A BUCCANEER FAMILY IN SPANISH EAST TEXAS:
A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF CAPTAIN JAMES AND MARY SABINAL CAMPBELL
By W. T. Block
Copyrighted byTexas Gulf Historical and Biographical Record, XXVII, No. 1
(1991)
Very little credible history has ever been written about the
buccaneering epoch of Galveston Island, Texas, because so very few primary or authentic
sources are known to exist. The men who lived and survived that era rarely talked about
their experiences for fear of self-incrimination that might provoke a charge of piracy
against them. As one early Galveston Island historian acknowledged: "(I)t is
impossible to get any of those daring privateers to divulge anything throwing any light
upon the life and career of their commander (Jean Lafitte) or relate any incidences of
their own lives..."1
Up until 1856, at least four former buccaneers, James Campbell, Stephen
Churchill, John Lambert, and Benjamin Dollivar, lived at Galveston, and a fifth, Charles
Cronea, resided on Bolivar Peninsula. And nothing infuriated those men more than to be
referred to as former "pirates." Each of them insisted that he was an
ex-privateer, while a member of a ship's crew carrying legitimate letters of marque from
one of the infant Latin-American republics of Mexico, New Cartegena (Colombia), Venezuela,
or La Plata (Argentina). Likewise, they compared their activities against the Spanish with
those of many American privateer captains who harassed British merchant shipping during
the American Revolution and the War of 1812.
The subjects of this monograph, Captain James and Mary Sabinal
Campbell, were extremely unusual in that they comprised a Galveston Island buccaneering
family in Spanish East Texas, Mary as a devoted wife who lived in Jean Lafitte's corsair
commune of Campeachy for almost four years, and her husband, Captain James Campbell, who
battled every Spanish galleon he could find afloat while cruising the Gulf of Mexico in
his privateer, the Hotspur. Actually, Campbell served Lafitte aboard four different
privateers, two of which bore the name of Hotspur, another was the Concord, and the fourth
name is unknown. In addition, both Campbell's and his wife's memoirs survive, the latter
in a copy of Galveston Daily News for 1879, and the former related his experiences to
Mirabeau B. Lamar in 1855.2 Another major source of information about the
Campbells, thirteen legal-size pages, which also include copies of their baptism and
marriage certificates, is the War of 1812 Pension File of James Campbell, No. WC-30-345,
in the National Archives.
James Campbell was born in Kerry County, Ireland, in 1786, but
resettled with his parents in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1790.3 At age
fourteen, he became a bound apprentice of ten years duration to a sail maker named Kesterd
at Donnell's Wharf in Baltimore.4 Early in 1812, Campbell enlisted in the
United States Navy and was assigned as a sail maker aboard the U. S. S. Constitution,
commanded by Commodore Isaac hull. On August 19, 1812, Campbell served as a gunner during
thirty minutes of violent cannonading, which dismasted the British frigate Guerriere and
won for the Constitution the nickname of Old Ironsides. Encyclopedia Britannica wrote that
since the affray was "considered the most important single victory in U. S. Naval
annals, the defeat of the Guerriere united the nation behind the war effort and destroyed
the legend of British naval invincibility."5
Early in 1813, James Campbell was reassigned as sail maker to Commodore
Oliver Hazard Perry, who was building a Lake Erie naval squadron at Erie, Pennsylvania. On
September, 10, 1813, Campbell served as a gunner when Perry's squadron engaged the British
fleet during the Battle of Lake Erie, offshore from Sandusky, Ohio. Campbell stayed aboard
the flagship Lawrence until that vessel began sinking, after which he helped row the
commodore to the Niagara, shortly before the English fleet surrendered. The Baltimore
sailore was then reassigned to the U. S. S. Constitution, but served aboard the U. S. S.
Constellation as well, prior to his discharge at the end of his naval enlistment early in
1814.6
Campbell then sailed aboard a merchant vessel to New Orleans, where he
soon met Jean Lafitte and two Spanish filibusterers, Xavier Mina and Don Luis de Aury. The
later operated a fleet of privateers, which were based at Galveston Island and preyed upon
Spanish galleons, and Mina raised a filibustering army that invaded Mexico, where Mina was
captured and executed for treason.7
Mary Campbell was probably born in 1799, at Crow's Ferry, Sabine River,
Texas (north of Sabinetown, Sabine County), along a well-travelled road between Spanish
Nacogdoches and Natchitoches, Louisiana. Her father, named Chabineaux, had operated the
ferry prior to Isaac Crow, who soon became her step-father, the former having been killed
in 1801 when a horse, crossing the ferry, kicked him. Mary's maiden name has appeared in
three different spellings--Sabinal,8 Savanno,9 and
Chireno,10 and the writer knows only that each was a corruption of her
Acadian name of Chabineaux (recorded on a Spanish census). Mary Sabinal was illiterate,
there having been no schools available on the frontier that she could attend, which
probably contributed to the variety of spellings. And it appeared that she generally
carried her step-father's surname, since in the Atascosita Census of 1826, she styled
herself as "Mary Crow, wife of James Campbell."11
Mary Sabinal first met James Campbell late in 1814, when she was
visiting in Natchitoches, La., and Campbell was smuggling trade goods up the Red River.
She invited him to visit her at Crow's Ferry whenever he could.12
Campbell then returned to New Orleans and signed aboard the Hotspur, a Colombian flag
vessel. Its master, a former United States naval officer named Rapp, held a privateer's
commission from the revolutionary republic of Colombia, and he sailed in the service of
Don Luis de Aury of Galveston Island.
Early in 1815, the Hotspur fought two Spanish cruisers off the Cuban
coast, an uneven battle that saw the grappling hooks of both cruisers attached to the
Hotspur, and blood and bodies strewn over three decks. The Hotspur finally broke loose
from them, sailed for Belize, British Honduras, to discharge wounded crewmen still aboard,
one of whom was James Campbell. He spent several months of the year 1815 recovering from
his wounds, after which Campbell decided to try his luck once more at coastal smuggling.13
One day early in 1816, Campbell arrived at Crow's Ferry on the Sabine
River in a single-masted sailing sloop loaded with smuggled wares that he had bought on
credit from Aury. According to Mary Campbell, he "soon rendered himself quite the
favorite...by virtue of his good humor and the narration...of his haps and mishaps on land
and sea." Following a whirlwind courtship, Mary and James were married in a bond
ceremony, and Campbell settled down to a life as a farmer and stockman.14
Earlier, Mary had inherited some livestock from her father, and the
increase had grown to 300 cattle and a large herd od swine by 1816. James Campbell,
however, could not adjust to the life of a farmer-stockman, the call of the sea forever
beckoning, and when one of Lafitte's recruiters stopped off at Crow's Ferry in the spring
of 1817, James soon convinced his young wife that Galveston Island was where they
belonged. One day in June, 1817, the Campbells arrived at Bolivar Peninsula with a wagon
load of household goods, 300 cattle, and a large herd od swine that they had driven
overland, and Campbell built a bonfire to signal Lafitte for ferriage across the bay.15
Mary soon discovered that Jean Lafitte's town of Campeachy had been
built on the burned-out ruins of de Aury's old camp, on the bay side overlooking Pelican
Island (or "Little Campeachy," where later Lafitte hanged the pirate George
Brown to a scaffold). She found the town contained about one hundred crudely-built huts,
sometimes with glass windows, usually with only sail cloth covering the windows. Although
the population numbered only about 100 persons in June, 1817, it soon increased to 800
people or more by year's end. The town had a mixed population of whites and mulattoes, was
of many nationalities and languages, and had only two wives living there, but an
assortment of mistresses. She always referred to Lafitte as "the old man,"
although Lafitte was only nine years older than her husband. She described Lafitte as
being six feet tall, of dark complexion, handsome, black hair with sideburns and hazel
eyes. The only time she ever saw him wear a gun was when Lafitte expected an attack from a
rebellious officer, John Marotte.16 Mary also noted that, despite the odd
mixture of races, nationalities, and tongues, "they were, as a general thing,
friendly toward each other, bickerings and hard feelings among the families being of rare
occurrence...; and society at Galveston Island, whatever may be said of its morals, began
to have the elements of permanency..."17
The year 1818 brought two particularly distasteful episodes at
Campeachy, a devasting hurricane in September that left many dead, and many houses and
ships destroyed. During the storm, Lafitte left the "Maison Rouge" (or "Red
House"), his well-provisioned and fortified headquarters, to the women and children
and took up residence aboard the Tonnere, a privateer at anchor, most probably aground, in
the bay. Earlier Campeachy had been attacked by 200 blood-thirsty Karankawa Indians, who
sought revenge after one of their squaws had been stolen by a buccaneer. The pirates soon
drove them off with artillery.
About the same time, a General L'Allemande, who formerly had been one
of Napoleion's commanders, had resettled a number of Frenchmen on the Trinity River, a
colony that soon had to be removed to Galveston. President James Monroe had taken a dim
view of the French encroachment, and he sent George Graham, his Secretary of War, to
Galveston to investigate the French situation as well as the buccaneering commune, about
which he had received so many complaints from the Spanish ambassador. When Lafitte
returned from New Orleans, where he had gone to seek a loan to repair storm damage, he
found Graham preparing the presidential report that would soon signal the end of the
pirate sanctuary.18
Throughtout the year 1817, Lafitte kept James Campbell ashore
performing administrative duties, considering him as too young to command men under fire.
Campbell served at first as assistant to Ramon Espagnol, Lafitte's treasurer and secretary
of state. Later Lafitte established a "new tribunal for law breakers and
criminals," sometimes referred to as his admiralty court, and Campbell was one of
five men assigned as "staff officers," or judges, of that court. At one time,
Campbell was placled in charge of the "Bolivar Port Depot." Lafitte's esteem for
James Campbell waxed stronger, while his lack of trust in the conspirators who surrounded
him grew as well, as is voiced in the following quote:
. . . Mr. James Campbell became one of my best secret officers,
beginning in the year 1817. I liked and trusted him very much, as I had known him for a
long time. He was from Baltimore, and had been a good sailor on American warships in the
wars against England. Captain Campbell, like most good Americans, detested land-holding
thieves. He had no respect for D. C. Patterson and others who had stolen my goods.....19
Every other Lafitte ship captain brought a load of African slaves to
Galveston, captured from some Spanish "guineaman" (slave ship), and Lafitte had
to build barracoons or slave pens on Galveston island capable of holding 1,000 slaves.
Campbell noted that of 308 Africans that he once brought there on one of his earlier
voyages, 200 were bought by a single planter, Guy Champlain of Mississippi.20
In 1853, John Bowie admitted that he and his brothers, James and Rezin Bowie, had realized
a $65,000 profit from the sale of 1,500 illegal Africans purchased from Lafitte at
Galveston between 1818 and 1820, and resold principally in Louisiana.21
(For years, Texans thought that 90 Africans adopted into the Comanche tribe were escaped
American slaves, but instead, they were African slaves captured from the Bowie brothers
while the latter were en route overland from Galveston Island to the Sabine River.) In
fact, it was James Campbell who convinced Lafitte that he should build slave barracks on
the lower Sabine River, north of present-day Orange, Texas, in order to market directly to
the Louisiana sugar planters. And in 1836, W. F. Gray, while fleeing in the Runaway Scrape
in the vicinity of present-day Deweyville, Texas, observed that: "...This is one of
Lafitte's old stations...Here stands an old shed, part of the shelter constructed for the
African slaves that he (Lafitte) used to bring here..."22
Finally, in 1818, Lafitte placed Campbell in command of the schooner
Concord, a 120-ton privateer, carrying five guns and seventy-five men, and sent the vessel
to sea. On a six-weeks cruise, Campbell captured five Spanish prizes, along with $100,000
in gold doubloons, silver and cargo, hardware and dry goods of equal value, all of whih he
sent or carried back to Galveston. On the second voyage, he captured a Spanish 'guineaman'
and its cargo of 308 slaves. His memoirs do not reveal any subsequent voyages or the fate
of the Concord, but the schooner probably was one of Lafitte's fourteen privateers that
sank at Galveston during the hurricane of September, 1818.23
From the time of his first cruise on, James Campbell soon led Lafitte's
ship captains in the quantity of booty and volume of prizes returned to Campeachy, all of
which increased his stature in the eyes of Campeachy's pirate chieftain and added to the
envy and enmity of the other captains. True to his Scotch-Irish blood, Campbell loved a
fair fight, but he always pressed his Spanish adversary to the fullest advantage and with
every cannonball at his command. According to Mary Campbell, her husband always treated
his Spanish captives mercifully and put them ashore at the first opportunity.24
And Charles Cronea, who sailed as cabin boy on Campbell's last cruise in 1820, once said
that he had "never seed {sic} a single man murdered" while he was aboard
Campbell's brigantine.25
During her long stay on Galveston Island, Mary Campbell gave birth to
her first child, a still-born daughter, long before Ann Long gave birth on Bolivar
Peninsula. Life was particularly lonesome for Mary, since her husband remained at sea for
long periods of time. Lafitte's ships kept Campeachy well-provisioned with supplies from
New Orleans, in addition to those captured at sea, much of which were luxuries such as
were rarely ever seen on the East Texas or Western Louisiana frontiers.26
Mary also witnessed the gibbeting of the pirate malfactor, Captain
George Brown. The corsair camp attracted human garbage like wharf rats to cheese, and Mrs.
Campbell considered it inevitable that some of the privateering captains would disgrace
Lafitte's operation by commiting piracy on American shipping. For a long time, Lafite had
refused to commission Brown, whom Lafitte distrusted, or Brown's schooner, which Lafitte
considered as too small to be seaworthy. After much harangue on Brown's part, Lafitte
finally relented and sent him to sea with guns and men, but Lafitte warned Brown that he
would hang him if he engaged in piracy on anything other than Spanish shipping.
Brown's first criminal act was the theft of several slaves from a
plantation on the Bayou Queue de Tortue near Lake Charles, Louisiana, which alerted the
United States revenue cutter Lynx. Soon afterward, Brown attacked an unarmed American
merchant ship near Sabine Pass, Texas. In turn, Brown's schooner was quickly engaged by
the cutter Lynx, which had witnessed the affair and succeeded in driving the pirate ship
on the beach. Eventually Brown and four of his crew made it back to Galveston, where Brown
was condemned by Lafitte's court and hanged, and Lafitte surrendered the other four
crewmen to the captain of the Lynx.27
As time advanced, Lafitte's trust in his young lieutenant, James
Campbell, blossomed even more, whereas his mistrust of the conspiring cutthroats that
surrounded him continued to mount in correlation. At intervals, Campbell was sent on
secret missions to New Orleans to negotiate with bankers, merchants, lawyers, and others.
Every notation that Lafitte wrote in his journal about Campbell contained words of praise,
such as "Captain Campbell was a loyal Irishman," or "Captain Campbell was a
fine, brave man."28
After the loss of the Concord, Lafitte sent Campbell back to sea as
second officer aboard a privateer owned and captained by John Marotte. Lafitte especially
mistrusted Marotte and expected Campbell to keep tab on the captain's activities. The
privateers soon captured three prizes while patrolling off Mantanzas, Cuba, a slave ship
loaded with Africans, and two galleons loaded with dry goods, silver plate, coins, and
merchandise equal to $200,000 in value. Upon reaching Galveston, Marotte unloaded the
slaves and some merchandise, but he claimed the cargo of silver, coins, and other
valuables had been lost overboard, whereas Campbell informed Lafitte that those items were
hidden in secret compartments on Marotte's schooner. When Lafitte accused Marotte of
falsely reporting to him, the latter challenged Lafitte to a duel. As each prepared to
pull the trigger, however, Marotte relented and confessed to his trickery. It is
noteworthy that Campbell's memoirs, as dictated to Mirabeau B. Lamar in 1855, ended the
Marotte affair at that point., According to Lafitte's journal, however, Lafitte and
Campbell were aboard the privateer Saragosa ten days later when Marotte and others
attempted to assassinate them. Instead, so Lafitte noted, Campbell fired the shot that
killed Marotte, whereas others of Lafitte's bodyguards quickly disposed of the remaining
conspirators.29
During the summer of 1819, Lafitte sent James Campbell to Baltimore to
superintendend the rigging and completion of a fleet, new vessel, a type of warship that
became popular among the American privateers of the War of 1812. Campbell made no mention
of that ship in his memoirs, but both Charles Cronea and Mary Campbell referred to it as
an "hermaphrodite brig" in their memoirs. (With cargo space sacrificed for
speed, such a combination schooner-brigintine or topsail schooner was square-rigged on the
foremast, schooner-rigged as well on both the fore and main masts, and carried its full
complement of jib sails and topsails; in other nautical terms, it had "all wings and
no feet".) The schooner was equipped with six guns, which Cronea described as a
"long Tom aft, two carronades on each side, and a bow-chaser on the forecastle. The
flag that we flew was the Carthegenian colors {Republic of Cartegena or Colombia}..."30
Charles Cronea was only fourteen years of age when he became the cabin
boy on the second of Campbell's vessels to bear the name Hotspur. Earlier, Cronea and
fourteen other Frenchmen, including an officer named Gustave Duval, had deserted a warship
of the Franch Navy in New York harbor. They then signed aboard a ship that was actually
recruiting crews for Lafitte's privateers, and each of the Frenchmen volunteered for
privateering duties. In April, 1820, the fifteen Frenchmen rendezvoused with the Hotspur
at Padre Island, Texas, at a time when Campbell had only forty crelwmen aboard, only half
enough men to man his guns properly. Within a short time, Campbell would make Duval the
Hotspur's first mate, a decision that James Campbell would regret for the remainder of his
life.
Cronea would remain at sea aboard the Hotspur for the next eight
months, although the privateer had already been at sea for two months when the Frenchmen
came aboard. At first, James Campbell introduced himself to the Franchmen as "Mr.
Carroll," but as time advanced, his true identity became known to everyone. One of
Cronea's accounts is the best record of Campbell as a disciplinarian, and Cronea noted
that for one of his minor infractions, spilling a bucket of water on Campbell's feet, the
latter "grabbed me by the ears, bounced me up and down on the deck a few times, then
he stood me upon the breech of a pivot gun and made me stand there about a half-hour
without falling off..."31
Cronea added that Campbell captured a number of Spanish craft, and
usually a shot fired across the bow of a Spanish galleon was sufficient to force it to
surrender. The captors would then remove all valuables, including all rum, tobacco, food,
and fresh water, before scuttling or burning the captured ship. The former cabin boy also
added that:
. . . Sometimes a Spaniard would show fight, and our gunners would put
a round shot into her. Then you should hear the Spanish yell and holler at us. They always
surrendered quickly after that. A good many people think we used to cut throats and make
those we captured walk the plank, but that is all a lie. I never saw a man murdered while
I was with Campbell.....32
During the late fall of 1820, Gustave Duval entered into a conspiracy
with Tomas Cox and James Clark, the latter two being deck officers, along with all the
Frenchmen except Cronea who had boarded the Hotspur at Padre Island, with intent to seize
control of the ship, kill the remainder of the crew, and divide all the spoils of battle
that were aboard. The mutiny was planned to take place while the conspirators were on
watch and Captain Campbell and the remainder of the crew were below deck. The
conspirators, however, began drinking rum before the mutiny began, and when Campbell came
up on deck, the only one who was sober enough to do so attacked him with a knife. Campbell
quickly returned below deck and armed his loyal crewmen with guns. Eventually all of the
conspirators were killed, but not before two of the loyal crewmen were killed and others
wounded. The Hotspur soon ran aground in Southwest Louisiana near the mouth of the
Mermentau River. At that time, Cronea deserted the wreck at Grand Chenier, La., where he
lived and married before moving back to Texas. Campbell devoted only three lines to the
Duval mutiny in his memoirs, it being seemly painful for him to admit during his old age
to the people he may have killed or that conspirators could wish to assassinate him.
Neither Cronea in 1892 or Mary Campbell in 1879 mentioned the incident in their memoirs,
but Cronea did relate a detailed account to Ben C. Stuart, an early Galveston News
reporter, who later published the story.33
Campbell managed to save only a few of the valuables aboard the
Hotspur, but upon his return to Galveston Island, Lafitte gave him command of another
privateer. However, the days of the corsair commune were numbered, and Campbell never put
to sea again as a pirate. One day in January, 1821, an American flag vessel appeared off
Galveston Island, and Lafitte sent Campbell offshore to investiage. The incoming vessel
was the United States frigate Enterprise, under Lieutenant Kearney, who had orders to
evict the pirates from Galveston Island. Kearney went ashore, wined and dined with Jean
Lafitte, and after Kearney presented President Monroe's proclamation to Lafitte, the
latter agreed to the burn the town and abandon it at the end of three months.34
By April, 1821, no trace was left of Lafitte's town of Campeachy except for a few charred
ruins.
Lafitte entreated James and Mary Campbell to leave with him, but they
declined, choosing instead to sail to New Orleans with their ship, with what valuables and
personal possessions they could salvage. The ex-privateer sold his schooner to a slave
smuggler, bought a stock of merchandise, and for about a year he lived the life of a
respectable merchant. Again, however, the call of the sea beckoned, and once more,
Campbell bought a small schooner named the Creole, upon which he and Mary sailed back to
Texas. They settled for awhile on the lower Sabine River at Pine Bluff (now Orange,
Texas), where they farmed and raised livestock. A year later, they moved to the Trinity
River, the exact location not identified by Mary Campbell's affadavit, but she did mention
that their neighbors and closest friends were the R. O. W McManus family.35
Miriam Partlow, a Liberty historian, identified McManus as one of the pioneers of Moss
Bluff, south of Liberty, but others believe the Campbells lived at Lake Charlotte, close
to Wallisville. While living in Liberty County in 1826, both Campbell and his wife (listed
as "Mary Crow, wife of James Campbell") were enumerated in the Atascosita Census
of that year.36 They were still living there a year later, November,
1827, when James Campbell was one of 72 "squatters" in the Atascosita District,
or Municipality of Liberty, who petitioned Don Anastacio Bustamente, commanding general of
Mexico's Internal Eastern Provinces, for land titles to the land they were farming.37
The Atascosita Census was another example of the problem historians can
have with people's ages. Mrs. Campbell gave her husbands's age in 1826 as 35, indicating
that his birth year was probably 1791. In her memoirs, she admitted that her busband was
27 when the Battle of Lake Erie was fought, which indicated that his birth year was 1786.
In the Atascosita Census, Mary gave her own age as 31, which indicated her birth year was
probably 1795. Her obituary of January 7, 1994, gave her age as 84, revealing that she was
probably born in 1799. In the 1860 census of Galveston County, she stated her age as
fifty-six.38
About 1828 or 1829, the Campbell family moved to Double Bayou in
present day Chambers County, to a point about five miles south of Anahuac, and Campbell
was still there when the Mexican commandant, Colonel John Davis Bradburn jailed William
Barret Travis and other Texas patriots. On November 9, 1831, James and Mary Campbell were
baptized by Anahuac's Catholic priest, Father Michael Muldoon, who styled himself on the
baptismal certificate as "Pastor of Austin's Colony and Vicar General of the Foreign
Colonies of Texas." The infamous commandant, Colonel Bradburn, stood as godfather for
the ceremony.39
On the same date, the Campbells were one of 25 couples who were married
in Roman Catholic rites byFather Muldoon at Anahuac, perhaps a part of an effort for all
of them to qualify for land grants.40 It is likewise of interest to note
that their marriage date, November 9, 1831, was certainly a festive occasion at Anahuac,
with a speech by David G. Burnett, a state dinner and ball, as well as other "royal
entertainment" to honor Mexican General Manuel Mier y Teran, a commander of Mexico's
Eastern Provinces, on the occasion of his last official visit to Anahuac.41
By 1834 or 1835, James and Mary Campbell had moved to a place then
known as Deer Island, then one of the western-most islands in Galveston Bay near
present-day Texas City. While living there in 1836, Campbell was visited by an old
ex-buccaneer friend with whom he had sailed nearly 20 years earlier. He was Captain
William Cochrane, who commanded a Mexican warship in Galveston Bay, whose mission was to
supply the army of General Antonio Lopez de Santa Ana's army. Cochrane was master of a
Mexican privateer in 1821, before Mexico's peace with Spain was established, and he
continued in the Mexican naval service during the intervening years. Cochrane was probably
trying to induce Campbell to accept a command in the Mexican Navy, but if so, he failed.
Mary Campbell made the following deposition in 1880 about their stay on Deer Island, as
follows:
. . . From Chambers County we moved on the Deer Island, now in
Galveston County, Texas..., that in June, 1837, James Campbell, after visiting New
Orleans, returned from there on the schooner Creole with a cargo of groceries and general
merchandise, having put all his capital in said stock, that in the fall of the year 1837,
all of our goods with everything else we possessed was swept away by a severe storm, and
after that, we left said Deer Island and moved on Galveston Bay...on Swan Lake near
Virginia Point (now Texas City)...42
One Galveston historian noted that: "...Six of Lafitte's men
stayed here (in Galveston) when the pirate fleet left on March 3, 1821. James Campbell was
one; Stephen Churchill was another..."43 Stephen Churchill, John
Lambert, and Benjamin "Crazy Ben" Dollivar had lived in Galveston for 20 or more
years each between 1827 and 1855. Campbell lived at Virginia Point, opposite the West Pass
Ferry, where his house was the only habitation visible for miles, and Charlie Cronea
settled at Rollover, on Bolivar Peninsula, in 1875. The sixth person referred to by the
historian was Captain Roach (or De la Roche), but the writer has no other information
about him. All of them were most uncommunicative about their careers with Lafitte, but in
each other's presence, they freely reminisced about the old buccaneering days. Dollivar,
whose "intellect was impaired," was the only one who had profited from his
buccaneering past, and daily over a span of two or more decades, he visited a local
saloon, where he always paid for his drinks with a single gold doubloon. However hard they
may have tried, Galvestonians were never able to dislodge from old Ben the source of his
Spanish gold.44
The first ex-buccaneer to return to Galveston Island in 1827, whose
family lived there alone for eight years, was Stephen Churchill, who built his cabin on
the island's east end. Churchill had been Lafitte's bar pilot for the East Pass channel,
and he continued as East Pass bar pilot for years for the Mexican government. In 1836, M.
B. Menard and the Galveston City Company proprietors deeded to Churchill without cost the
lot upon which his house was located (lot 14, block 70). in 1839, Churchill relocated to
the island's west end, where he and his son operated the West Pass ferry until Churchill's
death in 1855. Since Campbell resided at Virginia Point, opposite the ferry, he could
visit with Churchill weekly, or however often Campbell carried his wagon loads of cotton
and farm produce to the Galveston markets.45
John Lambert, another ex-buccaneer with whom Campbell often visited,
was a tall and powerful man, who for many years was one of Galveston's leading butchers.
Eventually, he returned to Mobile, Alabama, where he also died. However, Campbell and
Lambert had not served together at sea or on Galveston Island. Lambert had only served on
Lafitte's privateers operating out of Barataria Bay, Louisiana, prior to 1814. Lambert had
also fought at the Battle of New Orleans, but Lambert quit the sea after Lafitte and his
men won presidential pardons.46
There is one other record of James Campbell in Galveston Bay. In 1827,
Nicholas Clopper (who later resided at Clopper's Point) and others left New Orleans en
route to Texas aboard the small schooner Little Zoe. Upon entering Galveston Bay through
the West Pass, they met "Jim Campbell and -- Roach, two of Lafitte's captains,"
(who presumably were aboard the Creole), who advised Clopper that the best channel by far
for entering into Galveston Bay was the East Pass Channel.47
In 1838, James and Mary Campbell settled on the one-third league of
land (1,476 acres) on Campbell's Bayou at Swan Lake, Virginia Point, where they were to
maintain their home for the remainder of their lives. And after reaching age fifty-two in
1838, Jim Campbell was to settle down to the life of farmer and stockman that previously
he had so disdained. By 1840, the couple had a daughter and son, but only about three of
their children were to survive their childhood years to reach adulthood.48
All of James Campbell's memoirs, as might be expected, chronicle his
life at sea and almost nothing ashore. Inversely, Mary Campbell's memoirs describe their
lives, mostly her life, ashore and almost nothing of his life afloat. After decades of
silence, the writer believes that Jim Campbell knew he was terminally ill in 1855, being
the reason he finally chose to dictate his memoirs to Mirabeau Lamar. One article of 1878
noted that, from the time of his arrival at Virginia Point, Jim Campbell "led a
quiet, peaceable life and was a good citizen." Ben C. Stuart, another early Galveston
writer, also recounted that James Campbell "live a quiet life while a citizen of
Galveston County and made a good citizen."49
Without a doubt, the person who probably came to know James Campbell
best during the latter's declining years, some of which were lived as his neighbor, was
James P. Sherwood. Sherwood first met Campbell in 1838, when the former was driving a
small herd of cattle near Virginia Point as night was approaching. Campbell's cabin being
the only house in sight on the prairie, Sherwood stopped and asked for permission to spend
the night, "which was peremptorily refused." Sherwood then explained that he
otherwise had no choice but to sleep on the prairie without any supper since he could not
put the cattle on the ferry for Galveston until the next morning.
"Whose cattle are those?" Campbell inquired, as his eye balls
scanned the herd's flanks for cattle brands.
"They belong to Messrs. Morse and Clark, the butchers in
Galveston," Sherwood replied.
"Good!" Campbell responded. "I know them and they are
gentlemen who would not deal in stolen cattle. You can spend the night here."
When Campbell found out that Sherwood was an unemployed shipwright, who
had served his apprenticeship on Donnell's Wharf in Baltimore, and even knew the sail
maker named Kesterd to whom Campbell had once been a bound apprentice, a close friendship
developed between the two men that did not end until Campbell's death in 1856. They spent
many hours together discussing early life in Baltimore, and Campbell even felt comfortable
discussing his privateering past with Sherwood. In 1880, Sherwood wrote the long,
four-page affadavit about his friendship with James Campbell, that accompanied Mary
Campbell's pension application and is now a part of James Campbell's War of 1812 File No.
WC-30-345 in the National Archives. Sherwood observed that Campbell "was a very
reserved man, would not talk much unless he became well-acquainted with a person (and)....
was a man of sterling integrity..."50
On May 27, 1856, the Galveston Weekly News carried the following
obituary, under the caption of:
. . .Death Of An Old Pioneer---Died at his residence, near Virginia
Point, on the 5th inst., in the seventieth year of his age, James Campbell. Campbell
enlisted to join Commordore Perry on Lake Erie; reaching Philadelphia, he was transferred
to the Constitution and participated in the brilliant engagement with the Guerriere. He
afterward joined Lafitte and was his favorite lieutenant at this place over thirty years
ago. Campbell always spoke of Lafitte as sailing under letters of marque; that he was a
highly honorable man and a privateer, but unhesitatingly denied the general impression
that he was a pirate. Many times Campbell had, in this vicinity, frequent skirmishes with
the (Karankawa) Indians....He was the last of Lafitte's men left on this Bay.....51
Mary Campbell continued to live on her farm with her unmarried son,
Warren Campbell, who was born in 1840. Her married daughter, Mrs. Solomon Parr, resided in
Galveston. The writer believes too that there was a second Campbell son who reached
adulthood and married, but he has no other information. In 1860, Mrs. Campbell valued her
1,476 acres of land at $5,000, or about $3 an acre, and her personal property amounted
only to $500, probably the valued of farm impliments and livestock, but certainly not
enough money to include the value of slaves. It seems rather ironic that a man who had no
earlier compunctions about capturing, transporting, and trafficking in some one else's
slaves might choose not to own slaves himself. However, the Atascosita Census of 1826
revealed that James Campbell owned no slaves, and a search of the Galveston County census,
Schedule II, Slaves, for both 1850 and 1860, did not locate any slaves belonging to either
James or Mary Campbell.52 In 1879, Mary dictated her memoirs which
occupied two full columns in the Galveston Daily News. And in June, 1880, she dictated her
memoirs once more, stating that she was indigent and hoped to obtain a Federal pension,
and the latter memoirs are now in the National Archives.
After a long period of ill health, Mary Campbell died at her home on
Virginia Point on January 5, 1884, at age 84, survived only by her son Warren and
daughter, Mrs. Parr, both of Galveston. Again the Galveston Daily News devoted an entire
column to her obituary, but it was largely a repetition of the 1879 article. The obituary
closed with her words about Lafitte that she had repeated on many occasions before, that
left no doubt of her feelings and fondness for "the old man" (Lafitte), as
follows:
. . . Of her husband's commander, she was never known to speak save in
terms of kindness and with respect. That he (Jean Lafitte) was a smuggler and slaver might
have been -- that he was a privateer, certainly; but that he was a pirate -- NEVER! Such
was the old lady's firm and unshaken position toward the memory of Lafitte!53
Seldom in the annals of early Texas history have the lives of an
ordinary frontier couple been so thoroughly documented, which is all the more amazing,
considering that one marriage partner was illiterate and perhaps the other as well. And
never before in the annals of American history have the lives of a buccaneering couple
been so well documented as well. Actually, five sets of memoirs survive; those of James
Campbell in the Lamar Papers; Mary Campbell in the Galveston Daily News; Mary Campbell in
the National Archives; James P. Sherwood in the National Archives; and Charles Cronea,
memoirs in the Galveston Daily News, editions of 1893 and 1909, in addition to long
obituaries of both James and Mary.
James and Mary Campbell are the only Texas family who spent four long
years in Lafitte's corsair commune and lived to tell about it, let alone see it in print.
The experience certainly affected Jim Campbrll since, until shortly before he died, he was
ever reluctant to establish close friendships or to discuss his privateering days for fear
of self-incrimination that might provoke a charge of piracy against him. James and Mary
Campbell certainly did not walk in the footsteps of the wealthy and mighty; in fact, on
their sparsely-settled frontier, they might walk for weeks without seeing any footsteps at
all except their own. As a most uncommon couple in a frontier land of otherwise very
common people, they would have attracted no attention at all, except when the name of
Lafitte was mentioned. Nevertheless, a biography of their lives deserves to survive and
occupy some permanent niche in the annals of frontier Texas, where it might be perpetuated
for the edification of generations of Texans still unborn.
Endnotes
1 Charles W. Hayes, Galveston: History of the Island and The City
(Cincinnati: 1879: reprinted Austin: Jenkins Garrett Press, 1974), I, p. 130.
2 Mary S. Campbell, "Buccaneers-The Memoirs of Mary
Campbell," Galveston Daily News, May 25, 1879; "Information Derived From James
Campbell, Now Residing On Galveston Bay," June 10, 1855, reprinted in C. A. Gulick et
al (eds.), The Papers of Mirabeau Bonaparte Lamar (New York: AMA Press, 1973), IV, Part 2,
pp. 18-24, hereinafter cited as "J. Campbell Memoirs."
3 "J. Campbell Memoirs," Lamar Papers, IV, Part2, p. 18. Mary
Campbell's obituary reported her birth year as probably 1799. It is interesting that in
the Atascosita Census of 1826, she reported her age as 31 and her husband's as 35.
4 Affadavit of James P. Sherwood, March 27, 1880, p. 2, James Campbell
War of 1812 Pension File No. WC-30-345, Records of the Veterans Administrations in the
National Archives, also copy in the E. C. Barker Texas History Center in Austin.
5 "J. Campbell Memoirs," Lamar Papers, IV, Part 2, p. 18;
Encylpaedia Britannica (Chicago: 1970), XI, 823; Campbell War of 1812 Pension File
WC-30-345, p. 2.
6 "Buccaneers," Galveston Daily News, May 25, 1879; "J.
Campbell Memoirs," Lamar Papers, IV, Part 2, p. 18; "Days of Lafitte,"
Obituary of Mary Campbell, Galveston Daily News, January 7, 1884.
7 D. G. Wooten, Comprehensive History of Texas (Dallas, 1898), I, pp.
88-89.
8 "Buccaneers," Galveston Daily News, May 25, 1879.
9 J. Campbell War of 1812 Pension File, No. WC-30-345, James and Mary
Campbell Marriage Record, performed by Fr. M.Muldoon, Anahuac, Nov. 9, 1831, p. 13, in the
National Archives.
10 Ibid., Affadavit of Mary Campbell, dated Galveston, June 12, 1880,
p. 5, in the National Archives.
11 M. M. Osborn (ed.), "The Atascosita Census of 1826,"
Texana, Vol. IO, No. 4 (Fall, 1963), p. 306.
12 "Buccaneers," Galveston Daily News, May 25, 1879.
13 "J. Campbell Memoirs," Lamar Papers, IV, Part 2, pp.
18-19.
14 "Buccaneers," Galveston Daily News, May 25, 1879.
15 Ibid.
16 D. G.McComb, Galveston: A History (Austin: University of TexasPress,
1986), p. 36.
17 "Buccaneers," Galveston Daily News, May 25, 1879.
18 Lyle Saxon, Lafitte The Pirate (New Orleans: 1950), pp. 220-226.
19 The Journal of Jean Lafitte: The Privateer-Patriot's Own Story (New
York: Vantage Press, 1958), pp. 102-108.
20 "J. Campbell Memoirs," Lamar Papers, IV, Part 2, p. 20.
21 Dr. Kirkpatrick, "Early Life in The Southwest - The
Bowies," DeBow's Review, XIII (October, 1852), p. 381.
22 W. F. Gray, From Virginia to Texas, 1835: The Diary of Colonel
William F. Gray (reprint; Houston, 1965), p.170.
23 "J. Campbell Memoirs," Lamar Papers, IV, Part 2, p. 20;
Saxon, Lafitte The Pirate, p. 221.
24 "Buccaneers," Galveston Daily News, May 25, 1879; Ben C.
Stewart, "Story of Lafitte," Galveston Daily News, March 3, 1907.
25 "A Veteran Gone - Obituary of Charles Cronea," Galveston
Daily News, March 8, 1893.
26 "Buccaneers," Galveston Daily News, May 25, 1879.
27 Ibid.; "J. Campbell Memoirs," Lamar Papers, IV, Part 2, p.
20; D. G. McComb, Galveston: A History (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1986), pp.
36-37.
28 The Journal of Jean Lafitte, pp. 129, 131.
29 "J. Campbell Memoirs," Lamar Papers, IV, Part 2, pp.
20-21; The Journal of Jean lafitte, pp.113-114.
30 Reprint of The Cronea memoirs, "Charles Cronea of Sabine Pass:
Lafitte Buccaneer and Texas Veteran," Texas Gulf Historical and Biographical Record,
XI (November, 1975), pp. 92-93; W. T. Block, "The Last of Lafitte's
Pirates,"Frontier Times (July, 1977), pp. 17, 51-53; "Buccaneers,"
Galveston Daily News, may 25, 1879.
31 Obituary, "Charles Cronea, who Fought Under Jean Lafitte,"
Galveston Daily News, March 8, 1893.
32 Ibid.
33 Charles Cronea Memoirs, as told to Ben C. Stuart, "Sailed With
The Sea Rover," Galveston Daily News, Februry 7, 1909, p. 17.
34 The Journal of Jean Lafitte, p. 117; "J. Campbell
Memoirs," Lamar Papers, IV, Part 2, pp. 21-22; "Buccaneers," Galveston
Daily News, May 25, 1879.
35 Affadavit of Mary Campbell, J. Campbell War of 1812 Pension File,
No. WC-30-345, pp. 5-9, in the National Archives.
36 Miriam Partlow, Liberty, Liberty County, and The Atascosita District
(Austin: Pemberton Press, 1974), pp. 61, 329; M. M. Osborn, "The Atascosita Census of
1826," Texana, Vol. I, No. 4 (Fall, 1963), pp. 305-306.
37 Partlow, Liberty, Liberty County, and The Atascosita District, pp.
74-75.
38 "Buccaneers," Galveston Daily News, may 25, 1879; Osborn,
"Atascosita Census of 1826," pp. 305-306; Eighth Census of the United States,
1860, Galveston County, Texas, p. 176, No. 1,365.
39 J. Campbell War of 1812 Pension File, No. WC-30-345, p. 12; J.
Campbell Baptismal Certificate, Nov. 9, 1831, Anahuac, by Fr. M.Muldoon, p. 13, J.
Campbell War of 1812 Pension File No. WC-30-345, in the National Archives.
41 Partlow, Liberty, Liberty County and The Atascosita District, p. 83.
42 Affadavit of Mary Campbell, p. 6; J. Campbell War of 1812 Pension
File No. WC-30-345, National Archives; also "J. Campbell Memoirs,' Lamar Papers, IV,
Part 2, pp. 18-23.
43 Ray Miller, Ray Miller's Galveston (Austin: Capitol Printing, 1983),
p. 52.
44 Ben C. Stuart, " Story of Lafitte," Galveston Daily News,
March 3, 1907; "Lafitte and His Lieutenants," Galveston Daily News, April 21,
1878; "Career of Jean Lafitte," Galveston Daily News, April 5, 1886; 'One of
Lafitte's Men," New Orleans Delta, July 11, 1847; W. T. Block, "Crazy Ben"
Dollivar's Secret Gold Cache," True West (May, 1990), pp. 26-29.
45 "Lafitte and His Lieutenants," Galveston Daily News, April
21, 1878; Hayes, Galveston: History of The Island and The City I, 129-130; Galveston City
Company Records, Book B, copy 15, p. 57, recorded in Galveston County, Tx., Book E, p.
255.
46 "Lafitte and His Lieutenants," Galveston Daily News, April
21, 1878; Ben C. Stuart, "Story of Lafitte," Galveston Daily News, March 3,
1907.
47 Hayes, Galveston: History of The Island and The City, I, p. 128.
48 Galveston County Deed Records.
49 "Lafitte and His Lieutenants," Galveston Daily News, April
21, 1878; Ben C. Stuart, "Story of Lafitte," Galveston Daily News, March 3,
1907.
50 Affadavit of James P. Sherwood, dated Galvleston March 27, 1880, pp.
1-4, J. Campbell War of 1812 Pension File No. WC-30-345, in the National Archives.
51 Obituary of James Campbell, Galveston Weekly News, May 27, 1856, and
reprinted from Yellowed Pages, XX, No. 2 (Summer, 1990), p.105.
52 Osborn. "Atascosita Census of 1826," p. 305; Eighth Census
of the United States, 1860, Galveston County, Texas, Sched. I, p. 176, No. 1,365; Ibid.,
Schedules II, Slaves, 1850 and 1860., Galveston County, Texas.
53 Obituary of Mary Campbell, "The Days of Lafitte,"
Galveston Daily News, January 7, 1884.
