Invoke the name of Marie Laveau in some Southern communities, and you’re likely to be met with whispered tones of voodoo, murder, and seduction. But mention her husband Jacque Paris, and you’re likely to be met with straight-up silence! Why?
Paris was a free Black man originally from Haiti and a highly successful carpenter. Laveau was a powerful Black activist who spoke out against the high rates of imprisonment for Black people and cared for the incarcerated because white jailers treated them like animals.
They lived a great life together, except for one issue.
Though Laveau was beautiful and intelligent, it was said that Paris was unfaithful. On top of that, he apparently paraded his women right in his wife’s face. This issue proved to be just enough scandal to motivate jealous and scared white people to start rumors that still persist over 200 years later. What happened?
When Paris went missing and disappeared from the local community altogether, they used his disappearance to paint Marie as an evil, dangerous “voodoo priestess.”
But the mystery’s finally been solved, 200 years later.
A Black historian recently proved Paris most likely just moved away with one of his women.
A powerful Black woman who helped the incarcerated and stood against white supremacy? Of course a denigrating rumor was created to tarnish her legacy – the same thing still happens today.