William Ryan Smith

Father Jean Pierre, a missionary priest from Brittany, France, answered a call to serve in sparsely populated Shreveport, where he chose to remain when a yellow fever epidemic struck in 1873. From a perspective told largely through his own words, Father Pierre provides the reader a glimpse of his "fearful steps strengthened by hope." His unique insights extend even to the secular history, framing the development of Shreveport and the surrounding region in the middle of the nineteenth century. Gradually emerging as someone widely respected and admired for his intellect and ability, Father Pierre's story culminated in a heroic choice to sacrifice his life in the service of strangers when the epidemic ravaged the city. A trio of authors celebrates the life of this Shreveport martyr.

Beyond the fa ade of stately Louisiana platations are stories of hope and subjugation, tragedy and suffering, shame and perseverance and war and conquest. After sixteen workers chopped down most of the Houmas House's ancient oak trees, referred to as the Gentlemen, eight of the surviving trees eerily twisted overnight in grief over the losses wrought by a great Mississippi River flood. An illegal duel to reclaim lost honor left the grounds of Natchez's Cherokee Plantation bloodstained, but the victim's spirit may still wander there today. A mutilated slave girl named Chloe still haunts the halls of the Myrtles Plantation in St. Francisville. Cheryl H. White and W. Ryan Smith reveal the dark history, folklore and lasting human cost of Louisiana plantation life.