The deposition of Don Juan Domingo Lozano, Captain of the Infatigable
Translated and printed in the Louisiana Historical Quarterly of 1938
Lozano’s ship was captured by Aury off Matanzas [Cuba] June 23, 1816 and taken to the Dry Tortugas, “…the four corsairs, [namely] the Criolla, the Belona, the ketch San Fernando (a prize they had armed), and the Favorito, and four more prizes, namely, a fragata from Santander, another from Malaga, a schooner from [New] Providence, and his own brig the Indefatigable, anchored at Las Tortuguillas [Dry Tortugas] near which they took on water the following day and [captured] two [more] prizes, a small fishing schooner from Havana and a fragata from Campeche bound for Cadiz with a cargo of lumber. That in the morning, after having given the small [fishing] schooner from Havana to several prisoners, they all set sail.”
One of the prisoners Aury freed made it to Havana, reported the event to the Governor and it was published in the newspaper Diario de la Habana October 16, 1816, . This would be great to find, copy and translate. It is summarized in Spanish in: Piratas En El Caribe, Francisco Mota (1984), and may have additional Aury captures described. The entries are brief and need to be translated. From that Spanish summary is the interesting information that one of the ships captured was from Philadelphia.
In the article “Commodore Aury” by Stanley Faye, Louisiana Historical Quarterly, (July, 1941) there is more information, the Spanish went out from Havana to fight Aury, and that Aury “burned two worthless prizes off the Dry Tortugas”.
Faye gives as his references the deposition of Lozano and another original source which should be obtained from the Spanish archives. Perhaps it is in Louisiana archives. It is “Fatio to Cienfuegos, May 14, 1817” and may be attached to Lozano’s declaration in Archivo General de Indies, PdeC, Legajo 1900.”
When Aury’s fleet sailed from the Dry Tortugas it was headed for Galveston Bay, where Aury established himself and later moved his pirate depot to Matagorda Bay. His meeting with Lafitte, who took over Galveston Bay is described in Lyle Saxon, Lafitte The Pirate (1930).
The next year, 1817, Aury made an agreement with Gregor MacGregor to take over Amelia Island, north Florida. He was ousted by the U.S. later but meanwhile brought in more captured Spanish ships, many of them loaded slavers enroute to Havana. See Narrative of a Voyage to the Spanish Main, anon. (1819). There is also reference to Aury’s pirates at work near Havana during this time in a letter from Coppinger to Capt. General, Nov. 18, 1817, referred to in the thesis “The Borderland Florida…1815-1821”
There could be many more Keys incidents relating to Aury other than his fleet anchoring at the Dry Tortugas in June, 1816. His pirates obviously knew the territory well, and if they ever landed waiting for the next Spanish ship to approach Havana they probably would have come ashore at the Keys. A search of the newspapers of Havana, the Bahamas, St. Augustine, and Charleston, plus the Philadelphia connection, could reveal more. Aury was also arrested in mid-March, 1818 in Charleston, “on an old piratical charge, but it was dismissed”.
There are also reports in English in the National Archives that do and may relate to Aury described in Guide to Materials on Latin America in the National Archives, Harrison (1961).
