Newspaper Page Text
• <-uuc.no IrULLLL- If’.M
VOLUME XL1II—NUMBER NINE.
JItlanta, Ga., Week Ending Jlpril 29, 1905.
50c PER YEAR—SINGLE COPY 5c.
• 9 ••• • ••* # ••• # ’•* #•*•••
Famous Plot to Liberate
Napoleon;
Wanton Cruelty of Bloody
Fevered Breams of Emerald
O’Reilly; Absinthe;
Recalled by Old New Orleans Homes
Wierd Revenge of Founder of
Lottery;
• .#• • ••• • ••• e • •• • • •• • ••• • ••• • o ••• • ••• • ••• • ••• • ••• • ••• • ••• o ••• • ••• • • ••• ••••«•• ••• • .*• • ••• c ••• • ••• • ♦*•#••• • ••• • ••• • •«
••• t ••• • ••*§•»••••• 9 ••• • ••• O ••• 9-«•#•••••«•• -••••••••«■ 9
1 • *•*• *•* • ••• • ••• o ••• • ‘•■n ••• • ••• • • **• o ••• • o • ••• o
IH
By PAUL LINCOLN.
Written for C/>«» S«*xr»y South
PA NISH, French. United
-.j Tifwhat
ever flag floated over the
old city of New Orleans,
her people have ever dis
played one marked char
acteristic. they are in
tensely loyal and patriotic
Old traditions, old-time
glories, old customs, old
families, old houses, all
have been faithfully cher
ished, whatever the domi
nation she could be de
. when all was done, for un-
loyalty and most of all to her-
pended o
swerving
self.
So it is that certain shabby and de
caying old buildings, which in other
(ities would have been razed long ago,
io make way for new and modern ones,
have been allowed to stand; they repre
sent the pasi, which in New Orleans is
always a vital part of the present. When
one of these has to go it is not until
rendered necessary through the unrelent
ing push of growth or actual state of
disuse. As with the “Napoleon House,'’
whicli some months ago was condemned.
Olcl Beauregard Mansion in New Orleans.
It stood at the corner of Exchange alley
and Customhouse, now Iberville 1
and in its last days was used for a
grocery and liquor saloon.
11> other words, when it was designed a
residence for the hero of Austerlitz, Pix-
ehange alley, which has one end in Ca
nal street and the other opposite the
famous old St. Louis hotel, was the live
ly scene of trade and bustle; here were
.-e coffee houses most frequented by
the merchants and planters, and in these
familiar haunts, over their wine or ab
sinthe. they met to disc*nos business of
private concern or the broader questions
of the day.
AN AMBITIOUS PLOT.
The Emperor Napoleon had devoted
adherents in New Orleans, among them
Mr. Nicholas Girod, who in 1814 had
been mayor of the city. These loyal
and enthusiastic Frenchmen, in IE2I.
conceived a plan for liberating the exile
at St. Helena, and the “Napoleon
House” was part of it. The scheme
was well laid, and there Is every reason
to believe, would have been successful
in execution but for the flnal disappear
ance of the star whicli went out in
da rkness.
The plan of the conspirators was to
steal upon the island some dark night,
surprise the garrison, and letting the
emperor down by mi ans of a chair, sail
away with him to (he friendly shores
Headquarters of Do i Alexandra O’Reilly.
Exchange Alley in Which Napoleon House Was Situated.
of Louisiana. Accordingly they had
built a clipper yacht of the first speed,
wonderfully fast it is said to have been,
called the "Seraphine," and manned it
with a band of Barataria desperadoes—
noted cut-throats, who were to overpower
the garrison—under one Captain Bossier.
All being now in readiness the expe
dition sel forth, but laid proceeded no
further than the mouth of the river
when it was met by an incoming mer
chantman, bringing news of the death
at St. Helena on May 5th. of the noble
exile, who, it Is believed, was not un
aware of the efforts at work for his lib
eration.
The house which had a curious
wrought iron belvedere, or watch tower,
and was very good for its day, was
occupied by Mr. Nicholas Girod himself
after the disappointment of his cher
ished scheme, and from one vicissitude
of fortune to another came at last to
the level of a common barroom. The
Bonapartist faction long gone, and the
sentiment w hjcli had actuated the erec
tion of the house sleeping now with
other memories of that time, it was not
longer preserved, the more that the old
street in which it stood is not now the
center it once was, and unless it were to
he preserved as a relic the common
usage, to which it had sunk were inevita
ble. 11 had stood nearly a hundred years,
but at last had to go.
Another house still standing at the
corner of Bourbon and Bienville streets,
famous as a resort since it was founded
in 1752, and once the idling place of La
Fltte, king of Barataria and all the
southern coast, is the “Old Absinthe
House,” as it is called. A plate on the
corner gives the date of its founding,
but there is no record of the countless
glasses of the fatal green beverage
which have been passed over its coun
ter.
When the French soldiers, returning
from the Algerian war in I847, brought
with them the habit of drinking ab
sinthe, a custom soon disseminated, in
France, it was not long in finding its
v ay into French society in New Or
leans. Wormwood (absinthium) came,
too, from the old world, where its orig
inal use was medicinal. The drink, a
hitter, highly aromatic, and emerald col
ored liquer. is made from redistilled al
coholic. spirits, in which absinthium, or
wormwood, and other bitter herbs and
roots have been steeped. The wormwood
having strong tonic properties, the other
ingredients as well, the effect Is Im
mediate, magical and—deadly. The vic
tim of absinthism is ns certainly doom
ed as the criminal whose death sentence
admits of no possible reprieve, and a
more abjectly miserable wretcu the
whole gamut of the drink habit does
not show.
DOMAIN 'IF ABSINTHE.
It is a' curious old building, with dul*
green wooden shutters and solid, nail-
studded outer doors. An outside stair
way leads to the second story, the nar.
row, shuttered windows offering but dim
suggestion of former din and bustlo,
and the doughty feet that passed up and
down and in and out when the place
was a cabaret, or tavern. Even the
bold La Fitte lias left no trace of him
self, but just hearsay.
The ceiling of the nttle old saloon is
long and very low, and the original old
water fountain, there since the first ab
sinthe was made, shows Its marble base
worn hollow by the thick glasses of the
thousands that have come and gone. It
was a famous place in days gone by. if
not the fashion now—you would not quite
wish to go for it, maybe, but would
tather send for your glass of the famed
concoction, as do the tourists, the actors
and actresses and different visitors. It
is only three blocks down to the old
French opera, which was erected some
half dozen years later, and how many
eyes have been made to sparkle, how
many lines to "go trippingly on Uta
■ongue,” by the delicious green liquor
it were impossible to tell.
LON O’REILLY’S HEADQUARTERS.
Still another house which dates back to
the time of the Spanish succession is
that on the corner of Ursuline and St.
Claude streets, a house with strong pil-
lyars and a wide verandah, and about it
an old garde nof oleanders and magnolias
and orange and banana trees, a house
the sight of which is yet hateful to the
French Creoles, as they recall the cruel
ty and wickedneses of Alexandra O'Reilly
whose headquarters k was in 1769. When
Louis XV secretly gave Louisiana to his
cousin, Carlos III of Spain, it so incens
ed the loyal Louisianians that they re
fused to accept the situation or even be
lieve it could be true. Hon Antonio de
Ulloa, when he arrived to take possees-
sion of tiie colony, was not received, his
authority was not recognized, and he in
time was expelled from the shores. Then
It was that O'Reilly came crueller, more
vindictive, and even less possible to be
borne.
With all the pomp and show of one
representing majesty, heralded by music,
with bearers of silver maces preceding
him, and a rnagniflicent staff following,
and with 3.000 Spanish soldiers lining up
on either side of the Place d'Armes,
O'Reilly’s credentials were presented and
accepted, the French flag lowered and
the Spanish raised in its place—and the
lieutenant general of the armies of Spain
was duly installed in his new office.
Taking possession of one of the hand
somest houses in the little city, he gave
audiences seated on an elevated canop
ied chair, and received what he regard
ed as “the submission of the people.
It was a smooth and a misleading
tongue hat O'Reilly had. Issuing invi
tations 'to a grand levee to be held in
the viceregal hotel, the following guests,
the wealthiest and most prominent men
in the city, were included, and, as in
policy bound, .presented themselves: La-
frenlere,, Attorney General Masan Cheva
lier of St. Louis; Marquis; retired
commandant of Swiss troops, Noyan; re
tired captain of cavalry, Bienville, son
in law to Lafreniere; Caresse and oth
ers.
The levee was held on the 21st of Au
gust, and 'O’Reilly was particularly gra
cious in the reception of his guests, but
they ,on being escorted into an adjoining
room, were accorded a. second and very
different reception; the apartment was
filled with Spanish bayonets, and casting
off his friendly guise, O’Reilly proclaim
ing his visitors conspirators and rebel*,
gave orders that they be marched to
prison.
HAND OF THE TYRANT.
The trial was conducted in a room of
the barracks, and Lafreniere,. Marquis
Noyan de Bienville, Caresse. and Milliet
sentenced to be hanged, while other of
fenders were given imprisonments of
varying lengths. The whole city arose
in protest and appeal, but O'Reilly was
unyielding. The sentence was modified
only in that, since the only hangman
was a negro, and he disqualified from of
ficiating upon whites, death should bu
by shooting instead of hanging. Accord
ingly on the 25th day of October, at 3
o'clock in the afternoon, the prisoners,
with arms tied, were conducted from
their place of confinement to a position in
the barracks yard, the sentence being
read to them in English and in French,
they were shot to death, Lafreniere him
self giving the command to fire.
It was a dark day in New Orleans.
Many of the people, to avoid witnessing
the evil deed and hearing the sound of
the fatal muskety, tied into the country;
others shut themselves in their houses,
and no signs of life were in the deserted
streets. The old house that harbored
the cruel Spaniard is but an ugly remind
er. and it is one landmark none will
grieve to see razed.
HOUSE OCCUPIED BY GENERAL
BEAUREGARD.
Down in Chartres .street, between Ursu-
line and Hospital streets, and immediate
ly opposite the archbishropic, the oldest
building in Louisiana, is the old home
of General P. G. T. Beauregard. The
house in which he died is on the fash
ionable Esplanade avenue, but this was
at one time his home, unci ,s hi; -tic
also from 'the fact that General Jack-
son, the hero of Chalmette, and the Mar
quis de LaFayette were each of them
guests here.
It is melancholy, each new evidence we
have that
“Men's evil manners live in brass; their
virtues we write in water.”
In New Orleans the places associated
with General Beauregard suggest not so
much his career as a great soldier, as
the lottery, with which In his later years
he was connected. For about 2 hours'
work each month, and the use of his
name in endorsement, he received a sal
ary of SI 0,000 per year—and a blot on
the memory of him which can never be
effaced.
Tt was Charles T. Howard's money that
operated 'the Louisiana state lottery, and
when he applied for membership in the
Metairie Jockey Club he was blackballed
because of it. The Metairie race course
Had been for 30 years the most famous
in the United States, and. to be refused
adniitance into his circle of exclusives
stung the man who offered for it.
He vowed a vow; lie would buy the Me
tairie race track, and his tomb should
stand in the middle of it. Fate, as some
times happens, proved his colleague; tho
club becoming involved, lie bought up
the obligations, secured judgment and
tiie race course became his.
True to his word he had constructed
in the middle of it a handsome monu
ment. a large, open vault of granite, and
seated within, impressively visibly
through the iron gates which enclose it.
a statue representing “Time.” with a fin
ger held against the lips—the face said
to have been modeled from that of
Charles T. Howard himself.
It is but fair to say that the money
which he accumulated from the people
lias been largely turned back to them
through educational and philanthropic
channels.