The Maspero Exchange is Still There More, as a restaurant on St. Louis and Chartres.
The Maspero Exchange
Photograph of the Maspero Exchange, from a 1919 publication, The Romance of New Orleans. It was published by Lybcus Publishing Company, with a New Orleans postal box address. The book lists no author. The seal of the city is prominent on the cover, but that doesn’t necessarily imply an endorsement from City Hall. The first building on the corner Uptown/river corner of St. Louis and Chartres Streets burned down in the 1794 fire. This building, like the Girod (Napoleon) House across the street, dates from 1795-96.
Coffee and Human Trafficking
The building originally held a coffee shop on the first floor. Since such an establishment made for a good place to do business, the location rapidly became an “exchange,” a place where goods were regularly bought and sold. “Goods” included enslaved people. Even though the United States signed onto a ban on the international slave trade in 1808, domestic human trafficking was legal until the passage of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution. So, New Orleans served as a nexus for that trade. Maspero’s Exchange
As the volume of goods coming through New Orleans increased, so did the need for larger exchanges. Pierre Maspero passed in 1822. John Hewlett took over the exchange in 1826. Hewlett moved the exchange across the street. That exchange was demolished and replaced by the St. Louis Hotel Exchange in 1838. The St. Louis Exchange operated at a pace too swift for buyers to properly examine the enslaved on the block. So, the coffee shop displayed the enslaved prior to sale.
Battle of New Orleans
The “romantic” aspect of the Maspero Exchange stems from 1814. Maspero’s claims to be the location of a meeting between Major General Andrew Jackson and Jean Lafitte. While the Old Absinthe House also claims the meeting happened there, there is no firm documentation indicating exactly where the two met.
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