When New Orleans Mansion Caught Fire in 2007

A seven-alarm fire that ravaged a historic St. Charles Avenue house in New Orleans on Wednesday morning is the second large fire at the home in nearly 12 years. A three-alarm fire caused by lightning in 2007 also left heavy damage.

RELATED: Seven-Alarm Fire Ravages Historic New Orleans Mansion

Read the following story by Times-Picayune reporter Bob Ussery that was published June 5, 2007:

A three-story mansion at St. Charles Avenue and Third Street was heavily damaged Monday morning by a four-alarm fire set by lightning.

Steeped in tradition, the ornate residence was the home of a former Rex and subsequent kings of Carnival have stopped to make a toast there over the past 100 years.

Robert Henry Downman, a lumberman and Rex of 1907, and his wife, Anne Cameron Downman, bought the house in 1906, and their descendants have lived there over the past 101 years.

Their great-granddaughter, Anne Grace, was dropping off a friend on Arabella Street about 11:30 a.m. when she saw lightning and almost immediately heard a loud “boom,” indicating a strike nearby. Minutes later, she arrived home and found the Grace-Montgomery House, 2525 St. Charles, on fire.

Grace, who lives at the mansion with her husband, William F. Grace Jr., found a tool (key) which she used to free Cindy Hogan from an elevator at the house. Hogan, an employee of Anne Grace’s mother, Anne Kock Montgomery, who also lives there. Hogan had just gotten into the elevator to run an errand when the lights went out.

“She had to jump down. It was probably 5 feet off the ground,” Grace said.

She said Hogan was calm, but claimed she was not using the elevator again.

Grace said it was fortunate people were at home when the fire started, because someone was able to dial 911 right away. She said passers-by also dialed 911.

Grace’s mother, Hogan, and three other employees were at the home, but all escaped safely along with three French poodles.

She said the lightning hit either a laundry room or playroom on the third-floor, or the roof near them. “The attic was totally destroyed. (The lightning strike) must have been just above the playroom,” she said. That room has no roof now. The fire also damaged the laundry room and playroom.The rest of the house received extensive damage down to the first floor.

Grace said the mansion lost three chimneys and suffered damage to the third floor in Katrina, but Monday’s damage was worse. She said workers had been painting to repair the Katrina damage for the last eight months and had finished all but one room.

“Now we’re going to have to do it all over again,” she said.

Grace said firefighters responded within two minutes. “They were phenomenal,” she said. She said firefighters were courteous and efficient. They pushed furniture to the middle of the room and put tarps over it to protect it from water."

They were extremely thoughtful and helpful and did a great job," Grace said.She said the Downmans’ daughter, Virginia Downman, married Grace’s grandfather and raised three children in the mansion, the eldest of whom was Grace’s mother.

One of Grace’s aunts, Virginia Kock, inherited the house, and when she died in 1995, she left it to Grace and her husband.The historic house with cedar shake shingles dates to at least 1888 and probably to the late 1850s. An architect, Thomas Sully, designed the house in 1888, but there was evidence he might have remodeled and enlarged a previous home designed around 1860 by architect Henry Howard, according to information provided by the Preservation Resource Center of New Orleans.

Grace said many friends from different parts of the country called her Monday when they heard about the fire.

“It’s been home to many a good party, and lots of people have enjoyed it,” she said of her home.

It is also the place where each Mardi Gras, Rex toasts her husband.

“It’s an occasion we look forward to every year,” Grace said. “We consider Mardi Gras a family holiday.” She said relatives have been gathering for generations at the house to watch the toast. Grace and her family were at the mansion Monday after the fire, but will not be able to live there until repairs are made.

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