Article Image Alt Text

Jim Bradshaw

Voodoo humbug brought in the year

As the new year began a half century ago in 1951 there was a big stir in the newspapers about a woman who lived “almost in the heart of Eunice” who was “in the power of a witch doctor.”
The story was first published on the front page of the Opelousas Daily World under the headline,”Voo-Doo Comes Alive In Heart of Eunice As Woman Turns To Mystic For Herb Cure.”
That caused Mary Alice Fontenot to look into the story. She was then a reporter for the Eunice New Era and had not yet conjured up Clovis Crawfish and his pals. She reported that the account was more about humbug than voodoo.
The Opelousas story began, “The mystic madness of the African jungle, the potion that heals or bears a curse, has come alive in 20th century America, has reared its ugly head in the modern city of Eunice.”
The woman involved was not named. She was described as “a 22-year-old Eunice woman who has not left her house in two years [and who] is in the power of a witch-doctor.’”
Authorities got involved when the woman’s brother, who had not seen her for several years, dropped by for a visit but couldn’t get anyone to answer the door. He got worried and went to the police.
When officers went to the house, they were greeted by the woman’s mother, who was “brandishing a shot gun” and would not let them in, according to the first account.
After that, Judge Lessley Gardiner approved a search order for the house and Gladney Billeaudeaux was the deputy sheriff picked to execute it. Once again, the shotgun-carrying mother opened the door. This time, she told the deputy that “she would not shoot the law,” and let him in.
He said the daughter appeared “obviously ill,” and told him that she was being treated by “a doctor who practiced the mystic art of healing by charms and herbs.”
Traiteurs who used charms and herbs were not uncommon in south Louisiana in the 1950s, which causes a bit of wonder about why the story made the leap to voodoo instead of the traditions of the locale. It could also be noted that Opelousas (i.e., the Daily World) and Eunice (the New Era) had a significant rivalry going on in those days and missed few chances to undercut each other.
The voodoo part surely caught Mary Alice’s attention. At any rate, her story in the New Era was headlined, “No Voodoo, No Mystic Brew.” She said the Eunice police chief “laughed when he read the [Daily World] story” and said that his officers were never “denied entry at the point of a gun.”
“She invited us to come in,” the chief said. “Her daughter was in bed. She told us she was sick with some kind of ailment and was taking a patent medicine.”
The chief took Mary Alice to the house to see things for herself.
“As soon as I entered the humble little house, I recognized … that if there was anyone there ‘in the power of a witch doctor’ it would take a more perceptive person than I to discover it.” she wrote. “The mother and daughter seemed very much like any of our good people. They were perturbed, of course, over the newspaper story and the family misunderstanding that precipitated the whole affair.”
The daughter said she had been too sick to leave the house for more than a year, but was feeling better and expected to go to work again “before too long.”
When Mary Alice asked about “the potion that heals or curses,” she was shown a bottle of patent medicine with all of the ingredients listed on the label.
The invalid asked her to “please don’t write anything that will make us feel bad. … Just say as briefly as you can that the story isn’t true.”
And that’s what Mary Alice did.
A collection of Jim Bradshaw’s columns, Cajuns and Other Characters, is now available from Pelican Publishing. You can contact him at jimbradshaw4321@gmail.com or P.O. Box 1121, Washington LA 70589.

Vermilion Today

Abbeville Meridional

318 N. Main St.
Abbeville, LA 70510
Phone: 337-893-4223
Fax: 337-898-9022

The Kaplan Herald

219 North Cushing Avenue
Kaplan, LA 70548

The Gueydan Journal

311 Main Street
Gueydan, LA 70542