The Table Tomb in St. Louis Cemetery #1

The table tomb in St. Louis Cemetery No. 1.  I grow so weary of hearing our visitors be told that this was designed for a.) picnics, b.) voodoo ceremonies, c.) a slab upon which vampires lay their victims and drain them of their life blood or d.) God knows what!  Here are a few facts about the table tomb:

1.) IT IS A BELOW GROUND GRAVE!  The very people who just told their group that it is impossible to bury below ground now stand and point out this monument without telling their listeners that buried beneath it - in the soil - is a coffin.

Benjamin Latrobe's table tomb design

2.) Once upon a time there was an architect by the name of Benjamin Latrobe.  If you are an architect or a student or fan of architecture, you know him very well.  He designed the Capital Building in Washington, D.C.  He also designed grave monuments.  Among his concerns were ground caving in as wooden coffins deteriorated and collapsed, exacerbated by the weight of monuments pushing down on soft soil.  In his notebook he addresses this and sketches his design for this very table tomb. He says of it:

“But as if ingenuity had been employed to invent a monument still more caduceous [sic], there has been of late a new fashion introduced.  A thin slab is supported sometimes by 6 sometimes by only 4 balustres, or small stone or marble posts.” [1]
 

Middletown, CT

3.) In the early part of the 19th century table tomb was a common monument and is absolutely not unique to New Orleans.  Here is a gallery of table tombs from around the country.

(All of these pictures were found on the internet and
are not the property of Tour Creole.)

Philadelphia, PA

Richmond, VA

 

Raleigh, NC

Unusual coffin-shaped version from Somerset, OH

 

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[1] Impressions Respecting New Orleans, Diary & Sketches 1818-1820, Benjamin Latrobe.  Latrobe, by the way, is buried below ground in the protestant section of St. Louis Cemetery #1.  His headstone having been lost many years ago, the exact location of his grave is unknown.

The Progression Of The Building Of St. Louis Cathedral

The Progression Of The Building Of St. Louis Cathedral [PDF]

The Port Of New Orleans - A Video Slideshow

Artesian Well Report 1854 - 56

The year was 1854.  The city alderman was Edward Henry Durrel.  Thanks to him, the New Orleans Academy of Sciences (later absorbed into Tulane University, where the records can be found) under the direction of Dr. N. B. Benedict was granted rights to drill for an artesian well at the foot of Canal Street [1].  Their goal was twofold: a.) to dig for an artesian well and b.) to make a study of the strata the lie beneath the city.  The first water they came to was 41 feet down and mixed with sand and shells.  Artesian water was reached at a depth of 335 feet and was “strongly alkaline and chalybeate” (containing salts of iron, tasting like iron).  And just beneath the soil?    Two feet below the surface lies a layer of “clay, blue, tenacious, uniform.[2]”  The fact that New Orleans is like a bowl and drainage is a problem (especially in 1854 before our modern pumping system) means that rain water seeps down 2 feet and can’t drain past the clay.  The level of water we find when we dig down depends upon the time of year and the amount of rain we have.  Ask anyone who gardens and they’ll tell you that digging down into the clay can be a backbreaking chore.  (This clay also presented a problem when it came to grave digging!  Something to keep in mind.)  Two years later in 1856 they were still at it, so the Council passed a resolution “requesting the committee on the Artesian Well on Canal Street to report on the condition of same and the prospects of a speedy completion.[3]”

 

And so they finally (and speedily) completed, having drilled down to a depth of 630 feet - the height of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, Mo. - and never hit bedrock!  (Bedrock was finally discovered in the 1930's during the construction of the Huey P. Long Bridge; it is approximately 1000 feet beneath the City.)  Here is the report that the city requested in its entirety, outlining, strata upon strata,  what exactly lies beneath the city of New Orleans. 

No.	Character of Strata	Thickness of Stratum	Top of Stratum Below Surface
1	Heterogenous matters – the common surface	2.0	0
2	Clay, blue, tenacious, uniform	15.0	2
3	Clay, coal-black, containing woody matters, rootlets, &c.	3.8	17.0
4	Sand and clay mixed; subtile, like annual deposits of Mississippi River	10.2	20.8
5	Clay, dark, semi-fluid, nearly destitute of grittiness	7.0	31.0
6	Clay, same as No. 5 but becoming sandy	3.0	38.0
7	Sand, leaden-blue, coarse; many small shells; water abundant	0.7	41.0
8	Shells, exclusively, great variety, very compacted	1.3	41.7
9	Sand, identical with No. 7	13.0	43.0
10	Sand, clay and shells mixed, olive-colored, of consistency of “mortar”	10.0	56.0
11	Sand, coarse, dark-brown; small cypress roots and water-worn pebbles	4.0	66.0
12	Sand, coarse, light blue, destitute of shells	5.0	70.0
13	Sand, blue, mixed with fragments of shells	1.0	75.0
14	Shells exclusively, compacted; a few water-worn pebbles in lowest part	6.5	76.0
15	Clay, olive-green, tenacious, like wax	2.5	82.5
16	Sand, nearly impalpable, so subtile that little could be brought up	3.0	85.0
17	Clay, like No. 15, but a section of it is a little mottled with yellow	1.0	88.0
18	Sand, gray or light-blue	1.0	89.0
19	Clay, blue, as if half dried, with umber-colored masses, each enclosing a yellowish stone	1.0	90.0
20	Sand, blue, subtile, with a little clay	4.0	91.0
21	Sand and clay, identical with No. 4	3.0	95.0
22	Clay, identical with No. 19; stones contorted, fantastic forms, perforated, effervesce with acid	1.0	98.0
23	Sand, subtile, like German sand for grinding and fining glass, imported at 50 cents an ounce	9.0	99.0
24	Clay, masses of two different colors, both very dark, tenacious and pure	1.0	108.0
25	Clay and sand, blue, soft; tools sink by their own weight	3.0	109.0
26	Clay, dark, drab, like tallow between teeth; effervesces by acid, leaving pores surrounded by dark line	34.0	112.0
27	Sand, clay, shells and stone like indurated clay	3.0	146.0
28	Clay, blue, tenacious – a mere flake	0.2	149.0
29	Sand, &c., identical with No. 27	0.8	149.2
30	Clay, striated, changing to matter like vegetable mould	3.0	150.0
31	Wood, cedar log, sound, striated with thin plates of silicious matter	0.5	153.0
32	Vegetable mould, changing to striated clay, identical with No. 30 inverted; shells destitute of animal matter	1.0	153.5
33	Sand, greenish blue, tenacious from slight mixture of clay	2.0	154.5
34	Clay, pure; color identical with No. 33; tenacious	9.5	156.5
35	Sand, very subtile, rendered adhesive by a little clay	4.0	166.0
36	Clay, drab, tenacious, containing lumps exactly like pieces of chocolate	5.0	170.0
37	Clay, umber-colored, but darker, tenacious	1.0	175.0
38	Sand, green; a little clay, which increases with the depth	4.0	176.0
39	Clay, color same as the sand of No. 38, (still a little sand)	2.0	180.0
40	Sand, like No. 38; color still the same green as No. 38	1.0	182.0
41	Sand, coarse, whitish green, very variable as to clay mixture	13.0	183.0
42	Clay, leaden-blue, not gritty; effervesces with acid	32.5	196.0
43	Sand, leaden-blue, coarse; comminuted with shells; a little clay	21.5	228.5
44	Mixed, like Nos. 30 and 32	2.0	250.0
45	Clay, pale lead, or dirty white; tenacious, unctuous, like tallow between teeth, not gritty	39.0	252.0
46	Clay, sand and shells; soft mass, but looks like common sandstone	2.0	291.0
47	Sand, unmixed	29.0	93.0
48	Clay, pale olive, very pure	4.0	322.0
49	Sand, like No. 47	6.0	326.0
50	Clay, like No. 48	3.0	332.0
51	Sand, ash-colored, (pure white and black,) coarse; (artesian water)	95.0	335.0
52	Sand, nearly black, subtile, a little clay, (360 gallons of water an hour)	50.0	430.0
53	Clay, blue, tenacious, firm; a little gritty; no more water	63.5	480.0
54	Sand, many minute shells and fragments	2.5	543.5
55	Clay, blue, firm, tenacious, (containing a stratum of sand at 556 to 568½; no specimen obtained)	36.0	546.0
56	Sand and a little clay; hardness nearly stony, (penetrated to 584 feet)		582.0
	Total depth attained, 630 feet

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[1] ORDINANCES AND RESOLUTIONS OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF NEW ORLEANS, 1854; New Orleans City Archives.

[2] REPORT OF THE NEW ORLEANS ACADEMY OF SCIENCES,  1856, TULANE UNIVERSITY SPECIAL COLLECTIONS

[3] ORDINANCES AND RESOLUTIONS OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF NEW ORLEANS, 1856; New Orleans City Archives.