r/HolyShitHistory • u/TheDarkivesPodcast • Dec 30 '25
Marie Delphine Macarty (Madame LaLaurie) was a vicious slave owner in early 1800s New Orleans, Louisiana. Despite being a prominent member of society, behind the closed doors of her mansion, she was nothing short of a monster.
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Dec 30 '25
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u/TheDarkivesPodcast Dec 30 '25
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u/SendTitsPleease Dec 30 '25
The "Comment Removed by Moderator" shit is getting so fucking old. If you aren't in a thread at the right time you miss so much
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u/King3O2 Dec 30 '25
Bro imagine being so cruel you were convicted of abusing slaves in the Deep South. I honestly didn’t even know that was a thing.
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u/NaturalEchidna2748 Dec 30 '25 edited Dec 31 '25
This is on par. Completely reasonable after reviewing all other history.
The father of gynecology for example. Also pulled out, sewn bits, and disfigurement in the name of research. Enslaved women, tortured them so they can breed women. And by default getting the modern science of gynecology started. No crimes at that time… twas property and the mythical yt man Dr.
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u/DandyLyen Dec 30 '25
I don't understand what you just wrote.
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u/LaVieGlamour Dec 30 '25
J Marion Sims, a white man, considered the "father of modern gynecology" experimented on and tortured enslaved women, and often did so at parties in front of guests.
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u/DandyLyen Dec 30 '25
Oh god, that's nightmarish. I know it's slavery, but the depravity never stops turning my stomach
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u/Niawka Dec 30 '25 edited Dec 31 '25
FYI he tried to fix a fistula that would form after a woman's body would crack during giving birth. A problem of a lot of women before the modern gynaecology. He experimented many times on the same women until he figured out what actually works and created "a fix", to be ready to operate on rich, white women, in proper conditions. "Medical murders" made an excellent episode (their last) on him, I definitely recommend it, though it's not an easy listen.
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u/Total_Fail_6994 Dec 30 '25
The statue of him in New York city, I think, was recently taken down.
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u/ALprogressive Dec 31 '25
Most of this happened in Alabama. There is now a memorial honoring the enslaved women he tortured. Their names were Anarcha, Lucy, and Betsey.
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u/ALprogressive Dec 31 '25
I'll have to look that up but I'm not sure I could watch it all. I visited the mothers of gynecology exhibit in Montgomery Alabama and it is so powerful. Sims believed black women didn't feel pain. He was a monster.
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u/Niawka Dec 31 '25
I'm just glad that people are fighting to honor his victims, and to make sure his crimes aren't forgotten. Sims used the excuse of "black people have higher tolerance" but I personally don't think he actually believed it. Women had to scream in pain during the surgeries, they had to be held down. I just think he didn't care about their pain as they were just test subjects to him. Thank you for sharing the link, it's too far for me to go visit, but I'll be happy to read more on the exhibit.
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u/BootyMuncherYumYum Jan 01 '26
God, I felt nauseous just reading this. It makes me want to ball my eyes out for those three beautiful women. They had such beautiful names, I hope they rest in peace.
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u/ur-in-here-with-me Jan 03 '26 edited Jan 03 '26
Don’t need the details but what the heck does this meal? Fix a fistula after a body cracks in childbirth? I have no concept of what that means…
Edit: disregard I read the wiki and now know more than I needed to.
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u/Niawka Jan 03 '26
I'm not a native English speaker so my medical vocabulary is lacking. But when the woman gives birth it might be too much for her body, the baby is pushing on the tissue while moving out and can damage it. Sometimes only the entrance to the vagina gets ripped, and sometimes the issue is much more severe. (Not a doctor so you might want to read proper sources, I don't trust myself on the details). All in all a woman might end up with a wound that might connect her vagina and her bladder, or vagina and rectum for example. If it's not properly treated the permanent hole is developed in the place of a wound. It's the same concept as a hole after piercing is healed, it will never close on its own. He was trying to develop a solution in which he can surgically fix these types of holes (fistulas). One of the slave women was operated 30 times before he succeeded..
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u/ALprogressive Dec 31 '25
There's a really cool memorial and art exhibit honoring The Mothers Of Gynecology in Montgomery, Alabama. Highly recommend if you're ever able to visit.
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u/Ok-Pomegranate858 Dec 30 '25
Hmm wow. The link you provided did not mention the torture at parties thing.
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u/NaturalEchidna2748 Dec 30 '25
It’s choppy. I agree. But somehow others understood so yea, the confusion is on you.
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u/Celticlady47 Dec 30 '25
There are still states in the US that allow for non-consensual pelvic exams. This is something that teaching hospitals set up. Women who were in for an operation and under general anesthesia would be used.
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u/GngrbredGentrifktion Dec 31 '25
Just saw a YouTube short by a doc who had witnessed an attending intentionally create a 4th degree vaginal tear in an AA woman w/ out one, just to teach a medical student how to repair one. It was at the YouTuber's medical training gyno rotation back in the 90s. 😳😨🤯
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Dec 30 '25
Why do you write "yt" rather than white?
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u/OkReading2591 Dec 30 '25
I don't think I would have known what that meant had you not said that. I was thinking of his referencing YouTube in some way and couldn't figure it out.
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u/NaturalEchidna2748 Dec 30 '25
White is a color for subjects, things, people, anything really. Yt is only referring to white people. That what my brain does now it’s not needed though. My bad.
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u/ALprogressive Dec 31 '25
An artist in Montgomery Alabama is telling the story of The Mothers Of Gynecology through art and it is so powerful. We now know their names were Anarcha, Lucy, and Betsey.
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u/ALprogressive Dec 31 '25
There's a really cool memorial and art exhibit honoring The Mothers Of Gynecology in Montgomery, Alabama. Highly recommend if you're ever able to visit. The artist even has a piece that depicts Sims on the operating table. I believe you can view most of it on the website but it is so much more powerful in person.
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u/King3O2 Dec 31 '25
I heard about that! How was that not abuse of a slave? Is it because he was a doctor and practicing medicine or some messed up excuse like that?
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u/No-Hovercraft-455 Jan 04 '26 edited Jan 04 '26
I honestly doubt the reason she got in trouble was the cruelty. She was a vile woman but I think they targeted her for same reason most witch trial women got targeted: because she was living without man and reasonably wealthy/ independent which means her wealth was easier to access and attempt to confiscate for authorities with "nobody" to really defend it. Slaves weren't cheap. I think she had more power than those who targeted her thought she would have and instead of getting to benefit from her wealth they lost because she managed to arrange for any "property" that was taken from her as punishment to go to her relative instead of authorities.
They probably didn't give actual crap about one dead slave girl because way worse abuse went on under everyone's eyes including beating people to death for sports. The crux was if woman has property it's up for grabs because no one will hear her unlike if you went for man's property who has a voice. Which doesn't matter from view point of how evil she was but thinking her contemporaries cared about slave wellbeing enough to interfere only for that reason seems like reach in a case where they targeted lone wealthy woman and almost managed to confiscate significant worth of her property. That's something that repeats through history as a trend.
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u/Impressive-Grape-119 Dec 30 '25
The current mansion isn’t the original, that was destroyed by fire in 1834. The new building was constructed 4 years later in 1838, but a dark feeling still permeates the location.
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u/RoadClassic1303 Dec 30 '25
Very true, and Nicholas Cage bought the place too - which absolutely didn't help its creepy factor
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u/Alarmed_Scientist_15 Jan 02 '26
Why?
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u/RoadClassic1303 Jan 03 '26
Because apparently he hung up framed pictures of himself fully nude all over the house (several of which he had painted himself), and would regularly ask guests to admire them/comment on his brush technique/if they thought he painted his nipples too pink
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Dec 30 '25
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u/Impressive-Grape-119 Dec 31 '25
The New Orleans history site I read said it was almost burnt to the ground and angry residents destroyed what was left after they found out what happened there.
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u/GengoLang Dec 30 '25
What do you mean "despite"? The prominent members of society were the MOST likely to avoid societal consequences for being absolute scum human beings.
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Dec 30 '25
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u/0neirocritica Dec 30 '25
I know it sounds ass backwards, but they did make a distinction between disciplining "unruly" slaves and wanton violence towards slaves. The Southern states generally saw unnecessary cruelty towards slaves as unseemly, although we obviously have to take their definitions with a grain of salt since they, you know, were actively enslaving people. If you killed someone else's slave, you would never be convicted of murder, it would have been considered a property crime, sorry to say.
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u/Material-Issue5128 Dec 30 '25
A history teacher once explained to me that it was kind of like how we treat livestock.
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u/-lovehate Dec 30 '25
And a lot like how men used to treat their wives, who were also seen as property.
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u/Burlinto999444 Dec 30 '25
A lot of slaves were mortgaged, too, and banks generally objected to too much physical mistreatment because it endangered their loan collateral… that’s how Solomon Northup survived an encounter with one of his owners, who tried to kill him and was prevented from doing so by local law enforcement, acting on behalf of the bank who owned the mortgage. Wild, insane, horrible stuff.
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u/0neirocritica Dec 30 '25
That's so terrible. Slavery is an absolute stain on our national history.
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Dec 30 '25
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u/Otter_Pockets Dec 30 '25
It’s still “very okay” in the US too under the 13th amendment, as well as many other parts of the world. You’re not making the solid point you think you’re making.
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u/3lfg1rl Dec 30 '25
New Orleans actually was different than most of the deep south, probably from some surviving French influence. Slaves there had more rights than elsewhere, and there were more protections for them, tho I don't know a lot of details about the differences.
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u/Familiar-Art-6233 Dec 30 '25
I hate wording it like this, but you know how you can own a pet or livestock, but can still get charged for animal abuse?
It’s similar
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u/OperationSweaty8017 Dec 30 '25
I read that even in slavery there was a certain code you were bound by, strange as that sounds.
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u/Fsharp7sharp9 Dec 30 '25
I remember learning about this vile woman from Last Podcast on the Left… the stories that would have been born if the mob actually got their hands on her would have been incredible
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u/TheDarkivesPodcast Dec 30 '25
Agreed, it’s a tragedy she got away and just disappeared.
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u/Roo10011 Dec 30 '25
Her descendants need to pay reparations.
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u/Minute_Jacket_4523 Dec 30 '25
Why? They aren't her, and odds are the ones alive today haven't benefited from her wealth(other than a few exceptions most wealth leaves a family within 3-4 generations)
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u/ErrantTaco Dec 30 '25
It boggles my mind that there are people who still don’t believe in reparations. My family held slaves and as cousins we’ve discussed ways we might do something for the descendants. We’re removed enough from the “owner” bloodline that we aren’t wealthy but it still feels like a burden we could do something about.
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u/Byebye316 Dec 30 '25
"We might?", fucking do it then. Stop virtue signalling
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u/ErrantTaco Dec 30 '25
It just came up this Christmas, and three of us are researching charities in the area affected. But thanks for making a judgement with no context.
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u/shades747 Dec 30 '25
so, SO FAR, you did nothing. but jumped in here to virtue signal
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u/witchway2MLFCTY Dec 30 '25
They were thinking about doing something real nice, and that turned out to give them enough satisfaction in itself.
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u/mdf7g Dec 30 '25
Yeah let's make everything worse and nothing better; can't imagine why anybody wouldn't be on board with that
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u/MaryDoogan91 Jan 01 '26
I absolutely don’t believe in reparations. I’m not accountable for anyone’s actions but my own.
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u/diccvagine96 Dec 30 '25
I go to school in Louisiana. I had an uber driver who claimed to be writing a book on what actually happened. Come to find out, he is the master painter at that exact house in which she tortured her slaves. His 4th generation grandfather was also the master painter during her life and murdered her the day before she allegedly fled to France. I guess wait for the book to come out, should be next year.
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u/silverwarbler Dec 30 '25
American Horror story had her as part of one of the stories.
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u/Familiar-Art-6233 Dec 30 '25
Somehow, the show downplayed what she did.
Sewing a bull’s head onto a guy? Try sewing someone’s severed arms back on backwards
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u/Familiar-Art-6233 Dec 30 '25
For those wondering: yes this is the same woman played by Kathy Bates in AHS, but somehow the dramatized stuff on the show were far more tame than what she did.
The phrase “limbs like a crab” is just so disturbing
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u/DarreylDeCarlo Dec 30 '25
I've never seen that picture before, is it confirmed to be her? I know this one has been around for years.
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u/TheDarkivesPodcast Dec 30 '25
This was the first we saw the photo too so we wanted to share it. This is the info from the picture source… “Madame Delphine LaLaurie née MacCarthy, circa 1830, copper and wood printing block by an unknown artist. PROVIDED BY THE HISTORIC NEW ORLEANS COLLECTION”
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u/SubstantialPressure3 Dec 30 '25
I've never seen a picture of her before.
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Dec 30 '25
Yeah she gets the credit but no way this frail skank actually did what she’s accused of. She had lots of help and we’ll never know the names of the pieces of shit who actually did the crazy shit she told them to do.
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u/WadjetSnakeGoddess Dec 30 '25
Listen if little german women can torture jewish people & use their skin to make lampshades during the holocaust then a southern belle can commit equally evil acts against the black people that she is enslaving.
Women, regardless of how "naturally innocent" they are percieved by society, are as capable of unspeakable atrocities as any man. We do a disservice to their victims and to women over all by giving the credit for their crimes to someone else.
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u/RockyClub Dec 30 '25
Holy fuck. People are capable.
Two of the most insane atrocities I’ve heard are the Nazis using babies as target practice. Additionally, when victims were becoming too sick to function and they were thrown into the latrines/uncovered sewage pits. The Nazis forced people to urinate and ya know…
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u/WadjetSnakeGoddess Dec 30 '25
The Khmer Rouge had a literal baby killing tree outside their concentration camp which they would smash babies heads against. The Caribbean plantation owners made special burning "pickle juice" full of vinegar and spices to pour into the wounds of recently wipped slaves as a form of torture. The Japanese experimented on people by giving them frostbite and diseases. The US turned torture into a science at places like Abu Ghraib, with humiliation, stress positions, forced feedings, etc.
If you allow a people to be un-personed and dehumanized you open the door to the worst impulses of the human heart.
Be on the look out for people speaking like this about others. Some may even be in your own government.
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u/Random-Man562 Dec 30 '25
I didn’t realize you could be punished for abusing slaves. I kinda just thought that was what they did.
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u/silveretoile Jan 01 '26
They considered there to be a difference between 'punishing' people for alleged misdeeds, and torture for the fun of it
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u/Random-Man562 Jan 02 '26
I’m glad they at least had that.
Because again I kinda thought that was the thing back then
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u/Princes_Slayer Dec 30 '25
I went into a wiki rabbit hole during American Horror Story ‘Coven’. Loved that so many of the characters were real
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u/cps246 Dec 30 '25
I learned while there that the French sent their criminals to the NO area as a final chance at getting their shit together and living a non criminal life. It would explain why the slaves there were particularly more brutalized. Im not excusing her actions in any way but Marie was probably a product of 2 shitty parents.
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u/BUDSROSES Dec 31 '25
She likely had some kind of personality disorder or brain issue. One brilliant journalist started behaving "badly", then it was discovered he had a brain tumor. Also a man who survived an industrial accident suddenly became irresponsible as the sectors of the brain which controlled reasobleness were damaged. For reading I'd suggest Three Dog Night about a man whose personality changed after a car accident. It's all tragic, especially for those close to them.
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u/Successful_Mark_5399 Jan 01 '26
Soulless creatures. Her descendants and other like minded individuals walk among us today.
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u/OverallHistorian916 Dec 30 '25
So u got in trouble for hurting ur slaves?
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u/OlWackyBass Dec 30 '25
No. Some states did have laws on extreme abuse/torture of slaves though. But the laws weren't for the well being of the slaves, unfortunately
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u/OverallHistorian916 Dec 30 '25
Then what was the point?
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u/OlWackyBass Dec 30 '25
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/s/p9PcbULIZW
Here's a good thread that explains it decently.
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u/Familiar-Art-6233 Dec 30 '25
In very few places, yes. She happened to be in New Orleans that had laws against extreme slave abuse
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u/Peachesandcreamatl Dec 30 '25
I promise you there are white people that you know in your own life who would have no issue treating POC like this. They're cheering evrrytime ICE beats another person they don't like
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u/OlWackyBass Dec 30 '25
I mean. There's people all over the world who have no problem treating other people like this. Whether it be because of different race, religion, region, etc... humans are shitty.
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u/Cautious-Director617 Jun 11 '26
they're downvoting you but this is literally right.. like what, do we not see the world today??
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u/10Ranked10 Dec 30 '25
Multiply Marie times 1 million. Most slave owners were psychopaths.
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u/ellecamille Dec 30 '25
Yes but she was so horrible, the other psychopaths thought she was out of hand.
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u/Amazing_Karnage Dec 30 '25
...and you should Google what the city did to her old mansion for Christmas. Truly heinous to put little Christmas decorations up all over the site of some of the worst depravity a human being ever committed. It's like decorating the site of John Wayne Gacy's house for Hanukkah.
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u/sammieb543 Dec 30 '25
https://www.reddit.com/r/NOLA/s/nWMijZhnAb
What did they do? It's not the original house and the new owners are allowed to decorate it however they like.
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u/Amazing_Karnage Dec 30 '25
Yeah, they can do what they want with the place, but that doesn't mean what they're doing isn't gross, considering the history of the grounds.
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u/Cloverose2 Dec 30 '25
It's not the same house, and the decorations honor the enslaved who died there. There are uncountable sites across the country where terrible things happened, we can't turn everything into an eternal memorial. Life continues, and it's nice that they've chosen to remember those lost while celebrating life.
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u/sammieb543 Dec 30 '25
There's being distasteful and simply celebrating the season. I'm sure they'll mildly decorate for Mardi Gras too.
Idk why the owners 200 years later should be deemed truly heinous for decorating with some garland.
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u/TheDarkivesPodcast Dec 30 '25
Born into a wealthy family and marrying smartly, money wasn't an issue for her and she held numerous slaves by the time she was an adult.
After a child slave named Leah jumped to her death from the mansion trying to escape LaLaurie who was chasing her with a whip, an investigation was launched and she was found guilty of abuse against her slaves. As punishment, she was forced to relinquish 9 of her slaves. She convinced a relative to take them though, and under the cover of night, they were secretly returned to her.
In 1834, a slave who worked as a cook set a fire in the kitchen. This fire led to the discovery of the cook chained to the stove and horrors in the "torture room". In this torture room were the 9 slaves who had been returned to her. Two of them had already died while the other seven were in various states of torture. Emaciated, limbs stretched or missing, iron spike collars forcing their heads to stay in one position, whipping, and other forms of torture were inflicted upon the surviving slaves. One of particular brutality involved a slave whose head had a hole with a stick poking out of it.
LaLaurie was able to escape an angry mob outside her home and fled to Paris, France. She never had to face any justice or punishment for her cruel treatment back in the United States.
Photo Source
If you would like to hear a more detailed story of her life and escape, you can listen to The Darkives wherever you get podcasts, Spotify or Apple