Jean Lafitte Historic Resource Study (Chalmette Unit)

B. The Rodriguez Plantation

Immediately upriver from the Chalmet Plantation was the small tract of land that became known as the "Rodriguez Plantation." The nineteenth century history of this property may be viewed archivally in a sequence of land tenure that was closely related to the Battle of New Orleans and to subsequent recognition of the historic importance of that event. This parcel of land was owned in 1790 by Espiritus Liotaud and Augustus Faure, who subsequently sold it to Pierre Denis de ha Ronde. In 1800, the tract was purchased by Laurent (or Lorenzo) Sigur from Pierre Denis de la Ronde. [1] The downriver, adjoining sixteen arpents, which became known as "Chalmet Plantation," had been purchased by Sigur in 1798. In March, 1802, Sigur sold the small upriver parcel to Nicholas Roche. Three years later, Roche sold the property to Jean Baptiste Drouillard. The act of sale for this transaction describes the property as comprising three and one half arpents front on the river, and it included a residence, a mill, and other unspecified structures. [2] Wilson suggested that the mill enumerated in this act of sale, which was located on the Rodriguez Canal, was built ca. 1800, during Sigur's ownership of the property. [3] This structure, but not the residence, is recorded on the 1808 Lafon plat (Illustration 14).

Drouillard held the property for just over one year, and then he sold the lowermost one half arpent river front portion to Jean Baptiste Prevost, owner of the adjoining downriver plantation. [4] It was Prevost who commissioned the Lafon survey (Illustration 14). Prevost sold the property four months later to Dame Eliza M. Pintard, who was acting as agent for her husband, J.M. Pintard. [5] Again, the property was sold a short time later to the notary John Lynd; two days later, Lynd sold the property to Daniel Clark, the Louisiana Territory's representative to Congress. [6] Clark was an active land speculator in Louisiana during this period.

Clark sold the property to Jean Rodriguez, a New Orleans attorney, on September 29, 1808. This act of sale described the property as:

One half arpent of land fronting the river with all its buildings and dependencies situated at four miles from this city, below and shown on one side of the residence of Mr. Guillermo Brown and on the other side that of Mr. Edouard Macarty, with a depth of eighty-one and in conformity with the act of sale of Mr. Pierre Denis de la Ronde to Mr. Laurent Sigur, the said half arpent of land forming an angle opening and always following the canal.... [7]

John Dimitry, a writer for the Illustrated Visitor's guide to New Orleans, recounted a conversation with General John L. Lewis on the subject of Rodriguez and of his house:

Dimitry: Who owned this house in 1814-'15?

Lewis: An old Spanish lawyer named Rodriguez.

Q: What did Rodriguez do in those days?

A: He spoke broken English, and practised, with notable success, civil law.

Q: What became of him afterwards?

A: He died—still speaking broken English—on his own place. [8]

Thus, Rodriguez was the owner of this property during the Battle of New Orleans. During this period, the property probably served as a country retreat, since the tract was too small to support sugar agriculture profitably. Nevertheless, the property was referred to as a plantation, suggesting that some agricultural activities may have been undertaken there. The residence is shown in Laclotte's print "Battle of New Orleans," where a two story, one room wide structure with a columned gallery on the building's front is shown. On the downriver side of the house, a single storied wing was present. A hole is shown on its roof in the Laclotte print, as is a four-columned gallery across the wing's front. Latour's Plan of the Battle of January 8, 1815, also shows the Rodriguez house (Illustration 15). Beside that house is another small building, but it is detached, rather than being an attached wing as shown on the Laclotte print.

After the war, Rodriguez made a claim to the U. S. government for losses sustained as a result of the Battle of New Orleans. This document sheds further light on the possible function of the small wing adjoining the main residence. This claim states that the stable, coach-house, four slave cabins, a hen house, a pigeon house and the kitchen were "entirely destroyed," while the residence and "an adjoining building" were only damaged. Thus, it appears that this structure was not a kitchen, since it had been demolished. In addition, Rodriguez placed a large claim for the damage or loss of movables, including books; possibly the structure served as a library. [9]

Despite Dimitry's report to the contrary, Rodriguez did not die on the property, and after the Battle of New Orleans he sold it to Dame Marguerite Verret. The consideration for this 1817 sale was $7,500.00, or $2,500.00 more than Rodriguez had paid for it nine years earlier. [10] This suggests that any damage sustained by the residence during the Battle of New Orleans probably was repaired prior to the 1817 sale. However, no structures were referenced specifically in the 1817 transaction:

To Mrs. Marguerite Verret, wife, having separate property, of Mr. Solomon Prevost, residing in this parish,... accept as buyer for her and her heirs, a land situated at about four miles below this city, on the left side of the river, together with all the buildings thereon, without retaining any of them, said land having half and arpent fronting on what used to be the old levee, eighty arpents in depth, bounded on one side by the property of Mr. Montgomery before Edmond Macarty, and on the other by Mr. Pierre St. Amand before Ignace Delino, following the canal which is on this property...." [11]

In 1819, Benjamin H. B. Latrobe made a sketch of the area which showed a number of changes in the residence. The gallery was enclosed by blinds, and a dormer window was added to the hipped roof front. The adjoining single storied wing appeared substantially the same as recorded previously in the 1815 Laclotte print. Dame Verret, the wife separate in property from Salomon Prevost, presumably resided at least part time in the house at Rodriguez Plantation. She held the property until her death, at which time ownership passed to her son, Edouard Prevost, although the date of Madam Prevost's death has not been established, map evidence indicates that she died prior to 1834. Illustration 16 shows the property under Prevost's ownership. The residential structure and attendant buildings seen in the Latour plan again are portrayed. Two additional structures also are shown on the property; these may have been barns. Prevost subsequently held the property until his death. On March 7, 1849, the Second Judicial District Court ordered the sale of Edouard Prevost's property; the purchase price was $4,500.00, indicating that the property may have deteriorated during the period following Dame Verret's death.

Etienne Villavaso, a resident of St. Bernard Parish and owner of the adjoining downriver parcel, purchased the property after Edouard Prevost's death. [12] Villavaso sold the property in 1852 to Pierre Bachelot for $5,000.00 It is possible that Bachelot took up residence on the property, since he was listed as a resident of St. Bernard parish three years later on the date of his sale of the property to the state of Louisiana. At that time, the property was described as:

A certain portion of land with all and singular improvements thereon... situated in the Parish of St. Bernard about four miles below the city, and on the left bank of the River Mississippi, having in French measure ninety-one feet ten inches front on said river and running back between side lines opening in such manner as to give a width of two and a half arpents at the distance of fifteen arpents from the said River and from this point running back between two side lines, one of which closes seven feet eight inches so as to give a width of 443 feet on the rear line at the distance of eighty arpents from the said river, the whole bounded on the upper side by the property of Madam Widow Lombard, and on the lower side by that of Mr. Martin M. Villavaso and in conformity with a plan drawn by A. d'Hemecourt on the twenty-eighth day of December 1851. [13]

This purchase was authorized by an act of the Louisiana legislature, entitled: "An Act for the Relief of the Association for the Jackson Monument and for the Erection of a Memento Upon the Battle Ground of the Eighth of January, 1815," which was enacted on February 26, 1852.

The residence at Rodriguez Plantation still was standing at the time of the acquisition of the property by the state of Louisiana. However, during the late nineteenth century it fell into "the shabbiest of ruins." [14] Possibly because of its deteriorated state, it was not depicted on the 1874 Mississippi River Commission map (Illustration 17). Based on a contempoary woodcut, Wilson described the structure at the end of the nineteenth century as:

...a small, raised structure erected on a fairly low brick basement. A gallery with chamfered wood columns extended downriver to the east. The western end of the front gallery was protected by louvered jalousies. The house was only one room in width with two semi-circular fan light French doors opening onto the front gallery. A single dormer overlooked the river from the double pitched, hipped shingle roof. It was a typical small plantation house of the period. [15]

It should be noted that the single story wing no longer was extant in 1879.

The Rodriguez house was torn down before the end of the century, and during the 1890s money was appropriated for the construction of a house for the caretaker of the Chalmette monument, the latter having been begun during the 1850s. This residence is illustrated in Illustration 18. The structure remained in existence at least until 1940 (Illustration 19). By this time, there was also a small garage adjacent to the structure.

Work on the monument was not completed by the state of Louisiana, and on May 24, 1907, the Secretary of State of Louisiana transferred jurisdiction over the property to the United States Government. The United States Government appropriated $25,000.00 for the completion of a monument to the memory of soldiers who fell during the Battle of New Orleans. [16]

To recapitulate, at the end of the Spanish period, the Rodriguez plantation was part of a larger holding owned, successively, by the partners Liotaud and Faure, by Pierre Denis de la Ronde, and by Laurent Sigur. The land was undoubtedly used at this time as an indigo plantation. The Rodriguez property remained part of a parcel which was three and one half arpents front on the river, until Jean Baptiste Prevost purchased one-half arpent of the land, probably with the intention of operating the mill on the property, in 1807. This small parcel, too tiny for monocrop agriculture, changed hands many times until purchased by Jean Rodriguez in 1808 for use as a residence. Rodriguez sold it after the Battle of New Orleans, and it then remained in the Prevost family until 1849. State governmental jurisdiction over the property began in 1852, and the U. S. government completed the monument and took control of the property in the early years of the twentieth century.