New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1874-03-08
fFof the New Orleans Republican,
OUR CITY AT THE BEGINNING OF
THIS CENTURY.
BY CHARLES DERANCO.


tween the Ursuline Nuns Convent and tn
garrison's quarter, right in front Of OF,
Levee street, between Ursulines and Bar
racks streets; the other. the Charity Hospi
tai, situated in the rear of the city, in tn
vicinity of the head of Canal Ca-ondele
street or landing.
The former, the Military Hospital, ais
called the Royal Hospital, was exclusively
reserved for the reception aud entertain
ment of persons belonging to the mill tar!
department. For this reason the United
States authorities continued this establish
ment as long as regular garrison wal
kept in our city, which was up to abou
1924. After this period, and when the bar
racks had been sold to private speculator!
at public auction, the hospitalj building
which stood precisely upon the space occu
pylng the ground of Hospital street, wa:
demolished or taken down, in order to at
ford an opening of that thOroughfare
towards the levee or river front, which II
had hitherto blocked up completely.
This building, though two stories high
and surrounded by an airy gallery, was ye.
of ancient date, no doubt from tho very
first times of the French colonial regime
under Governor Bienville or Marquis d.
Vandreuil, from l740 to 1850
As for the other hospital, called the
charity one, or Don Carlos Hospital, near
st. Peter and Rampant streets, we sh all
state what we find respecting this public
institution in one of our elder chronicles,
to wit:
The first hospital for indigent persons
erected in our city was built Of wood, on
the west side of Rampant street. between
Toulouse and St. Peter, and was totally de-
stroyed BY hurricane, A. d. 1879. This
building had been installed for the above
purpose by the Governor, Bienville, in con-
sequence OF bequest by mariner named
Jean Louis, left in 1737 of some 10000
livres. In 1884 Don Andre Almonaster, the
ancestor of the Mrs. Pontalbo family, ap-
lied to the Spanish monarch, King Carlos
Ill for permission to erect, at his own ex-
pense, another editice IN brick on the same
premises, and, having been granted this re-
quest, he completed the building in 1856, at
q cost of STA 200; to which edifice he gave
the name of his sovereign. under the title of
the New Charity Hospital of St. Charles,
endowing it. moreover, with . perpetual
of $500 per annum by ASST signing the
rents arising from some stores at the corner
of st. Peter and Old Levee streets, and
making donation to the hospital Of five
slaves. For these charitable actions the
King, by royal decree at Arapjuez, the
royal palace near Madrid, appointed him
patron for life, with reversiOn to his heirs,
a rrnn IlnN nv., G.l.
being dated the twenty third of April, 1898.
The hospital was administrated under this
patronage up to the ninth of March, 1911,
when the surviving widow, the patroness,
Almonaster, relinquished all her
rights and privileges in favor of the city
corporation of New Orleans, the building
having been burnt previously to such relin-
1uishment.
This hospital must have been somewhat
# an ornament TO our city in 1902, because
he above mentioned traveller. who has de.
cribed our then existing public buildings,
Mentions it in an approbative manner with
egard to its exterior appearance.
Major Stoddard, who visited our city q
ew years later lin 1907. besides describing
he already enumerated public buildings,
makes mention also of the public
risons, which he says were behind the
own house, or citadel, at the corner of St.
'eter street, and adjoining the Cathedral
y narrow lane. He continues:
Under the Spanish government this was
wretched receptacle of vice and misery:
Ike the grave it received it's many tenants,
Tho were soon forgotten by the world. |
ONE of them persisted with age and dis
ase, and others by the hands of assassins. |
under sentence of death were |
ften kept immured within its walls for |
ears. owing either to the hardness or
nifty of the tribunal at Havana, without
hose approval no sentence of death could |
Q carried into execution.
These prison buildings were demolished
'mewhere in 1884 or 1885, after the present
asst parish and city prisons had been COM
eted on Orleans street, between Irene
Id Marais streets. During the time of the
smoition Of this ancient, inquisitorial-like
oking cabannos the public had free access
the several cells and chambers; also some
ZEN ike built vaults or extensions, in |
hich the prisoners were kept in the pros
ate positions, no standing up room being
erein found. Strong iron rings and chains
tested the force by which the desperate
iminafs were kept 20 the ground or in
bjection. But there was general rejoic.
2 that the relics of an old feudal system
d been finally eradicated from among
r modern civilized society. There sombre.
liking buildings, with strong barred,
ated windows, fronted St. Peter street, be.
cen Chartres and Royal, for about half
3 length of the block or square.
There were then no public places OF walks
cept the space for the landing or shipping
: the harbor, generally called the levee.
r traveller makes no mention of any
lnting of trees upon that location. from
ich we infer that the alley of trees which
did find there in 1916 must have been
Inted after his sojourn in our city. Major
'ddard likewise omits making mention of
? such public promenade; and yet we
re informed by older residents that even
'nge groves had at one time been planted
front Of the Fortiers' stores, between I
blouse and St. Louis streets, which, how
IT, the breaking Of the levee or the sink =,
of the ground had finally precpitated q
0 the river. 6
Below the city, and in front of private +
ellings we then noticed several such g
'utiful orange hedges. One, little above c
ruins of the former Turo's Asylum,
led the Frascaty's; another somewhat
'er down, about Macarty's farm, gener- d
: named Belair or Belvedier, on account t
the fine view up and down the river, Il
the agreeable breeze tanning from the J.
# running current of the Mississippi in b
t vicinity. These groves were planted f
quilt upon what we may call outside bull r