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Early Life of Jean Lafitte Barataria and Privateering Map of Barataria The Battle of New Orleans Galveston 1817-21
The Mystery of the Final Years of Jean Lafitte Lafitte's Treasure
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signature of Jean Lafitte ( spelled Laffite in this case ) on a letter to President Madison
Jean Lafitte was one of the leaders or bos of the community of privateers on Grand Terre. Jean was a handsome man by all accounts, of great personal charm and became a legend in his own time, after his patriotic actions in the Battle of New Orleans. Lord Byron's poem The Corsair was inspired by a 1816 newspaper account of Lafitte in the Battle of New Orleans.
Registration for Pierre Lafitte's ship Goelette la Dilidente,a 136 ton schooner, captained by Jean Lafitte in 1813. Jean lists his age as 32 and his birthplace as Bordeaux. The la Dilidente had a crew of 84 an 12 14 pounder cannon .The Lafittes had a fleet of four ships in their privateering fleet by 1813, with the Dorada, Petit Milan ,the la Dilidente and the Sarpis.
1873 portrait of Lafitte based on eyewitness accounts
Jean Lafitte purposely shrouded his activities in secrecy due to the nature of his business, and even the dates and places of his birth and death have been a matter of conjecture . There are also other Lafittes, which cloud the issue . A number of different birthplaces have been given for the Lafitte brothers ( Pierre, Jean and Henri) such as Port-au-Prince, then San Domingo,Bordeaux and Bayonne, France. The elder brother left the turmoil of revolutionary France and spent some time in Saint-Domingue.A violent slave uprising in Saint-Domingue forced Pierre to leave by 1803 for New Orleans , the same year Napoleon sold the Louisiana territory to the United States .
Gentlemen of the era were expected to defend their honor with a duel. Lafitte is reported to have fought 2 duels by the time he was 21. According to another story , he fought three duels in the restaurant that would latter become the Court of two Sisters in the French Quarter.
The first twenty years of Jean's life are a mystery, but it is almost certain he spent some time at sea .By 1805, he appears Jean operating a warehouse in New Orleans to help sell the goods smuggled by his brother Pierre and on Grand Terre, where the Lafittes made their privateering base, on the western tip of the island, facing Barataria Pass . The Lafittes grew rich from the sale of their privateered goods during the trade embargo before the War of 1812 and the British blockade. Grande Terre was six miles long and one to three miles wide . By 1809, it was well known that slaves fresh from Africa could be gotten at Grande Terre, which were kept in barracon, or slave barracks .Here they erected storehouses and a small brick fort . The last remains of the fort were destroyed by a hurricane in 1965
The reselling of slaves or 'black ivory' from captured slave ships was a profitable business for the Lafittes New Orleans and Galveston
Jean was reported to be tall for the time, an inch or two over six feet, with pale skin dark hair and hazel eyes and liked to dress in style . He could speak some English and Spanish, and was spoke Bordelaise French .New Orleans at this time was flooded with French refugees from Cuba,who had fled there from San Domingue. Cuba ordered the French to leave after Napoleon invaded Spain and put his brother on the Spanish throne . Out of a population of about 25,000 at this time, fewer than 3,300 were English or American. The French population was generally anti-American and sympathetic to the illegal activities of the Lafitte brothers .The Lafittes were often seen at the Coquet's Ballroom on St.Phillip street, the Cafe des Refugies and the Hotel de la Marine while in New Orleans .The revenue from the lucrative slave trade allowed the Lafittes to buy a warehouse on Royal Street .
In 1811 there was a slave rebellion led by Charles Deslondes, a San Domingue slave in St.Charles Parish and marched upon New Orleans. The rebellion was stopped and many members of the rebellion were executes and their heads put on spikes as a warning . The rebellion put New Orleans into a panic and thereafter authorities took greater notice of the Lafitte slave smuggling activities .
Gov Claiborne
The American governor of Louisiana,Gov Claiborne, angered by the privateer's disregard for custom laws, ordered an attack on Grand Terre on Sept 16, , destroying the Grand Terre base. The Gov also offered a reward of $300 for the capture of Lafitte, to which Lafitte responded by printing handbills offering a larger reward of $1,000 for the capture of the Gov if he were delivered to the Lafitte's new base of operations on Cat Island. At the bottom of the handbill, it was written that this was only in jest.
Reward offered for Pierre Lafitte in the Louisiana Courier, Sept.7, 1814
$1,000 Reward Will be paid to whoever arrests Pierre Laffite who last night broke from the parish prison and escaped. The said Lafitte is 5 feet 10 inches tall of robust nature,fine complexion and slightly cross-eyed.It is believed a more complete discription is useless as he is well known in the city. The said Lafitte took with him three negroes:Sam,formerlly the property of Mr.Sewze,Ceasar, belonging to Mr.Lefebere, and Hamilcar belonging to Mr.Jarnand. the above reward will be given to whoever will deliver the said Lafitte to the undersigned who also will pay fifty dollars for each negreo. J.H. Holland Jailer
Map showing location of Barataria Bay and Grande Terre and Cat island
Piracy was largely on the wan in the Caribbean and the Gulf by 1800, but the Napoleonic Wars made ships tempting targets for privateers operating under government issued letters of marque. Often the privateers were made up of groups of investors who made a large cash bond as a guarantee that they would observe to rules of war.
Jean Lafitte was estimated to have captured some 100 ships in his career as a privateer
Privateers had to bring their prizes into ports of a commissioning nation or a friendly nation, where a court of admiralty would decide if the prize was legally taken .During this time English and French privateers preyed on each other and both preyed upon the Spanish, which switched alliances many times during this period .
Those who attacked shipping without a letter of marque were hung as pirates
Most of the privateers in the Gulf received their letters of marque from the French colonies of Martinique and Guadalupe. After the British captured these in 1806, they could be gotten from the newly independent country of Colombia. Grand Terre became a sort of depot where the privateers could dispose of their goods and agents were appointed in New Orleans for the sale of the captured goods .The importation of slaves had been banned in America in 1808, but the invention of the cotton gin led to a huge demand for cotton and slaves to work the fields. Slaves taken from Spanish slave ships bound for the colonies of New Spain became a sort of black gold to the privateers who would smuggle them into America after capturing Spanish ships .
a quadroon When Lafitte was flush with cash, he had many kept ladies in apartments in New Orleans. He preferred the company of quadroons ( someone of one-quarter black ancestry ), Lafitte is known to have had at least one illegitimate child, named Pierre, with the quadroon Catherine Villars.He is said to of had a daughter, Denise and two sons, Lucien and Antoine, from a marriage with Christina Levine, who died after giving birth to Denise in 1804.
often privateered goods were moved from Grande Terre to New Orleans through the maze of bayous on pirogues.
In this period, Barataria came to mean all the lakes, swamps and bays south of New Orleans and the Gulf of Mexico, including Grand Isle and Grande Terre. This area lends itself to piracy and smuggling with its myriad bayous leading to New Orleans as it is impossible to patrol them all .
Jean Lafitte's Blacksmith shop ( a front for smuggling ) , now a bar
Gov Claiborne
The American governor of Louisiana,Gov Claiborne, angered by the privateer's disregard for custom laws, ordered an attack on Grand Terre . The Gov also offered a reward of $300 for the capture of Lafitte, to which Lafitte responded by printing handbills offering a larger reward of $1,000 for the capture of the Gov if he were delivered to the Lafitte's new base of operations on Cat Island. At the bottom of the handbill, it was written that this was only in jest
Trailer to the movie The Buccaneer with more detail than you would expect
Late in November 1814, a large British expeditionary force of 18,000 sailed from Jamaica under Sir Edward Pakenham, a hero of the Peninsular war. A complete civil governmental staff, with printing presses, were with them as well, to rule over 'the Crown Colony of Louisiana.' The British troops were composed of veterans from the war with Napoleon and the invasion of Washington and considered the best in the world. The British, expected to sweep aside the meager American force, seize the 'Beauty and Booty' of the rich trading port of New Orleans and with the Mississippi in their hands, separate the western states from the rest of the Union . The British expected the French and Spanish settlers and the large slave population of the sugar cane and cotton plantations, which the planned to free, would aid them in their conquest. If the British were able to take New Orleans they would be in a much stronger bargaining position at the ongoing peace talks, which had started at Ghent, Belgium on August 8, 1814. The British were making objections at the negotiations to drag the process out out, counting on a victory at New Orleans .A British victory might even tip the New England states into succeeding, perhaps even ending the American 'experiment and bring the colonies back into the English fold. Jean Lafitte(l), Pierre Lafitte(center) and Dominique You. Painted in 1812 Attributed to John Wesley Jarvis In New Orleans there was general knowledge of the coming attack, but no positive evidence till Jean Laffite sent his a warning to Governor Claiborne, which he had sent after the British attemped to bribe him into aiding the British cause with 30,000 British pounds and a commission in the British navy on Sept 3, 1814 by Captain Nicholas Lockyer and a Captain McWilliams. In response to the British offer he requested 15 days to sound out his men on the matter, but really to buy time to warn the Americans. Why did Laffite chose to aid the Americans ? Possibly a combination a reasons, hatred for the english and their war with Napoleon and a belief that it was better to be a privateer under American rule with its weaker rule, than British, with the strongest navy in the world. According to others he was inspired by American democracy and owed a debt to Americans, who rescued him as a child. The knowledge Laffite had of the bayous leading into New Orleans from Barataria bay and his being the leader or bos of the Baratarian privateers and smugglers on Grand Terre island and made him an import player to the British and Americans. The Laffite's also had well trained gun crews and large stores of flinys, gunpowder and other supplies . Despite the bribe and the Americans holding his brother Pierre in jail for smuggling and expecting an American attack on his base and small fort on Grande Terre, Laffite sent a warning to New Orleans with his fastest courier, who could arrive in a day. He sent a copy of the British offer and a plea for the release of his brother and a stop to the 'persecution' of his privateers and even volunteered himself, his men and supplies for the defense of New Orleans to Jean Blanque, who gave it to gov Claiborne. Pierre Lafitte then 'escaped' from prison and returned to Grande Terre with the messenger . Gov Claiborne held a meeting with the leaders of the defense of New Orleans: Major-General Jacques Villere of the Louisiana militia, Commodore Daniel T. Patterson of the U.S. Navy, Colonel George T. Ross of the 44th Infantry and Pierre Dubourg of the U.S. Customs . Patterson, Ross and dubourg thought the letters were a ruse to evade the planned attack on Grand Terre. Villere thought the letters were authentic and that Lafitte's men should be employed for the defense of New Orleans . Patterson said he was under orders to attack the Lafitte base . The Gov also thought the letters were real, but reluctantly agreed to Patterson's planned attack. The planned assault on the Lafitte base on Grande Terre by the United States, went on as planned. Jean was made aware of the upcoming attack on Sept 15, and urged his men to submit to the authorities when they arrived. He argued that the men would get their ships and goods back from the Americans, in return for attacking the British. Jean left Grande terre that night , going to hide out among the plantations of friends on the Mississippi above New Orleans .Ironically, the corolina was to play a decisive role in the Battle of New Orleans, and would not have been there except for the attack on Grande Terre. .On Sept 11, 1814, The Carolina, a schooner with 14 guns under command of Commdore Daniel Patterson and six gunboats left New Orleans, sailed down the Mississippi River and attacked Grande Terre on Sept 16. Lafitte's men, not knowing if the attacking fleet was British or American, took battle stations. Lafitte's men, not knowing if the attacking fleet was British or American, took battle stations.The Corolina raised a flag offering pardon for deserters. The Baratarians abandoned their vessels .Tthe Americans seized 8 ships, 20 canons and an estimated $500,000 worth of goods and captured 80 Baratarians . Most of the 500 or so Baratarians escaped.The seized goods never were returned, and became part of a protracted suit by Lafitte against the U.S. for its return. Despite going to Washington and writing to President Madison, the goods were never returned nor any compensation given, causing Lafitte much bitternes years later. .Most of the 500 or so Baratarians escaped. Ironically, the Carolina was to play a decisive role in the Battle of New Orleans, and would not have been there except for the attack on Grande Terre.
After two weeks, a British brig-of-war appeared off Barataria Pass awaiting Jean's reply to the British offer . No ship from Lafitte came to meet it and it sailed off, no doubt cursing the Lafitte's and the time they had wasted .Now the British knew they could not count on Lafitte .
Andrew Jackson at this time was placed in command of the Seventh Military District, and was in Mobile, .Alabama fighting the Creek Indians .On the same day as the Grande Terre attack, Edward Livingston, a former mayor of New York who had fled to New Orleans to escape legal trouble, organized a committee of defense .Jackson arrived in New Orleans on Nov 30, 1814 , severely weakened by dysentery. Despite this, his presence inspired the inhabitants of New Orleans . Preventing access to the New Orleans by the British fleet was flotilla of five American gunboats with 182 men , commanded by Thomas ap Catesby Jones. these were the same gunboats that had attacked Grande terre. A calm left the gunboats open to attack by the British in 45 rowboats, carrying 980 marines and sailors.On December 14, British sailors in rowing boats, each boat armed with a small cannon, captured the vastly outnumbered American gunboats in a brief but violent battle.The Americans had 6 killed and the British 98.
Lafitte meeting Gov Claiborne and gen Jackson Jackson, who needed every man, still would not release the men captured at Grande Terre or take up Lafitte on his offer .After the defeat of the gunboats, Claiborne meet with Jackson and changed his mind .Claiborne issued a proclomation on Dec 17, offering amnesty to all Baratarians if they jioned the fight against the British. Jean Laffite returned to New Orleans, and arranged a meeting with Jackson through Edward Livingston at the general's headquarters at 106 Royal Street. Jackson, it was reported by the sophistication of Lafitte and found him not to be the 'hellish banditti' he imagined .Jean Laffite was sent to Barataria on Dec 22nd to watch for any invasion from the Barataria Bay route and did not see action in the battle of Jan 8.Pierre Laffite remained at Jackson's HQ to provide his knowledge of the land around New Orleans . Dominique You organized his Baratarians into three artillery units.
.Lafitte seemed to sincerely patriotic in his help for the American cause and furnished Jackson's small army of 2,000 men, who faced 10,000 British veterans with 366 cannons and a large supply of powder and shot and trained artillerymen who played havoc with the British at the Battle of New Orleans . During the battle on Jan 8, 1815, Jean was out of sight, perhaps reconnoitering to the south at Grand Isle. The Baratarians made up about 50 of the 5,000 men on Jackson's main line .
President James Madison gave full pardons to the Barataria privateers for their actions. However, he was not able to reclaim his goods, vessels and slaves seized by Commodore Patterson and the war materiels he provided to the underfunded and ill equipped Jackson, even after writing a letter to President Madison himself and going to Washington to pleas his case . All attempts failed and Lafitte became very bitter .In 1816 Lafitte exploring the interior of the Louisiana territory with Major Arsene Latour, an agent for Spain for the Spanish government to determine the attitudes of the Americans and Indians to Spain's lands that were west of the Louisiana Purchase. Spain was afraid of Indian raids and possible filibuster actions against its territory . For 8 months they explored what is now the Arkansas, Oklahoma and Missouri areas .and returned to New Orleans .
Galveston 1817-1821
In this period the Mexicans were trying to become independent of Spain, and the Mexican Manuel de Herrera had commissioned a Frenchman named Loius d'Aury to occupy the island of Galveston .d'Aury was chosen the civil and military leader of Texas and Galveston was declared part of the Mexican Republic on Sept 12, 1816 .d'Aury had a small squadron of 12 to 15 ships and 500 men were given letters of Marque to raid Spanish shipping in the Gulf .d'Aury left with all of his ships but one to aid the Mexican general Mina, but falling out with him, returned to Galveston, where he was shocked to find Lafitte had sailed in and taken over on May 14, 1817 .Lafitte, was still an agent for Spain, and it was suggested by the viceroy of Cuba, Don Jose Cienfuegos, to use the Lafittes against the pirates attacking Spanish shipping . The Lafitte's were given money to start a rival base against a'Aury by the Spanish .Lafitte then turned against Spain and supported Mexico .d'Aury was run out of Galveston, and Lafitte took over .In this period Texas was claimed by both Mexico and Spain .Lafitte's ships flew under the flag of Mexico . They arrived at Galveston in May, 1817 . The island was named Galveztown by Spanish explorers, in honor of Bernardo de Gálvez y Madrid, a viceroy of New Spain .Galveston Island, also called Snake Island at the time,for the many snakes there .Before Lafitte arrived, Galveston served as the home base of privateer Louis-Michel a'Aury. While Aury was away, Jean Lafitte took control . Lafitte called his settlement Galveztown in 1819 and Galveston Island was named Campeche .
In 1818 , Lafitte was notified by President Monroe to leave the island as it was considered part of the Louisiana Purchase. this message was delivered by Col George Graham .Also in 1819, one of Lafitte's ships, the El Bravo, was captured by two U.S. revenue cutters after a brief battle . The captain of the ship, Jean Desforges and his crew were taken to New Orleans for trail .Jean Lafitte went to New Orleans to hire lawyers for the trail. They were unable to provide a letter of marque from the Mexican Republic, found guilty and hung on the yard arm of a revenue cutter anchored on the Mississippi by New Orleans in 1820 . After this, the Lafitte's started to secure secret storage places for their loot, sensing a coming of the end of operations out of Galveston.
A hurricane in 1835 merged the two islands into present day Galveston Island .Aury returned, but could not remove Lafitte from the island . Lafitte's colony grew to around 1000, drawn to the profitable business of capturing Spanish ships and outlaws from America. All who came were personally interviewed by Lafitte and required to take an oath of loyalty to him.
Lafitte either purchased or took over a lavishly furnished mansion used by French pirate Louis-Michel Aury, which he named "Maison Rouge". This building was painted red and surrounded by a moat , the upper level was converted into a fortress where a cannon commanding Galveston harbor was placed. Jim Bowie, of the knife and Alamo fame, was there in this period, involved in the profitable slave trade .
Around 1820, Lafitte reportedly married Madeline Regaud, daughter of Antoine Regaud or Lallemand(1758-1820) a French officer in Napoleon's service. He had sailed to Texas, with a group of French exiles and adventurers in 1818 and started a colony on the Trinity River, called Champ d'Asile,which failed , and its population went to Galveston .
According to one story, one day the ships of Lafitte brought in a captured galleon, loaded with treasure. As soon as the ships weighted anchor, a furious hurricane hit, and the men were forced to leave their ships. After the hurricane had passed, the galleon was gone, and never found .
In 1818, the Karankawa Indians attacked, after some of the Galvestonians made off with an Indian woman,but were driven off by cannon fire .
By this time, Spain was rerouting its shipping to bypass the Gulf Of Mexico due to piracy, and the prizes for Lafitte were fewer and fewer. Many of his men had already left by the early 1820s.
In 1821, the schooner USS Enterprise was sent to Galveston and demanded that the privateering camp be destroyed and the Lafittes were to leave the site .If this were not done in 60 days, the Enterprise would return and attack . Lafitte agreed to leave the island without a fight, and in 1821 or 1822 departed on his flagship, the Pride, burning his fortress and settlements and reportedly taking immense amounts of treasure with him. All that remains of Maison Rouge is the foundation, located at 1417 Avenue A near the Galveston wharf.
The Mystery of the Final Years of Jean Lafitte
There are many stories about what happened to Lafitte and where he died. According to one account, published in 1885, The Historical Guide to New Orleans, Jean Lafitte died of sickness on the island of Mugeres, off the Yucatan, in 1826.
woodblock print of the death of Jean Lafitte from The Pirates Own Book, published in 1837. According to this account, Jean died after being boarded by the British. In this account, Jean Lafitte, was born at St. Maloes in France, in 1781, and went to sea at the age of thirteen; after several voyages in Europe, and to the coast of Africa, he was appointed mate of a French East Indiaman, bound for Madras. After a quarrel with the captain, he left and became captain of a pirate vessel, which commandeered the English East India Company Pagoda, before going to New Orleans.
According to one account, Jean Lafitte was killed upon the General Santander, an armed private vessel in the service of Columbia, on Feb. 5, 1823, at the age of 41. In the Gulf of Honduras, the General Santander encountered two Spanish privateers or warships, and was mortally wounded in a brief battle with the vessels and buried at sea . By this time. Columbia and other Latin American countries stopped issuing letters of marque as they were at peace with Spain and pirates were hunted down by American and British squadrons .
According to Lafitte's Journal ( which many believe to be a hoax, claimed to have been found by a great grand son of Lafitte) written by Lafitte himself in 1851, he took the name John Lafflin and died in St. Louis in his 70s.
After Lafitte's death, stories of Lafitte's buried treasure grew on the Louisiana and Texas coast . when the brothers left Galveston, they had little more than their three ships . However, who knows, perhaps he left a hidden cache somewhere .They were said to have made caches of their loot in many different places before they were forced to leave Galveston. The Calcasieu and Mermenteau Rivers,was used by Lafitte, according to a slave many caches were made here . There are also stories of a large cache at the Sabine river near a grove of gum tress, about 3 miles east of the Old Spanish Trail. Coins from the era are found from time to time on Grand Terre, which is accessable only by boat .In 1915 in New Orleans a worker uncovered a chest filled with more than 1,500 dubloons . In Gretna in 1960, across the river from New Orleans, a large number of gold coins were found in an area frequented by Lafitte and his men .According to another story, Laffite buried a large cach on an unnamed island in Lake Borgne .
Lafitte Links
Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve Pier 21 Theater shows a short film on Lafitte MexicanHistory.org Lafitte sailed under the flag of the new Mexican Republic at Galveston
Other historical Links
Franco Prussian War 1870-71 Sino Japanese War War between China and Japan over Korea1894-5 Taping Rebellion The rebellion that almost toppled the Qing Dynasty, lead by the younger brother of Christ Persian Empire History of the Persian Empires
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William C. Davis Davis provides an excellent history of the Laffites and piracy on the gulf coast in general
Listen to free audio book on Lafitte at
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