The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 42, July 1938 - April, 1939 Page: 109
446 p. : ill., maps ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Louis Aury: First Governor of Texas
death or desertion. We were to leave in a few days for France,
but since the frigate, La Consolante, which was coming to
relieve us, was lost, we are going to delay here one or two
months more.
He sent his love to his sister and said that he had also written
to his uncle Aury but had since learned that the ship carrying
the letter was lost.
After five years of silence, a second letter writen to the Maignets
at Paris from Samana, San Domingo, September 8, 1808, resumed
the interrupted story of Aury's adventures.
My dear uncle and aunt:
The long space of time which has passed since I last sent
you news of my adventures has doubtless caused you to
worry . . . but lack of opportunity was the sole cause
of this silence.
When circumstances made me leave the ship on which I
was at Guadaloupe, I followed the career that I had under-
taken, for which I felt an inclination, and I embarked on
board corsair boats which are in this country. Let not preju-
dice cause you to believe, because of this, that the fruit of
your early training has been lost. Corsairs are the only French
boats, war or merchant, in this country. They wage war as
loyally as the ships of his imperial majesty. I was once made
a prisoner of war on one of these boats, but having found the
opportunity at the end of fifteen months in prison to escape
by swimming in spite of the vigilance of the sentinels, I took
advantage of it and fortunately succeeded. I have also been
slightly wounded in different affairs in which I took part,
but since the first illness, I have been ill very little.
Fortune until this day has not been very favorable to me;
nevertheless, I hope that it will not always persecute me or
that peace will come bringing me the satisfaction of seeing
you again and another way of making my living.
A third letter was written from Baltimore, Maryland, in 1812.
Aury acknowledged the receipt of a first letter from his Parisian
relatives and grew eloquent concerning the value of friends and
the indifference of strangers. After a page and a half of this,
he continued:
Since the letter I wrote you from San Domingo, I have lost
almost everything, having been caught by the English com-
manding a corsair in which I had a share of 2,500 piastres.
As San Domingo had also been captured, I went to Guada-109
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 42, July 1938 - April, 1939, periodical, 1939; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101107/m1/123/: accessed April 25, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.