SOUTH VACHERIE TOWN HISTORY

The area generally known as "South Vacherie" is, indeed, Vacherie, at least historically speaking.� But "Back Vacherie" is still the name for many.� Since the cattle ranch, or Vacherie, of Antoine Folse fronted on Lac des Allemands, what is now called Vacherie is not really Vacherie.� Prior to around 1830, the remainder of settlements on the West Bank of St. James Parish was primarily upriver of present day Louisiana Highway 20.� South Vacherie has undergone many names over the years, including Vacherie Folse, Brule Dit Des Allemands, La Vacherie Des Allemands, Settlement of Germans, Dutch Settlement, Derriere De La Vacherie, Back Vacherie, and Lower Vacherie.� In 1854, Joseph Stein sold a plot of land, 122 feet wide by 424 feet deep for the establishment of a Catholic Chapel.� Prior to that date mass was held in the community's grocery store.� That year, a chapel dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary was founded.� Area planter Valcour Aime donated a bell to the church in 1857.

Notre Dame de la Paix (Our Lady of Peace) Catholic Church was established I 1864, but by 1868, the building was already deemed too small and more land was purchased for expansion in 1875.� Work began in 1892 and when it was consecrated on May 12, 1902, it was out of debt.� That same year, the church added its own parochial school.

During the Civil War, a number of militia groups and other volunteers picked up their arms and joined the cause.� The militia unit of Back Vacherie was Company G, St. James Regiment, Louisiana Militia.� (The Front Vacherie group was company F.)� Each was formed after January 1861 when Louisiana seceded.� The group, in various forms, served in New Orleans, Vicksburg, Memphis and eventually surrendered in Mobile in May 1865.

An old path, which ran from the River Road to Bayou Lafourche, passed through Back Vacherie, as colonel George Wailes, commander of the St. Charles Parish militia, and Captain Louis Ranson of the St. James Parish militia, discovered in the summer of 1862, with the help of local guides.� The shortcut slashed two days of hard riding on the public roads to a few hours.

Soldiers constructed a military road across the Chackbay swamp and other roads were built connecting Chackbay to Vacherie and from Vacherie into St. Charles Parish, linking various headlands.

In August 1862, this road allowed Confederate forces to surprise the troop train at Boutte Station and the later capture of the Des Allemands fort, the first Confederate victory in Louisiana after the fall of New Orleans.

Following the war, "Le Chemin Militaire" became the main road between Vacherie and Chackbay.

Among those serving in Back Vacherie's Company G was Frederick Kleiber, the son of Joseph and Marie Magdelaine Oubre Kleiber.� Frederick gained notoriety in 1891 for having seen a "giant" in the nearby swamps.� A newspaper account related:� "Communique: Appearance of a giant in the forest.� Wednesday morning, the seventh of the current month, Mr. Frederic Kleiber, a well known and respectable inhabitant of Vacherie  was returning around 11 o'clock form a squirrel hunt in the great forest west of the beautiful coteau of Vacherie, at the places known by the name of Bayou Rat-de-bois, when all of a sudden he heard at a short distance from him a sound like that of a deer coming toward him.� Since his gun was loaded with fine shot, he hurried to reload with buckshot in order to shoot the animal, which he thought was a deer.� He was greatly surprised when he saw approaching and passing within 15 steps of him a huge man of around nine feet in height, covered by a long black beard.� He had on a kind of cloak of fur or some material of a brownish color, which seemed to be attached only by a rope around the neck.� The rest of his body was naked and was covered with red hair, Mr. Kleiber was so surprised by the size of this giant and the way that he was walking that he feared to call out and ask him who he was and from where did he come.� He did this however three times, but the giant gave him no response and just looked at Mr. Kleiber and instant and then continued his fast walk with a sad and serious look toward the west.� Mr. Kleiber affirmed that the footprints of the giant measured two feet of length by nine inches of width.

Mr. Kleiber is not a visionary and he swears his report is true and we should believe him." Tracks 23 inches long were found and Kleiber pointed to a branch that the "giant" stooped under - which was nine feet from the ground.� Kleiber died in November 1918 at the given age of 79.

South Vacherie is also known for another remarkable thing - the "Mad stone." (click on Mad stone for more info)    According to family legend, the stone first came to Ernest Gravois in the 1830's after a poisonous snake bit his wife in her garden.� As she grew steadily worse and the swelling began on her hand, an Indian walked out of the nearby woods and applied a small stone to the wound.� Later, that stone fell from the wound, and she recovered fully.� A year later, the same Indian became ill, and the Gravois and Webre families cared for him until he recovered. In gratitude, he presented the stone to them.� Legend has it that the stone was found in the heart of a pure white deer that was killed in the woods by the Indians.� At the time, it was three inches long and about and inch around, shiny and black. �Area residents can direct people to the current possessor, however, the remnants are quite small, split into pieces and seldom now used.

Frank Narcisse, 68, is a longtime resident of South Vacherie.� The son of a local gravedigger, Fleix "Tit Frere" Narcisse, Frank is looking forward to a long life.� As his father lived to 99 and his mother Enola, lived to 105 years old, it seems a safe bet.� Frank was born in Back Vacherie, as he insists on calling it.� The family moved to Wallace and to St. Philip before returning to Back Vacherie in 1950.� "My daddy always said he used to haul bricks when they built that church." He said of Our Lady of Peace Catholic Church, only a half mile away.

One of eight children, he attended school at the old Shell Mound Elementary, dropping out after third grade to start field hand work at the Aucoin Plantation.� Some time later, Frank started construction work and married the former Emma Steib in 1956 when he was 25 and she was 19, the youngest of 15 children.� He later worked at Avondale Shipyard, and they raised five daughters and one son.� The couple now has eight grandchildren.

"All of a sudden, we were South Vacherie people," he said of recent days.� Nowadays, he and Emma enjoy a quiet life, except on when the card game gets started.� It's a ritual performed every Sunday afternoon, the six retired gentlemen gathering to play Yucca.� As far as anyone remembers, their fathers did the same thing.� "That game's been going on as long as I've known myself, " Frank smiled.

Some things, like long lives and the Mad Stone and Yucca, never change.� And never should.