The Savannah morning news., 1903-10-28
WHERE A PIRATE REIGNED.
FORMER REFUGE OF LAFITTE
NOW MARKED BY DEsOLATION.

for the American Cause-His Re-
treat Now Given Over to Beasts
and ReptiIes-TraditiOns of His
Adventurous Career That Cling
About Region.
From the Atlantic Monthly.
The student of American history
knows that among the defenders of
New Orleans in 1914 was Jean Laftte,
the pirate, with some hundreds of his
men, who came from their settlement
on the islands and cheniers about Ba-
rataria bay; he knows that when the
city had been saved these men were
granted a full pardon and that many
returned to civilized life. But the fate
OF the Barbarian settlement-that was
left to the students guess. So complete
was the region forgotten that the aver
age New Orleans citizen to-day has
little or no idea of the route to be pur-
sued in reaching it. Inquiries at hotel
and steamer offices gave me very little
4 help when one day in April 1 went to
4 and fro about the Crescent City asking
4 a way to reach the country of the pi-
i rates. At last l bethought myself of
4 shrimp, fish and turtles from Barataria.
u There, among dark-haired Hungarians
\ and fat-faCed French madams learn
ed the name of a little steamer which
4 plies back and forth in the Barataria
i trade.
4 The boat would leave in two days,
i said the kindly old gray-haired captain,
and would arrive at Grand Pass, be-
4 tween Grande Terre and Grande Isle,
i on the second day out
4 Amid Weird surroundings.
The vessel lay at the head of Har-
j vey's canal one of the little channels
4 by which luggers make their way to
4 the swamps and bayous and back again
to the river. The engine gave forth
/ putf-puff, puff-puffpaff, and we starte1
1 southwestWard from the city. The
/ reed covered marsh gave way to dense
4 cypress swamp, cypress whose limbs
were draped with long festoons of gray
/ Spanish moss. Turtles Scurried from
/ every fallen log. Water snakes swan
1 lazily along the shore. Huge garfish
/ jumped like trout, splashing the water
! in our front The huts of moss gather
/ ers, with their adornment of stupid,
wondering black faces, passed. Then
we issued upon an almost currentless
stream of brackish water-a stream
/ half as wide as the Hudson at Albany.
/ This was the Bayou OF Little -Baratarla.
Now we are approaching the country
of the pirates. The bayou branches
and branches again, and at one forklng
place there is a high shell mound and
about it's foot a modest extent of land
that rises always well above tldewater.
Here in the old days was L7fitteS chief
distributing point. BY dozen routes
COntraband could be brought from the
gulf to one of the cypress shaded pas
sages that led hither. And from here
he nrfa
leans the way was safe to follow ana
easy to guard. Here was the palace
royal of the buccaneer chief. Here IL
was that Lawyer Grymes, invited to
Barataria to receive his fee of $2O,OOO
for the defense of the younger Lahtte,
was wlned and dined by the most poi
ished gentlemen of the world" 1t was
back through the same bayou by which
We came that he went with his gold In
| splendid yawl 1t was at plantations
whose charred ruins we have seen that
he met hospitable planters and played
sinful games that left him to arrive In
4 New Orleans penniless and in debt.
LATTE Reigned Surpeme.
From here to the Gulf of Mexico ex-
tended the rule of LATTE. The sheu
heaps were his stations. The higher
land was settled by his followers. The
bayous were his routes of travel and
places of hiding. When piracy ceased
with the battle of Chalmette his peo-
pie improved the plantations that eX-
listed and made new ones on every Dit
OF land that rose high enough for TIL
ing. The old civilization was contln-
ued on a new basis. only little more
IN touch with Louisiana laws and tar
less in touch with Louisiana people
Than in the days of the freebooter.
1t is thirty-five miles by the most
direct bayou route from this point to
Grande Terre on the gulf coast. Yet
over the whole persists the personality
or Jean LATTE. 1t is a strange thing,
This immortality of strong characters.
one who has visited Mount Vernon
Ieels that Washington still lives. Al
monticello one finds Thomas Jefferson
alive in the traditions that connect him
with every object SO lives Lat1tte on
bay.
At the old distributing point near
Lake Salvador is a prehistoric smell
mound and on this beneath the I'VE
oaks lie two brothers. sons of a FOL
lower of LATTE, who even as late as
me civil War ruled over Baratarla
an the ruins of the old slave hospltal
iNes an ancient negro who served the
urothers as a slave. He brings them
~ lie and let's us see them in one
p11se of their piratical character
| H. Dolh mad n1ggan wives saiu
'e' ar yallah chilluns. De younges
ne ne die first We all niggahs hab to go
" oe funeral. De odder brudder ne
teau de sermon outn book. He read
a while an de Ill yallah chilluns CD
Ne Ne 9ead brudder all cry an say, On.
eauuy daddy' Den he stop readin' an
ny ny smut up, you d-n lii niggahs!
o JgM ne read some noah. Bimeby dc
a6niIluns cry ag'in an say, oh, daddy,
e Sauuy. Den he stop readin' az in an
Cat, smut up, yotI d--n lii niggahs!
sa SILL YOU alls femme read dis here
sermon fur you alls' d--n noise =?
A Native Legened.
70 from scene like this it is not far
-L,dnsport ourselves to the day when
brsioh and freebooting went hand IN /
Gu, Gu when a buccaneer captain would
sbtnPei MS crew to attend divine Wor-
bIalp. on Sunday; when he asked the
sei.ssIihg of heaven upon every voyage;
eau mat his prizes might be easily
pn 55'ured and heavily treasure laden
icas' me conquest complete, read serV-
OF thanksgiving.
Attie below this point, with It's