Written by Craig Dominey

It was another crowded Saturday night as Josie Arlington sat wearily on her plush couch, lit a cigarette, and silently observed the crowd gathered in her parlor. Standing around the lavishly decorated room were the most powerful men in New Orleans high society – politicians, judges, lawyers, doctors, even a police commander or two. And she knew the money would be flowing into her coffers once again.

Most club owners would be ecstatic at such a large crowd, but not Josie Arlington. She dragged on her cigarette and bitterly whispered to herself, “What hypocrites.”

For she also knew that not one of these gentlemen would dare acknowledge her presence outside the secretive walls of the club that bared her name: “The Arlington.” For Josie was the most infamous Madam in the most scandalous district in New Orleans: Storyville.

Josie always said that the life of a Madam chose her, she didn’t choose it. She was orphaned at age 4, and the only parents she knew were the nuns at St. Elizabeth’s Home who took her in. But their attempts to scare the fear of God in her over the years eventually drove her away – and straight onto the mean streets of New Orleans.

Now as crazy as New Orleans is these days, back in the nineteenth century it was downright lecherous. There were red light districts all over town, and while the trade was not officially accepted, it was certainly tolerated. Josie knew where the real money was to be made, and became a teenage prostitute under the control of an older lover.

Life as a prostitute destroyed many women in New Orleans, but not Josie Arlington. As the years went by, she gained quite a reputation as a tough, no-nonsense woman of the night. She even got into a legendary fistfight with a rival prostitute, biting off part of her lips and ears!

But Josie knew she couldn’t work as a prostitute forever, and to make a life for herself, she would have to take advantage of the very men who were taking advantage of her. She would have to become a Madam.

So Josie opened a bordello in one of the largest red light districts in New Orleans. The district was located along the Basin Street rail line, just a few blocks from the French Quarter. Despite her rowdy reputation, Josie wanted to clean up her image and open a refined establishment where true gentlemen could pay for the services of, as she put it, “amiable, foreign girls.”

While her brothel became quite successful, the city of New Orleans was about to make her richer that she could have imagined. For in 1897, the city leaders decided upon a bold experiment. Rather than fight vices like prostitution and gambling, they decided to control them by confining them to one supervised area – the exact district where Josie had set up shop.

The area was named Storyville, and it soon became an amusement park of sin. The densely packed neighborhood was filled with saloons and brothels. High class gentlemen and rogues alike staggered through the streets, fueled by exotic drugs and overpriced booze, listening to the sounds of piano jazz in-between trysts with the endless collection of prostitutes.

And of all the bordellos in Storyville, none was larger and more lavish than the Arlington. Beautiful women in exotic European lingerie waited in the grand parlor for the most powerful men in New Orleans to walk through the door.

But while Josie reveled in her upper class status within the walls of Storyville, she soon found out she had a much different reputation within New Orleans high society. When she left the streets of Storyville on any given day, her male customers would suddenly look away when she passed them in the street. Some would grab the hands of their confused wives and dart to the other side of the street to avoid her approach.

Even when she bought a mansion in one of New Orleans’ most affluent neighborhoods, she was still an outcast to the high society women of New Orleans. She could hear them whispering and giggling behind her back when she came home at night. “I wonder how many of these ladies know that their husbands visit me on weekends,” she thought to herself. But she kept silent, her bitterness festering inside her.

In later years, Josie fell into ill health, and the piles of money she made at the Arlington began to seem meaningless. She began to fixate on her approaching death, and knew it would provide her one more opportunity to get back at those who shunned her. So she shocked New Orleans one more time by purchasing a plot in Metairie Cemetery, the most expensive and fashionable graveyard in town.

Now the high society women were truly mortified! They couldn’t imagine a dirty, low-life prostitute being buried within the same cemetery as their loved ones! But there was nothing they could do.

Now, Metairie Cemetery was, and is to this day, one of the most impressive cemeteries you’re ever likely to see. It’s a bewildering maze of giant mausoleums and monuments, with some of the most powerful and well-known names in New Orleans history chiseled onto their stone facades. Josie knew she needed a special monument in such a place, and commissioned an architect to design her a tomb unlike any other.

The monument was made of red granite, topped with two flaming urns. A statue of a young woman bearing a wreath stood on the stairwell, touching the bronze door that led to Josie’s future resting place. The tomb cost Josie a fortune, but the aggravation it caused the high society ladies was well worth the price.

Josie eventually passed away at age 50. A few years later, Storyville itself was shut down by the U.S. Navy, which was concerned about the effect it was having on its young sailors stationed in New Orleans. The brothels and bars were leveled to build a housing project. There is no sign today that Storyville ever existed.

But some believe that Josie Arlington stuck around long after the death of Storyville for one last bid for attention.

In the years after Josie was buried, rumors began to spread about strange goings-on at her grave. Curiosity-seekers who visited the grave ran back to town claiming they saw the urns on top of the tomb burst into flames before their eyes! Others saw an eerie red glow coming from the tomb at night, as if the granite walls were burning like hot coals. Josie’s grave was soon nicknamed the “Flaming Tomb.”

Of course, the symbolism of a red light on Josie’s tomb was not lost on many folks. Another rumor spread that the statue of the young girl would bang on the door of Josie’s tomb, trying to get in. But Josie would never answer, since she had always claimed that no girl had ever lost her virginity at the Arlington.

But the reports didn’t stop there. Two gravediggers swore they saw the female statue walk away from her post and wander aimlessly amongst the graves before vanishing. Was she really the ghost of Josie, still unable to find a home within the high society world she craved?

As the stories spread, the cemetery became overrun with visitors wanting to see the strange events for themselves. The families of those buried in the surrounding graves were horrified at the thought of their loved ones being trampled upon. So the cemetery agreed to remove Josie’s remains and bury them in an unknown location. The “Flaming Tomb” was sold to another owner, strangely enough with the same initials: “J.A.”

But next time you travel to New Orleans, you can still find Josie’s old tomb deep in Metairie Cemetery. And even though Josie may not have found the acceptance she wanted in life, I imagine she’d be pleased to know that folks are still talking about her to this very day. And that her name, like Storyville itself, would pass into the history – and mythology – that is unmistakably New Orleans.

- THE END -

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Collected and Adapted by Craig Dominey

If there’s one thing New Orleans is famous for besides jazz and gumbo, it’s ghost stories. Why, it’s almost a matter of public shame if you own an old building that doesn’t have a ghost or two lurking about. And the more gruesome the tale, the better.

But this story is one of the most gruesome of them all. And the scary thing is – some folks say it actually happened.

Back in the 1800s, a young German couple opened a sausage factory in New Orleans. They were well respected for being hard workers and very pleasant sort of people. They’d greet everyone with a smile, and happily called out their regular customers’ names as they walked through the door. On top of that, they made some of the most delicious pork sausage you ever put in your mouth.

But of course, like a lot of other marriages, there was darkness lurking behind the public smiles and affection. Behind closed doors, the husband was getting a bit tired of his wife. In his eyes, all their hard work had made her old and wrinkled before her time. It wasn’t long before he found a young mistress and eventually fell in love with her.

And he knew he could never have a life with his new lover as long as his wife was around.

So one night after the shop closed, the man crept up behind his wife as she swept the floor, wrapped a cord around her neck, and strangled her. She was a strong woman, and put up quite a fight, but her husband was stronger. As he pulled the cord tighter and tighter around her throat, he could feel her body collapse until she finally fell dead onto the dirty floor. The husband gazed down at her body and smiled – at last, he thought, I’m free!

Now if you’ve ever been to New Orleans, you know it’s awfully hard to conceal a murder down there. Because there’s so little land space, all the houses are built right up against one another. So you become very aware of what your neighbors are up to.

But the sausage maker had a gruesome plan. With great effort, he lifted his wife’s body off the floor – and stuck her headfirst into the sausage grinder!

As the days passed, the man reveled in his happy new life with his mistress. But he continued to keep their relationship a secret so he wouldn’t raise any suspicion. Whenever customers walked into his shop and asked where his wife was, he’d say she was ill, or she was visiting relatives out of town. Nobody thought twice about it, and life went on as normal.

But shameful secrets have a way of creeping up on people eventually. And the longer the wife stayed missing, the more the neighbors began to whisper that something was wrong. The sausage maker’s appearance had become unkempt and haggard, his eyes tired and bloodshot. What’s more, the quality of his meats had deteriorated. Some customers had even bit into bits of hair and torn fabric in their breakfast sausage.

Late one evening, the sausage man was cleaning the front of the shop, trying desperately to think of a new excuse for his wife’s prolonged absence. Suddenly, he heard a strange thumping noise coming from the back room. It sounded to him like somebody was grinding sausages. He ran into the back – and what he saw next froze him in his tracks.

Climbing out of the sausage vat was his dead wife. Her shop apron was covered in blood, and her head was horribly mutilated. She walked slowly toward her husband, arms outstretched, her agonizing moans filling the room. The sausage maker ran out into the street in a panic, screaming loudly. One by one, his neighbors rushed out of their homes and asked what was wrong. Gathering himself, he claimed to have had a bad dream, and thanked them for their concern.

Night after night, the hauntings continued, and the neighbors became more and more suspicious. Dark rumors spread that the man had murdered his wife – but where was her body? The answer came one day when a customer bit into a piece of a gold wedding ring in her sausage. She informed the police, who raided the sausage factory that evening.

As they busted into the back room, they found the sausage maker huddled in a corner, screaming uncontrollably like a maniac. He pointed a shaking finger at the sausage grinder and cried out that his wife was coming to get him. The police grabbed him and promptly locked him up in the nearest insane asylum.

But the asylum provided no safe haven for the sausage man. He screamed day and night that his wife’s ghost had entered the room, and was coming to get him. He eventually had a complete mental breakdown, and committed suicide.

During the time the sausage maker was locked up, the factory was sold to another man, who claimed the ghost of the sausage maker’s wife continued to haunt the building. Immediately after her husband’s suicide, the hauntings stopped, and the ghost was never seen again.

Nowadays, you might find a longtime New Orleans resident whose ancestor was one of the unlucky ones who ate the tainted sausage that year. Needless to say, that’s one of those deep, dark secrets that’s probably best taken to the grave.

- THE END -

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