No. 1: Deserted Benedictine
Monastery, Covington, near St. Benedict.
Since the earliest settlers arrived
in the wild woodlands that later became
St. Tammany Parish there were among
them men and women of faith charged
with keeping the righteous right and
evangelizing the natives to increase
the ranks of the church. One such frontier
ministry was instituted by the Benedictine
brothers north of what is today Covington.
Though the Benedictines now have a strong
presence at St. Joseph’s Abbey
and Seminary, the long ago monastery
was a shadow of that modern edifice.
Built precariously on the edge of the
wild and left to fend for itself for
long stretches of times between supply
wagons, it is said that the brothers
and laymen of the first Benedictine
monastery were killed by Native Americans
who attacked the holy place and burned
all remnants of it to the ground. Legend
has it that the Natives even dug up
the dead from the consecrated cemetery
that stood not far from the monastery
walls.
Since that horrific event, which most
likely took place in the early 1700’s,
a strange apparition has been spotted
in the piney woods outside of Covington:
the apparition of the monastery itself
is seen to appear and disappear at unexpected
times in the shadowy woods.
Witnesses who claim to have seen the
monastery say it is like seeing a grey,
shadowy “photo negative”
of a building – almost, but not
completely transparent. Others claim
to have discovered the desecrated graveyard
where they say a feeling of such malevolence
overwhelms them that it is impossible
to linger there long. Invariably, they
are never able to relocate the graveyard,
despite any number of attempts. Still
others have heard the sound of ghostly
Gregorian chant and claim to have seen
the shapes of hooded monks walking through
the shadows of the trees.
The mysterious disappearing monastery
is said to lie somewhere off the River
Road, not far from St. Benedict and
the present day St. Joseph’s.
Where it was originally is anyone’s
guess, but if you travel the old River
Road, you just might see this number
one most chilling place.
No. 2: Artesia
Restaurant and Inn, Hwy. 59, Abita Springs.
The sleepy little town of Abita Springs
grew to prominence because of the luck
of its location – in the heart of
the ozone belt at the confluence of several
healthy artesian wellsprings. People came
from miles around to “take the waters”
at Abita Springs and in an effort to provide
accommodations to them more convenient
than hotels in Mandeville or Covington,
Abita Springs businessmen responded with
style and pizzazz. One of the first hotels
to be built in Abita Springs was located
in what is now the Artesia Restaurant
on Highway 59 just north of town. It is
said that the hotel had all the accoutrements
expected of such a place in its heyday
and that the builder, a man not only of
means but of high expectations, made certain
that every part of the building and grounds
met his demands.
It can be surmised that a man such as
this might accumulate enemies as well
as friends, as he accumulated money. Whatever
the cause, the story goes that one summer
day in the early 1930’s, the man
left the hotel walking toward town: he
was never seen or heard from again. Since
that time, a restless spirit has haunted
the old hotel and grounds. Workers in
the restaurant have encountered the apparition
of a man standing in the entranceway or
in remote parts of the dining room. Guests
arriving early have seen the ghostly spectre
peering down at them from the second storey
of the old building. Visitors who stay
over at the quaint Bed & Breakfast
cottages at Artesia have reported being
awakened in the middle of the night by
the voice of a man calling out a name
they can’t discern; there have also
been reports of heavy footsteps around
the cottage area; and at least one motorist
has reported striking what he thought
was a man standing in the middle of the
highway in front of the hotel. When the
rattled motorist came to a stop and ran
back to help his victim he found himself
alone on a darkened highway. (It doesn’t
help that Highway 59 is known throughout
the parish as the “Highway of Death,”
but that’s part of another story…)
Police have also been called by concerned
residents who have seen a man wandering
aimlessly along the road, perhaps concerned
he is a criminal and up to no good; patrols
have repeatedly failed to turn up anything,
or anyone.
Employees and even the owners of Artesia
Restaurant confess that they do not like
to be the last to lock up at night. There
is a presence, they say, that broods in
the old building, constantly watching
everything that is done.
Artesia Restaurant and Inn is open limited
hours since Hurricane Katrina, so call
ahead and prepare for a ghostly encounter!
No. 3: Guste Island Road and the Famous
White Lady, Near Port Louis, Madisonville.
Madisonville is a beautiful little town
that nestles on the banks of the Tchefuncte
River near where it empties into Lake
Pontchartrain. One of the oldest settlements
in what is now St. Tammany Parish, the
town still sits amid wild woods and encroaching
swamplands. Even in a heavy downpour there
is threat of flooding from the nearby
Lake, not to mention the surge and deluge
recently experienced in Hurricane Katrina.
Highway 22 runs through the heart of Madisonville,
crossing the Tchefuncte at Main Street
and continuing on into the rural areas
to the west. Guste Island Road intersects
the highway approximately three miles
outside of town and is the only access
to the waterfront community of Port Louis.
The road is a long, winding affair, like
something out of a Cajun dream, alternately
lined with frowning woodlands and empty,
marshy swamps. Gators often crawl up out
of the swamps and sit in the road or alongside
of it, providing a scare or two, but the
most frightening thing about Guste Island
road isn’t the twists and turns
or the local fauna: it’s the ghostly
white spectre of a long-dead woman.
She appears out of nowhere, say most who
have seen her; often she is just walking
alongside the road, but as a car approaches
she will suddenly turn and – hopefully
– vanish. On the occasions when
she has not vanished, witnesses have been
aghast at the sight of her skeletal face
and empty eye sockets. Many have been
petrified out of their wits: some have
backed up practically all the way to Port
Louis, others have hit the accelerator
and blown right by her, but not before
she reaches out with a scratchy, skeleton
hand against the car windows. One couple,
who shall remain nameless, actually drove
off the road and both nearly died: the
driver swore that he had seen a deer,
but his passenger was all too certain
that the figure was that of a woman in
white who rushed across the road and into
the path of their car. The car was totaled
and both ended up in the hospital, but
they report that the most frightening
thing was having to wait for the tow truck
and ambulance in the dead of a dark and
cloudy night with the ghost of Guste Island
Road on the prowl.
Who she was and how she came to haunt
this desolate stretch of swampy road,
no one knows, but all agree that she is
there and it is no pleasure to encounter
her, making Guste Island Road number three
on the list of most haunted places in
“New Orleans North.”
No. 4: Northstar
Theatre, Mandeville.
The Northstar Theatre is an old building
with a history, one of the most colorful
histories of all the buildings in Mandeville.
When the recreation retreats and hotels
along Lakeshore Drive would fill to capacity
with the rich and idle of New Orleans,
the working class vacationers found themselves
in need of a place to call their own.
A man named Allen stepped up to fill that
need and he constructed the straightforward
Allen Hotel at the corner of Gerard and
Madison Streets. Granted, there was no
view of the Lake from the Allen Hotel
windows, but it was close and it was nearer
to the electric trolley train that continuous
brought people to and fro throughout the
parish.
The Allen Hotel enjoyed a heyday during
the 1920’s and 30’s offering
affordable lodging to the middle and working
class of New Orleans who wanted to rub
elbows (and fannies) with the rich in
the languid lake waters or at the casino
tables.
The Allens, husband and wife, ran the
hotel in good times and in bad. Those
good times began to taper off quickly
in the 1940’s as the nation entered
WWII, with only the occasional GI booking
rooms at the old hotel. In the 1950’s
the hotel was full again with workers
from the nearby pre-stress concrete plant
who were building the wonder that became
the Causeway Bridge. It is around this
time, too, that Mr. Allen passed away,
leaving his wife to run the place on her
own.
Soon, however, she became ill as well,
and management of the Allen Hotel passed
for the first time to strangers. Around
this time (late 50’s) the hotel
gained the dubious distinction of becoming
Mandeville’s first (and last) brothel,
a house of ill repute.
Mrs. Allen, confined to a wheelchair in
a ground floor room at the rear of the
building eventually died and the building
was left derelict until purchased by current
owner, theatre director Lori Bennett,
in the 1970’s. Bennett set about
renovations to the old building, redesigning
it into an arts complex and finally into
the theatre it is today.
Mrs. Allen’s old rooms became part
of the theatre backstage area and it is
this part of the old building where the
most paranormal activity is said to occur.
Staff working in the building alone late
at night or early in the morning on production
days have reported hearing sighs and a
soft voice, like that of an elderly woman;
they have also heard the distinct sound
of a wheelchair rolling along the old
floorboards from the back of the building
to the front. Most of the time, the wheels
stop at the front door, where there is
always a cold spot. Workers say they are
convinced it is the ghost of Mrs. Allen,
but instead of inspiring fear, they insist
she is mostly a benevolent presence, probably
casting an approving eye on the activity
in what used to be “her” hotel.
Mrs. Allen’s ghost is not the only
one said to haunt the old building, but
she is by far and away the only “nice”
spirit present. Several people have reported
hearing disturbing sounds from the upper
floors of the building, which is where
the prostitutes used to service their
customers in the brothel days. One volunteer
was shocked to overhear what she thought
was a fight between a man and a woman;
it sounded as if the man was striking
the woman. Alarmed, the volunteer ran
up the stairs to confront the attacker,
only to find the second floor completely
empty of anyone living.
The Northstar Theatre sustained damage
in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, but
Bennett has vowed that the theatre will
return. We assume she means ghosts and
all …
No. 5: Madisonville Light,
Madisonville.
The Madisonville Lighthouse sits on a
little peninsula at the mouth of the Tchefuncte
River, three miles south of Madisonville
on the banks of Lake Pontchartrain. Built
in 1838, the lighthouse tower rises 38
feet above the shore and has been an icon
to this small, shore side community for
generations. Inside the building, a winding
staircase of 45 steps leads to the top
with its commanding view of Lake Pontchartrain
and its environs.
Though the lighthouse has withstood harsh
weather, an 1888 storm swept away all
the nearby buildings except for the keeper’s
cottage and the lighthouse itself. Today
the keeper’s cottage is part of
the exhibits of the nearby Lake Pontchartrain
Basin Maritime Museum, but the lighthouse
remains, in excellent condition.
Over the years there was a succession
of keepers at the Madisonville Light but
it is most associated with its first keeper,
Benjamin Thurston, who also planted the
nearby Thurston Oak during his tenure.
Today the oak is listed in the National
Tree Registry.
In the daylight hours, the view from the
lighthouse can be stunning. But when the
sun sets, the coming of night brings a
brooding silence with it and a tangible
feeling of loneliness prevails.
Security guards have summoned police patrols
to the lighthouse after reporting the
sight of strange lights bobbing inside,
as if someone were making their way up
the stairs. Since there hasn’t been
a keeper at the light since 1935 and no
one is allowed access after dark, the
lights remain unexplained. Lights are
often seen around the exterior, bobbing
in the brush and along the shore. Daylight
visitors have seen the shadow of a strange
man standing in the windows of the lighthouse
towers; tour guides say that the descriptions
given match the surviving information
they have about Benjamin Thurston.
Boaters have also seen strange sights
near the lighthouse, like a red light
that appears in the light window, glowing
brightly before disappearing. Others,
docked nearby on still, summer nights,
claim to have heard the sound of children’s
laughter coming from the shore near the
feet of the lighthouse.
Thurston may have been the first keeper,
but he wasn’t the last, and the
dark, forbidding ghost of what is believed
to be a later keeper also keeps vigil
in the darkness around Madisonville Light.
It is not a place to venture alone in
the dark, as some who have met the fearsome
spectre have reported. One brave soul
who conducted a vigil in the lighthouse
claims to have recorded EVP of the malevolent
spirit growling indistinguishable words
in a harsh voice. The spooked investigator
admits to fleeing the location immediately.
No. 6: Old Creole Cemetery,
Hwy. 90, Lacombe.
The old Creole Cemetery faces the busy
scenic route Highway 90 in the middle
of the little hamlet of Lacombe, Louisiana.
It is one of the few cemeteries on the
Northshore where Day of the Dead celebrations
are held regularly and on the night of
November 1st every year the cemetery is
alight with candles and festivities in
memory of the souls who have passed on.
But for the other 364 days of the year,
give or take a couple, the cemetery sits
in silence and darkness. Few dare to enter
it who do not have family already buried
there, and no one, it seems will venture
there after dark except on that one holy
All Saints’ Day.
There are very old graves in the little
cemetery. Many date from the earliest
days of settlement in Lacombe and the
surrounding areas. Most of the dead are
Creoles who came across the Lake from
New Orleans to found a new community in
the piney woods of the Northshore. Once
settled they mixed and ultimately intermarried
with the Native Americans already living
here, and as most were raised in the prevailing
Catholic faith, most ended up buried in
the little cemetery.
But many people say there is something
else in the cemetery. Some don’t
feel fearful of it, but most, especially
those with no connection at all to the
place, say there is an evil presence lurking
among the old Creole tombs. One night
of lights and prayers, they say, isn’t
nearly enough to keep it still all year.
Late night drivers or those unlucky enough
to be walking past the cemetery at night
have reported seeing shadowy forms moving
among the graves, hunched over, like someone
looking at each tombstone for a familiar
name. One driver reported that he witnessed
a ghostly visitant literally rise from
the ground of the cemetery and walk across
the road, narrowly missing the moving
car. Not far along is the Rumours bar
and its not surprising that they get their
share of spooked motorists in there on
any given night.
But perhaps the weirdest thing about the
Old Creole Cemetery is the traveling tombstone.
The story goes that late one night a motorist
slowed and swerved to avoid something
laying in the middle of the highway. Pulling
over to the side, the motorist got out
of his car to inspect the object and was
appalled to see that it was a tombstone,
laying flat in the middle of the road.
Seeing no one in sight to offer any assistance,
the motorist moved the stone himself and
stopped at the next Sheriff’s annex
to report what had happened. A sheriff
deputy dispatched to the location was
unable to locate the stone, however, another
deputy on patrol eight miles in the opposite
direction came upon the errant tombstone,
once again in the middle of the highway.
This deputy picked the stone up and, placing
it gingerly in his trunk, went into the
station to make a report. The stone was
removed at the station and placed against
a side wall. To his dismay, when the deputy
returned, he found the tombstone missing
yet again. Assuming a prank or some petty
theft, the sheriff filed his report and
went off shift for the night.
Two days later another deputy on patrol
found the stone laying in the road across
the street from the cemetery and called
in a report. This time the deputy did
not leave his vehicle, but, with lights
flashing and headlights fixed on the stone,
he proceeded to start his report about
the finding.
When he looked up from his report some
minutes later he was alarmed to see that
the tombstone had moved and was laying
at the gates of the Old Creole Cemetery!
Boldly, the deputy got out of the car
and looked around. It was nearly 3 a.m.
and there was no one around, nor had any
vehicle driven by in the time since he
had stopped. There was no plausible explanation
for the movement of the stone and, not
inclined to interfere with what he deemed
“higher powers,” the deputy
left the stone where it lay. Yet another
deputy, however, on an early morning patrol,
saw the tombstone at the cemetery gate
and stopped to place it in his trunk.
When he reached the station he was surprised
to hear a chorus of “Not THAT thing!”
from his cohorts. On hearing their wild
stories about the moving tombstone, the
deputy figured he’d put an end to
it and locked the stone in a nearby maintenance
shed while he attempted to track down
family members from the name on the stone.
A call to the cemetery started the wheels
in motion and a the deputy was told that
a keeper would meet him at the gates within
a half hour. The deputy decided to leave
the stone in place and go out to meet
the keeper, but before he even reached
the cemetery he received a radio call
that the keeper was on a pay phone near
the cemetery reporting a TOMBSTONE laying
out at the cemetery gate!
Shocked and confused, the deputy asked
a fellow officer to check on the status
of the stone locked away in the maintenance
shed. He was shaken to hear that there
was no tombstone to be found in the shed.
Somehow, it had moved of its own volition,
and had returned to the cemetery gates.
There was no living family to be found
who could claim the stone as their own,
but the with the help of the keeper the
proper location of the stone was determined:
it had somehow been moved, or had moved,
from a spot under a shady oak tree at
the rear of the cemetery. A sheltered
spot, it was only when the keeper said
aloud, “That the old Indian oak,
you know the one where they found those
Indian skulls buried inside it?”
Soon it became clear: the name on the
tomb was that of a prominent Catholic
Creole who had, in his lifetime, hated
and mistreated Native Americans. It never
was clear whether the spirits of dead
Indians were responsible for evicting
the old Creole, but it was obvious, in
a weird way, that the Creole was trying
to get his stone back in.
The traveling tombstone was finally completely
buried in a separate plot not far from
the remains of the old Creole man and
the haunted tree. So far, it hasn’t
resurfaced … well, not yet anyway.
No. 7:
Chateau Bleu Caterers, West Hall Street,
Slidell.
The building that now houses Chateau
Bleu Caterers was once a tavern that
hosted a decidedly rough clientele.
Grizzled railroad men, tar-coated workers
from the nearby creosote plant, and
salty old sea dogs fresh from plying
their boats in the waters of Lake Pontchartrain
all converged at this popular late 19th
century watering hole.
As so often happens in places where
men gather and drink – just like
roosters fighting in a barnyard –
brutal fights often broke out. Sometimes
the police would be required to break
them up, sometimes a doctor was required
to sew someone up, but usually the disagreement
passed with the intoxication and men
who had beaten each other to pulp the
night before would return the best of
friends to drink another night.
One particular incident, however, is
not remembered lightly, and this is
probably because it was a continuing
feud brought into the little tavern.
A fisherman and a man from the nearby
icehouse, located across the railroad
tracks from the tavern, were involved
in a continuing battle that centered
around the latter’s wife and the
attentions she showed to the fisherman.
Eventually, the anger between the men
boiled over and one night after a particularly
brutal exchange of words the ice man
disappeared across the tracks only to
return with a huge pair of iron ice
tongs. The story goes that he waited
for the fisherman to leave the tavern
and then accosted him, first beating
him with the tongs and then using them
to gouge the eyes and tear off the ears
of his victim. The fisherman managed
to run to the railroad tracks nearby,
but blind and bleeding he was unable
to avoid the oncoming train and was
killed instantly at the West Hall Street
crossing. The ice man, it is said, went
home and beat his wayward wife unconscious,
then committed suicide with a bullet
through his brain.
As time passed, the tavern eventually
closed and the small building went through
a number of incarnations until it was
opened as a catering business in the
early 1990’s. Popular with businesses
and residents, Chateau Bleu gained a
reputation for fine food throughout
the area. But it was the story of the
haunting that really put it on the map
for some people.
It seems that the murdered fisherman
died but never really left the old tavern:
his ghost is often seen standing in
the shadowy building late at night or
early in the morning when the staff
is about to start their day. They say
that they often smell his pipe, a very
distinctive tobacco, and sometimes there
is the smell of whiskey. Footsteps are
heard when the building is supposed
to be empty, and several workers have
claimed to have been pushed or tapped
on the head by the ghost. Most disturbing
is the reenactment, in the early morning
hours and mostly in the fall, of the
fisherman’s death: several witnesses
have claimed to have seen a man running
from Chateau Bleu to the railroad tracks,
clutching his face. When he reaches
the tracks he vanishes into thin air.
Some people speculate it is the recreation
of a tragedy that has caused the little
catering business to be among the most
haunted places in St. Tammany Parish.
No. 8: Lewisburg Village
Indian Mounds, Mandeville.
The little lakeside hamlet of Lewisburg
was a village that came into existence
around the time Mandeville was being
founded. Located further west along
the lake where the shoreline was less
friendly to resort traffic, a cottage
community took root in the area and
became the retreat of many artists,
writers and recluses of the era. Even
today, Lewisburg is a wilder part of
the quickly urbanizing Mandeville, and
is the location of many beautiful ancient
trees and live oaks, among them the
famous Seven Sisters oak.
Prior to the coming of the white man,
Native Americans lived all along the
shore of the lake and it is said that
they once used the area near Lewisburg
as burial grounds. In fact, mounds containing
remains and artifacts were found there
as early as the late 1700’s, but
excavation really did not go forward
until the more inquisitive era of the
middle nineteenth century. During that
time, several artifacts, relics and
bones were found in Lewisburg and were
removed to university collections in
New Orleans and elsewhere for study.
Around this time, villagers began to
be troubled by shady, whitish apparitions
and by the appearance of a large, black
dog that plagued the area incessantly
for several years following the desecration
of the grave mounds.
People reported hearing strange voices
in the night woods and peacekeepers
were often dispatched to investigate,
finding nothing and being frightened
away by the howling of the monstrous
dog.
At the time of the Civil War, Union
troops camped in the woods surrounding
Lewisburg, as they did all along the
lake. But it was from Lewisburg that
they asked to be moved, reporting to
their superiors in the chain of command
that the woods were full of “lurking
Indians” and that their supplies
had been looted by a “large, black
canine” that came into their camps
while they were sleeping and prowled
among them. Soldiers on guard had even
gotten off shots at the dog, but never
felled it, and in fact it seemed to
challenge them by stopping and staring
at them before it disappeared into the
trees.
Today Lewisburg retains its quaint,
colony atmosphere, but visitors are
forewarned: the mounds are still there,
the woods are still as dark as nature
intended, and the black dog of Lewisburg
has never been captured or killed.
No. 9: Old Marigny Sugar
Plantation, Fontainebleau State Park,
Mandeville.
The Marigny family was a vastly wealthy
New Orleans clan that owned a huge,
sprawling plantation along the river
to the east of the old City. When Bernard
Marigny de Mandeville inherited all
the land and money that went with his
titles he began to divide the huge plantation
into parcels of land that today make
up the area known as the Faubourg Marigny.
Bernard Marigny de Mandeville himself
began to spend more and more time north
of New Orleans in the piney woods of
St. Tammany Parish where he maintained
a lovely home overlooking the water
and an even larger plantation home in
the wooded sanctuary near Bayou Castine
in what is now Fontainebleau State Park.
Here Marigny undertook to create a sugar
processing mill adjacent to his plantation
home to provide work for his slaves
as well as for freedmen whom he hired
from the surrounding area. The sugar
mill thrived for many years in its secluded
location, while the Marigny plantation
home became a social beacon to the denizens
of New Orleans society. In his time,
Marigny was visited by French and Spanish
royalty, the notorious – Madame
LaLaurie is said to have been there
– and the famous – pianist
Louis Moreau Gottschalk performed for
Marigny and his family at the Fontainebleau
home.
But time passed and fortunes changed.
Succeeding Marigny heirs relocated to
New Orleans and even to the mother country
of France, and the sugar mill on the
North Shore was abandoned, ultimately
falling into dereliction.
Some brick walls and several old cistern
wells are all that remain of the old
home and mill, but if the reports of
hikers and campers in the park can be
believed, the place is anything but
abandoned.
Several witnesses claim that they have
seen lights amid the ruins and have
heard the sound of machinery running
in the dark night. Others claim to have
felt a menacing presence around the
old ruin – this is fueled by rumors
that followers of Marie Laveau often
returned to the place and used it for
their voodoo rituals. There have been
reports of misty apparitions and one
report of a ghostly child who is seen
playing hide and seek among the trees.
The ruins are still accessible and the
state park guards can be helpful in
locating them, but exploration there
at night cannot be advised.
No. 10: Donz Bar, Lakeshore
Drive, Mandeville.
Donz Bar is a popular watering hole
with Mandeville locals and is slowly
coming back from the floods of Hurricane
Katrina. It has a reputation as a “party
hard” pool hall and bar as is
proven by the fact that most of its
patrons returned to it after the hurricane
when nothing remained but a shell of
the former building: patrons brought
lawn chairs and their own beer and partied
on inside the devastated building.
Donz, however, is more than a legend
in its own mind: the building has a
history that reaches back into the darkest
days of the Civil War.
Union soldiers fought hard to gain a
foothold along the shores of the lake,
and once there they were encamped all
along what is now the manicured recreation
area for this part of the parish. In
the war years, the building that now
houses Donz was a field hospital for
injured and dying Federal troops and
some say that legacy lives on.
Long before Katrina added her own ghosts
to the mix there were reports of misty
apparitions and unexplainable noises
such as footsteps, moaning and the clinking
of what sounds like surgical knives.
Several customers, long before tying
on their own drunk, have sworn to seeing
the sad figure of a young soldier, clad
in Union blue with his left arm in a
sling, sitting in the shadows beyond
the pool tables, staring empty-eyed
at the modern melee. The figure of a
ghostly nun, possibly a hospital nurse,
has also been seen walking behind the
bar and disappearing through the side
wall of the building. Late at night,
when the most die hard customers have
toddled off for home, the feeling of
being watched is most intense, and most
employees like to get out of the building
quickly. Those who linger have often
experienced bar stools moving on their
own or pool balls hitting together with
a loud “clack” when no one
else is around.
Donz is definitely rising from the ashes
of the hurricane, but many are curious
to see how the horrific storm will have
effected the hauntings, if at all. Only
time will tell, but the bloody history
of Donz makes it number ten on our most
haunted list!
Since
the mid-nineteenth century generations
of well-heeled and middle-class New
Orleanians have escaped to the North
Shore of Lake Pontchartrain, to the
deep, piney woods of St. Tammany Parish
for rest and respite from the toil of
urban life.
Quaint little towns like Mandeville
with its view of Lake Pontchartrain,
its popular bath houses and hotels,
Madisonville with its pirate history
and lighthouse to explore, Abita Springs
with healing natural springs that provided
Nature’s tonic to all kinds of
ailments, Covington with its commerce,
Lacombe with its Creole roots, and the
burgeoning railroad town of Slidell
– all were the vacation destinations
of the urbanites. The quiet streets
and slow pace of the little towns, along
with their distance from the clutter
and noise of New Orleans, were the perfect
place for recreation and often for escape
from the numerous deadly epidemics that
plagued the city population.
St. Tammany Parish was by no means a
discovery of the genteel classes: it
had figured prominently in the history
and events of Southeast Louisiana since
the lands were opened by explorers in
the late 1600’s. British troops
had held the area until their final
defeat and expulsion in the War of 1812;
prior to this, sea battles on the gray
waters of Lake Pontchartrain were not
uncommon and pirate Jean Lafitte even
participated in such a battle near Mandeville
in the late 1700’s. In the 1800’s
the very rich and very popular family
of Bernard Marigny de Mandeville settled
in the place that came to bear his name
– Mandeville – making the
piney woodlands on the shores of the
lake their home for half of every year.
Marigny also built a large sugar plantation
in the densely forested area that is
now Fountainebleu State Park. Remains
of the plantation home can still be
found there today. Fleeing New Orleans
in 1834, the notorious Madame LaLaurie
took refuge at the lakefront home of
the Coquille family, who assisted her
in her later escape to Paris. Some suggest
that Madame LaLaurie never left the
North Shore, that she took up residence
first in Covington and finally settling
in the deep woods of Lacombe. Those
who adhere to this version of the LaLaurie
legend say that another infamous woman,
the Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau, often
visited Madame. Though the veracity
of this account is still debated, it
is a fact that the famous traiteur or
Creole healer, Josephine Mosebury settled
in the Lacombe area in a derelict cottage
that had once housed her notorious grandmother,
Marie Laveau’s protégé
Fanny Mosebury.
With the coming of commerce to the sleepy
villages along the Lake and a growing
popularity among the middle classes,
St. Tammany Parish became a popular
weekend and vacation destination for
a large cross-section of the New Orleans
population. Several hotels and casinos
were opened catering to this less well-to-do
element and many believe this was the
beginning of the end of the North Shore’s
glory days as a getaway destination.
Ferries from New Orleans still plied
the waters of Lake Pontchartrain as
late as the early 1940’s, but
with the coming of the famous Lake Pontchartrain
Causeway, the “Longest Bridge
in the World,” the old ferries
were put out of service.
With such a wealth of history and an
assortment of residents and visitors,
some more infamous than others, it is
no surprise that St. Tammany Parish
is one of the most haunted areas in
Louisiana outside of the City of New
Orleans. It is easily visited in a day
– or night – trip, and certainly
should not be missed by anyone who is
interested in the paranormal.
