O’Flaherty’s Irish Channel Pub
In the 1990s, O’Flaherty’s Irish Channel Pub was considered to be the most haunted location in the entire French Quarter of New Orleans, Louisiana. It was concluded after years of investigations that the ghosts of three spirits were tied together in some way haunted the building. However, a few years ago the International Society of Paranormal Investigations made an announcement that the building was no longer haunted. They, along with clairvoyants, performed a remote cleansing of the pub. The problem with this is that not everyone believes that psychic intervention can make a spirits attachment to a building disappear.
The three ghosts who haunt the building are linked by adultery, murder, and suicide. In 1806, a woman by the name of Mary Wheaton married Joseph Baptandiere, whom was her third husband. They lived on the second floor of the building at 508 Toulouse Street. They then opened a feed store on the first floor. Things seemed to be going pretty well, but by 1810, Joseph began to have an infatuation with a woman who worked in the store who was named Angelique DuBois. In the 1800s, the white men of New Orleans established extra-marital relationships with free colored women or white Creoles.
This practice was called the placage system and offered many things to the men that just having one wife could ever do. Joseph would go ahead and establish a placage relationship with Angelique. After a short period of time, Angelique demanded Joseph to leave Mary and to marry her. Joseph decided to stay with his wife for her money from the past two relationships, and the fact that Angelique seemed like she would not be a very good wife. One afternoon, the two began to have another fight about getting married. She ran upstairs to the third floor and Joseph ran after her.
Joseph pinned Angelique against a brick wall and she threatened to tell Mary of their relationship. He then grabbed her throat until she went unconscious. He dragged her body across the room and threw her out of the window. Angelique fell into the courtyard and received a broken neck upon impact. Joseph ran down to get the body before anyone saw it, and he dragged her across the courtyard into the sewage well. Following this, he then noticed a teenage boy watching everything from a fourth floor window. Joseph knew that the boy would make it clear that he committed the murder so he decided to act.
He ran up the third floor of the building a tied a rope around his neck. He then jumped out of the window and his neck snapped, instantly killing him. The truth would still come out about the placage arrangement between Joseph and Angelique, and the murder of Angelique as well. Even so, Mary continued to live on the second floor of the building and she ran the feed store until her death at the age of 35. To this day, many believe that the spirits of Mary, Angelique, and Joseph have been at the building where all of their deaths took place. Since the death of Angelique, intense cold spots have been felt in the courtyard over a brick planter.
According to the story, Joseph dragged Angelique’s body into the sewage well that was located there. Angelique’s apparition has also been seen in the courtyard wandering around. Her apparition appears to have a thin body of medium height, and hair that reaches down all the way to her waist. Her ghost is said to like young men and children because she will often touch their hands. The ghost of Joseph is also seen and felt in the courtyard. He often leaves marks on the arms of visitors. Some visitors have even been physically assaulted by the spirit of Joseph. One woman was pushed to the ground at such a force she almost went unconscious. Others have been pushed by the spirit of what they reported to be a tall and fat man.
Joseph may also be responsible for paranormal activity reported in the Celtic Gift Shop that is located across the courtyard. The ghost of Mary is always seen in the building, watching over things in the bar and restaurant. She has been known to let staff members know of her disapproval if they aren’t doing a good job. The favorite spot of her spirit to be seen is on the balcony that overlooks the Ballad Room. Her ghost can be seen from the courtyard in a second floor window that is looking at the spot where Angelique was killed. Ghost hunters that have investigated that the building is also haunted by the spirits of yellow fever victims.
During the epidemic of 1853, the third floor was used to quarantine those who had fallen ill. Most of the victims who were put there all died. The illness became so worse that several people reported trying to jump out of the windows to end their misery. Thus, iron bars were placed on the windows to try and prevent these people from killing themselves. O’Flaherty’s Irish Channel Pub is no longer open, but it is still very haunted. This is just one of many pubs in New Orleans that are haunted by the souls of restless spirits.
(Source: Dwyer, Jeff. Ghost Hunter’s Guide to New Orleans. 2007.)
