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The Journal of Jean Laffite
I purchased a copy of this book, _The Journal of Jean
Laffite_ (NY:Vantage Press (1958), copyrighted by John A. Laffite, yesterday and only just examined it today, to find that with this particular copy I actually have evidence in a controversy. The book claims to be a translation of a French language manuscript written by the famous pirate Laffite between 1845 and 1850 and passed down to his descendants, arriving in the hands of John A. Laffite (or Laffitte, see below) when he inherited the manuscript in 1926. Eventually, he had it translated and published by a vanity press. The manuscript was later donated to the Sam Houston Regional Library and Research Center. The problem is that many people have questioned whether the manuscript is a forgery. There have been claims that the handwriting of the manuscript is similar to that of John A. Laffite. There has, apparently, been no definitive analysis one way or the other. The copy that I have is inscribed and signed by the man who had it published. The inscription reads: With best wishes and kind regards To David Laffitte From John A. Laffitte Route No. 4 Spartanburg, So. Carolina June 17th, 1959 Note that in signing the book, he spells his name "Laffitte" not "Laffite" as shown on the copyright page. Now the copyright page could have an error, so that is not terribly important. The book contains some pages of photographs after page 16 and two of the photos show excerpts from the original manuscript (in French, of course). So I compared the handwriting as best I could, given that I am not an expert in the field. What I found was this. The formation of letters "a", "o", "p" and "v", for instance, are different in the inscription from the two photographed pages; also, in the inscription, the flourish on capital "L" is to the left, whereas the flourish in the manuscript is to the right. The crossing of "t" in the inscription (four exemplars) is always bowed as a faint smile, while the crossing of "t" in the manuscript is a straight line (at least eight exemplars). The letter "a" is so different that even a layman can see it. The "o" is open at the top in the inscription but closed in the manuscript. Based on the limited sample I have, it would seem that if it is a forgery, it was not done by John A. Laffite. Now other information would be relevant. Is the French of the manuscript consistent with the state of the language in the early 19th century? Are the paper and ink from the right period? These and other questions have as yet no answer. But it is interesting to actually possess evidence relevant to the controversy. -- Francis A. Miniter Mesure is Medicine þauh þou muche ȝeor[n]e. Al nis not good to þe gost þat þe bodi lykeþ, Ne lyflode to þe licam þat leof is to þe soule. William Langland, The Vision of Piers Plowman Passus I, lines 33 - 35 |
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