Haunted New Orleans, Louisiana

LaLaurie Mansion

In April 1834, a fire broke out at 1140 Royal Street. When firefighters arrived at the home of socialite Madame Delphine LaLaurie, they found the source of the smoke and then found something else: a hidden attic chamber containing enslaved people who had been subjected to prolonged, systematic torture. The discovery caused a riot. The LaLauries fled New Orleans and were never prosecuted. The building changed hands dozens of times over the next two centuries. Nicolas Cage owned it briefly. Nobody stays long. The attic, investigators consistently report, still holds what was left behind. Not in any physical sense, but in every other sense.

The phenomena documented here span the full paranormal spectrum: screaming apparitions heard from the street at night, shadow figures on the upper floors, an overwhelming feeling of dread that multiple investigators have described as physically nauseating, and the spirit of Madame LaLaurie herself, reported as a cold, imperious presence near the main staircase. It is the most investigated private residence in New Orleans, and arguably the most aggressive location in the city.

Portals to Hell S01E07: "LaLaurie Mansion" (Travel Channel, 2019)

Jack Osbourne and Katrina Weidman investigated LaLaurie Mansion for Portals to Hell, their series focused on locations so paranormally saturated they're considered literal gateways for dark entities. The team spent the night in the mansion with a focus on the attic, the epicenter of the historical atrocities and the location of the most consistently reported activity. During the attic investigation, Weidman captured what she described as a direct EVP response: after asking "Are you in pain?", the recorder picked up a clear voice saying "Yes." The team also documented rapid, unexplained temperature drops of more than 15 degrees in isolated areas of the attic with no HVAC explanation. Osbourne reported feeling physically ill during portions of the investigation and described a pressure sensation on his chest that lifted immediately upon leaving the attic space. The episode concluded that LaLaurie Mansion represents one of the darkest residual hauntings in the country. Not a loop, but an active, aware presence with clear intelligence behind it.

Ghost Hunters S08E15: "French Quarter Massacre" (Syfy, Sep 20, 2012)

TAPS investigators Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson made LaLaurie Mansion the anchor location of their French Quarter Massacre episode, a single-night sweep of seven of New Orleans' most paranormally active sites. At the mansion, the team deployed full-spectrum cameras and EMF meters throughout the main floors and captured a significant spike on the K-II meter in the main hallway with no electrical source identified. Grant Wilson reported hearing a woman's laugh, clearly audible to both investigators, in an empty room on the second floor. The audio was reviewed and confirmed as unexplained. A shadow figure was captured on their full-spectrum camera moving across the main parlor doorway. The team classified LaLaurie as one of the most consistently active locations they had visited in eight seasons of investigating. The six additional locations visited the same night are documented individually below.

Bourbon Orleans Hotel

The Bourbon Orleans Hotel has had more lives than most city blocks. Built in 1817 as the Orleans Ballroom, the city's most prestigious venue for the infamous quadroon balls, it later became a convent and orphanage run by the Sisters of the Holy Family, housing girls orphaned by the yellow fever epidemics that swept New Orleans repeatedly through the 19th century. Many of those girls died here. The nuns who cared for them died here. The building became a hotel in the 1960s, and somewhere in the transition, none of the previous residents left. Paranormal investigators have documented more than twenty distinct entities in the building, a figure that sounds like an exaggeration until you spend a night there.

Ghost Adventures S07E24: "New Orleans" (Travel Channel, Nov 16, 2013)

Zak Bagans, Nick Groff, and Aaron Goodwin investigated the Bourbon Orleans Hotel as their primary New Orleans location, locking down overnight in the ballroom, hallways, and former convent areas of the building. The ballroom investigation produced the episode's most compelling evidence: Zak and Nick both independently heard the sound of a woman humming, audible without equipment, in the empty ballroom. A full-spectrum camera positioned on the dance floor captured what appeared to be a translucent figure moving in a circular path consistent with waltzing, visible for approximately four seconds before disappearing. The investigators attributed this to the spirit of a woman who died during one of the ballroom's grand events, a theory supported by the building's history of deaths on-site during the Creole ball era. In the former convent corridors, Aaron Goodwin caught an EVP of a child's voice saying what sounded like "help me," replayed multiple times on the episode and confirmed as unexplained by audio analysis. The spirit box session in the orphanage rooms produced responses that Zak described as some of the clearest he had captured in seven seasons: direct name responses and the word "sisters" repeated twice in response to questions about who was present. The team concluded the Bourbon Orleans is one of the highest-density haunted locations in the United States, with multiple active, intelligent entities sharing the space.

St. Louis Cemetery No. 1

New Orleans' oldest cemetery, established in 1789, is a city of the dead in the most literal architectural sense: above-ground "oven" vaults stacked like apartment blocks along whitewashed alleyways, because the water table made in-ground burial a suggestion rather than a plan. The cemetery holds yellow fever victims, Civil War dead, free people of color, and, most famously, Voodoo Queen Marie Laveau, who reportedly sold gris-gris, conducted ceremonies in Congo Square, and ran New Orleans' social underground for decades before her death in 1881. Her tomb is the most visited in the cemetery. Visitors leave offerings, rum, candy, Mardi Gras beads, and report that requests made at the tomb are sometimes fulfilled in ways that are difficult to explain. Whether that's Marie Laveau or confirmation bias is a question best left to the individual visitor.

Ghost Hunters S08E15: "French Quarter Massacre" (Syfy, Sep 20, 2012)

TAPS included St. Louis Cemetery No. 1 in their multi-location French Quarter sweep, investigating after hours with the cooperation of the Archdiocese of New Orleans. The team focused their investigation near Marie Laveau's tomb and the older sections of the cemetery where yellow fever victims were interred in mass vaults. Grant Wilson captured an EVP near the Laveau tomb, a low, rhythmic sound that the team described as consistent with chanting, captured with no ambient source identifiable on the audio track. Jason Hawes reported his equipment battery draining completely in under ten minutes near the oldest section of the cemetery, despite a full charge at the start of the lockdown. This is a phenomenon documented by multiple investigators at this location across different visits. Full-body apparitions in period dress have been reported by tour guides and visitors regularly, and the TAPS team documented a thermal anomaly consistent with a human-shaped figure that did not match the thermal signature of any physical person present during the investigation.

Brennan's Restaurant

Brennan's has been serving Bananas Foster and Eggs Sardou to New Orleans since 1946, in a building that dates to the 1790s. It is one of the most famous restaurants in America and, according to TAPS, one of the more poltergeist-active. The staff had been reporting flying objects, cold spots, full-body apparitions in the dining rooms, and unexplained sounds from the kitchen for years before Ghost Hunters arrived. The building's long history as a private residence before its life as a restaurant gives it the layered occupancy that tends to produce the most persistent activity. Generations of people considered the address home long before anyone thought to serve Eggs Benedict in it.

Ghost Hunters S02E03: "The Red Room" (Syfy, 2005)

TAPS investigators Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson investigated Brennan's in one of their earliest New Orleans cases, named for a distinctive red-walled private dining room that staff described as the epicenter of the building's most intense activity. The team set up stationary cameras throughout the dining rooms and positioned investigators in the Red Room overnight. During the investigation, a wine glass on a dining table moved approximately eight inches across the surface with no vibration source identified. The movement was captured on both the stationary camera and a handheld camera simultaneously. The TAPS team captured EMF spikes throughout the main dining room at intervals that corresponded with staff reports of the "cold presence" felt by servers during evening service. A male apparition in 19th-century dress was sighted by both investigators on the upper landing, disappearing before they could approach. The evidence review concluded that Brennan's exhibits classic intelligent haunting characteristics. The activity responds to human presence and shows deliberate, non-residual behavior, suggesting an aware entity rather than a simple recording.

New Orleans Pharmacy Museum

America's first licensed pharmacy opened at this address in 1823, operated by Louis Joseph Dufilho Jr. under the first pharmacist licensing law in the country. It sounds straightforward until you read what Dufilho was allegedly compounding in addition to the standard remedies: potions sold to Voodoo practitioners, and according to persistent historical accounts, poisons administered in ways that circumvented the gap between what was legal and what was requested. The building still contains the original apothecary jars, surgical equipment, and leeching apparatus, displayed in cases that look less like museum exhibits and more like someone just stepped away. Staff report hearing moaning from the back room, finding objects displaced overnight in locked cases, and seeing apparitions of patients in the treatment areas. These are the kind of guests who didn't leave and aren't reflected in any checkout register.

Ghost Hunters S08E15: "French Quarter Massacre" (Syfy, Sep 20, 2012)

TAPS included the Pharmacy Museum in their French Quarter sweep, investigating the treatment rooms and apothecary displays after hours. The team set up thermal cameras facing the original dispensing counter and operating area. During the investigation, Jason Hawes captured a significant EMF anomaly near the original apothecary jars. The meter spiked and held for approximately forty seconds with no electrical source within range. Grant Wilson reported hearing what sounded like a bottle being set down on a hard surface in the adjacent treatment room when both investigators were in the main dispensary; review of the audio track confirmed an unexplained impact sound at that timestamp. A thermal anomaly consistent with a seated human figure was captured in the treatment chair, present for approximately six seconds before dissipating. The TAPS team concluded the Pharmacy Museum's activity is concentrated around the original treatment areas, consistent with residual haunting tied to the physical objects and spaces where medical procedures took place.

The Sultan's Palace

The building at 716 Dauphine Street is one of the more exotic entries in New Orleans' paranormal catalog, which is saying something. In the mid-1800s, a man of Turkish origin known locally as "the Sultan" rented the property and proceeded to fill it with an entourage of women, guards, and servants in a manner that his Creole neighbors found deeply suspicious and entirely too interesting. One morning, neighbors noticed blood seeping from beneath the front door. When the house was opened, every person inside had been massacred, reportedly including the Sultan himself. The killer was never identified. The Sultan may have been buried alive in the courtyard. Local legend holds that his hand was found protruding from the soil.

The building's paranormal reputation is consequently among the most extreme in the city: blood-curdling screaming reported from the street at night, the apparition of a turbaned man on the upper floors, and an intense oppressive sensation throughout the building that investigators describe as one of the more physically affecting they have encountered. It remains a private multi-unit residence.

Ghost Hunters S08E15: "French Quarter Massacre" (Syfy, Sep 20, 2012)

TAPS included the Sultan's Palace in their French Quarter night, gaining rare access to the building's interior spaces. The team focused on the upper floors and the courtyard area associated with the massacre legend. During the investigation, the TAPS investigators captured one of the episode's most notable EVPs in the main hall: after Jason Hawes stated "We know what happened here," the recorder picked up a male voice responding with a single word in what audio analysts described as a non-English language, consistent with the building's Turkish-origin history. In the courtyard, both investigators experienced simultaneous and independent cold spots in the area traditionally associated with the burial, despite consistent ambient temperatures across the rest of the property. The team documented the Sultan's Palace as a location with a credible, well-supported paranormal history and activity consistent with a violent death event, including multiple entities, significant emotional imprinting, and intelligent responses to investigator presence.

Beauregard-Keyes House

This 1826 Greek Revival mansion served as a temporary residence for Confederate General P.G.T. Beauregard after the Civil War, a man who lost the war, lost his property, and came to New Orleans to attempt a quieter second act. He did not entirely succeed at the quiet part. The house is named for both Beauregard and novelist Frances Parkinson Keyes, who purchased and restored it in the 1940s. Its most dramatic paranormal report is not a simple apparition but something considerably more cinematic: witnesses describe a full spectral re-enactment of a Civil War battle in the garden at night, soldiers in formation, the sound of cannon fire, the whole theatrical production, appearing without warning and vanishing the same way. It's the kind of claim that invites skepticism until you talk to the people who have seen it independently and compare notes.

Ghost Hunters S08E15: "French Quarter Massacre" (Syfy, Sep 20, 2012)

TAPS investigated the Beauregard-Keyes House as part of their French Quarter sweep, spending time in the main rooms and the garden where the spectral battle re-enactments are most often reported. The team positioned audio recorders throughout the garden and caught a compelling EVP session: multiple distinct sounds consistent with marching boots captured on the recorders, with no street traffic or ambient source identifiable at the time of recording. Grant Wilson experienced a K-II EMF spike in General Beauregard's former bedroom that held steady for over a minute, long enough that the team was able to attempt a spirit box session in real time, during which the name "Pierre" (Beauregard's first name) was returned by the box in a direct response to the question "What is your name?" The team classified the Beauregard-Keyes House as a location with strong residual and intelligent activity, with the garden remaining the primary hotspot.

Ursuline Convent

Built in 1752, the Ursuline Convent is the oldest surviving building in the Mississippi Valley and the oldest building in New Orleans. It outlasted every hurricane, flood, and fire that erased most of what surrounded it for three centuries, which is either a testament to 18th-century French colonial construction or to something else entirely. Local legend ties the top-floor windows, permanently shuttered, to the "casket girls," young women shipped from France to Louisiana in coffin-shaped trunks to serve as wives for colonists. The legend holds that the trunks contained something else in addition to their contents, and that whatever that was ended up in the convent's upper floors, which is why the windows have been nailed shut and reportedly blessed by the Archbishop of New Orleans. Apparitions of nuns move through the chapel at night. Whispering voices are documented throughout the building. The top floor is not open to visitors, a policy that has been in place for a very long time.

Ghost Hunters S08E15: "French Quarter Massacre" (Syfy, Sep 20, 2012)

TAPS gained access to the Ursuline Convent as part of their French Quarter investigation, one of the harder clearances to obtain given the building's active religious use and restricted areas. The team focused on the chapel and the accessible corridor areas, setting up both audio recorders and full-spectrum cameras. During the chapel investigation, Jason Hawes captured a clear EVP of a woman's voice, described as soft and deliberate, saying what sounded like "pray." The full-spectrum camera positioned at the chapel entrance captured movement consistent with a robed figure crossing in front of the altar, with no person physically present in that area during the time of capture. Grant Wilson reported hearing chanting from the upper floor, a steady, rhythmic sound consistent with liturgical recitation, despite the floor being empty and sealed. The TAPS team concluded the Ursuline Convent carries centuries of concentrated residual energy, with the chapel being the most active area and the upper floors remaining the great unanswered question of the building.

Cabildo Museum

The Louisiana Purchase was signed here in 1803. Napoleon's death mask is displayed here. The building served as the seat of Spanish colonial government, then French colonial government, then American government, then the Louisiana Supreme Court, and finally became a state museum. Its walls have absorbed the decision-making, the arguments, and the deaths of people who shaped the entire continental United States. It is, in terms of historical weight per square foot, one of the most consequential buildings in American history. The ghost of a Spanish colonial governor, formal, imperious, appearing in period dress, has been reported by museum staff repeatedly. Objects have been found displaced in sealed exhibit cases. Visitors in the upper galleries consistently report the feeling of being closely observed.

Ghost Hunters S08E15: "French Quarter Massacre" (Syfy, Sep 20, 2012)

TAPS ended their extraordinary French Quarter night at the Cabildo, investigating the upper galleries and the room where the Louisiana Purchase transfer ceremony took place. The team set up recorders in the main exhibit hall and conducted a spirit box session in the transfer room. The spirit box produced what Jason Hawes described as a clear name response, a Spanish-sounding name returned twice in succession when the investigators asked who was present. In the upper gallery, Grant Wilson captured a full-spectrum image of what appeared to be a male figure in formal period clothing standing near the window overlooking Jackson Square, visible in one frame and absent in the next. A K-II meter session in the Louisiana Purchase room produced sustained EMF activity that TAPS characterized as responsive, spiking in direct answer to yes/no questions in a pattern that ruled out random interference. The Cabildo investigation concluded the French Quarter Massacre episode, and TAPS classified the night as one of the most evidence-rich they had conducted in a single location cluster anywhere in their history.

Sauvé House (Haunted House on Esplanade)

The Sauvé House is the French Quarter's less famous cousin, a 19th-century Creole townhouse in the Tremé neighborhood with two centuries of unexplained deaths and paranormal reports that it has never quite managed to shake. Where the French Quarter's haunted buildings attract camera crews and ghost tours, the Sauvé House attracts the quieter, more methodical kind of investigation: the kind that involves a physical medium walking through with no prior briefing and a detective reviewing the history afterward to compare notes. That's exactly what The Dead Files did in 2011, and the comparison was uncomfortable.

The Dead Files S01E05: "The White Widow" (Travel Channel, Oct 21, 2011)

The Dead Files pairs physical medium Amy Allan with retired NYPD homicide detective Steve DiSchiavi, who investigate locations independently and compare findings only at the reveal, a format designed to prevent the medium from being informed by the historical research. At the Sauvé House, Allan walked the property blind and described a female entity she called "the White Widow," a tall woman in white, furious, with a strong territorial attachment to the building and a hostility toward the current occupants that Allan characterized as physically dangerous. She described cold spots precise enough to locate specific rooms, which DiSchiavi's independent historical research confirmed corresponded to rooms with documented deaths. Allan also identified a male presence in the lower floor, younger, confused, and not malevolent, consistent with a death record DiSchiavi uncovered during his research. Temperature drops of over twenty degrees in specific rooms were documented by the production team with thermal equipment during Allan's walkthrough. The reveal confirmed significant overlap between Allan's physical impressions and DiSchiavi's archival findings, placing the Sauvé House among the more credible cases in the show's first season.