Quote:

 

Well, actually I just bought 1 on Amazon, 'Under the black flag' but I don't know if it's good.

William C. Davis

 

The Laffite operation grew increasingly sophisticated. The brothers even devised a means of introducing contraband goods directly into New Orleans aboard their own ships in broad daylight. It was deceptively simple. They would send La Diligent into port with a safe cargo or perhaps none at all, allowing a thorough search of the vessel without fear. Then the captain made out a manifest to cover the outgoing cargo he was taking on in port. However, whatever he loaded in his hold - and most likely it was innocent provisions for a voyage - on his manifest he listed goods the Laffites had at hand at Cat Island, counting on port authorities not to compare the inventory with the cargo when he left port. After all, the revenue agents were interested in what came into New Orleans, not what went out of it. Then the vessel sailed to the mouth of the Lafourche [a bayou with its other end near Cat Island] and took on the contraband, which now matched a cargo manifest signed and approved by the port inspector. The ship took the goods back to New Orleans, where all the paperwork was in order and there was nothing to show that the goods were prize merchandise taken by the privateers.

William C. Davis

 

That day he hired a printer to produce some handbills of his own that his associates put up in the night. When New Orleans awoke the next morning, citizens saw posted at the Exchange Coffee House and elsewhere a $1,000 reward offered for apprehending Governor Claiborne and delivering him to Cat Island. It was signed simply "Laffite." A memorandum at the bottom of the broadside stated that he was "only jesting & desired that no one would do violence to his Excellency."