The Louisiana Man That Tried To Burn New York

I thought I would update an observation I made in today's Louisiana Catholic Blogger Update. One of our fine Louisiana Catholic Bloggers From The Recamier made this "day in history" observation in her post of yesterday.
" 1864 during the American Civil War, a group of Confederate operatives calling themselves the Confederate Army of Manhattan started fires in more than 20 locations, including P. T. Barnum’s Museum, in an unsuccessful attempt to burn down New York City. (The objective was to overwhelm the city’s firefighting resources by distributing the fires around the city. Most of the fires either failed to start or were contained quickly"

I mentioned that I believed the person behind the plot was not only from Louisiana but also from the parish where I lived. Well that turns out to be true. His name was Robert Cobb Kennedy. His life and the plot is told in the book The Man who Tried To Burn New York by Nat Brandt. He was from Claiborne Parish Louisiana and was Confederate Secret Agent. He was later hanged for trying to burn the Big Apple down.

Here is a picture and short bio.
More on the plot from the 1864 New York Times
A must see Cartoon regarding the event from Harper's Weekly
More on Robert Kennedy Here.