New Orleans cemeteries have been the sites of a multitude of unusual
happenings and a source of fascination for visitors to our city.

In early New Orleans, if you dug a six-foot hole you would soon have a cavity with up to 5 feet 11 and ¾ inches of water because of the city’s high water table and below sea-level elevation. As a result, a coffin placed in a freshly dug grave floated on top until men forced it to settle on the bottom with long wooden poles. To eliminate this agonizing sight, large holes were bored into the bottoms of coffins so water could enter quickly and force the coffin to sink without delay.

Imagine listening to the coffin of a loved one, gurgling, gurgling, gurgling, as it sank to its rest. This painful ordeal led to the practice of building tombs above ground. A visiting writer in the mid-1800s labeled these cemeteries “cities of the dead.”

A humorist said, “Death is simply nature’s way of telling us to slow down.” And a very famous writer, upon visiting New Orleans, said, “You can tell a great deal about a community by the way they honor their dead, and without meeting any of the people of New Orleans yet, I can tell you I know I’m going to like them, for very few cities that I have visited throughout the world honor the dead as they do here in New Orleans.”

New Orleans cemeteries have been the sites of a multitude of unusual happenings and no doubt a source of fascination for visitors to our city. In 1980, a vice president of Neiman-Marcus of Houston chose Lafayette Cemetery on Washington Avenue as the site for his wedding. The date was Friday the 13^th of June.

A chartered flight from Houston brought the bride, groom and guests, all dressed in black. Four black limousines took the wedding party to Lafayette Cemetery. The ceremony was held in one of the aisles between the graves, while a lone trumpet played “Summertime.”

The bride and groom, both married previously, told the graveyard superintendent they had come to bury the past and get married at the same time.

There are 42 cemeteries in the metropolitan New Orleans area. The largest is Lake Lawn Metairie Cemetery, which locals always refer to simply as Metairie Cemetery. If you wish to see the architecture of the world, you need only visit Metairie Cemetery. There are hundreds of interesting stories about this graveyard, beginning with its origins. In the mid-1800s, this was the site of the Metairie Racetrack and Jockey Club.

According to lore, an American millionaire named Charles Howard was denied admission to the clubhouse, his sin being that he was not a Creole. The miffed millionaire vowed to buy and bury the track and the club. In 1872, the site did become a cemetery, and in 1885, when Howard died, his eternal resting place was on the grounds of the former Jockey Club. His ornate mausoleum features a statue of a man with his finger to his lips. Following is another noteworthy example of Metairie’s stories.

Faith, Hope, Charity & Mrs. Moriarty
At what was once the main entrance of Metairie Cemetery, you will find the largest monument in the cemetery—all 85 feet of it.

As the story goes, Daniel Moriarty, an Irish immigrant, worked hard and was a very successful businessman. His wife was much older then he, and Daniel was not as attentive as he could have been. But he tried to make amends after she died in 1887.

Although Daniel was successful in commerce, he and his wife could never break into New Orleans society. They simply didn’t have that good old New Orleans blue blood.

Daniel, having a silver tongue and the ability to get his ideas across, convinced a friend to design an impressive memorial. He ordered an overpowering monument with a huge granite shaft topped with a cross of the same material. Since Metairie was a cemetery where most of the blue bloods in New Orleans were buried, Daniel wanted his wife to look down her nose at those who had snubbed the Moriartys for so many years. This, he hoped, would give his departed spouse great satisfaction.

Daniel told the sculptor he wanted four life-size statues to represent the four Graces. When informed there were but three Graces— Faith, Hope and Charity— he insisted that there be four Graces anyway. Daniel was successful in convincing a big out-of-state builder that his monument would bring him untold dollars. The final cost was $185,000. (Moriarty paid only a very small portion of that amount.)

Upon arrival of the monument, it was discovered that no local drayage company had equipment large enough to transport it. A railroad spur from the mainline had to be laid directly into the cemetery in order to make on-site delivery. The first erecting firm went bankrupt, and a second contractor was hired. The monument, including the huge granite cross at the top of an eight-sided sphere, with the life-size statues of the “Four Graces,” was finally erected.

A circular sidewalk installed around the base of the monument consisted of stones from various states throughout the country, each weighing eleven tons. When the walk was completed, Mrs. Moriarty’s remains were transferred from her original burial site to Metairie Cemetery.

Because of the Moriartys’ age difference, Mrs. Moriarty stipulated in her will that only the date of her death be shown. She didn’t want to give anyone the satisfaction of knowing how much older she was than her spouse.

After the stonecutter inscribed the information given him by Moriarty, he realized the date he’d carved was one day off the date he had been instructed to chisel on the monument.

He approached Moriarty very tactfully and advised him that, apparently in his time of grief, he had made an understandable error, but the error could be corrected for the small sum of $2.50. Grunting, Moriarty said, “The hell with it. I’ve spent enough already.”

After the remains of Mrs. Moriarty were placed under the monument, Moriarty called the contractor back to the monument and advised him that the cross was crooked and he would not pay one cent until it was corrected.

The second contractor went back to work, and like the first, went bankrupt. Moriarty moved to California for health reasons, and upon his death 36 years later, was buried alongside his wife, Mary, under the highly controversial Moriarty monument.

St. Louis Cemetery No. 1
This cemetery was the fourth cemetery in New Orleans. It was laid out in two squares. Square Number 3 was set aside by the city principally for the burial of African-American Catholics. Such notable African Americans as voodoo queen Marie Laveau, Oscar J. Dunn, members of the Sisters of the Holy Family, Arthur Esteves, former mayor Ernest “Dutch” Morial and many others are buried here.

The iron ornaments and gates of the tombs were usually fashioned by African-American artisans, many of whom are also buried in the cemetery. Cemetery tours are conducted daily by a number of tour companies, one of which is the nonprofit group Save Our Cemeteries, 888-721-7493.

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