This  establishment  was  more  important  than
that  on  Amelia  Island,  as  well  on  account  of
numbers  as  for  the  greater  facilities  aiforded
for  smuggling.  An  adventurer  named  Louis
Aury  was  at  the  head  of  this  establishment,  and
had  organized  a  sort  of  civil  government.  It
was  a  second  Barataria,  and  to  it  several  of  the
old  privateers  and  smugglers  of  Lafitte's  band  of
Baratarians  resorted.  (See  Lafilte  and  the  Bara-
taiians.')  Under  a  secret  act,  passed  in  1811,  now
(1817)  first  made  public,  the  President  took  the
responsibility  of  suppressing  both  these  estab-

I  lishments.  Aury  had  joined  McGregor  with
the  Galveston  desperadoes,  and  their  force  was
formidable.  The  President  sent  Captain  Henly,
in  the  ship  John  Adams,  with  smaller  vessels,
and  a  battalion  of  Charleston  artillery  under
Major  Bankhead,  to  take  possession  of  Amelia
Island.  McGregor  was  then  on  the  main,  leav-
ing Anry  in  command  of  the  island.  He  was
summoned  to  evacuate  it;  and  on  Dec. 23  the
naval  and  military  comnianders  took  quiet  pos-
session. Anry  left  it  in  February,  aud  so  both
nests  of  pirates  and  smugglers  were  broken  np.
At  the  same  time  there  was  ninch  sympathy  felt
in  the  United  States  for  the  revolted  Spanish-
American  colonies,  and,  in  spite  of  the  neutrality
laws,  cruisers  were  fitted  out  in  American  ports
under  their  flags.
