The Convent Attic

Dear friends and vampire enthusiasts,

   If you’re reading this, then you have a taste for the unknown.  When I set out to write the book New Orleans Vampires - History and Legend for History Press Publishing, I expected it to be both interesting and a bit difficult to write as I wasn’t sure there would truly be enough meat to the legends of French Quarter vampires to fill the pages.  However, when I delved into the research, I continued to be surprised and pleased by my findings that the facts were measurably more interesting than the fiction and that these adventures from the past deserved to have legends spawned from the fibers of these fantastical truths.

   The Ursuline Convent, located in the French Quarter, has held my fascination since the first time I visited New Orleans and heard the legend of the Casket Girls in 1998.  Never did I think I would one day be exploring the attic on a private visit in conjunction with my research for a book on New Orleans vampires.  The adventures that life has in store for us never cease to amaze.

***

   It was a stormy New Orleans day when I met my guide for lunch just prior to my anticipated visit to the convent.  I was armed with a slew of questions, fully aware of the good fortune of having a representative from the convent at my disposal for the afternoon.  I asked about the architecture of the attic and if architectural plans would be available for use in the book. As my guide described the layout of the attic, it seemed too fantastical.  I felt myself leaning forward, hanging on her every word.  It had not been a simple attic used for storage.  Rather, she explained, there were six bed chambers, used to house orphans at the time of their inception. Now those bed chambers remain, but they were abandoned.  The entire attic, it seemed, was left empty.  I found it very curious that the attic would not be necessary for storage as space in the French Quarter is so valuable.  Just six mysterious, seemingly empty bed chambers, above the convent remained.  My guide also explained there was an additional room, a bit diabolical, that later sent chills down my spine.

   Given this information, the mystery began to intrigue every ounce of my imagination.  I had expected to hear that it was a simple attic, as most attics are, filled with boxes and perhaps some interesting artifacts coveted by the Archdiocese.  

   Thunder and lightning cracked through the grey, ominous clouds above the convent as the electronic gate let my guide’s car behind the convent walls. The downpour was steady.  We pulled out our umbrellas and made a dash for the door and into the safety of the convent.  My heart raced with excitement.  This adventure was simply too good to be true. 

   First, my guide showed me around the convent’s first floor. My tour of this floor was highlighted by a charcoal illustration drawn by Mary Hachard, one of the Ursuline pioneers, which depicted the nuns’ arrival in New Orleans.  A copy of the charcoal can be found in the “Casket Girls” portion of my book.  I had a little time to explore downstairs on my own.  I was enjoying both the history and the legend as I walked through the halls of the vacant convent, exploring old maps and images of historical figures who had helped shape our past.  After a while my guide found me and led me to the stairwell that would take us to the legendary vampires’ chambers.

Catalogue V #002

She explained that it was, in fact, the original stairwell from the first convent. Beautiful and solid, the bannister invited us upstairs.I imagined all the colorful history the bannister had witnessed. I ran my hand along the old wood as I made my way up to the second floor.Upstairs, my guide let me into the Archdiocese library.She pointed out old books from the 1700’s and 1800’s, which were all in French. Books are my weakness- thus I was in my element wandering about the library. My guide once again excused herself for a moment and as she tended to some business in her second-floor office, I noticed there was a beautiful view of the cathedral garden below.

 The storm continued feeding my imagination.  I felt I had to decide at that moment how I would view my experience there.  Was I an historian on a fact-finding mission, was I a writer gaining atmosphere on an adventure to develop and embellish stories for the future, or, the choice I wanted most, was I a tourist, consumed in the legend, who had secretly made her way up to the very diabolical attic that was the prison of the casket girls?   It was very difficult finding a happy medium. I truly wanted to dismiss all that was real and just disappear into the fiction and fantasy.   

The vantage point of the second floor window afforded me a view of the garden’s gazebo and perfectly manicured hedges.This is where the nuns’ garden had been, where they grew their medicinal herbs to help cure the ill at the time.There was another window in the wall which separated the convent from the chapel. It allowed me to look into the chapel and onto the pews, the elaborate stained-glass windows and the ornate architecture. I was so entranced that I forgot the attic for just a moment. However, soon my guide arrived and broke the trance, and we headed to the third floor and the feature of my adventure.

   At the top of the stairs, I was introduced to a long hall lined with very thin horizontal slats of wood through which dim light peeked its way in, almost like laser beams in an elaborate high security building.  Shadows of open doors lay on the floor causing my heart to skip a beat.  I hadn’t expected the doors to be open. There would be no distance between me and anything that might roam the attic. It was quiet but for the howling of the swirling storm, which seemed anxious for us.

  We walked up to the first open door.  I didn’t really know what I expected to find, but what I did discover there was more eerie than anything I could have imagined on my own - a small room with sections of the floor missing.  Perfect rectangular, long sections, in fact, were missing between the beams.  These sections were large enough wherein to place coffins.  It was almost as if they had been temporarily removed for my visit as there was nothing else in the room and no reasoning behind it. 

Had vampires occupied these rooms during the day, they would surely have been tortured by the thousands of peering lights that shone their beams through the slats of wood. A vampire would have been forced to remain in the safety of a coffin deep within the hollowed-out floor between these beams.

I took a picture of a closed shutter outside one of the dormer windows.The shutter was framed by light begging to come in – this guard made of light stood post outside the convent walls protecting the French Quarter from the monsters rumored to be inside this room. It was very difficult to tear myself away from this particular scene. I stared at the shutter which so many have looked at from the street below wondering what was on the other side.Here I stood, on the inside where the vampires had stood themselves for centuries, aching to escape. The scene was eerie and spectacular, and I think it would have been terrifying at night with no light present as a weapon in my favor.

   We passed bed chamber after bed chamber at a slow pace, as I wanted to take everything in.  Then we reached the very peculiar little room, the only one with brick floors.  It seemed darker than the other rooms and noticeably smaller.  Chains with strong, heavy, thick links hung from the very sturdy beams toward the back of the chamber.

   I noticed something else unique to this room.  The door to the room was a Dutch door.My guide explained it had been placed there for the nuns’ safety. The door allowed the nuns to safely pass food across into the room without having to enter, keeping them out of harm’s way. That’s when chills ran down my spine. Out of harm’s way from what? What in fact were the nuns being protected from? My guide gave the explanation that while the nuns did house young women, they also helped women in any situation, including the mentally ill (and maidens turned vampire?). She said the insane were kept in this room with brick floors, which made it easier to wash away any bodily fluids, and the chains held them when necessary. The door made it easy to slide food across. It was an acceptable explanation, but, at the same time, the room could not have been more perfect to fit the fictional fantasy.

  My guide explained that Katrina had done great damage to the attic, and the funding for repairs was substantial and had yet to be obtained.  Again, this was an acceptable explanation.  However, all that taken into consideration, somehow, to this day, questions remain.  Why would the rooms be left completely empty?  Why were there perfect sections missing in the floors, just the size to nicely fit coffins?  Why were the shutters sealed tightly, rather than letting in a flow of air to help with keeping the convent cool?  And why did the chains remain in the very spooky chamber with the brick floors?

   Had perhaps the contents of the convent attic been temporarily removed for my visit to appease my curiosity and mask a horrifying truth which has no reasonable explanation?

   I sincerely hope so!  May the legend live on.

Eternally yours,

Marita Woywod Crandle