Pierre Lafitte - Early Life

Early Life

Details of Lafitte's early life are scarce and often disputed. His brother Jean gave contradictory information about his birthplace, including time the French cities of St. Malo and Brest. However, as Jean Lafitte's biographer Jack C. Ramsay states, "this was a convenient time to be a native of France, a claim that provided protection from the enforcement of American law." Further contemporary accounts claim that Jean Lafitte was born in Orduna, Spain or even Westchester, New York. Ramsay speculates that Lafitte was actually born in the French territory Saint-Domingue (now Haiti).

It was not uncommon in the late 18th century for the adult children of the French landowners in Saint-Dominique to resettle in the Mississippi River delta, also owned by France. Families with the surname Lafitte are mentioned in Louisiana documents dating as early as 1765. According to Ramsay, Lafitte, his younger brother Jean, and their widowed mother journeyed from Saint-Dominique to New Orleans, Louisiana in the 1780s. Approximately 1784, his mother married Pedro Aubry, a New Orleans merchant; Jean stayed with his mother while Pierre was raised by extended family elsewhere in Louisiana.

Biographer William C. Davis reports a different childhood. According to his book, Lafitte was born in or near Pauillac, France. He was the son of Pierre Lafitte and Marie LaGrange, who married in 1769. LaGrange died the following year, likely while giving birth. The elder Pierre Lafitte remarried in 1775 to Marguerite Desteil; they had six children, including Jean Lafitte. The boys were likely given a basic education, and Pierre Lafitte later joined his father's trading enterprise.

The father died in 1796, and Davis speculates that the younger Pierre Lafitte journeyed to Saint-Domingue, a French colony in the Caribbean Sea. In May 1802 Lafitte requested a passport so that he could go "to Louisiana to join one of his brothers". As the Haitian Revolution became more violent, French citizens began leaving the islands. Lafitte, probably accompanied by an infant son, left the island aboard a refuge ship in early 1803.

Lafitte's ship landed in New Orleans, part of colonial French Louisiana. Records indicate that on March 21, 1803, Lafitte partnered with Joseph Maria Bourguignon to purchase a city lot, home, and outbuildings near Royal Street. The men were unable to pay their mortgage and returned the property three months later. In December 1803, Louisiana became a territory of the United States. The following year, Lafitte moved to Baton Rouge, located in Spanish-controlled West Florida.