Beyond Depraved: LaLaurie Mansion’s Death Attic
On the evening on April 10, 1834, a fire broke out in an elegant three-story mansion in New Orleans’ French Quarter. The rescuers found a slave woman chained in the kitchen who admitted to deliberately setting the blaze. She felt it was worth the risk of dying in a fire to escape further torture at the hands of Madame LaLaurie, the lady of the house. After the authorities released her, she led them to the attic where worse horrors awaited them.
The mistreatment of slaves was not a matter for concern during the 1830s in New Orleans, especially for wealthy, socially prominent ladies like Delphine LaLaurie. But even among the elite, there were boundaries. When a furious, whip-wielding Delphine chased a young slave girl over the edge of the roof, causing her to fall to her death in 1833, she crossed them.
She tried to hide the “evidence,” but the police soon discovered the little girl’s body thrown down a well. As punishment, Madame LaLaurie was ordered to sell her other slaves. She got around this by selling them to her family members, who quietly sold them back to her.
When the firefighters burst into the attic, they were greeted by the sight of…
