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An elderly enslaved woman started the fire to kill herself so she could escape LaLaurie's sadistic wrath. So disturbed were the townspeople of New Orleans that they formed a mob and pillaged the mansion. Blackpast reports that LaLaurie fled and most likely died in Paris, France, in 1849 without facing any repercussions for her horrific crimes. The mansion, however, still stands as a reminder of what LaLaurie's slaves endured. In the Sunday magazine section of the New Orleans Times-Picayune on February 4, 1934, much of this information was brought to light by Meigs Frost.
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What is for certain is that she and her husband did own a number of men and women as property. Although some contemporaries say she never mistreated them in public, and in general was civil to African Americans, it seems as though Delphine had a dark secret. There were rumors that she kept her 70-year-old cook chained to the stove, starving.
LaLaurie and her slaves
Marie Delphine MacCarthy Blanque LaLaurie purchased the property and constructed a three-story mansion in 1832. The house quickly gained a reputation as one of the grandest homes in the city’s French Quarter. Despite the Lalauries’ protests, local residents investigated the ruined mansion and uncovered horrifying evidence of the cruelty that had taken place inside. One of the first sights they came across was an elderly woman chained to the stove in the kitchen. She told the rescuers that she had been kept there for years, abused and starved.
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Marie Delphine Macarty or MacCarthy was born on March 19, 1787, in New Orleans during the Spanish Colonial period. She was one of five children born to Louis Barthelemy de McCarty (originally Chevalier de MacCarthy) and Marie-Jeanne L’Érable, both of whom were prominent in the New Orleans’ European Creole community. It is considered the most haunted building in all of New Orleans.
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Martineau's account, written in 1838, indicates that the enslaved people had been flayed, and wore spiked iron collars to prevent movement of the head. After this incident, an investigation took place, and charges of unusual cruelty leveled against Delphine. However, Delphine managed to use her family's connections to get them all back to Royal Street.
The first season of AHS centered on the violent history and ghostly present of the Murder House, which was played by L.A.'s 113-year-old Rosenheim Mansion. The alleged cruelty eventually influenced the couple’s social standing. People declined dinner invitations, and Madame found herself alone more often as the whispers of terrible tortures intensified in town. The servants carried delicious food on delicate china to the grand table, and the dancing for the evening took place on plush, Oriental rugs.
But what is hard to deny is the multiple sources and eyewitness accounts of the cruel and inhumane conditions that the Lalauries kept their enslaved persons in. And it should be noted that she was never accused of mistreating her bondspeople until after she married Dr. Louis Lalaurie. Perhaps she began to take her unhappy marriage out on her servants. The forty-year-old Delphine was now on her third husband, and the twenty-five-year-old Dr. Lalaurie was a new father in a new country with a very wealthy wife. Lalaurie was an "older" woman at thirty-eight, with two dead husbands, five children, and considerable wealth. One could speculate a few scenarios around their blossoming relationship, but one thing we know for sure is that Madame Delphine became pregnant with Dr. Lalaurie's child out of wedlock.
Today, the handsome house at 1140 Royal Street looks as charming as ever. Though it looks lovely from the sidewalk, this house of horrors has a truly nightmarish history. According to local lore, there’s a reason that no one owned the house for very long.
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After she was taken to court, a judge ruled in favor of McDaniel and other black homeowners on the grounds of the 14th Amendment. This amendment prohibits depriving individuals of life, freedom, and property without due process of law, and also prohibits the state from curtailing the privileges and protections of citizens. McDaniel identified as a bisexual woman and was married four times. In 1941, she moved into the Sugar Hill neighborhood of Los Angeles. The Missions and Ranchos are a special designation of historic homes that have such a unique position in telling the history of southern California that they deserve a separate page.
But within the first sight of the LaLaurie Mansion, the medium sucked in a deep breath. "Such sadness," she whispered as she rocked back on her heels. Pulling out her phone, she proceeded to snap a picture of the mansion.
In New Orleans itself, much of Madame Lalaurie’s behavior had been overlooked for years. But once the whisperings of her cruel treatment gave way to the reality revealed by the fire, residents were quick to condemn her actions. This was made clear by their destruction of the Lalaurie mansion itself. Abolitionist newspapers printed lurid descriptions of Madame Lalaurie’s sadism.
Seven slaves were rescued from deplorable conditions, "their bodies covered with scars and loaded with chains." They were taken out on stretchers and delivered to safety at the Cabildo. While a mob proceeded to destroy the furnishings of the home in outrage. The debt that Blanque left behind could have depleted Lalaurie's wealth. Delphine had the luck of the Irish, though it came in the form of morbid and macabre luck. Her father, Chevalier Louis Barthélémy de Macarty, passed away in 1824, leaving his children with a substantial inheritance. His daughter, with a free woman of color, was included in his will, he left her "$5,000 and two slaves."
Negligence and abuse of slaves were common in the antebellum South. But as the Lalaurie mansion burned to the ground, the true extent of Madame Lalaurie’s cruelty would soon send shockwaves through the city of New Orleans. Bryant wrote that he set sail for France out of New York on June 24, 1834. Madame Delphine Lalaurie did have one loyal servant on her staff, this we know for sure. Amid the mayhem and flames, her enslaved coachman brought her carriage around, and Delphine stepped into it with complete confidence. It is said that the angry citizens tried desperately to hold the horses and snatch her from the carriage.
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