The Myrtles

Louisiana · United States · Hotel

The story about the enslaved woman who poisoned the family is the most repeated ghost story in the American south. None of it happened.

The Myrtles Plantation is described as the most haunted house in America, and the story it is famous for is about an enslaved woman.

In the version told to visitors she poisoned the owner's wife and children with oleander in a cake, meaning to make them ill so she could nurse them and avoid being sent to the fields, and killed them by mistake. She confessed and was lynched.

None of it is true. No woman of that name is in the records of this plantation. No wife and children died of poisoning. Historians who have gone through the documents have found nothing behind any of it, and the story appears to have been assembled in the twentieth century.

What did happen here needs no invention. This was a working plantation and the people held on it were owned, worked and sold.

The house is open to visitors and runs tours.

FAQ

Where is The Myrtles located?

The Myrtles is in Louisiana, United States.