Jean Lafitte
Jean Lafitte was a French pirate, privateer, and slave trader who operated in the Gulf of Mexico in the early 19th century. He and his older brother Pierre spelled their last name Laffite, but English language documents of the time used "Lafitte". This has become the common spelling in the United States, including places named after him.
Lafitte is believed to have been born either in Biarritz, in the French Basque Country, France, or the French colony of Saint-Domingue in the Caribbean.
By 1805, Lafitte was operating a warehouse in New Orleans to help distribute the goods smuggled by his brother Pierre Lafitte. The United States government passed the Embargo Act of 1807 as tensions built with the United Kingdom by prohibiting trade. The Lafittes moved their operations to an island in Barataria Bay, Louisiana. By 1810, their new port had become very successful: the Lafittes had a profitable smuggling operation and also started to engage in piracy.
In 1812, the United States and the United Kingdom went to war. Despite Lafitte warning the other Baratarians of a possible military attack on their base, a US naval force successfully invaded in September 1814 and captured most of his fleet. Later, in return for a legal pardon, Lafitte and his fleet helped General Andrew Jackson during the Battle of New Orleans to defend the city during the War of 1812. British forces sought access to the Mississippi River to gain control of the interior of the US. After securing victory, Jackson paid tribute in despatches to the Lafitte brothers' efforts, as well as those of their fellow privateers.
The Lafittes subsequently became spies for the Spanish during the Mexican War of Independence. In 1817, Jean founded a new colony on Galveston Island named Campeche. At its height, the colonists and privateers earned millions of dollars annually from stolen or smuggled coin and goods. Very little is known about Lafitte, and speculation about his life and death continues among historians.
A rumor claimed that Lafitte rescued French Emperor Napoleon from exile, and both of them ended their days in Louisiana. No evidence supports it.
Origins
A number of details about Jean Lafitte's early life remain obscure, and often sources contradict each other. In the Journal de Jean Lafitte, the authenticity of which is contested, Lafitte claims to have been born in Bordeaux, France, in 1780 to Sephardic Jewish parents. His maternal grandmother and mother, both Conversos, fled Spain for France in 1765. His maternal grandfather had been executed by the Inquisition for "Judaizing". Some sources say that his father was French and his mother's family had come from Spain.Lafitte and his brother Pierre also claimed to have been born in Bayonne. Other documents of the period place his birthplace as St. Malo or Brest. Jack C. Ramsay, who published a 1996 biography of Lafitte, says, "this was a convenient time to be a native of France, a claim that provided protection from the enforcement of American law". He notes that still other contemporary accounts claim that Lafitte was born in Orduña, Spain, or in Westchester County, New York, north of Manhattan.
Saint-Domingue
Some sources speculate that Lafitte was born in the French colony of Saint-Domingue. In the late 18th century, adult children of the French planters in Saint-Domingue often resettled along the Mississippi River in La Louisiane, especially in its largest city of New Orleans. Families with the surname Lafitte have been found in Louisiana documents from 1765. According to Ramsay, Lafitte's widowed mother migrated with her two sons, the elder Pierre and Jean, from Saint-Domingue to New Orleans in the 1780s. In approximately 1784, his mother married Pedro Aubry, a New Orleans merchant, keeping Jean with her. She placed Pierre to be raised by extended family elsewhere in Louisiana.According to Ramsay, as a young man, Lafitte likely spent much time exploring the wetlands and bayou country south of New Orleans. In later years, he was described as having "a more accurate knowledge of every inlet from the Gulf than any other man". His elder brother Pierre became a privateer; he may have operated from Saint-Domingue, where the colonial government frequently issued letters of marque to profit from the shipping traffic of other nations.
Lafitte likely helped his brother to sell or trade the captured merchandise. By 1805 he is believed to have been running a warehouse in New Orleans and possibly a store on Royal Street.
France
Biographer William C. Davis suggests a different childhood for Lafitte. According to his 2005 book, Lafitte was born in or near Pauillac, France, the son of Pierre Lafitte and his second wife, Marguerite Desteil. The couple had six children, including at least three daughters. Jean Lafitte was likely born in 1782, although he was not baptized until 1786. Pierre Lafitte had an older son, his namesake Pierre, born from his first marriage to Marie LaGrange, who died in childbirth. The boys were given a basic Catholic education.Acknowledging that details of Lafitte's first twenty years are sparse, Davis speculates that Lafitte spent much time at sea as a child, probably aboard ships owned by his father, a known trader. Davis places Lafitte's brother Pierre in Saint-Domingue by the late 1790s and the early 19th century. Due to escalating violence from the Haitian Revolution, in early 1803 Pierre boarded a refugee ship for New Orleans. This was the last year that Napoleon Bonaparte failed to regain control of Saint-Domingue. He withdrew his battered troops and ended French involvement in North America, selling the US what became known as the Louisiana Purchase in 1803: French-claimed lands west of the Mississippi River. By 1806, several "Captain Lafitte"s operated in New Orleans; Jean Lafitte was likely one of them.
Character and abilities
Sources indicate that Lafitte was sharp and resourceful, but also handsome and friendly, enjoying drinking, gambling, and women. He was known to adopt more aristocratic mannerisms and dress than most of his fellow privateers.Lafitte's native language was clearly French, though the specific dialect is a matter of some debate. He was evidently able to speak English reasonably well and most likely had a working knowledge of Spanish. He was educated with his brother at a military academy on Saint Kitts. No samples of his writing survive, except his signature; his surviving letters were always written by a secretary. His reading and writing abilities, therefore, remain unclear. During his life he acted as a soldier, sailor, diplomat, merchant, and much more, demonstrating natural gifts for leadership.
Barataria
The United States made the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. In January 1808, the government began to enforce the Embargo Act of 1807, which barred American ships from docking at any foreign port and imposed an embargo on goods imported into the US. It was specifically intended to prohibit trade with the United Kingdom, as tensions were increasing between the two countries over the North American border with Canada and other issues. That was problematic for New Orleans merchants, who had depended on trade with the Caribbean colonies of Great Britain and other nations. The Lafitte brothers began to look for another port from which they could smuggle goods to local merchants.They created a base on the small and sparsely populated island of Barataria, in Barataria Bay. The bay was located beyond a narrow passage between the barrier islands of Grand Terre and Grande Isle. Barataria was far from the US naval base, and ships could easily smuggle in goods without being noticed by customs officials. Workers would reload goods into smaller batches onto pirogues or barges, for transport through the many bayous to New Orleans.
Based in New Orleans, Pierre Lafitte served as a silent partner, looking after their interests in the city. Jean Lafitte spent most of his time in Barataria managing the daily hands-on business of outfitting privateers and arranging the smuggling of stolen goods. By 1810, the island had become a booming port. Seamen flocked to the island, working on the docks or at the warehouses until they were chosen as crew for one of the privateers.
Dissatisfied with their role as brokers, in October 1812 the Lafitte brothers purchased a schooner and hired Captain Trey Cook to sail it. As the schooner did not have an official commission from a national government, its captain was considered a pirate operating illegally. In January 1813, they took their first prize, a British hermaphrodite brig loaded with 77 slaves. Sale of the slaves and additional cargo generated $18,000 in profits.
The brothers adapted the captured ship for use in piracy and named it Dorada. Within weeks, Dorada captured a schooner loaded with goods valued at more than $9,000. The captured schooner was not considered useful for piracy and so after they had unloaded its cargo, the Lafittes returned the ship to its former captain and crew. The Lafittes gained a reputation for treating captive crew members well and often returned captured ships to their original crew.
The brothers soon acquired a third ship, La Diligente. They outfitted it with 12 fourteen-pounder cannons. Dorada captured a fourth ship, a schooner they renamed Petit Milan. The brothers stripped down their original ship and used its guns to outfit the new one.
They sailed three ships, which Davis described as likely "one of the largest privately owned corsair fleets operating on the coast, and the most versatile." For several months, the Lafittes would send the ships directly to New Orleans with legal cargo and would take on outgoing provisions in the city. The crew would create a manifest that listed not the provisions that had been purchased, but smuggled items stored at Barataria. Uninterested in exports from New Orleans, customs agents rarely checked the accuracy of the manifests. The ship would sail to the mouth of Bayou Lafourche, load the contraband goods, and sail "legally" back to New Orleans, with goods listed on a certified manifest.