Louis-Michel Aury
Louis-Michel Aury | |
---|---|
privateering and filibustering efforts to overturn governments in East Florida, Mexico, Spanish Texas, the Caribbean Sea, Central America, and South America | |
Military career | |
Allegiance | France |
Service/ | French Navy |
Years of service | 1802 or 1803–1811 |
Louis-Michel Aury (1788 – August 30, 1821) was a French privateer operating in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean during the early 19th century.
Early life
Louis Michel-Aury was born in Paris, France in the 1780s, likely between 21 July 1786 and 1788.
Louis Aury served in the French Navy from 1802 or 1803 until 1811 as a sailor on a ship stationed in the French colonies of the West Indies.[1] From 1802 he crewed on privateer ships, and by 1810 he had accumulated enough prize money to become the master of his own vessel. He participated in various privateering and filibuster efforts to overturn governments in East Florida, Mexico, Spanish Texas, the Caribbean Sea, Central America, and South America.
Evacuation of Cartagena de Indias
Aury decided to support the Spanish colonies of South America in their fight for independence from Spanish rule. In April 1813 he sailed from North Carolina on his own privateer ship with Venezuelan Letters of Marque to attack Spanish ships. He was then commissioned as a commodore in the navy of New Granada (now Colombia),[2] at considerable personal expense, in December 1815 ran the Spanish blockade[3] and evacuated hundreds of people in his vessels from the besieged fortress city of Cartagena de Indias (Colombia) to Haiti.[4] In spite of his success in this dangerous exploit he argued with Simón Bolívar, leader of the Latin American revolutionaries, over payment for his services in organizing the unsuccessful naval expedition to Los Cayos.[5]
Governor of Galveston
Aury subsequently accepted an appointment as resident commissioner of Galveston Island, Texas, made by José Manuel de Herrera, an envoy from the fledgling Republic of Mexico, who had declared Galveston a port of the Republic.[6] Aury established a privateering base there[7] in September 1816.
One of Aury's privateers had captured a Spanish vessel from
Amelia Island affair
However, while Aury was away, the pirate
Settlement in Old Providence and Saint Catherine islands
On 4 July 1818 Aury captured
Project to conquer Panama for France
With the merchants of Kingston, Benoît Chassériau and Jean-Baptiste Pavageau and the privateer shipowner Jean-Baptiste de Novion, Aury had imagined in 1820 conquering Panama, then the possession of Spain. This project aimed to give France the means to strengthen and secure its trade in this region of the world. Unofficially, the Minister of the Navy and the Colonies, Pierre-Barthélémy Portal d'Albarèdes, declined their bold offer.[17]
Attempts to liberate Central America
In 1820 Guatemala City was still the capital of the Captaincy General of Guatemala, so Central America was seen as yet under the sway of Spain, and thus was open to attack from its enemies. In an attempt to secure their independence, the Gran Colombian insurgents and the Aury flotilla fitted a combined sea and land expedition to operate against the ports of Omoa and Trujillo, in Honduras.
On 21 April 1820, the watch-tower at Capiro in Trujillo Port announced the approach of a Colombian flotilla. The port's garrison, commanded by
During the night of the 24th, the Aury vessels dropped out of sight. On the 25th the flotilla appeared off the port of Omoa and for several days attempted to land. Commodore Aury failed and left the area on the 6th of May.
Some historians, for example Miguel Ángel de Marco,
-
United Provinces of Central America
Death
A document drawn up by the justice of the peace and chief of police of the isles of Santa Catalina and Old Providence
Bibliography
- Une autre 'affaire de Panama' ou le projet de conquête de quatre Français en 1820 (Louis-Michel Aury, Benoît Chassériau, Jean Pavageau and Jean-Baptiste de Novion), by Jean-Baptiste Nouvion, Revue d'histoire diplomatique, Paris, Éditions A. Pedone, no 2, 2019 pp. 159–174
- History of Central America, by Hubert Howe Bancroft
- Rebel without a Cause : The adventure of Louis Aury, by Robert C. Vogel, Laffite Society Chronicles, VIII, Fevrier 2002
- Vida de Luis Aury : corsario de Buenos Aires en las luchas por la independencia de Colombia y Centroamérica, by Carlos A. Ferro, Tegucigalpa : Departamento de Relaciones Públicas de la Jefatura de Estado, 1973
- La Presencia de Luis Aury en Centro América, by Héctor Humberto Samayoa Guevara, Guatemala, 1965
References
- ^ Lancaster E. Dabney (October 1938). "Louis Aury: The First Governor of Texas Under the Mexican Republic". The Southwestern Historical Quarterly. 42. The University of Texas: 108. Retrieved 17 July 2013.
- ISBN 978-1-85109-411-0. Retrieved 17 July 2013.
- ^ Southwestern 1938, p. 112–113
- ISBN 978-0-547-35075-2. Retrieved 17 July 2013.
- ISBN 978-0-8071-2459-8. Retrieved 17 July 2013.
- ^ Edwin Wiley; Albert Bushnell Hart; Irving Everett Rines (1916). Lectures on the Growth and Development of the United States: illustrated. American Educational Alliance. p. 246. Retrieved 17 July 2013.
- ^ John Wymond; Henry Plauché Dart (1969). The Louisiana Historical Quarterly. The Louisiana Historical Society. p. 1091. Retrieved 17 July 2013.
- ^ Clarence Ousley (1900). Galveston in nineteen hundred: the authorized and official record of the proud city of the Southwest as it was before and after the hurricane of September 8, and a logical forecast of its future. W. C. Chase. p. 54. Retrieved 17 July 2013.
- ^ William Horace Brown (1906). The Glory Seekers: The Romance of Would-be Founders of Empire in the Early Days of the Great Southwest. McClurg. p. 237. Retrieved 17 July 2013.
- ^ The date for the expedition's departure is variously given as April 6, 7, or 16
- ^ Davis 2006, p. 324
- ^ British and Foreign State Papers. H.M. Stationery Office. 1837. pp. 789.
- ^ Great Britain. Foreign and Commonwealth Office (1837). British and foreign state papers. H.M.S.O. p. 771. Retrieved 4 May 2013.
- ISBN 978-0-8173-0880-3. Retrieved 17 July 2013.
- ^ Federal Writer's Project (1939). Florida: A Guide to the Southern-Most State. US History Publishers. p. 543.
- ^ Foreign and Commonwealth Office 1837, p. 773
- ^ [Une autre 'affaire de Panama' ou le projet de conquête de quatre Français en 1820 (Louis-Michel Aury, Benoît Chassériau, Jean Pavageau and Jean-Baptiste de Novion), par Jean-Baptiste Nouvion, Revue d'histoire diplomatique, Paris, Éditions A. Pedone, no 2, 2019 pp. 159–174
- ISBN 978-950-49-0944-6.
- ^ Buret de Longchamp (1826). Les fastes universels ou Tableaux historiques, chronologiques et géographiques avec atlas contenant trois grands tableaux synoptiques ... suivis de 42 tableaux particuliers ... nouvel art de vérifier les dates. J. B. Dupon. p. 335. Retrieved 17 July 2013.
- ^ Southwestern 1938, p. 116
External links
- Aury Website
- Aury Biography
- Louis Michel Aury international, very good multilanguage page
- Louis Michel Aury (Spanish), very complete Spanish page
- Louis Michel Aury (French), very complete French page