5 Creepy, Odd And Unusual Cemeteries In Louisiana
Louisiana isn't short on history. The state features Spanish, French, American, and Creole architecture just to name a few. It is bursting with historic sites, and ancient French/Cajun traditions and culture. The centuries-old buildings and cities have seen a lot of tragedy, war, storms, voodoo, and deaths over the centuries.
With all that going on, it's no surprise Louisianna has some of the world's most famous cemeteries. Let's go down to the Bayou and see what terrifying things we can find out about the Creepy, Odd, And Unusual Cemeteries In Louisiana.
St. Joseph Catholic Cemetery in Rayne, Louisiana, features the above-ground crypts much like the ones in New Orleans. However, there is something very unusual about this cemetery that sets it apart from every other cemetery in the whole nation. Face north-south instead of the usual east-west.
All the graves are pointed in the wrong direction! In America, Catholic graves face north-south instead of the east-west.
2.) Frenier Cemetery
The only thing left in LaPlace, Louisiana, is a cemetery. The tiny village was destroyed by a hurricane in 1915, and the legend is that a voodoo priestess predicted this would happen. The locals would go to Julia Brown for medicines when they were ill. Other than that, they feared her because she was believed to have been an oracle and had predicted a disaster would destroy the town.
She told them she would take the village with her when she died. The day she died on September 30, 1915, a category 4 hurricane wiped the village off the map. Everyone died except two people who left town for the day. All the townspeople were buried in a mass grave. Julia Brown's grave was reportedly removed and separated from the rest about 100 yards away.
The Frenier Cemetary is located in the Manchac Swamp.
The legendary actor Nicolas Cage has his final resting place planned for a funeral already! The famous actor bought two plots in New Orleans St. Louis Cemetery No. 1. It's pretty strange for a mausoleum to look like an Egyptian pyramid, but we are talking about Nicolas Cage.
The Moriarty Monument is in New Orleans, Louisiana, the tallest monument in a historic cemetery. When Mary Moriarty died in 1887, it was a way for Daniel A. Moriarty to honor his beloved wife and show up NOLA socialites buried at Metairie Cemetery for the rich and privileged, who never accepted him.
According to legend, Daniel was a poor Irish emigrant when he arrived in New Orleans in the mid-1800s. He married a local woman, Mary Farrell, who was older than him. Nonetheless, the two enjoyed a happy marriage and became wealthy due to their successful joint business endeavors. However, Daniel was never expected by the New Orleans elite. They looked down on his poor background and Irish heritage and mistreated him.
He found a way to get even with the bougie high-society crowd. When Mary passed away, he spared no expense, making sure she would spend the rest of eternity looking down on them! Which was a challenge, being that all of the above-ground tombs and moralisms at Metairie Cemetery are over the top. Still, he achieved his goal by building an 80-foot-tall monument, with four life-sized statues commissioned in the image of virtues: Faith, Hope, Charity, and his wife, Mary.
The Moriarty Monument bears a colossal granite steeple crowned by a cross, with four life-sized statues at its base. According to local legend, Moriarty commissioned a sculptor to create the statues in the image of four virtues: Faith, Hope, Charity, and Mary Moriarty. However, another theory suggests that the fourth statue represents the virtue of Memory.
The monument bears the name “Moriarty” in large capital letters, but the date of Mary’s death has been omitted due to her self-consciousness about how much older she was than her husband. Daniel Moriarty and his father are buried in Metairie Cemetery alongside her.
It’s no easy feat to compete with the magnificent mausoleums in Metairie Cemetery, a New Orleans cemetery built in 1872 on the site of a former horse racing track. With the largest assemblage of above-ground monuments and mausoleums in the city, Metairie Cemetery boasts a number of impressive tombs that create a small neighborhood of imposing buildings in various architectural styles, from an Egyptian pyramid to spectacular Neoclassical structures.
5.) Saint Roch Chapel
The chapel is in the St. Roch cemetery and is an odd shrine that is covered with prosthetic legs hanging from the walls. The neighborhood used to be known as Faubourg Franklin, where Pastor Peter Thevis ministered at the Holy Trinity Church.
Desperate to save the lives of his parishioners, Pastor Thevis prayed to the Patron Saint of Health, St. Roch. He promised to build a chapel in St. Roch's honor if his people were spared. St. Roch ministered to victims of the Black Plague in the 1300s.
His legend grew after he contracted the 'black death' himself. He was banished from the parish and hid in a forest close by. A nobleman and his dog would visit from time to time and bring him bread. While visiting, the dog licked the reverend's wounds, and gradually, his wounds went away until completely healed.
Miraculously, St. Rock answered Pastor Thevis's prayers, and the people of Faubourg were spared. In return, Pastor Thevis built the Saint Roch Chapel and cemetery where folks leave prosthetics and pray to the Saint to cure their disease or illness.
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