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A historical illustration depicting an auction scene with an auctioneer holding a gavel and several men in 19th-century clothing. A Black man and a Black woman stand on the auction block. Various fabrics are visible in the foreground.
Slave Auction; ca. 1831; ink and watercolor. The Historic New Orleans Collection, 1941.3

New Orleans, Slave Market of the South

Purchased Lives
Born in Slavery
A Great Forced Migration
To Be Sold
Resisting the Trade
Solomon Northup in Louisiana
New Orleans, Slave Market of the South
Supporting the Trade
In Search of Freedom and Family

Unlike many southern cities, New Orleans did not confine its slave trade to a single market structure or even a handful of locations. Instead, slaves were sold citywide. Auction blocks in the sumptuous rotunda of the St. Louis Hotel, private residences, public parks, decks of ships moored along the Mississippi, high-walled slave pens, and commercial complexes such as Banks Arcade all served as sites for the buying and selling of human beings. As the city expanded from its original footprint (today's French Quarter) into the Faubourgs Sainte Marie (now the Warehouse and Central Business Districts) and Marigny, the city's traders, hoteliers, bankers, auctioneers, brokers, and merchants followed suit. Where there was commerce, there were slave traders. 

“When war was declared there was ten boats of niggers loaded at Washington and shipped to New Orleans. We stayed in the ‘Nigger Traders Yard’ there for about three months. … The yard had a tall brick wall around it. We had a bunk room, good cotton pads to sleep on and blankets. On one side they had a wall fixed to go up on from the inside and twelve platforms. You could see them being sold on the inside and the crowd on the outside. When they auctioned them off they would come, pick out what they wanted to sell next and fill them blocks again. They sold niggers all day long. They come in another drove they had, had men out buying over the country.”

Taylor Jackson, from Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers’ Project, 1936–1938

Though it is impossible to capture the location of every slave sale that took place in antebellum New Orleans, the map linked below represents an effort to understand major landmarks in the city's expansive network of slave trading sites. Using city directories, newspaper advertisements, property records, historic maps, and an 1854 merchant census from the Office of the City Treasurer, researchers identified fifty-two discrete sites where the sale of men, women, and children took place on a large scale between 1811 and 1862. Though slave pens and auction houses were scattered throughout the city's core, three nodes of pronounced trading activity emerged: Esplanade Avenue at Moreau (now Chartres) Street, St. Louis Street between Royal Street and the levee, and the area bounded by Common, Carondelet, Union, and Phillippa (now O'Keefe) Streets, which, not coincidentally, also served as New Orleans's banking district. 

A historic illustration of a rotunda in New Orleans, depicting an auction scene. People gather around, some on platforms, with various goods like pictures and bales visible. The dome above is intricately detailed with sunlight streaming in.
Sale of Estates, Pictures and Slaves in the Rotunda, New Orleans by William Henry Brooke, engraver; hand-colored engraving from The Slave States of America, vol. 1; London: Fisher and Son, 1842. HNOC, 1974.25.23.4
An old advertisement for the sale of 24 slaves, featuring details like names, ages, and skills. The text highlights roles such as cooper, blacksmith, and field hands, with payment terms mentioned at the bottom. Dated Saturday, 14th April.
Hewlett and Raspiller auction notice for the sale of twenty-four slaves from the Iberville Parish estate of Jonathan Erwin; 1838. HNOC, 73-701-L
A historical architectural plan showing 2 lots and buildings in a district. The map includes Baronne Street, Common Street, Carondelet Street, and Gravier Street. There is an illustration of a red brick building at the bottom.
Plan of 2 Lots and Buildings, 1t District; April 14, 1855; watercolor and ink by Pietro Gualdi, draftsman. Courtesy of the Notarial Archives Division, Dale N. Atkins, Clerk of Civil District Court, Parish of Orleans, plan book 10, folio 14
Antique map titled Normans Plan of New Orleans & Environs 1849, showcasing streets, landmarks, and municipal boundaries along the Mississippi River. The detailed layout includes numbered sections and parish lines in various colors.

Mapping the Slave Trade in New Orleans; created in 2015 by HNOC for the exhibition Purchased Lives: New Orleans and the Domestic Slave Trade.

Base map: Norman's Plan of New Orleans and Environs; 1849; hand-colored engraving by Shields and Hammond, engravers; Benjamin Moore Norman, publisher. HNOC, gift of Boyd Cruise, 1952.29
Chapter 7: Supporting the Trade