He gave December 23, 1896 as his date of birth on his signed WWI Draft Card.

He was briefly lured to Los Angeles by Jelly Roll Morton and Bill Johnson in 1917,[2] but he objected to being told to dress and behave differently from what he was accustomed to and returned to New Orleans.

He spent the rest of his career in the area around greater New Orleans,[2] and the towns north of Lake Pontchartrain, not venturing further from home than Baton Rouge and the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

Danny Barker and Louis Armstrong said that it was a great loss to jazz history that there are no recordings of Petit.

[citation needed] He died on July 4, 1931, reportedly after "over-indulging" in food and drink.