Summary

At large during the most colorful period in New Orleans' history, from just after the Louisiana Purchase through the War of 1812, privateers Jean and Pierre Laffite made life hell for Spanish merchants on the Gulf. Pirates to the U.S. Navy officers who chased them, heroes to the private citizens who shopped for contraband at their well-publicized auctions, the brothers became important members of a filibustering syndicate that included lawyers, bankers, merchants, and corrupt U.S. officials. But this allegiance didn't stop the Laffites from becoming paid Spanish spies, disappearing into the fog of history after selling out their own associates. William C. Davis uncovers the truth about two men who made their names synonymous with piracy and intrigue on the Gulf.

Author Biography

WILLIAM C. DAVIS is the director of programs at the Virginia Center for Civil War Studies and chief consultant for the A&E television series Civil War Journal. Davis teaches history at Virginia Tech and lives in Virginia.

Preface A Corsair's Name

xiii

Vintage Bordeaux 1770-1803

(7)

New Men in a New World 1803-1806

(17)

Brothers United 1806-1809

(19)

Brothers in Business 1806-1809

(21)

Dawn of the Corsairs 1810-1811

(18)

Origins of the Laffite Fleet 1811-1813

(24)

Lords of Barataria 1813-1814

107

(26)

The Rise of the Filibusters 1814

133

(21)

Patriots for a Price 1814

154

(27)

The End of Barataria 1814

181

(30)

The Fight for New Orleans 1814-1815

211

(21)

Spies for Spain 1815-1816

232

(27)

A Career of Betrayals 1815-1816

259

(22)

Distant Horizons 1816

281

(26)

The Birth of Galveston 1816-1817

307

(19)

A Season of Treachery 1817

326

(23)

Deadly Friends 1817-1818

349

(18)

Winds of Change 1818

367

(26)

The Dying Dream 1819

393

(26)

Farewell to Galveston 1820

419

(26)

The Last Voyage 1810-1823

445

(21)

The Legend of the Laffites

466

(21)

Acknowledgments

487

(4)

Notes

491

(158)

Bibliography

649

(30)

Index

679

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Excerpts

O'er the glad waters of the dark blue sea, Our thoughts as boundless, and our soul's as free Far as the breeze can bear, the billows foam, Survey our empire, and behold our home!Vintage Bordeaux1770-1803PERHAPS IT IS FITTING for men whose lives so lent themselves to adventure and melodrama that their name traced its origins to a word meaning something like "the song." For centuries men named Lafitte inhabited the fertile reaches between the river Garonne and the Pyrenees Mountains that separated France from Spain. Proximity to the often lawless Pyrenees, and life in the part of France most remote from the center of politics and culture in Paris, encouraged a spirit of independence in the region's inhabitants, and a tendency to look as much to the world as to their country for opportunity. Among those named for "the song," that independence appeared in their stubborn refusal of a uniform spelling of their name. Lafitte, Lafit, Laffitt, Laffite, and more, all emerged between the river and the mountains, and for many the song in their name was a Siren's call to the broader world. Immediate access to the sea on the Bay of Biscay tied many of them to trade and seafaring. The lush vineyards on either side of the Garonne, and the Gironde estuary formed at its confluence with the Dordogne River, turned more of them into vintners.The ancient village of Pauillac perched on the west bank of the Gironde estuary exactly midway between Bordeaux and the Bay of Biscay at Pointe de Grave some thirty miles distant.1 It was about as far up the estuary as the limited maneuverability of sail could bring oceangoing ships, making it a natural port for the merchants of Bordeaux and the surrounding region. Though small, it was already the informal capital of the Medoc, and just now starting to blossom thanks to the produce of its vineyards. One Laffite family, and apparently only one of that spelling, lived in the village.2 Jean Laffite and his wife, Anne Denis, saw their son Pierre marry Marie Lagrange in 1769, but the young woman died, perhaps giving birth to a son Pierre around 1770.3 In 1775 the father Pierre remarried, this time to Marguerite Desteil, who bore six children at their home in the little village of Bages just south of Pauillac. Three daughters lived to maturity, as did a son Jean, born around 1782 or later but not baptized until 1786.4Most of the Laffites living in the Bordeaux were solidly middle-class merchants and traders, and the elder Pierre Laffite appears to have been in trade himself.5 Certainly he was able to give his two sons at least rudimentary schooling, though their written grammar, spelling, and syntax would never be better than mediocre.6 Whoever taught them to write- parent, priest, or schoolmaster- could not keep a natural independence out of their developing handwriting, for neither boy learned very good penmanship, but their teacher left some artifacts of his rote with them. All their lives, the half brothers signed their

Excerpted from The Pirates Laffite: The Treacherous World of the Corsairs of the Gulf by William C. Davis
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