Marie Laveau

Marie Laveau
Portrait by Frank Schneider, based on a painting by George Catlin (Louisiana State Museum)
Born	Marie Catherine Laveau (1801-09-10)September 10, 1801 French Quarter, New Orleans, Louisiana
Died	June 15, 1881(1881-06-15) (aged 79) New Orleans, Louisiana
Resting place	Saint Louis Cemetery
Nationality	Native American, French, African (Senegal)
Occupation	Occultist, voodoo priestess, midwife, nurse
Known for	Voodoo Queen of New Orleans
Spouse(s)	Jacques Paris, Christophe Glapion

Marie Catherine Laveau (September 10, 1801– June 15, 1881) was a Louisiana Creole practitioner of Voodoo, who was renowned in New Orleans. Her daughter, Marie Laveau II, (1827 — c. 1862) also practiced rootwork, conjure, Native American and spiritualism as well as Louisiana or what is known today as New Orleans Voodoo. She and her mother had great influence over their multiracial following. "In 1874 as many as twelve thousand spectators, both black and white, swarmed to the shores of Lake Pontchartrain to catch a glimpse of Marie Laveau II performing her legendary rites on St. John's Eve (June 23–24)." *Marie Laveau II Died in 1860-62. The woman practicing using that name in the 1870's was not a descendant but one of many women who used that name. Marie I (1801-1881) retired from the practice in the 1860's due to health. She was bedridden the last several years of her life and taken care of by her younger daughter Marie Philomene (1836-1897) until her passing. There is much misinformation about this group of women.

Historical records surmise that Marie Laveau was born free in the French Quarter of New Orleans, Louisiana, Thursday September 10, 1801. She was the natural daughter of a free woman of color of Native American, African and French descent, Marguerite Henry and Charles LaVeau, a free man of color , African and French descent and merchant. On August 4, 1819, she married Jacques (or Santiago, in other records) Paris, a French immigrant who had fled as a refugee from the black Haitian massacre in the former French territory Saint-Dominque. Their marriage certificate is preserved in the St. Louis Cathedral in New Orleans. The wedding mass was performed by Father Antonio de Sedella, the Capuchin priest known as Pere Antoine.

The death of Jacques Paris was recorded in 1820. He was part of a large French immigration of refugees to New Orleans in 1809, after the Haitian Revolution of 1791-1804. They had two daughters, Felicite in 1817 and Angele in 1820. Both disappear from the records in 1820's.