The LaLaurie Mansion’s Haunted and Foreclosed Past

New Orleans is home to many frightening real estate stories, but none are quite as scary as the history of the LaLaurie Mansion in the famed French Quarter. The LaLaurie Mansion has a very gruesome past, and has spooked owners out of their wits and money.

LaLaurie Mansion Early Years

LaLaurie Mansion

LaLaurie Mansion from a 1906 postcard via Wikimedia Commons

The LaLaurie Mansion gets its name from prior owner Madame LaLaurie (real name Marie Delphine LaLaurie). The LaLaurie Mansion sits at 1140 Royal Street in New Orleans. The home was known at the time for lavish parties and its massive size, towering over nearby homes.

The three story mansion, it turns out, was not just used for hedonistic fun. LaLaurie was also a slave owner, and gained a reputation for treating her slaves in a horrific manner.

She was seen publicly chasing a twelve year old female slave to the roof with a whip, leading to the girl falling to her death. Madam LaLaurie also reportedly kept a slave responsible for cooking chained to the kitchen stove.

Others reported seeing slaves chained around the neck, with deep cuts and other injuries, and tortured.

In 1834, the home caught fire. As the fire was moving toward the slaves’ quarters, bystanders acted quickly to free the slaves from the burning building. They found mutilated bodies and living slaves hanging from their neck in the attic, some with limbs literally torn off. Some had been suspended there for months.

LaLaurie fled and was never seen again. She is reported to have died in Paris some years later.

LaLaurie Mansion Haunted History

Thanks to its wretched past, this property is reportedly severely haunted. The site is a popular stop on New Orleans ghost tours, and it is said that a dark presence remains in the home, which is also rumored by locals to be cursed.

LaLaurie Mansion and Nicholas Cage

Whether or not you believe in the occult, another haunting took place at the home in 2009, but this was a financial haunt.

Actor Nicholas Cage purchased the property in 2007 for $3.45 million, and was proud to own and reside in the home during stays in The Big Easy. Due to personal financial difficulties from the real estate bubble burst, the home was foreclosed on in 2009. It sold for $2.3 million at auction, compared to an appraised value of $3.5 million.