New Orleans Haunted History Ghost Tour is a two-hour guided walk through the French Quarter run by Haunted History Tours, booking from $30 per person at our July 30, 2026 check. It runs in the evening, with no clock departure time on the listing. The route names nine points: the French Quarter itself, Rev. Zombie's Voodoo Shop, the LaLaurie Mansion and Jackson Square as stops, with Bourbon Street, Finnegan's Easy, Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop Bar, Pirates Alley and the Pirate's Alley Cafe passed along the way. The listing shows 4.6 across 2,274 reviews, takes groups of up to 28, and states wheelchair and stroller access. It suits people who want documented history told on the pavement rather than a small group or anything indoors.
| Detail | What the listing shows |
|---|---|
| From price | $30 per person (checked July 30, 2026) |
| Duration | 2 hours |
| Departures | Evening. No clock time verified. |
| Ages | Adult 6 to 99, infant 0 to 5. No child rate. |
| Group size | Up to 28 |
| Accessibility | Wheelchair accessible, strollers allowed |
| Meeting point | Not verified. Confirm when you book. |
| Cancellation | Free cancellation to 24 hours before, at our check |
| Rating | 4.6 from 2,274 Viator reviews |
| Operator | Haunted History Tours. We do not run this tour. |
What you will see
The LaLaurie Mansion at 1140 Royal Street, on the corner of Governor Nicholls Street, is the address that seven of the eleven New Orleans listings whose stop lists we banked put on their routes. Delphine LaLaurie bought the corner lot and its unfinished house on August 30, 1831 (Vieux Carre Digital Survey, Historic New Orleans Collection). A fire began in the kitchen on April 10, 1834, responders who forced the locked quarters found enslaved people confined there, and the New Orleans Bee of April 11 reported seven of them mutilated and suspended by the neck, condemning the atrocities committed against them (as quoted by nola.com). That is a crime record, printed in the city's own newspaper within a day.
The catalogue of surgical tortures repeated on nearly every ghost tour is not in those newspapers. It traces to Jeanne deLavigne's Ghost Stories of Old New Orleans, published in 1946 with no sources given. The earliest published narrative account, Harriet Martineau's Retrospect of Western Travel of 1838, describes enslaved people who looked haggard and showed signs of whipping, and no mutilations. The building is not the building either: a crowd gutted the house in April 1834, and Pierre E. Trastour bought the ruin on March 24, 1837 and rebuilt it across 1837 and 1838, so the facade in every photograph postdates the crime. There is no known court record of a trial, no documented excavation of remains under the floor, and no death toll to give. LaLaurie died in Paris on December 7, 1849 (64 Parishes). Nicolas Cage owned the house until a 2009 foreclosure and was not driven out by ghosts. It is private, so tours stop on the sidewalk.
On Bourbon Street the tour passes Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop Bar at number 941, which carries a durable false attribution. The building was most likely put up as a house in the 1770s, in the Spanish colonial period (Wikipedia). The property record for 1773 to 1833 puts the site in the family of a carpenter named Bartholomie Robert, with no Lafitte in the chain of title, and Jean Lafitte was born around 1780 and did not reach the Gulf before about 1804, so the stories placing him here in the 1770s predate his birth (nola.com). The smithy story starts with Lafcadio Hearn writing in 1883. No source establishes a forge, nothing supports the smuggling tunnels, and the oldest-bar-in-America line is marketing: use as a bar dates to the mid-1940s. Rev. Zombie's Voodoo Shop, Finnegan's Easy and the Pirate's Alley Cafe are working businesses with no documented history in our sources. A shop trading on a historical name is not a historic site: the Bourbon Street business calling itself Marie Laveau's House of Voodoo, which this route does not name, opened in 1978, almost a century after she died in 1881 (64 Parishes).
Jackson Square was laid out in August 1721 as the Place d'Armes, the colonial parade ground, and the Historic New Orleans Collection states that public punishments and executions were carried out on it, naming no individuals and giving no count. The heads of the men who led the 1811 German Coast uprising are documented as displayed along the river road and at the city gates, not in the Place d'Armes, and that was state terror, not a spooky detail. The raised hooves on Clark Mills's 1856 equestrian statue encode nothing about how Jackson died. Pirates Alley, passed on the cathedral side, is named for something that never happened in it: its nineteenth-century name was Ruelle d'Orleans, Sud, and the city adopted Pirates Alley only in 1964 (Experience New Orleans). No record puts Jean Lafitte and Andrew Jackson in the passage planning the city's defense, the documented slave trade ran through the exchanges and hotel rotundas on nearby streets, and the duels belong to St. Anthony's Garden behind the fence.
Who it suits
This is two hours on French Quarter pavement in the evening, in a group that can reach 28, with the LaLaurie Mansion at its center. The listing states wheelchair access and allows strollers, which not every ghost walk here does.
- Good if you want the LaLaurie story where it happened, documented parts separated from the folklore.
- Good for families who can walk two hours, though the bands are adult 6 to 99 and infant 0 to 5.
- Skip it if you want a small group. One listing we compared caps at nine.
- Skip it if you want a cemetery, an indoor location or ghost-hunting equipment.
- Skip it if you need a confirmed start time first.
How it compares
Haunted History Tours lists two French Quarter ghost walks at the same $30 and the same two hours, so the route is the difference. This one names the LaLaurie Mansion, Rev. Zombie's Voodoo Shop and Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop Bar. New Orleans Ghost, Vampire, Witch, Voodoo, and Mystery Tour packages five subjects instead, adds the Royal Street Mall, operates in all weather, and carries child 6 to 12 and senior 60 and over bands this listing does not have. Both sit at 4.6, but this one is the better-tested of the pair, 2,274 reviews against 787.
If group size matters more, The Ghosts of New Orleans Tour from Ghost City Tours runs 90 minutes at $29.99 with a cap of nine, the smallest stated cap among the fifteen New Orleans listings in our research, and shows 4.7 across 718 reviews. If price decides it, Haunted Ghost and Paranormal Tour in New Orleans is the cheapest of the fifteen at $15 for two hours, though its 4.5 rests on 98 reviews, a thin sample beside this one. For the wider field, see New Orleans ghost tours compared and our guide to the best haunted tours in New Orleans.
Questions people ask
Who runs this tour?
Haunted History Tours. We do not run it.
What does it cost and how long is it?
From $30 per person for two hours, at our July 30, 2026 check. Prices move, so confirm the rate when you book.
What time does it start?
The listing shows evening departures and no clock time we could verify, so check the times offered for your date.
Can children come?
The bands are adult 6 to 99 and infant 0 to 5, so everyone from six up books at the adult band.
Can you go inside the LaLaurie Mansion?
No. 1140 Royal Street is private and tours stop on the sidewalk. The house standing there was rebuilt by Pierre E. Trastour in 1837 and 1838, after a crowd gutted the original.
Is it accessible, and can I cancel?
The listing states wheelchair access and allows strollers, and carried free cancellation to 24 hours before the start at our check.
