Patterson and Ross Awarded Laffite-owned Property They Seized

This week on Historia Obscura there is a very significant article by Pam Keyes.

http://www.historiaobscura.com/john-dicks-letter-to-monroe-honoring-the-baratarians/

The article gives the background for a letter written by John Dick, the US District Attorney for Louisiana,  to James Monroe, the Secretary of State, on behalf of the Baratarian privateers. President James Madison had just signed a blanket pardon to the Baratarians for their evasion of the Customs Taxes of the day prior to the Battle of New Orleans. Dick was glad he did not have to prosecute any of the Baratarians, because of their indispensable service to the United States that helped defeat the British.

But despite the presidential pardon, Pam Keyes notes in her article that property belonging to the Baratarians, and the Laffites in particular, which had been seized in the Patterson-Ross raid prior to the Battle of New Orleans, was awarded by Congress to the raiders, Patterson and Ross,  to have and to hold and to spend as they pleased.

A couple of weeks before Dick wrote his letter, and after the Baratarian indictments were dropped, Ross left New Orleans in March 1815 for Washington, D.C. to petition Congress with the help of a Congressional friend for the monies from the Barataria raid. The bill for the relief of Ross and Patterson was read for the first time in Congress on April 1816, a month before the sickly Ross died at a relative’s home in Pennsylvania. Jean Laffite went to Washington, too, but not until December 1815, when he wrote a letter to President Madison on Dec. 27 seeking recovery of the raid monies. Madison’s response is unknown, but at that time, he was not in Washington. On Feb. 22, 1817, President Madison signed into law an amended bill supported by Congress that directed the secretary of the treasury to pay Ross and Patterson $50,000 from the proceeds of the Barataria raid.

 We have to ask ourselves who were the pirates in this transaction, and who was the aggrieved property holder.

The Looted Ships in the Navy Docks

Pam Keyes has just published a very interesting article about the Battle of Lake Borgne.

http://www.historiaobscura.com/pattersons-mistake-the-battle-of-lake-borgne-revisited/

The article describes a number of tactical and strategic mistakes made by Commodore Daniel T. Patterson and those under his command that not only lost the United States Navy some badly needed gun boats but also made those same gun boats available to the British to use against the American forces.

The article also touched obliquely on the fate of the ships confiscated at Barataria during the Patterson-Ross raid.

Patterson’s small navy had been reduced to the Carolina schooner and Louisiana sloop, both at New Orleans, and one gunboat at Ft. St. Phillip on the Mississippi River. Six fast armed schooners taken in the Patterson-Ross raid of Jean Laffite’s Barataria sat idle at the Navy yard in New Orleans, but couldn’t be used for two reasons: there were no sailors to man them, and they were still awaiting judgment in admiralty court, so it was like they weren’t even there. The Louisiana also couldn’t be used initially due to a lack of men. Only the Carolina boasted a full crew of New Englanders who had arrived with the ship in August 1814. Patterson’s unpopularity with sometime privateer crews made him anathema for them to want to work for his navy.

 One wonders, since Andrew Jackson had declared martial law and was conscripting men and impressing sailors and confiscating property and ignoring court orders, according to the book by Matthew Warshauer, why Jackson could not simply take over the Baratarian ships in the Navy dockyard and assign Baratarian volunteers under his command to man them.

Could it be because the Navy and the Army were separate entities, and there was no Secretary of the Navy in office, and Jackson was not sure he could make his martial law stick against Daniel T. Patterson?

Will the Real Pirate Please Stand Up

Pam Keyes recently published an article about Daniel Todd Patterson's activities against innocent bystanders during the Patterson-Ross raid at Barataria.

http://www.historiaobscura.com/the-saga-of-melita-and-the-patterson-ross-raid-at-barataria/

If you review the evidence objectively, it was Patterson, not Laffite, who was the real pirate. I have nothing to add to what Pam Keyes has uncovered except to ask:

•           Why did Patterson behave this way?
•           Why were all complaints against this behavior met with indifference?
•            Who really gained from the Patterson-Ross raid?
•            Why don't the history books tell us about this? 

 I know a lot of people who say: "Don't rehash old history. Don't keep reliving the past. You can't change the past, so concentrate on the present."

I am concentrating on the present. But how do we fix the present, if we don't understand the past?

Isn't this an ongoing problem?

Ode to Privateers

Today on Historia Obscura, we have the first poem about the Battle of New Orleans.

The First Battle of New Orleans poem

Notably absent is any mention of Jean Laffite. To correct this omission, I have written a different poem about the same topic.

Sketch of Jean Laffite by Lanie Frick

Ode to Privateers

by Aya Katz

There are men who die for their nation,

    Who unselfishly give up their lives

There are men who live for their station,

    Who prevail without sacrifice.

There are women who raise up their children,

      And scrub floors and clean bottoms and nurse,

At the end of the day they want payment

      In undying love and remorse.

But the love that is true does not barter

Or require one to suffer to pay

For the care and affection a baby

Ought always to have anyway.

Now Britain was one kind of mother

Who demanded a fee for her love,

And she forced former children to serve her,

And she never accepted rebuff.

She kidnapped, indentured those sailors,

     Who had never agreed they should serve

And she thought she could live off the payments

     That others were making to her.

But Americans swore they were freemen,

      And only would work for their gain

And they never consented to fiefdom

     To serve under England or Spain.

Now Madison turned to the Congress

     And he asked that a war be declared

Against Britain, that unruly mother,

     Who forced sailors under her care.

But the coffers of war they were empty,

     And the army and navy were poor

And American patriot  menfolk

    Were not ready to set out to war.

They had sworn that they never would live for

    Another, and only alone for their gain,

And who wants to die for the right to

     Avoid paying taxes again? 

If not for the brave privateers who

Had always made war for their gain,

Who would set aside natural fear for

The right to know freedom again?

When the British approached Jean Laffite and

Required that he help them regain

Their colonial holdings, discreetly

  He sent word to Americans then.

He said:  "Though you're holding my brother,

   "In that dirty old Cabildo jail,"

"I will never agree to serve Britain,

    "And I  do want your side to prevail."

But Patterson, hearing the news that

    The British were near Mobile Point,

Instead of defending Ft. Bowyer,

    Came and ransacked closer to home.

He took all the ships that Laffite had,

   The stores were to serve as his spoils,

And he feasted on chocolate and Seegars

    And he cared not the British to foil.

So it came that when Jackson came marching

     His ragtag troops for their stint,

They were shoeless and all out of powder,

    And awfully short on the flint. 

And up spoke Laffite: "Let me help you,

      "I have men, and cannons and flint,

"I have barrels and barrels of powder,

      "We will fight for you, just let us in! "

There are men who fight for their nation,

     Because in fighting they gain,

And together they vanquished the British,

    Who were crushed so that few did remain.

And the British, they begged to be let go,

    And America won on that day,

And not because taxes or duties

   Or regular armies held sway.

For the men who have chosen no thralldom,

     And who fight every day for their bread,

Are the ones who are ready when called on,

     Who can shoot at the foe until dead.

There are men who will fight but are fearful,

     And who miss because of that fear,

But the reason we all are still here is

    Because there were once privateers.