Queen Of Shadows: Marie Laveau

The streets of New Orleans carry stories like river water—slow, heavy, and charged with memory. We follow those currents into the life of Marie Laveau, a free woman of color who became the city’s most enduring symbol of power, faith, and fear. Between jazz funerals and above-ground tombs, we explore how a healer and hairdresser rose to be called the Voodoo Queen, and why her shadow still stretches across the Gulf Coast.

We set the stage in the early 1800s, when French, Spanish, African, and Creole traditions converged under a sky of wealth, epidemics, and floods. That pressure-cooker forged both resilience and superstition. Marie Laveau moved through it all with herbs and rosaries, gathering influence in salons, sickrooms, and prisons. Some saw her as a guardian who blended voodoo and Catholic devotion to protect families and guide the desperate. Others told darker stories—poison smuggled to the condemned, political strings pulled, and a death conjure that ended a powerful bloodline. The infamous Fatal Sisters tale becomes a lens on justice, rumor, and the ways communities police harm when courts fail.

We also trace her lasting footprint: the rituals at St. Louis Cemetery No. 1, the rise of cemetery tourism, the vandalism that forced guided access, and the many retellings that cast her as feminist icon, folk saint, or sorceress. Along the way, we cut through sensational tropes to parse what records show versus what legend insists. The result is a portrait of a city and a woman who made belief tangible—gris-gris in the pocket, prayers at the bedside, stories passed like torches in the dark.

Press play to step into the French Quarter’s twilight, weigh fact against folklore, and decide what kind of power you believe in. If this journey moved you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review so more listeners can find these Southern histories and hauntings.

Chapters

• 0:10 Halloween And The Nature Of Fear
• 0:55 Enter 19th-Century New Orleans
• 2:36 Tourism, Nightlife, And The Occult
• 4:59 Golden Age And Gathering Storms
• 7:47 Birth Of Marie Laveau
• 8:52 Healer, Hairdresser, And Rumors
• 12:52 Fact Versus Legend
• 16:15 The Fatal Sisters Curse
• 19:03 Death, Tomb, And Vandalism
• 21:41 Legacy, Questions, And Goodnight

Transcript

Carole Townsend: 0:10

Halloween. It's the time of year that gives us the opportunity to scare others and ourselves. Some celebrate it for fun. Others celebrate to win costume contests or to dance in parades. At this time of year, we drag out our innermost fears and we put them on display. Those fears are many, as numerous as there are people to face them. Some are steeped in farce, some in death, others in black magic, in voodoo. And when we think of voodoo, we must remember the city of New Orleans more than 200 years ago. Join me tonight, won't you, as we travel back to 19th century New Orleans, to the French quarter. The city's elegance is at its height. Its population was diverse. And it was indeed steeped in voodoo and in the dark arts. The Big Easy, New Orleans, Louisiana, welcomes about nineteen million visitors every year. An extraordinary number of tourists for just one city. People come to New Orleans for the unique food, a reflection of the French, African, and Spanish American cultures that swirl throughout the city. They come for the round the clock nightlife and for the vibrant live music, jazz in particular. They come for Mardi Gras, that famous late winter carnival known for its raucous costume parades and street parties. And of course they come for the beignets and Cafe du Mon. And many of those nineteen million tourists come for a look or a journey into the dark world of the occult. The city's mix of French, Spanish, and African influences, combined with its tumultuous history of slavery, epidemics, and natural disasters, have made New Orleans a hot spot for strange sightings, shocking occurrences, and ghost stories. In an earlier episode of Front Porch Mysteries, we pulled back the curtain on the horrors of Delphine La Lerie and her mansion of horrors in the French Quarter. There's something about this city. Its dark and mysterious history is linked with vampirism, death, voodoo and hauntings, and its captivating above-ground cemeteries only add to that hypnotic mystery. There's one woman who in the early 19th century was very much real and alive. A woman whose legacy is woven into the very fabric of New Orleans history. Tonight we'll take a look at her life and her legacy of dark practices, and we'll ask ourselves, were they real too? There's something about a good story, isn't there? It grabs our attention and holds it, rising to a crescendo, keeping us there just long enough, then slowly lowering us down again to stand where we started and to get our bearings in the real and tangible world of our everyday lives. It always seems that a good story is over far too soon, doesn't it? I think it's because of that time we spend at the top, at the climax when the story is full of possibility, when it can go either way. It's in that wisp of a moment that we realize that stories mirror real life, and that we in fact are living in a story of our own. The following podcast contains material that may be disturbing. Listener discretion is advised. New Orleans is a city quite unlike any other in the world. It's the birthplace of jazz and of those unique and beguiling jazz funerals that dance and whine throughout the city. It's a city that's quite literally underwater. New Orleans has a reputation for offering up some of the most fabulous cuisine imaginable, and it's been dubbed the most haunted city in America. In the early 1800s, the Crescent City was under the control of France until Napoleon sold the territory to the United States for $15 million. The city's opulence was the direct result of its lucrative sugar and cotton exports. And with the knowledge that at any minute a levee could break and drown every living being in New Orleans, residents lived the high life, daring the possible to happen. In fact, the 1800s marked the golden age of New Orleans, a time in which anything felt possible. The many spiritual elements that converged in this region at the time were brought by the Haitian, Congolese, Creole, French, and Spanish people. Deadly yellow fever epidemics, natural disasters, and a legacy of violent slavery plagued the city's early 19th century beginnings. And sure enough, in 1849, the Mississippi River broke through a levee 17 miles upriver. Just a week later, waters crept up to the back door of the city's central business district. Within days, twelve thousand people were forced to flee their homes, and six feet of water covered most of the cemeteries. Snake bites plagued the population in the aftermath of the Great Flood. Families were desperate, their hopes drowned in the ruthless waters of the uncaged Mississippi River. In New Orleans, tragedy, religion, and culture were brought to a boil, and a few notable characters rose to the top. Perhaps it was only in this place and only during this time that Marie Laveau could have been born and risen to the powerful influence that she was. In September 1801, she was born to an unmarried free woman of color and of African, European, and Native American ancestry. A Louisiana Creole practitioner of voodoo, an herbalist and a midwife, Marie Laveau was also, of all things, a hairdresser. A staunch member of the Catholic communion, Laveau attended to the many who fell ill during the yellow fever epidemic of 1878, providing herbal remedies and prayers for the afflicted. Records of her other community activities include visiting prisoners, providing lessons to the women of the community, and performing rituals for those in need without charge. But other reports of record have been made of Laveau providing poison to prisoners who had been sentenced to death, and of her performing dark rituals free of charge for those in need. She has been accused of placing curses on individuals or on entire bloodlines. She's been said to cast spells on white slave owners. She's been said to heal the sick and oversee spiritual rights. She's been said to commit murder, and she's been said to bring the dead back to life. While she performed her magic in styling their hair, she also listened intently to their gossip, and she garnered information from their attending servants. As queen for several decades, Laveau was mother to many. People sought her advice for marital affairs, domestic disputes, judicial issues, childbearing, finances, health, and good luck. She would use the information that she gathered as a hairdresser to convince the wealthy socialites that she was indeed clairvoyant. Laveau would then sell these wealthy women grigris or talismans to ward off evil or to cure mysterious ailments. Because of her skills and talents in these areas, Marie Laveau became the third female leader or priestess of Voodoo in New Orleans. Despite the errors, wild rumors, and historical twists often found in early American history, records do in fact indicate that Marie Laveau was married to a Creole man from Haiti named Jacques Perry. Alas, Jacques reportedly disappeared and was later reported dead. Laveau then started a relationship with a man named Jean-Louis. Together they had several children, some of whom fell victim to the various yellow fever outbreaks that plagued New Orleans because of the city's sweltering heat and poor drainage system. While Marie Laveau couldn't save her own children, she reportedly treated and saved other victims of the dreaded disease. Because of her acts of kindness and help during dark times, and because of her mastery of the occult, Marie Laveau was known as both a religious figure as well as a mythological character in New Orleans history. For instance, many said that Laveau smuggled deadly poisons into prisoners who had been sentenced to death, thereby giving them the opportunity to end their lives themselves. She is said to have cast spells and conjured the dead. She is said to have influenced political races with her powers. She is said to have stolen a baby just to sacrifice that baby to the Haitian voodoo god Papa Legba. She is said to have done much behind the secret veil of voodoo. Although some references to Marie LeVaux in popular culture refer to her as a witch, she's also been called a voodoo priestess, and she's frequently described as the voodoo queen. What we find in history about Marie Laveau is this. Yes, she practiced voodoo as well as Catholicism. She did have seven children, and a woman of color, she owned at least seven slaves in her lifetime. She did visit prisoners of all races, building them altars and praying with them, even preparing their last meals. One reporter from the New Orleans Daily Pick a Yune reported a visit during which Laveau gave a prisoner poison shortly before his execution date, but that assertion was never confirmed. She did attend births, helping mothers bring life into the world. She attended funerals, consoling families who had lost a loved one. She used spells and incantations, and she passed many of these along to her children and her grandchildren. Current writings about the voodoo priestess tell us that Marie Laveau's voodoo was about knowledge, love, and understanding of the forces that bind us together. Some even link her life legacy to feminism. In other words, those of us who came after Laveau have made her into what we want her to be? Was she a lover of humanity who desired only to help those in need? Or was she a practitioner of the dark arts, casting spells and reciting incantations to bring harm, or maybe justice, to her victims? Did Marie Laveau really steal a baby only to sacrifice that baby to a Haitian voodoo god? If we look to legend and lore to answer these questions, Laveau was indeed a sinister force in nineteenth century New Orleans, weaving a tapestry of magic and influence that greatly impacted the city. She was a close friend of the infamous Madame Delphine La Lerie, who brutally tortured her slaves inside her elegant mansion in the French Quarter. But if we look to historical accounts, she was beautiful. She did practice voodoo, but not the dark and dangerous art we see on television and read about in books. She practiced Catholicism. She helped her community in many ways, serving both the poor and the afflicted. No matter which version of Marie Laveau you choose to believe, know this. While the woman could be kind and charitable to the members of her community, you'd be hard pressed to find someone who wasn't terribly afraid of her death curse. The death conjure was a cultural reality in Voodoo, and it was well known along the Gulf Coast in the southeastern United States. With respect to Marie Laveau, there was an incident recounted in the newspapers of a strange story of a Voodoo curse by Marie Laveau on three women. Referred to as the Fatal Sisters, it is a tragic story of the DeCorset family, one of the wealthiest and most influential families in Louisiana before the Civil War. DeCorset owned at least three sugar plantations, among them the famous Magnolia Plantation. When he was a young man, de Coursey made the bold mistake of taking Marie Laveau's favorite granddaughter as his mistress. Now we can't be sure whether the granddaughter was indeed de Coursey's mistress, or whether the term taking her meant that he sexually assaulted her. I tend to believe the latter because of the depth and severity of the curse that followed. It's said that Marie was so outraged that she held one of her Greg ceremonies on the shores of Lake Pontchartrain, summoned the grand zombie, and quote, recorded the anthemas against the white master de Coursi. Marie Laveau declared in true voodoo fashion that quote, he would have no male heirs, and his line should die with his daughters. At first, of course, no one took the curse seriously, and it was laughed off as a joke. But over time, the story was well known by families all along the Gulf Coast. Plantation owner de Corsey ended up getting married, and he did have three daughters. But eventually, many say the family succumbed to the death curse of Marie Laveau. De Corsay died, then two of his daughters lost their husbands to duels, and another lost her husband to suicide. The curse of the Voodoo Queen was then fulfilled. All three husbands died violent deaths, and all three daughters died without having any children. The decoursey family lineage was eliminated. Marie Laveau died in 1881 and is buried in her family vault in St. Louis Cemetery No. 1. Tourists continue to visit her grave, and some draw X marks on the tomb in accordance with a decades old tradition that began back in the 1930s. It goes something like this. Turn around three times, knock on the tomb, and yell out the wish. If the wish is granted, they must come back, circle their exes, and leave Laveau an offering. In 1982, New Jersey-based punk rock group The Misfits were arrested and accused of attempting to exhume Laveau from her grave after a local concert. The arrest took place in nearby cemetery number two, and factual accounts of the incident conflict. We can assume that the body snatchers were not successful. The tomb in St. Louis Cemetery No. 1, though protected by ten foot tall brick walls and locked gates, was vandalized by an unknown person on December 17, 2013, by being painted over with pink latex paint. The Archdiocese Cemetery's office acted quickly by cleaning the tomb, but since the tomb is family owned, they don't routinely maintain it. As of March 1, 2015, access to St. Louis Cemetery No. 1 is no longer public. Entry with the tour guide is required because of continued vandalism and the destruction of tombs, including Laveau's. This change was made by the Archdiocese of New Orleans to protect the tombs of the Laveau family as well as those of the many other dead interred there. It's interesting to note that the New York Times, in its 1881 story about the priestess, claimed that Laveau was buried in Old St. Louis Cemetery on the same side of the tomb as her husband. Other reports say she's buried in St. Louis No. And still other accounts claim that she was never buried at all. Because they claim that she never died. And if that's true, my friends, then where is she? And more importantly, have you angered her? Voodoo is still a recognized and widely practiced religion in New Orleans. Happy Halloween, my friends. Stay safe out there. You can find me on social media and check out my website at Carole Townsend.com. As always, thanks for listening. And if you're enjoying these tales of Southern history and lore, I hope you'll tell your friends. Subscribe to this podcast on Spotify, Apple Play, iHeart, and anywhere you listen. The Marie Laveau Voodoo Grimoire: Rituals, Recipes, and Spells for Healing, Protection, Beauty, Love, and More, written by Denise Alvarado, published by Buffalo Street Books, by the website Marie Laveau.com, and the website Encyclopedia Britannica.com. And Marie Laveau's Lost Spell Book by Marie Laveau on Amazon.com.