent to Cienfuegos, October 22, 1816, Legajo 1873, AGI-Newberry.

  8. Report and Manifest, September 7, 1816, Testimony of Mr. Willson, October 20, 1818, Testimony of Mr. McMellan, October 20, 1818, Testimony of François Raux, August 24, 1818, Testimony of H. Pierre, October 9, 1818, Role d'equipage of the Lameson, n.d., United States vs. Schooner Lameson, Case File #1227, NAFW.

  9. Onís to Monroe, January 2, 1817, M-50, RG 59, NA.

  10. Onís to Monroe, February 10, 1817, Ibid.

  11. Faye, "Privateersmen," pp. 1054–56. Faye, "Aury," I, p. 126, borrows Saxon's mistaken identification of Sauvinet as a chief agent of the Laffites'.

  12. Morphy to Apodaca, March 1, 1816, Legajo 1836, AGI-Newberry.

  13. Grymes to Thomas Cunningham, January 11, 1817, M-125, NA.

  14. Naval History Division, Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Volume II (Washington, 1963), p. 406.

  15. Washington, National Intelligencer, October 15, 1816.

  16. Morphy to Cienfuegos, September 25, 1816, Legajo 1900, AGI-Newberry.

  17. Washington, National Intelligencer, October 17, 1816.

  18. Morphy to Cienfuegos, September 25, 1816, Legajo 1900, AGI-Newberry. The standard account of this episode is Harris Gaylord Warren, "The Firebrand Affair: A Forgotten Incident of the Mexican Revolution," Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXI (January 1938), pp. 203–12. Warren mistakenly refers to James Monroe as president during the affair, whereas Madison was still in office and Monroe was secretary of state at the time.

  19. Jackson to Livingston, October 24, 1816, Bassett, Correspondence, VI, PP. 459–60.

  20. Eighth Annual Message, December 3, 1816, Richardson, Messages and Papers, I, p. 575.

  21. New Orleans, Courier de la Louisiane, December 16, 1816; Rollins to Duplessis, November 25, 1816, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA; Alfred Toledano Wellborn, "The Relations Between New Orleans and Latin America, 1810–1824," Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXII (July 1939), pp. 760–61.

  22. Report of all vesse
ls inward bound & boarded by the Inspector at the Balize, 1816, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA.

  23. Petition of Dominique Youx, November 1816, Judgment, December 15, 1816, Result of Sale, December 17, 1816, Dominique Youx vs. Francis Deglanne, #1143, Parish Court Civil Suit Records, NOPL.

  24. Harris Gaylord Warren, "Pensacola and the Filibusters, 1816–1817," Louisiana Historical Quarterly, XXI (July 1928), p. 816.

  25. Rollins to Duplessis, November 25, 1816, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA.

  26. Rollins to Duplessis, November 25, December 4, 1816, Dick to Chew, February 1, 1817, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA.

  27. Rollins to Duplessis, December 2, 1816, Entry 1627, RG 36, NA.

  28. Sam Baldwin to Duplessis, September 26, 1816, Ibid.

  29. Rollins to Duplessis, October 28, 1816, Ibid.

  30. Rollins to Duplessis, November 25, December 4, 1816, Ibid.

  31. New Orleans, Courier, November 15, 1816.

  32. Ibid., November 20, 1816.

  33. Fatio to Cienfuegos, September 28, 1818, Legajo 1900, AGI-Newberry.

  34. Morphy to Cienfuegos, December 4, 1816, Ibid.

  35. Masot to Captain General, January n, 1817, Legajo 1874, AGI-Newberry.

  36. Marie Louise Villard to Pierre Laffite, January 4, 1817, Notary Phillipe Pedesclaux, Vol. 1, item 8; Pierre Laffite promissory note, January 4, 1817, Vol. 1, item 6; Jean Bonnaux to Jean Laffite, January 7, 1817, Vol. 1, item n, NONA.

  37. On February 17, 1817, Laffite sued Gambi for $250. Pierre Lafitte vs. Vincent Gambie or Jean Roup, #1346, First Judicial Court, NOPL.

  38. Robinson, Memoirs, I, p. 133; Morphy to Captain General, December 4, 1816, Legajo 1900, Morphy to José Masot, December 23, 1816, Legajo 1874, AGI-Newberry.

  39. Warren, "Pensacola and the Filibusters, 1816–1817," p. 816.

  40. Faye, "Aury," I 92, CAHUT.