As you may know, NO’s former residents are interred above ground because the high water table periodically caused buried caskets to float and push through the surface, a phenomenon that rather disturbed the living. The city solved the problem by interment in vaults, both in little houselike structures that were the earliest American mausoleums, and stacks of "oven vaults" that form the cemetery walls. St Louis #1 is the oldest extant cemetery in NO and houses some of its most illustrious dead. Its population echoes the historic diversity of New Orleans: the cemetery is the resting place of the rich and famous and the destitute and anonymous, both white and black. That may not seem remarkable, but keep in mind that many cemeteries (yes, even in the north) were segregated, particularly before the civil war. Not here. And it’s not just a racial mix. The stones document birthplaces in Germany, China and Czechoslovakia, France, Spain, and Greece. Some of the most elegant mausoleums are the Italian and Portuguese Society tombs, built for wealthy ethnic residents who "bought in" to the tomb so they could have an elegant resting place near their fellow countrymen. But even these "neighborhoods" aren’t as exclusive as they seem…the original Portuguese society tomb has been turned over to the St Vincent DePaul Society, which uses it for interment of the poor. And the second Portuguese Society tomb was delegated for the interment of Vietnamese refugees in the 1970s.

The diversity doesn’t end there. People leave offerings of toys, flowers, and memorabilia at the tombs of the recent dead, and these offerings bear a resemblance to Voodoo and Santeria altars. But there’s plenty of full-fledged Voodoo going on in St Louis #1, too. Several tombs bear offerings of candy, rum and candles. I even saw one imposing mausoleum decked out with a wreath of black velvet roses and several burnt-down orange and black Halloween candles.

Marie Laveau is supposedly buried in the Glapion family vault, though no ones knows for sure. While I didn’t find a tomb that was identified specifically as hers, I did find one in a similar style that had been heavily marked with circles and red Xs in multiples of three. The original plaque had been pried off, and roof was showered with hard candies and bits and pieces of neighboring tombs.

It’s said that petitioners who perform certain rituals at the tomb of Marie Laveau will have their wishes granted. The Xs are part of that, so are the offerings, including chunks of stone and brick broken off of other tombs. It seemed to me Marie would have preferred fresh flowers, and I vowed to bring her some on my next trip to New Orleans. (I made my three Xs with a fingertip so as not to further mar the tomb, and presented a clamshell from the cemetery path as an offering. I’m not a True Believer, but…)

Of course, many people take pieces of the tombs for mojo or souvenirs. The tomb I found was badly deteriorated, and not just from weather and time. And although it was the most heavily damaged tomb I found, many of the older tombs had Xs and spirals etched on their walls and dark offerings on their thresholds. I’m not sure if there’s a special significance about tombs that are targeted for this treatment. My guess is that most of the time, a visitor with a bent for the occult who is inclined toward vandalism gets a "vibe" from a particular old or imposing tomb and just improvises a ritual on the spot, though some graves, like Marie Laveau’s, probably have historical significance.