Ozeme Carriere (1831 - 1865)

Ancestors

Biography

Ozeme Carriere was born on 6 May 1831, a son of Ursin Carriere (1790 - 1831) and Carmelite Lacase (1796 - <1854).^[1] His father died a few months before he was born.

His known siblings were:

1. Carmelite (Carriere) Sonnier (1812 - 1884)
2. Ursin Carriere (1815 - <1865)
3. Apolline Carriere (1817 - )
4. Adelaide Carriere (1823 - )
5. Hilaire Carriere (~1825 - )
6. Constant Carriere (1828 - )

According to Canadian historian James Laxer, when Ozenne was a teenager, he joined a band of local bandits and became an outlaw. By the late 1850s he was the leader of a band who regularly stole livestock and valuables from people in southwest Louisiana, and by then their crimes included murder. Vigilantes finally came after them and captured Ozeme's brother, Hilaire, and several gang members, who were all hanged. But they didn't catch Ozeme. He lay low for a while, living with a free woman of color whose brother, Martin Guillory, was his chief lieutenant. When the Civil War broke out, Ozeme turned his local reputation around by becoming a guerilla conscription resister: a Jayhawker, helping hundreds to evade the draft. Those with no interest in fighting the "American's war" -- on either side-- were welcome to join him, including escaped slaves, South Louisiana Creoles of color who were being conscripted for forced labor, tenant-farming Cajuns, and deserters from both sides. They regularly raided Confederate camps for food, weapons, and horses. Confederates were under orders to shoot him on sight, but through the help of local sympathizers he managed to evade them, and from late 1863 to early 1865 he more or less controlled the southwestern prairie. General Banks of the Union Army offered him a commission, which he turned down. Captain H. C. Morell of Opelousas wrote about him,

Carriere is becoming daily more and more popular with the masses, and that, every day, serves to increase his gang. These men are making the ignorant and deluded suppose that they are their champions, that the object they follow... is to bring the war to a close, and tell them if they could only make everybody join them, the war would soon be brought to a close.^[2]

In the spring of 1864, Major General Richard Taylor issued an order for Confederate soldiers to shoot Jayhawkers on sight, sending Col. Louis Bush's 4th Louisiana Cavalry to take down Carriere and his men. Lt. Col. Louis Amadee Bringier, whose men had already executed over a hundred Jayhawkers, made it his mission after Carriere's men rampaged on a spree of arson, murder and mayhem that turned the locals against them. By the following year the war, and the draft, had ended, and many of Carriere's men went back home. In May of 1865, he was ambushed and killed by Confederate soldiers.^[3]

Sources

1. ↑ Donald J. Hébert, Southwest Louisiana Records, 1750-1900, compact disk #101 ("SWLR CD"), (Rayne, LA: Hébert Publications, 2001; reprints by Claitor's Publications);
   • CARRIERE, Ozeme (Ursin & Emelite LACASE) b. 6 May 1831 (Opel. Ch.: v.3, p. 162)
   • CARRIERE, Ozeme (Ursin & Emilite LACASE) b. 6 May 1831, bt. 25 June 1831 Pats: Pierre CARRIERE & Marie Louise VIVARET; Mats: Michel LACASE & Therese ROY; Spons: Hylaire CARRIERE & Celeste ROY. Fr. Flavius Henri ROSSI (Opel. Ch.: v.3, p.162)
2. ↑ Laxer, The Acadians... p. 167, citing Jim Bradshaw, "Some thought Jayhawker Carriere was really a hero," Lafayette Daily Advertiser, 26 August 1997.
3. ↑ James Laxer, The Acadians, In Search of a Homeland, (Anchor Canada, 2007) pp. 165-168;

   Citing Carl A. Brasseaux, "Acadian to Cajun: Transformation of a People, 1803-1877," (University Press of Mississippi, 1992) pp.125-126, 181.

See also:

• Fr. J. Vidrine, "Ozeme Carriere the St. Landry Parish Jayhawker," December 5, 2016
• Lee Crockett, "Ozeme Carriere - Jayhawker or Hero? - Massacre at Bois Mallet," Genealogy.com, September 29, 2007