{"id":3422,"slug":"madewood-napoleonville-louisiana","story":[{"heading":null,"paragraphs":["Madewood was built in 1846 — the Greek Revival mansion on Bayou Lafourche that is considered one of the South's purest examples of the style, a sugar plantation's showpiece whose columns and proportions were the architect's masterwork.","The file's documented spine is the architecture's perfection: a plantation house so correct in its Greek Revival lines that it became the standard, the sugar wealth's finest statement on the bayou."]},{"heading":"The mansion's dead","paragraphs":["The lore reports figures in the mansion — the dead reportedly seen, the file's ghosts being the house's own: the plantation's people reportedly still in the rooms the sugar built, the mansion's perfection reportedly holding its occupants.","The Madewood dead are the file's entity — a masterpiece of plantation architecture reportedly keeping its people, the perfect house's residents including those it was built on."]},{"heading":"Why this file matters","paragraphs":["Madewood is the archive's perfect-Greek file — the South's purest Greek Revival plantation house, keeping figures reportedly in its rooms. The documented architecture is the record; the dead are the lore of a house built on sugar.","A mansion of perfect proportions keeps its people — the file's suggestion being that Madewood's masterpiece includes its dead."]}],"name":"Madewood","aliases":[],"type":"HOUSE","type_label":"House","cats":["LOCAL_FOLKLORE","HAUNTED_PLACE","PLANTATION","HISTORIC_ESTATE"],"groups":["hauntings","historic-sites","legends"],"desc":"The 1846 Greek Revival—where the Bayou Lafourche dead stay.","full_desc":"Madewood is a house in Napoleonville, Louisiana. The 1846 Greek Revival—where the Bayou Lafourche dead stay. HauntHunt files it with plantation, local folklore and haunted places. Its accounts name only a collective — the madewood dead. The dossier holds 2 reported claims, 2 legends, 1 documented fact and 1 named or described presence — documented record and retelling kept side by side. The site is open to visitors.","address":null,"city":"Napoleonville","county":null,"state":"Louisiana","postal":null,"region":"South","lat":29.938267,"lon":-91.026361,"coord_kind":"CITY","status":"ACTIVE","access":"PUBLIC","access_notes":null,"ownership":null,"website":null,"phone":null,"year_built":null,"year_opened":null,"year_closed":null,"year_demolished":null,"designation":null,"current_use":"Historic site","research_notes":"LA2 batch; VERIFY task auto-queued.","stage":"SOURCE_RESEARCH","quality":{"level":"MEDIUM","score":59.4,"dims":{"location_confidence":0.75,"identity_confidence":0.65,"historical_confidence":0.8,"source_quality":0.3999999999999999,"paranormal_claim_provenance":0.8,"coordinate_confidence":0,"current_access_confidence":0.7,"freshness":0.65}},"claims":[{"id":3640,"type":"APPARITION","description":"Reported figures in the mansion. Madewood wears the claim the way old houses do: visibly, and without comment. The claim is neighborhood knowledge — retold locally, verified nowhere. Sources including 'Madewood' keep the claim in circulation. The apparition is the file's anchor — every other report orbits it.","evidence":"LOCAL_FOLKLORE","evidence_label":"Local folklore","entity":null,"where":null,"first_report":null,"approx_date":null,"confidence":0.8,"conflict_notes":null,"source":{"name":"Madewood","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madewood_Plantation_House","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4},"conflicting_source":null,"variants":[]},{"id":3641,"type":"NAMED_GHOST_LEGEND","description":"The dead are reportedly seen. The accounts name only a collective — the Madewood dead. The house's rooms are where the accounts concentrate — old houses keep their stories in the walls they were built around. The story is documented as legend — recorded and retold, never verified as fact. Sources including 'Madewood' keep the claim in circulation. A ghost with a name outlasts a ghost without one; the reports keep it employed.","evidence":"DOCUMENTED_LEGEND","evidence_label":"Documented legend","entity":"The Madewood dead","where":null,"first_report":null,"approx_date":null,"confidence":0.8,"conflict_notes":null,"source":{"name":"Madewood","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madewood_Plantation_House","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4},"conflicting_source":null,"variants":[]}],"history":[{"description":"The 1846 mansion is documented. Madewood's history is documented rather than told — this entry is part of that spine. The record holds it as fact — documented, not retold. 'Madewood' documents the entry. It anchors the timeline the rest of the file hangs from. The account stays in the file — reported, retold, unresolved.","evidence":"HISTORICALLY_VERIFIED","date_start":"1846","date_end":null,"confidence":null,"source":{"name":"Madewood","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madewood_Plantation_House","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"legends":[{"name":null,"summary":"Reported figures in the mansion. Madewood wears the claim the way old houses do: visibly, and without comment. It survives as local folklore, which is to say it survives because people keep telling it. The account appears in 'Madewood'. The story outranks the documentation, which is how you know it's folklore.","earliest":null,"evidence":"LOCAL_FOLKLORE","source":{"name":"Madewood","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madewood_Plantation_House","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}},{"name":null,"summary":"The dead are reportedly seen. Madewood in Napoleonville, Louisiana is the kind of old house where every sound eventually gets a name. 'Madewood' preserves the telling; the record keeps it filed where it belongs, as lore. Legends accrue where records go silent; this one filled the gap and stayed. The file stays open on it.","earliest":null,"evidence":"DOCUMENTED_LEGEND","source":{"name":"Madewood","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madewood_Plantation_House","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"entities":[{"name":"The Madewood dead","claimed_identity":"The Madewood dead","verified":null,"summary":"The dead are reportedly seen. The presences go by the Madewood dead in the file. The house's rooms are where the accounts concentrate — old houses keep their stories in the walls they were built around. 'Madewood' carries the account. The lore has a face now: The Madewood dead. The claim holds its place in the ledger.","behavior":"The dead are reportedly seen.","area":null,"first_ref":null,"source":{"name":"Madewood","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madewood_Plantation_House","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"events":[],"investigations":[],"encounters":[],"media":[],"persons":[],"visitor":{"tour_availability":"Verify before visiting","notes":"Historic house; many are private residences—verify public access before visiting.","last_verified_at":"2026-09-18 11:32:55","source":{"name":"HauntHunt generic access guidance","url":"https://haunthunt.com/about#access-guidance","publisher":"HauntHunt editorial","type":"DIRECTORY","authority":2}},"sources":[{"name":"Madewood","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madewood_Plantation_House","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}],"conflicts":[],"wiki":{"title":"Madewood Plantation House","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madewood_Plantation_House","desc":"United States historic place","extract":"Madewood Plantation House, also known as Madewood, is a former sugarcane plantation house on Bayou Lafourche, near Napoleonville, Louisiana. It is located approximately two miles east of Napoleonville on Louisiana Highway 308.  A National Historic Landmark, the 1846 house is architecturally significant as the first major work of Henry Howard, and as one of the finest Greek Revival plantation houses in the American South.","img":"https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/95/Madewood_house.jpg/960px-Madewood_house.jpg?utm_source=en.wikipedia.org&utm_campaign=api&utm_content=thumbnail","score":88,"lat":29.927,"lon":-90.99444},"counts":{"claims":2,"history":1,"legends":2,"entities":1,"sources":1}}