701 Chartres St.

City property, no property I.D. number.
Property I.D. number is now 18492-01_Cab to correspond to the Property I.D. number assigned to the other lots in the square. This lot contains the Cabildo.

Records and Deliberations of the Cabildo, re: property is use as a cemetery.

No. 4, Sept. 19, 1800 - July 15, 1802.

The CALABOOSE - the venerable old building opposite the Place d'Armes yclept the Calaboose, is being renovated to such an extent that it will scarcely be known by those who have been absent from the city for a year. Although we have alluded to this before, we cannot forebear indulging in a moral in a present instance. The necessity for the renovation of this antiquated pile is a forcible illustration of the progress of time. If the old building could speak, what stories it could tell of Spanish Dons, gallant Chevaliers from France, lovely ladies, and others who, years and years ago have been laid in their silent tombs! Thus it is - the old times wearing away for the advance of the future - old customs have to give place to the innovations of the present - and the old Calaboose, that had stood the storms of more than half a century, is now surmounted with roof and windows like those of an old Virginia mansion! "So runs the world away"! Grass grows upon the graves, and over the monuments of the past we build emblems of the future!

Building contract

John Page, builder for the City of New Orleans, J. C. Denis, acting Mayor, to repair the courtroom of the Recorder of the Second and Third Districts [in the Cabildo] according to the plans and specifications on file in the office of the City Surveyor (situated at the corner of St. Peter and Chartres Streets). A new prisoner's dock and passageway shall be built as shown on the plans. $1,190.

G. Le Gardeur, Jr., Vol. 22/94

Building contract

John Page, builder for the City of New Orleans, Edward Pilsbury, Mayor "for repairing the Supreme Court Room [of the Cabildo] according to the plans and specifications on file in the office of the City Surveyor." Specifications of repairs to be done in the Supreme Court Room and adjoining rooms in the second story of the building on the N. W. corner of Chartres and St. Peter Sts, for $1900.

G. Le Gardeur, Jr., Vol. 22/97

Translation (in full) of Ordinance of O'Reilly, Spanish Governor (February 22, 1770) does not clear up the city's ownership of the Cabildo and Jackson Square.

"Buildings of Vieux Carre"

The Cabildo, drawn by R. G. Foster and B. Foster for Historic American Buildings Survey

History of the Cabildo:

[w/drawing]

The Cabildo, one of the most important historic buildings in the United States, is the most impressive surviving monument of the period of Spanish Domination in Louisiana. Designed by the Architect-engineer, Gilbert Guillemard, its construction was financed and directed by the New Orleans Spanish philanthropist, Don Andres Almonester y Roxas. It was begun in 1795 on the site of an earlier Cabildo building that had been built in 1769 by Louisiana's second Spanish Governor, Don Alexandro O'Reilly who established the Cabildo as the governing body of the city of New Orleans. The first Cabildo building was destroyed in the conflagration of 1788 which also severally damaged the adjacent corps de garde.

The corps de garde, which had been built by the French in the 1750's, was again badly damaged by the great fire of 1794. Most of its massive brick walls remained standing, however, and were incorporated in the present Cabildo building in 1795. The building was completed and the Illustrious Cabildo (Spanish colonial city council) held its first session in the Sala Capitular on May 10, 1799. Here on November 30, 1803 the ceremonies were held transferring Louisiana from Spain back to France and on December 20, 1803 from France to the United States.

After the Louisiana Purchase the building served as the City Hall of New Orleans until 1853 when the seat of city government was transferred to the new City Hall (now Gallier Hall) on Lafayette Square. The Sala Capitular, enlarged to twice its original size, then housed the Supreme Court of Louisiana until 1910. Until 1914 the corps de garde on the ground floor served as a district police station using the prison cells in the courtyard as a jail.

The Cabildo was temporarily converted into a residence for General Lafayette when he visited the city in 1825. The third story mansard roof with its dormer windows was added in 1847. The Louisiana State Museum was first opened to visitors in the Cabildo on April 17, 1911 with the formal opening being held a year later on April 30, 1912.

"MRS. R . V. PLATOU of the friends of the Cabildo displays a hand-forged nail taken from the Presbytere during the remodeling of that building. J. T. Prowell, chairman of the board of managers of the Louisiana state museum which is housed in the Presbytere, poses with Mrs. Platou. The Friends of the Cabildo have several hundred of these nails which they are selling to raise funds to assist their work on behalf of the Cabildo and Presbytere."

Cabildo Board Again Rejects Federal Offer

Re: Cabildo-Presbytere revamping
Dr. John N. Pearce

___ Run Short in Museum Renovation

"The historic Cabildo on Jackson Square may benefit little from $900,000 in state funds made available for renovation and reconstruction of it and the equally venerable Presbytere... "

Enough Funds Available For Cabildo Work -- Andry

Square, Cabildo to Get U.S. Landmark Labels

Bond Issue May Provide Cabildo House-Cleaning

Porches of Cabildo, Presbytere Are Contrasts

LA. Vieux Carre Council Elects

[Friends of the Cabildo]

Cabildo Said Too Broke To Reopen

Cabildo 'May Close' Before It 'Opens'

"4 Buildings in French Quarter Designated U.S. Landmarks"
[The Presbytere, 713 Chartres]

Friends of the Cabildo Find Historic Lafayette Letter

Cabildo Scene of Fete

Mr. Joseph Newell
Vieux Carre Commission
630 Chartres Street
New Orleans, LA 70130

Dear Joseph:

I was rooting through a large pile of papers on my desk and turned up something that I thought you might want to put into your file on the Cabildo. In the course of pulling together the documentation on the structure for the Americas City Hall project, I ran across the...references to the installation of the massive wrought iron gates at the entrance to the building. The actual financial accounts were found in the records of the 1st Municipality, specifically, the Surveyors Office.

This material must have been unknown, seeing as when I told Sam Wilson about it, he indicated that he had never seen such documentation, although he had found reference to the gates in a contemporary newspaper article.

The records for the 1st Municipality are really rather remarkable, they even indicate how many trees were purchased for Jackson Square, and the species of the trees as well! Only in a state as legally minded as this one would such things be recorded!

Sincerely,
John Ferguson
Architectural Historian

The Iron Gates at the Entrance to the Cabildo.

The first reference I could locate regarding the installation of the massive iron gates at the entrance to the Cabildo appears in the published Proceedings of the First Municipality Council. At their meeting of October 4, 1850, the Council "Resolved, That the Mayor jointly with the surveyor be, and is hereby authorized to have the entrance of the Municipal Hall paved with marble tiles; the walls painted imitation of marble - a new entrance door made."

A contract for the marble floor and the interior plaster work still survives in the acts of J.C. Cuvillier dated June 2, 1851 which only concerns the repair of the entrance and of the staircase with no mention of new entrance doors. This work was to be executed by Louis Surgi, the Surveyor of the Municipality.

However, in the Account Ledger from the Surveryor's office for the years 1850-1852 there is an entry dated March 26, 1851 which refers to the iron gates. Listed under the heading Entretien Proprietes, or Maintenance of Properties, the entry notes the payment to the Pelanne Brothers of $1,760.00 for "[a] gateway of iron positioned at the entrance of the Municipal Hall, and for the painting of the same and the repair of the plaster." It is rather curious that the Pelanne Brothers, who were blacksmiths by trade, were asked to repair plaster. The entry, which is in French, reads untranslated as follows: Pelanne frères - Pour une porte de fer posie a l'entre de L'Hotel de Ville, peinture de la dite port & reparation dis enduits.

In Samuel Wilson, Jr. and Leonard Huber's monograph on the Cabildo, an article in the newspaper Louisiana Courier noted that the gates were designed by Louis Pilie, the Surveyor for the First Municipality and were the work of the Pelanne Brothers. This article appeared in March of 1851, with no specific date given. The Pelanne Brothers did a great deal of work for the First Municipality, the most notable of which is the iron fence which still surrounds Jackson Square, which was erected at the same time as the gates to the Municipal Hall.

Letter from Joseph Newell, Architectural Historian - Vieux Carre Commission, to Florence Jumonville, The Historic New Orleans Collection.

Re: Cabildo gates

Cabildo restoration under way