The Casket Girls

Published 7 days ago • 2 min read

The Casket Girls

May 7, 2026

Hello Reader,

Last week, I wrote about the submission process agented authors have to go through. As I'm now officially 2 weeks on submission with my most recent novel, I'm turning my attention to my next project. I'm not 100% sure what this next book will be, but I know that at least part of it will focus on the original New Orleans vampire legend: the casket girls.

Since I've basically memorized this legend as I've read about 30 versions of it for research, I'm going to retell it here. If you are not into spooky New Orleans legends with loose ties to real history, please scroll down to my recommended readings for the week because I've scrounged up some good ones.

"The Casket Girls of New Orleans"

New Orleans was founded by France in 1718, with the intention that it would be an important port city. However, in those early days, there were very few women in the city, and a city can't thrive without us ladies.

The French government realized that the city could not be populated without women, so they gathered some ladies up to send to the city. They started by sending a ship full of nuns, which was confusing and frustrated to the men of New Orleans for obvious reasons. Next, they sent a ship full of lady criminals because those were the easiest to round up. This did not seem to help matters.

Finally, in 1721 the ship, La Baleine, was sent to New Orleans full of orphans with respectable backgrounds who were ready to be married off. The ship arrived in the dead of night, six weeks late. The girls who disembarked were notably pale and thin, and they each brought a strange trunk that resembled a casket. The nuns quickly escorted the girls to the Ursuline convent, where they were to be housed on the third floor until their marriages could be arranged.

Shortly after they arrived, mysterious deaths started occurring all over the city--corpses found bloodless with their throats torn out.

The nuns became suspicious of their pale charges, who were refusing to leave their third floor dormitories during the day, insisting that they needed rest after their long, hard journey. One night, finding the girls gone, the nuns checked their strange luggage, which should have been filled with clothing and possessions intended to aid a woman in starting a family.

What they found in those casket-shaped trunks is something that differs based on the version of the legend you're being told. In some versions, the nuns found empty trunks and conclude that the girls are sleeping in the caskets during the day--making the girls themselves the vampires. In other versions of the legend, the nuns find that the girls have smuggled vampires--or something even more evil--into the city.

Whatever they found, the nuns quickly summoned a Bishop. The Bishop blessed silver nails and used them to nail shut the shutters on the third floor windows . He then locked the only entrance to that third floor room, blessing the lock to seal in whatever evil had been smuggled in.

What do you think of this legend?

Quick note:

As summer approaches, my schedule is getting crazy, so I'm temporarily turning this weekly newsletter into a bi-weekly newsletter. Thank you for following, and for understanding!