Pioneer Jewish Texans

Appendices

a p p e n d i C e s There is some indication that Laffite was a Jew, and if this is true, his hatred of the inquisition could explain his acts of violence in attacking ships sailing under the flag of spain. according to stanley Clisby arthur in Jean Laffite, Gentleman Rover, on a flyleaf of Laffite’s family Bible, Laffite wrote (translated from the French), “i owe all my ingenuity to the great intuition of my grandmother, a spanish Jewess, who was a witness at the time of the inquisition.” This grandmother was responsible for rearing oneyear -old Jean and his siblings when their mother died in 1783 in Port au Prince, haiti, leaving eight children (three daughters and five sons). Jean was the youngest. Various sites have been named as Laffite birthplace, including Bordeaux, st. Malo, and Marseilles, France. when he was eighteen, Laffite married Christina Levine, of Jewish descent, a native of st. Croix, Virgin islands. Besides his grandmother Zora nadrimal, his maternal grandfather allegedly also became a victim of the inquisition, which persecuted, jailed, and tortured him before he died in prison at Zaragoza, spain, on september 9, 1760. To authenticate Mr. arthur, the author of this material, i interviewed several persons: Maurice ries of sarasota, Florida, who was with the Middle american research institute of Tulane University, new orleans, for eleven years (1931–1941) while writing for the Times-Picayune, New Orleans States, and New Orleans Item, said, “arthur was a newspaper man in new orleans in the 1930s, and so was i.” ries was also with the U.s. Department of state (1941–1943) and coordinator of inter-american affairs (1944–1946). From 1946 to 1948 he was director of the Laboratory of anthropology in santa Fe, new a p p e n d i x a Laffite a Jew? Mexico. ries stated that arthur was a man of education , did accurate research, and had integrity as a historian (interview with ries, 1984). winston de Ville of Mobile, alabama, a reliable researcher who has written on the spanish period in new orleans, took this viewpoint: “arthur was absolutely sold on the authenticity of it. i don’t know where to document it. none of us in historical circles gave any credence to it. The new orleans historical society did not ask to see the Bible. There is no record of the president then [1954] inquiring about it” (interview with de Ville, 1984). 276 appendices stanton Frazar, director of the historic new orleans Collection, and F. M. Jumonville, head librarian of the collection, referred to pages 121–129 of Great Forgers and Famous Fakes, by Charles hamilton, which states that John andrechyne Laffite (born John Laflin) manufactured his ancestral relationship to Jean Laffite with forgeries. hamilton quoted Charles van ravenswaay, former director of the Missouri historical society, who called Laflin’s materials “his obvious fabrication” and said arthur used some of these materials (interview with Frazar, 1984). The 1984 president of the Louisiana historical society , raymond samuel, whose field of expertise is the Battle of new orleans, questioned whether Laffite wrote the paragraphs in French about his Jewish ancestry during the spanish inquisition, which are reproduced in arthur’s book. said samuel, “experts have tried for years but have not been able to corroborate his ancestry ” (interview with samuel, 1984). (another source of information is the Parsons Collection, harry ransom humanities research Center, University of Texas at austin , for Laffite handwriting comparisons.) Dr. J. o. Dyer’s information on the de la Portas and Laffite is derived partly from primary source material from Dyer’s father’s business associate, a Colonel Graham of new orleans, who had actually visited Laffite in Galveston in 1818 (J. o. Dyer, Galveston News, september 19, 1923). Bertram w. Korn discusses the possibility of Laffite ’s being a Jew in his book The Early Jews of New Orleans, pp. 98–100, 296. a p p e n d i x B Goliad’s Edward Isaac Johnson an international Family Lawrence P. Johnson, who in 1981 was age seventyfive , recalled in an interview with me that edward isaac Johnson, who died at Goliad, was his grandfather ’s brother and that the family name originally was Disraeli, of the famous family that included Lord Beaconsfield. The name was changed under unusual circumstances. The Goliad martyr’s grandfather, a Britisher, saved the life of the Prince of wales, later...