Baroness de Pontalba

Episode 153: How the Wealthiest Woman in New Orleans "Got Her Money Back"

Portrait of Micaela, Baroness de Pontalba by Claude-Marie Dubufe in 1841

Listen:

Watch:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OF7ijbDYuRY

Transcript:

I’ve been to New Orleans a number of times. It’s a really cool city. If you ever get a chance to go, you totally should. On my most recent trip, we took a walking tour of the French Quarter and one of the stops was, of course, Jackson Square. Jackson Square is the heart of the French Quarter which is the historic district of New Orleans. It’s dominated by the St. Louis Cathedral directly in the middle with the Cabildo, the former seat of the Spanish colonial government, and the Presbytère building on either side. Out in front you’ll find a statue of Andrew Jackson on horseback and then to either side of the square these four story red brick buildings with intricate cast iron balconies. These buildings are called the Pontalba buildings and they are some of the most famous in New Orleans. Jackson Square wasn’t always so beautiful. It used to be the place where people were executed, hanged. Back then it was called the Place d’Armes. But in the 1800s it was changed to Jackson Square to honor Andrew Jackson who led the Battle of New Orleans in the War of 1812, which honestly didn’t even need to be fought because the treaty ending the war had already been signed, he just didn’t know that yet. But, whatever, Jackson was an American hero or whatever. Tune in to episode 5 to find out how I really feel about Andrew Jackson. But he gets this square named after him and he gets the statue and all that. On this walking tour I did, yeah, back to that. On this walking tour, the tour guide pointed out that the statue of Andrew Jackson is tipping his hat towards one of the Pontalba buildings. In fact, he’s tipping his hat towards the town house where the builder and owner of the Pontalba buildings lived, a woman by the name of Micaela Leonarda Antonia de Almonester Rojas y de la Ronde, Baroness de Pontalba. Everyone in this episode has long names, get ready. I immediately thought it was pretty cool that these iconic buildings, these New Orleans landmarks, the Pontalba buildings were built by a woman. But the story got even juicier. The tour guide told us that Micaela, the Baroness de Pontalba was a free woman of color and that, upon meeting Andrew Jackson, he refused to tip his hat to her. So, as the wealthiest woman in New Orleans, she had the statue erected with Jackson perpetually tipping his hat to her. I was all for it and I really wanted to learn more about this woman, this baroness. Turns out, that story’s not true. Don’t believe everything a tour guide tells you but, it doesn’t make the story of Micaela Almonester, the Baroness de Pontalba any less interesting. Let’s fix that. 

Hello, I’m Shea LaFountaine and you’re listening to History Fix where I tell surprising true stories from history you won’t be able to stop thinking about. This week we’re going to New Orleans, and also to France. Actually, we’re mostly going to France. Because, while Micaela was from New Orleans, she spent most of her adult life in France. So, what that means is I get to probably butcher the pronunciation of a lot of these French names and words again. Yippie. Micaela was born in New Orleans, Louisiana in November of 1795. At that time, 1795, New Orleans was controlled by Spain. Part of the reason New Orleans is such a culturally unique place is because it is this blend of a lot of very different cultures. First you have Native American cultures that were there first, of course. Then the French. France established the city of New Orleans in 1718. After that, they sort of secretly gifted it to Spain in 1763 during the 7 years war. This was a war mostly between Great Britain and France over who controlled the American colonies. Spain came to France’s aid and, in doing so, lost Havana to the British. Havana was like everything to them so France gave them New Orleans cause they felt bad or whatever and they wanted Spain to keep helping them. But they didn’t tell the British that of course. After the war the British split Louisiana with the French. In the treaty, that’s what it said. That the British would get Louisiana east of the Mississippi River and France would keep it to the west. But then the French were like syke, we actually already gave that to the Spanish suckas. And so Spain got New Orleans for a few decades. So we have Native American cultural influences, French, Spanish, African of course because New Orleans was the location of the largest slave market in what is now the United States so there were a lot of enslaved Africans coming into the city. And then, with the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, New Orleans was absorbed into the United States. But because of this mixture of peoples and cultures it became this really unique and one of a kind place. 

Micaela was born into Spanish controlled New Orleans. She was Creole. I don’t think many people actually know what that means, myself included. Creole is not a racial term. It has nothing to do with the person’s race. There were white Creoles and there were Black Creoles and there were Creoles with Native American blood too. What Creole meant was a person of old world descent born in the new world. They were the new generation. So, Micaela for example, her father was Spanish and her mother was French. She was not born in Spain or in France. She was born in New Orleans and that made her Creole. If your father was French and your mother was Black, you’re still Creole. Maybe your father was Spanish and your mother was half Black and have Native American, Creole. Creole is a cultural and linguistic identity that transcends race. It defines a heritage based on place, language, and culture instead of skin color. So we have this Creole culture, this heritage in New Orleans, we also see it in places like Cuba, Haiti, Guadeloupe, and Martinique where we see similar blending of people happening, French, Spanish, African, Native American. They speak similarly, they eat similar cuisine, they have a similar way of being, of doing things. This is Creole. 

So Micaela was Creole but she was not Black that we know of. She was French and Spanish. She was also incredibly wealthy. Micaela’s father was Don Andres Almonester y Rojas. He was from Andalucia, Spain and was a very wealthy notary, politician, and also a bit of a real estate tycoon in New Orleans. Her mother’s name was Louise Denys de la Ronde. Louise was 30 years younger than Don Andres, who was 70 years old, by the way, when Micaela was born. Louise was not wealthy. She brought no dowry to the marriage. However, she was related to some very wealthy folks over in France, we’ll come back to that. So Don Andres was already 70 when Micaela was born. He died soon after, when she was only 2 and a half years old. This made her the sole heir to his massive fortune and, really, the richest girl in New Orleans at a very young age. Micaela spoke French because her mother spoke French and honestly, most people in New Orleans spoke French despite the Spanish takeover. She also spoke Spanish and, later in life, learned English too. 

In 1811 when Micaela was 15 years old, marriage arrangements were made for her. Arranged marriages were part of Creole tradition. So her mother arranged for her to be married to her cousin, yes to her first cousin, who lived in France. This cousin, Joseph-Xavier Célestin Delfau de Pontalba, known as Célestin or "Tin-Tin," had actually been born in New Orleans but had since moved with his family to France. Celestin was 20 years old, Micaela was 15. Fun fact, his mother was related to Delphine LaLaurie who is a legendary New Orleans villain, featured in season 3 of American Horror Story played by Kathy Bates. She is most known for torturing and murdering the people she enslaved. But, honestly her story has been so fictionalized and mythologized it’s hard to tell which parts of it are true. I’m going to save her for Spooktober I think. Anyway, Celestin’s family reached out to Micaela’s mother. They were like “let’s hook these two up because your daughter is super rich and we want her money in our family.” I mean they didn’t actually come out and say that but that was why they wanted their son to marry Micaela. It was a business transaction, a merger of sorts. So Celestin and his mother come to New Orleans from France in 1811. He meets Micaela. I guess it goes okay because after 3 weeks, they get married at St. Louis Cathedral there in what would later become Jackson Square but right now is still the Place d’Armes where people get executed. Married and executed, you can do it all right there. So they get married, in Spanish, the ceremony was all in Spanish which Celestin did not understand at all. He’s like cool sounds good, whatever you said just sign me up, I heard she’s super rich. So they get married and Micaela and her mother go to live with Celestin’s family in France. And Celestin, I mean, his family is not hurting for money. They live in this palace, this super fancy chateau, Mont-l’Eveque. There’s a moat, there are turrets, it’s, picture a fairy tale palace. It looks like that. It’s about 50 miles from Paris and it’s the ancestral home of Celestin’s family, the de Pontalba family. Micaela moves into the family palace and her mother goes to live in Paris. 

Micaela was a bit of a character. She wasn’t your classic damsel in distress. She wasn’t one to let men walk all over her. According to French Quarter historian Sally Reeves quote “Contemporaries called her persistent, bright-eyed, intelligent, vivacious, prompt, shrewd and business-like. Male historians characterized the Baroness as strong-willed, imperious, penurious, self-indulgent and vacillating, while her female biographer uncovered a life of affliction and resilience. Her portrait as a young wife shows a woman of grace and reflection; her photograph at an older age shows a hardened veteran with unmistakably masculine features," end quote. I think this says a lot. I find it interesting that the contemporaries describe her in mostly a positive light but the male historians sort of twist that into more negative traits later. Reeves points out these changes in her portraits. While young Micaela appears youthful, graceful. In her older portraits you can see that she’s been through some stuff. She’s hardened, she’s tough looking, masculine even. So what happened to Micaela to cause this visual shift? Let’s find out. 

Micaela and Celestin’s marriage seemed to be successful, at least at first. Micaela had four sons and a daughter. Three of the sons survived - Celestin, Alfred, and Gaston. Her first born son, Joseph, and her daughter, Mathilde, both died as babies, sadly although that was pretty common and even expected at the time. Micaela definitely missed the hustle and bustle of New Orleans though. Here she is out in the French countryside and she’s bored as can be. So she converted one of the rooms in the chateau into a theater where she put on plays. She herself acted in the plays but she also hired actual actors from Paris to play the leading roles. And she invited people, her friends from Paris, to come watch these plays. 

So, that’s fun. You know, things seem to be going okay for Micaela. But there is one major problem that just keeps getting worse and that is her father in law, Celestin’s father Baron Joseph Delfau de Pontalba. Joseph is unstable, we’ll call it that. We know that he served as an officer in the French and Spanish armies and I think he suffered mentally from that experience. Dude’s not all there. He’s exceptionally greedy despite living in an actual palace. I’m pretty sure he was the mastermind behind the whole marry your cousin Micaela, the richest girl in New Orleans, plot. Except, then he was super disappointed in Micaela’s dowry which included $40,000 cash plus all of her jewelry. $40,000 in 1811 is just under a million dollars today and who knows how much the jewelry was worth but the Baron is not pleased. This was only around one fourth of the inheritance she got from her father, he knew. He wanted more than one fourth of her wealth. The other 3/4 of the inheritance, by the way, was being controlled by Micaela‘s mother Louise and she was kind of killing it as this super savvy businesswoman. She was making all of these really solid financial decisions, investing the money, buying up real estate in Paris and increasing Micaela‘s net worth by a lot. But her father-in-law, the Baron, he wants all of it and he’s mentally deranged enough to think he deserves it. He forces Micaela to sign a power of attorney that granted her husband, Celestin, control over her assets, all of her money, her dowry. Desperate to get away from this overbearing and overstepping father-in-law, Micaela convinces Celestin to set up his own household in Paris. She’s like this palace is nice and all but your dad kind of sucks so let’s get out of here. Time to leave the nest my friend. And they move into a house in Paris, still owned by Celestin’s father, still owned by the Baron but whatever, at least they aren’t all under the same roof anymore. 

In 1825, Micaela’s mother Louise died and remember Louise had maintained control of ¾ of the inheritance left by Micaela’s father. So when Louise died, Micaela got all of it. It was all hers now, she was in control of all the money, all the properties, lots in New Orleans and, thanks to her mother, lots in Paris now too. Now the Pontablas, her father-in-law, are beside themselves. Now Micaela is filthy rich and he still very much wants it all. He demands that Micaela sign over all of her New Orleans properties to them in exchange for getting to keep the Paris properties that her mother bought. She’s like, no. And in 1830, without her husband’s permission, she returns to New Orleans for a visit just to sort of get her head straight, get a break from these people, and to assert her land rights on American soil. While in the United States, she visits Canada, we know. She also visited Washington DC. Now, at this time, 1830, Andrew Jackson was president of the United States. So when Micaela visited Washington DC, we know that Andrew Jackson sent his carriage along with secretary of state Martin Van Buren to pick her up and bring her to the White House as his guest. They also exchanged letters after that. That’s all we really know about the relationship between Micaela and Andrew Jackson but it’s enough to have sparked all kinds of rumors and myths that we’ll get into soon. 

Back to reality though, after this little jaunt to the US, Micaela returned to France where her father-in-law, the Baron accused her of deserting his son, because remember she just sort of up and went. She didn’t get permission from her husband before taking this trip. After that she became what sources refer to as a virtual prisoner of the de Pontalbas. They really cracked down on her, tightened the leash. But Micaela wasn’t really the sort of person to just be cool with this sort of life. So she attempted to legally separate from Celestin. French marriage laws were rather strict though, and she was unsuccessful in her attempts. But, the attempts, though failed, absolutely enraged the Baron who decided to take matters into his own hands. According to Wikipedia quote “Micaela's attempts to protect her fortune and separate from Célestin so enraged Baron de Pontalba that he resorted to violence. On October 19, 1834, during one of her visits to the chateau, he stormed into her bedroom and shot Micaela four times in the chest at point-blank range with a pair of duelling pistols. After the first shot, she allegedly screamed out: "Don't! I'll give you everything". Whereupon he replied: "No, you are going to die" and shot her another three times in the chest, one bullet passing through the hand that she had instinctively put up to cover one of the gun's muzzles. Despite her injuries, Micaela made an attempt to escape her father-in-law and outside the door she fell into the arms of her maid who had rushed up the stairs upon hearing the first gunshot. With the armed baron still in pursuit, Micaela was dragged down the stairs to the drawing room where she fell to the floor, crying out, "Help me". Baron de Pontalba stood over her bleeding, unconscious body, yet he fired no more shots and returned to his study. She survived the shooting attack, despite multiple shot wounds. One of the bullets had crushed her hand; her left breast was disfigured and two of her fingers were mutilated. That evening, the baron committed suicide in his study by shooting himself in the head with the same dueling pistols,” end quote. So, yeah. Dude just completely lost it and attempted to murder Micaela for her money. 

After the death of the Baron, Celestin became the new Baron de Pontalba which made Micaela the Baroness de Pontalba. But she’s like so wanting out of this family for obvious reasons. After several more lawsuits, she finally got a judge to grant her legal separation from Celestin and the return of all property taken from her by the de Pontalbas. So I guess almost being murdered by her father in law was what it took for the courts to rule in her favor. Seems a bit extreme but okay. Micaela and Celestin never actually divorced but they did remain legally separated for the rest of their lives. So, with her full fortune returned to her, Micaela built a mansion for herself in Paris which today is called the Hotel de Pontalba and now it actually serves as the official residence of the US Ambassador to France. Not bad digs at all for an ambassador. She fancy. 

In 1848 a sort of a mini revolution erupted in France. This was a period of unrest that led to the collapse of the current monarchy, and the beginning of the second French republic. Since the actual French Revolution of the late 1700s, France had been sort of flopping back and forth between monarchy and republic, monarchy and republic. So, 1848, not a great time to be in France. Micaela takes two of her sons, Alfred and Gaston, and returns to New Orleans. She had not been to New Orleans in many years and, upon her return, she was disappointed to find that the once fashionable, posh French Quarter had become sort of derelict and run down. The Place d’Armes, which will soon become Jackson Square, was especially slummy. And this particularly bothered Micaela because she owned most of the property surrounding the Place d’Armes. It was some of the most valuable property in the French Quarter but she wasn’t capitalizing on it because the tenants who lived in her buildings rarely paid rent. So she came up with a plan to demolish those buildings and build new ones. She’s trying to revitalize, to gentrify the French Quarter, if you will. 

Micaela personally designed and commissioned the replacement buildings, which are called the Pontalba Buildings, that run along either side of what’s now Jackson Square. Their design was clearly drawn from buildings in Paris with distinctive cast iron balconies displaying her initials. After they were built, Micaela and her sons lived, for a short time, in the house, because these were like townhouses, these Pontalba Buildings, and they lived in the house at number 5, St. Peter Street, the house that the statue of Andrew Jackson now tips his hat to. Shortly after building the Pontalba buildings, Micaela helped in the full transformation of the Place d’Armes, the changing of the name to Jackson Square, replacing the parade ground to a formal garden, and the erection of the Andrew Jackson statue which she donated $1,500 to. 

But, despite all of that involvement, Micaela did not stay in New Orleans for long. She returned to Paris to live in her mansion there, the Hotel de Pontalba. When her estranged husband, Celestin, suffered a mental breakdown, she took him in, allowing him to live at her house, and cared for him for the rest of her life. Micaela died in 1874 at the age of 78. Celestin died four years later and is buried beside Micaela at the de Pontalba family tomb. 

So, you know, Micaela was clearly a very colorful character. History often does not remember colorful characters accurately or fondly, for that matter. But when we look at the details of her life, there’s really a lot to admire. Micaela was fiercely independent. She did not allow her husband’s family to walk all over her as many women of the era would have done. And I think part of this is due to cultural differences between France and New Orleans. Women in New Orleans were much more liberated than women in France. They had a lot more independence and freedom than French women and a lot more than women in other parts of the United States. I think it’s very interesting, and speaks a lot to her character though, that Micaela took in her husband, even after separating from him, when his health was failing, to care for him. This man’s father attempted to murder her for her money and very nearly pulled it off and yet, she chose to care for him anyway. Historians may call her imperious and self-indulgent but she doesn’t really seem that way to me. 

Let’s go back to the Andrew Jackson thing though, the statue, the myths. We know that Micaela knew Andrew Jackson to some extent. We know that she visited him at the White House when he was president. We know that they wrote letters to each other. And we know that she was instrumental in renaming the Place d’Armes Jackson Square and that she helped fund the statue of Jackson that stands in the center of it, tipping its hat to her house. From this very limited information that we know, two different myths arose, and I find this very interesting. The first myth, according to New Orleans tour guide Sean Micheal Chick writing for Emerging Civil War, is that Micaela was in love with Andrew Jackson. She had this huge crush on him but couldn’t be with him so she had the statue erected so that he would always be near her. We don’t have any evidence of this at all but this myth comes from a time when Andrew Jackson was still viewed as an American hero, right he valiantly led the completely unnecessary Battle of New Orleans. He was the savior of New Orleans and of all of America for that matter. And so, when Jackson is a hero, we see myths emerge that Micaela was in love with him and that’s why she built the statue. 

Later, when public opinion of Jackson begins to shift mostly because of the Indian Removal Act and the forced removal and borderline genocide of tens of thousands of Indigenous Americans at his hand, the myth shifts too. When we don’t like Jackson, the myth twists completely. The new myth is that Micaela was a free woman of color. And that works because, you know, Creole isn’t a racial determination. You can be a white Creole. You can be a Black Creole. Micaela happened to be a white Creole of French and Spanish ancestry but who needs to know that detail. She just as easily could have been a Black Creole. And so, according to the new myth, Andrew Jackson was racist and refused to tip his hat to Micaela because she was Black and so she made him ever tipping his hat to her in the statue. Now, we know that’s not true. Could Micaela have been the littlest bit Black? Yes it’s possible. There was a lot of racial intermixing happening in New Orleans. But we know that she visited him at the White House and rode in his personal carriage and all that. We know that they wrote each other letters. These two were buds. We can’t say that she was in love with him. But we can at least say that they liked each other, they got along. So that doesn’t really mesh with the new myth. It’s a fun story. It’s an awesome story. But it’s not a true story and that kind of matters when it comes to history, no? I find that really interesting that, when we still liked Andrew Jackson the myth was that Micaela was in love with him and that’s why she built the statue. When we started to dislike Andrew Jackson, the myth shifted to Michaela hated him and that’s why she built the statue. It can’t be both guys. I understand wanting to tell an interesting story to your tour group but this kind of thing is so damaging when it’s presented as fact. Chick says quote “To fight the new myth is impossible. Most simply refuse to believe the truth or find it too rewarding to tell a lie that makes for a good story, confirms their proclivities, and might secure an extra tip. In the end, humanity is mostly attracted to myth instead of truth. History will forever be at the service and whims of the present age for the dead do not speak. They cannot defend themselves. Indeed, the very words they used are often taken out of context, edited, misattributed, or just misunderstood. If a myth is to fade away it is often because a new myth will overtake the old myth. New Orleans once wanted Jackson to be a hero and yarns were spun about him, many of which still infest books on the battle of New Orleans. Today he is not a hero, and his statue, still gazing into Micaela’s old residence, lives on borrowed time,” end quote. 

But, you know, in some ways I’m glad to have heard that myth on my most recent trip to New Orleans because without it, I may never have known about Micaela Leonarda Antonia de Almonester Rojas y de la Ronde, Baroness de Pontalba, and she is very much worth knowing about. As a woman, living in the early 1800s, she broke with gender norms in a way that most women would never have considered. She paved her own path, demonstrating incredible courage and resilience. She designed and oversaw the construction of new landmarks, leaving a lasting impact, landmarks that remain to this day, defining the look of not one but two memorable cities. Micaela was a force to be reckoned with and, in the end, her tenacity, her determination paid off. In the words of historian Sally Reeves quote “In the end, French law notwithstanding, the Baroness got her money back.”

Sources: 

• Frenchquarter.com "Micaela Almonester Pontalba: The Baroness of Extremes"

• Wikipedia "Micaela Almonester, Baroness de Pontalba"

• The Historic New Orleans Collection "The Woman Behind New Orleans' Famous Pontalba Buildings"

• The Historic New Orleans Collection "How Did Louisiana Become Spanish?"

• Laura Plantation "What is Creole?

• Emerging Civil War "Micaela Almonester, Andrew Jackson, and Myths"