Onionhead: Closer to the Truth

A Story by J. Ish

A deformed baby is forced to grow up alone in the woods of Southeast Louisiana.

The accounts of this legend come secondhand from locals born in the early 1920s who discovered this tale from fathers and neighbors who were around when the events took place. As time passes, stories take on a life of their own. But, the life of these old lore’s is its origins which will swell your thoughts and stain your soul.

Soon after the town of Pearl River was established just before the turn of the century, the poor and destitute started to move along the dirt road and railroad that ran south to the town of Slidell in Southeast Louisiana. Called by its inhabitants as “The Sticks” many of its dwellers experienced the chills of the Civil War. Many of these combatants are now gathered under the rich, dark soil of Haaswood Cemetery. Long strands of grey moss from Live Oaks act as draperies over the graves of these men of honor.

Ruthie was the widow of one of these men whose financial status nudged him in fighting with the Confederates in the “Great Rebellion.” The terrors of war did not allow her husband to ever see their first and only baby. Jasper was born with syndromic craniosynostosis which causes an abnormal growth of the skull. Ruthie loved this baby as he was a living memory of his father in which he shared a name.

Life is cruel to all urchins growing up, but a youngster growing up with an outward deformity is just one of life’s brutal jokes. Without a father to show the younger Jasper how to defend himself, Ruthie was left with only one option �" move to “The Sticks.”

Jasper’s mother traveled three miles six days a week to a wealthier area of Slidell, now known as Olde Towne, where she labored scrubbing, ironing, and starching linens non-stop for families until the sun decided to rest and she was allowed to return home. While she was away, Jasper would wander through the woods careful not to encounter anything that walked on two legs. Jasper became a great climber of trees, hunter of squirrels, and collector of blackberries.

As Jasper got older, he forgot the ridicule he accrued as a child, and he became curious about other human beings. Jasper started climbing trees around the railroad tracks to peer through the windows of trains as they clickety-clacked southward to New Orleans. On occasion, Jasper would hide behind a tree to stare at children playing marbles, hide-and-seek, or tag. He once walked up to a young boy who just caught a small fish, but the boy dropped his cane pole and took off running leaving toe prints down the muddy trail.

Stories around Pearl River, Alton, Joe, and Slidell started springing up about a creature wandering through the woods. All the stories had one thing in common, a man with an Onionhead. Travelers from Chicago would depart their trains in New Orleans with the story of a deformed creature waiting for a train to break down in-order-to snatch his next prey. A muddy footed boy even entered the sheriff’s office yelling, “I was chased out of the woods by a swamp monster.”

The legend of Onionhead had now taken on its own life. Every campfire would entice the story of Onionhead and his wanderings through the woods looking for his next victim. Teenage boys would bring nervous girls into Haaswood Cemetery on Halloween nights looking for Onionhead only to get scared of their own story. Often, a foolhardy boy ended up running out of the cemetery in the woods without the damsel they walked in with to frighten. Little kids were terrorized by older brothers with stories of Onionhead looking in bedroom windows at night. When those stories were told, the parent’s bed always had a couple of more occupants.

All good stories must have tragedy, and this tale, unfortunately, does not steer from this configuration. An eleven-year-old girl from Alton named Betsy disappeared from the front of her church. Betsy was last seen drawing a hopscotch outline with a stick by herself in the back of the church. The sheriff and men from the church searched the woods looking for Betsy. The girl was found dead along the railroad tracks one-half mile north of Slidell. Fifty men from Pearl River and Alton massed at the tracks to look for Betsy’s killer. No one asked who done it because they knew the answer. It was Onionhead.

For fourteen hours, the men sloshed through puddles, brushed against thorny vines, and hit their heads on low branches. Two eyes dug deep inside an enlarged cranium cropped up from behind a stump. Once they emerged, a lumberman named Clyde stared right at them while his rifle dropped from his shoulder into his hands. Jasper took off running toward his home which was only 500 feet away. As he reached the back door, BANG.

Ruthie opened the back-screen door as men started emerging out of the woods. Without a tear in her eye, Ruthie said, “I see who you are.” The men returned into the woods leaving Ruthie and the corpse behind. Ruthie buried Jasper in an unmarked grave next to his father that he never knew.

Two weeks later a hobo was arrested in New Orleans for being drunk and disorderly. He told the police that he was glad that he was being arrested because he had no control of his thoughts. On his way to New Orleans, he admitted, he hopped off the train he hitched a ride on and killed a little girl he saw playing at a church.

Although I am just the scribe of this story of the aging from Eastern St. Tammany Parish, I can attest that every recollection ended with the same statement. The men that hunted down and killed Onionhead mysteriously succumbed to their own fate.