Book Set During French/Inidan war?

the book i'm looking for is about a girl raised in a New Orleans orphanage. Her parents were plantation owners who died. She has a sister named Simone. Her sister later becomes a nun at the orphanage. On the day of her wedding a hurricane hits new Orleans and carries her off. She unexpectedly find refuge in her old plantation home where she is later found by traders that travel the river back to there home. A family there takes her in until she does something wrong then they banish her. Through out the book she lives in a cemetery, a bordello, gets involved with wealthy scam artists, ends up on a blockade running ship and friends with a band of gypsies who are also very good friends with the captain of the ship and spys for the US against the French.
the name of the ship which eventually get set on fire is named KING. I think
oh and the man she was forced to marry at 16 is a master of disguise and the captain of the ship.

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Hmm. The United States was still thirteen colonies during the French and Indian war and I think Louisiana was still owned by the Spanish. So maybe it was a later dispute with the French over privateering in the early 1800s?