This text was obtained via automated optical character recognition.
It has not been edited and may therefore contain several errors.

---

Pirate House
Frederic, was a sea captain known in Louisiana as "Dominique You." One can visit his grave in St. Louis Cemetery, marked not by a cross but by the emblem of a "free mason.” Jean first went to sea under his brother's command.
We know something of how Zora raised him. Lafitte described her as training him "in the habits necessary to the development of a strong personality, prepared to face the vicissitudes of life with a firm and determined will and capable of ignoring all obstacles that would retard the development of my mind." Moreover, his grandmother had the ideals of the prophets, encouraging Jean to become a writer who would "unchain humanity and emancipate the poor from suffering and exploitation. But, though he was an accomplished writer, Jean chose the sword over the pen and this raises an uncomfortable point.
The Spanish ships Lafitte attacked were importing slaves from Africa - a trade illegal in Louisiana under American law. To the planters of Louisiana, he was a hero, because fresh slaves were in short supply. But in ugly truth, he was a slave smuggler. Yet Lafitte never forgot entirely his grandmother's ideals. After leaving Louisiana, he founded a utopian pirate's den near Galveston. In later years, he actually became an early labor leader in St. Louis, affiliated with the international Working Men's Association. In 1847 he met with Marx and Engels, writing, "I heartily support the two young men. I hope and pray that their projects may become joined in a strong doctrine to shake the foundations of the highest dynasties and leave them to be devoured by the lower masses."
He opened an escrow account in a Paris bank to aid them. There is even evidence that Lafitte tried to introduce Marx to the young Abraham Lincoln.
A Jew and a pirate, a slave smuggler and communist,a frequenter of cabarets and quadroon balls but a loyal family man, the contradictions blur and dazzle. As for how Jewish he was, let's
Page 5