The Haunted Columns Hotel, New Orleans: Room 10 and the Ghostly Host

Away from the French Quarter, on the oak-shaded St. Charles Avenue streetcar line uptown, The Columns is one of the most atmospheric places to stay in New Orleans. Built in 1883 as the home of tobacco merchant Simon Hernsheim, it became a boarding house during World War I and a hotel in 1953. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, holds a MICHELIN Key, and its front porch has long been one of the city’s favorite places for a drink.

It has a quieter ghost story than the Quarter hotels, but a consistent one: a courteous gentleman who appears at guest room doors and vanishes when thanked, a pale little girl on the third floor, a woman in white in the old ballroom, and Room 10, where guests wake to find a woman sitting on the bed. Here is what is told, the real history of the house, and how to request the room. For more nearby, see our guide to the most haunted hotels in New Orleans.

The ghosts of The Columns

The ghostly host

The most common story at The Columns is of a well-dressed gentleman who seems to act as the house’s host. Visitors say he appears at the door of their room or in the public rooms and asks whether they need anything. When they say no, he is gone.

Ghost City Tours wonders whether he might be Simon Hernsheim, who built the house, or its architect Thomas Sully, but that is guesswork. Either way he is said to be entirely polite.

The woman in Room 10

Room 10 is the room people ask for. One guest reported waking in the night to see a middle-aged woman sitting quietly on the end of the bed. Others describe sudden freezing spots and a toilet that flushes on its own.

Another guest described two middle-aged women in the bathroom area who seemed sad rather than frightening. No one has identified them.

The little girl on the third floor

Guests also describe a little girl who looks visibly ill, seen on the third-floor balcony and around Room 21. Her story is unknown. Some guess at an illness or accident in the house’s boarding house years, but there is no record to say.

The woman in white

In the grand old ballroom, a woman in a long white dress is said to drift silently across the floor. She has never been heard to speak and is described as completely benign. Some guests add the smell of cigar smoke in the bar after midnight and children’s laughter on the third floor at dawn.

The most haunted rooms and places to look

• Room 10: The most requested room, with a woman seen sitting on the bed, cold spots and a toilet that flushes by itself.
• Room 21 and the third floor: Where a pale little girl is seen, including on the third-floor balcony.
• The ballroom: Where the woman in white drifts across the floor.
• The grand staircase: A favorite spot for photographs, and for the ghostly host.

History of The Columns Hotel

Simon Hernsheim was a wealthy New Orleans tobacco merchant whose family business imported and exported tobacco before moving into cigars. He built his Italianate mansion on St. Charles Avenue in the early 1880s to a design by Thomas Sully, one of the city’s leading architects. The hotel dates it to 1883, and some sources give 1884. Ghost City Tours describes it as the only survivor of the Italianate homes Sully designed along the avenue.

Hernsheim’s later years were unhappy. His wife and sister died within a few years of each other, and he was said to suffer from deep melancholy. In 1898, after he went missing, he was found at his cigar factory with a bottle of poison and letters to his family. His family later gave $50,000 to the Fisk Free Library in his memory.

Around 1917, during World War I, the mansion became an upscale boarding house. In 1953 a local family turned it into a hotel, and its porch bar became an uptown institution. In 1978 director Louis Malle used it as the setting for the bordello in Pretty Baby, and the hotel still has a Pretty Baby suite. Local stories say the upstairs rooms saw some discreet political meetings in the 1960s and 1970s, which is part of the hotel’s charm rather than anything on record.

In 2019 the hotel was sold to Jayson Seidman and his family, owners of the Drifter Hotel, who restored the house and added a new garden and patio. Today it has 20 rooms and suites, some with 15-foot ceilings and claw-foot tubs, a Victorian lounge with coffered mahogany ceilings, and a dining room serving breakfast and a Sunday jazz brunch. It was awarded a MICHELIN Key.

Tips for a haunted stay

• Ask for Room 10. Book direct, then call 504-899-9308 and ask for it by number. Room 21 on the third floor is the other one to try.
• Take the streetcar. The St. Charles streetcar stops outside and runs to the edge of the French Quarter, past some of the city’s grandest homes.
• Have a drink on the porch. It is the classic way to spend an evening at The Columns. Note that the lounge and upper porch are sometimes booked for private events.
• Check the age rule. The primary guest must be at least 21.
• Combine with a French Quarter haunt. Spend a night uptown here and another downtown at the Le Pavillon or the Hotel Monteleone.
• Want to investigate with a team? Haunted Rooms runs ghost hunts at historic venues across the US.

More haunted hotels nearby

• Le Pavillon Hotel: the Poydras Street grand dame with its own ghosts, at the other end of the streetcar ride
• Hotel Monteleone: Maurice on the 14th floor, on Royal Street
• The Myrtles Plantation: Louisiana’s most famous haunted bed and breakfast, a road trip away
• Haunted places in New Orleans: the city’s other famous haunts
• Haunted hotels in Louisiana
• Haunted hotels in New Orleans

Sources

Facts on this page are checked against the hotel’s own website, historic records and news coverage. Ghost stories are reported as guests, staff and local historians tell them. Read how we rate haunted hotels.

• The Columns: About (official)
• Wikipedia: Simon Hernsheim (Columns Hotel)
• Ghost City Tours: The haunted Columns Hotel
• MICHELIN Guide: Columns
• Explore Louisiana: The Columns Hotel

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