Swashbuckling Swamp Tales

The children and I recently walked the swamp trails at 29°56’33” N by 89°59’39” W, the Barataria Preserve in the Mississippi River Delta of Louisiana.  Long ago this was the land of Jean Lafitte, a swashbuckling rogue of French or Spanish or Haitian descent, a pirate and slave trader, as handsome as he was cunning and shrewd, who played all sides against the others in the era when Thomas Jefferson purchased Louisiana from the French in 1803.  

During the war of 1812, King George III of England offered Lafitte and his men citizenship and land grants if they would fight for the British.  Lafitte shrewdly leveraged that offer to form an alliance with the Americans – his piracy was easier against US Revenue agents than the British Navy – but then after Andrew Jackson agreed to a full pardon for all of his men,  Lafitte’s troops fought with Jackson to defeat the British at the battle of New Orleans.  The pirates’ skill with artillery was greater than the British Navy and Andrew Jackson praised their “courage and fidelity.”

During the Mexican War of Independence in 1815, Lafitte and his brother acted as spies for Spain, which allowed them to develop Galveston Island as another smuggling base outside the authority of the United States.  The swashbuckling history was of great interest to me, but my children only wanted to see an alligator.  To no avail though, as the temperatures were warm enough that the gators laid low, hidden in the water to stay cool from the sun’s heat.  We saw no gators, but plenty of snakes, frogs and spiders.