The Civil War usually conjures images of vast and bloody battlefields. But what about skirmishes in remote swamps? The war came to Louisiana, too, and, like everywhere else, people took sides. Being in the deep South, most Louisiana residents naturally sided with the Confederacy. New Orleans, in particular, was a hotbed of rebel activity.
In late April 1862, Flag Officer David G. Farragut commanded a Union fleet that broke through two confederate forts at a juncture in the Mississippi River below New Orleans. This led to the capture of the city and control over its waterway. It marked an important victory for the North.
After that, the Union presence in Louisiana intensified, and regional outposts were established. One of these was in Des Allemands, located in the St. Charles and Lafourche parishes, near the toes of the boot-shaped state. Though now a township, at the time it was only lightly occupied with German settlers. The only major building was a train depot owned by the New Orleans, Opelousas, and Great Western Railroad company.
This company, chartered in 1852, laid more than 80 miles of track from Algiers to Berwick Bay. The depot at Des Allemands was one of seven such stations in the St. Charles parish alone.
A Ghost Train Under the Bayou?
For generations, a local legend has been passed down that a train is buried beneath the Bayou Des Allemands. Since ambushing supply trains was a common tactic of Confederate forces, it makes sense that they might have derailed one. Or perhaps two trains collided. Accidents were common during the early days of the railroad, after all. Though the rumor remains unconfirmed, the local lore has taken on a life of its own, and many Des Allemands residents are adamant that this “ghost train” lurks somewhere under their bayou.Efforts to research the origins of this missing train have usually focused on the accounts left by soldiers during skirmishes and ambushes. One researcher, documentary filmmaker Roy Lunk, stated in a 2009 interview with the St. Charles Herald Guide, “I’ve read actual accounts written by Civil War captains that fought in the battles, but nothing was mentioned about this supposed train accident.” Divers have occasionally discovered minor artifacts in the Bayou, such as cannonballs, but no locomotives.
In another 2009 interview with the same publication, Civil War buff Bob Vitter said, “I’ve studied the history of St. Charles Parish and there is no documented account of a train derailing in Bayou Des Allemands during the Civil War.”
I myself read a number of Civil War accounts looking for evidence of a missing train, but couldn’t find anything. Accounts of the Battle of Des Allemands don’t mention it. Ambushes at the nearby stations of Boutte and Chitimacha noted that the trains escaped.
The Great Western Railroad Disaster
There remains another potential historical source, however. Instead of examining the accounts of soldiers, what if we looked at the records of the New Orleans, Opelousas, and Great Western Railroad Company? Surely, if they had lost a train, they would have noted this in a report.The Great Western Railroad’s Eleventh Annual Report, dated Jan. 1, 1863 begins by noting the death of its president the previous August. It then describes the “excellent order” of the corporation’s “eighty miles of finished Road” in the beginning of 1862. The corporation was at such a high point at the date of its last annual report, in fact, that its affairs were “in a better condition than at any previous time.” So far, our search for the missing train would seem to have poor prospects.
However, the report’s cheery outlook changes drastically as the year progresses. Things went downhill for the company after the capture of New Orleans, when Union army officers took control of the company’s trains from engineers, resulting in careless stewardship of the engines.
Then in November, this bad fortune turned into a crisis.
After the confederates captured the large Union garrison in Des Allemands on Sept. 4, Maj. Gen. F. Butler, the Federal commander in New Orleans, launched an invasion of the Lafourche district the following month. The Confederates had reestablished a foothold in the area, and Butler planned on wiping them out entirely.
An Unsolved Mystery
The Great Western Railroad’s report does not explicitly describe a train derailing. The report does mention of the destruction of the 475-foot long bridge at Des Allemands, however, along with most of the company’s other properties. Could it be that the Confederates ran a train into the bayou? It seems both logical and possible.Civil War buff and train skeptic Bob Vitter also noted, in the same interview with the St. Charles Herald Guide, that “it’s really too dangerous to dive into that part of the water” where the train might be. And even if divers have covered this territory, a heavy locomotive sinking into muck for more than 150 years may simply be too deep to discover.
In our scientific age, we tend to dismiss oral traditions as inferior sources of knowledge, nothing more than old wives’ tales. But absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. This is a case where there seems to be more than meets the eye in the documented record. And where official records are absent, oral wisdom often contains important overlooked truths. It has made this writer, for one, a believer in the ghost train of the Bayou Des Allemands.
