Framed and Shot

An IR shoot of a nice old cemetery in New Orleans. Saint Louis Cemetery No. 1, replaced the now vanished St. Peter Cemetery as the main burial ground in 1788 when New Orleans lost many citizens to an epidemic and a great fire,
St. Louis Cemetery contains approximately of 700 tombs, tomb ruins and markers in small urban-like precincts. The tombs are owned by individuals, families and societies and most are above ground – for obvious reasons:

No grave could be dug of the usual depth without coming to water, … the coffin is laid upon the surface of the ground, and a strong structure of brick built around it. This is then plastered and whitewashed.
(1834 by John H.B. Latrobe, the youngest son of Benjamin Latrabe, The “Father of American Architecture” best known for his design of the United States Capitol).

The tombs are designed for multiple and repeated burials. This pyramid-shaped market tomb (PNTHNOC 322) belongs to the Varney family and was erected in 1814 for two children. It was once at the center of the cemetery. The front half was lopped off to make room for the turning basin for sailing ships on the Carondolet Canal, which when filled in, became Basin Street.

This is a rather interesting cemetery, several famous New Orleanians are buried here, like Benjamin Latrobe, (America’s first professional architect and mentioned above), the first African-American Mayor of New Orleans; Paul Morphy, and Marie Laveau, a legendary Voodoo priestess, her grave in the Glapion family crypt is unmarked but perpetually decorated with gifts and marked X’s or crosses left by visitors…..

(And once more are we impressed by the work someone has done to make this history easy available to everyone, it is all there – on the net! Want to know more? Have a look!