“Hitherto the Baratarians had been divided into factions, and there were constant dissensions and quarrels among them, but under Lafitte’s management all were united, and so daring and brazenly did they carry on their operations that within three years from the time the Lafitte brothers stepped ashore at New Orleans there was more commerce entering and leaving Barataria Bay than the port of New Orleans. Great warehouses rose above the low sand dunes of Grande-Terre; cargoes of slaves were weekly auctioned in the big slave market; from far and near merchants and dealers flocked to the smugglers’ stronghold to barter and trade, and it was evidently but a question of time before the Lafittes and their Baratarian friends would control all the import trade of the Mississippi Valley. “Becoming alarmed at the magnitude of operations, the federal government decided to break up the smugglers, and revenue cutters were dispatched to the bay. But the Baratarians’ spies were vigilant, word of the raid was brought, and the discomfited government officers returned empty-handed, without having accomplished anything worth while. Indeed, it was a common rumor in New Orleans that even the United States officials were in league with the Lafittes, and the wealthy, charming Frenchmen came and went, spent their money freely in New Orleans, drove about in splendid carriages and with magnificent horses, maintained expensive establishments, and snapped their slender, jeweled fingers at the authorities. “It was the greatest, most flagrant smuggling enterprise ever carried on in the history of the world, and at last Governor Claiborne of Louisiana decided to take drastic measures to suppress it. The penalties of the law for smuggling were evidently not severe enough to meet the case, and so, in 1813, the governor issued a proclamation in which he declared the Baratarians pirates, warned the citizens not to deal with them, and threatened to hang every one he could lay hands on. “But His Excellency might have saved his breath and his paper. Twirling gold-headed canes, decked in valuable jewels, attired in the most expensive and beautifully tailored clothes, the Lafitte brothers strolled nonchalantly through the streets and, surrounded by admirers, read with interest and amusement the official placards in which they were denounced as pirates. Then, to add insult to injury, they tacked up posters, advertising a slave auction to be held at Barataria, alongside the irate governor’s proclamations!