The Napoleon House sits at 500 Chartres Street in the French Quarter (Wikipedia). It has a famous legend, a family that owned it for 101 years, and a cocktail most visitors order first. Here is what the sources say about each, and where they disagree.
The building and the Napoleon legend
The bar’s own history page says the building went up in 1797 as the residence of Nicholas Girod, then mayor of New Orleans (Napoleon House). Others differ. Wikipedia says it was built in 1794 and enlarged in 1814. Historian Shannon Selin says Girod built the townhouse after his brother Claude died in 1814 and left him the property (Shannon Selin). The Clio entry says Claude bought it in 1798 at an estate auction.
Nicolas Girod was mayor from 1812 to 1815, per Selin.
The name comes from a story. The bar’s history page says the property earned its name from the mayor’s offer, in 1821, to give refuge to Napoleon Bonaparte, who never accepted and died on Saint Helena that year. Wikipedia’s article on Girod describes a rescue plan he helped finance: a ship, the Seraphine, turned back after word came that Napoleon had died on May 5, 1821 (Wikipedia).
Others are less sure. Selin says there is no direct evidence of a plot, and the earliest printed version she cites is an 1885 guide, about 60 years after the supposed events. Treat it as a good story.
The Impastato family
Selin and Clio say Joseph Impastato, a Sicilian immigrant, rented the building in 1914, ran a grocery downstairs, and lived upstairs. The bar’s own page says the family purchased it in 1914. Selin and Clio say he bought it in 1920, and Clio gives the price as $14,000.
After World War II, Joseph handed the business to his brother Peter. Peter died in 1971, and his son Sal took over (New Orleans Magazine). The family sold in April 2015 to restaurateur Ralph Brennan, per Selin.
What the bar did during Prohibition
The federal government outlawed alcohol in 1920 (New Orleans Magazine). Clio says Impastato “operated an illegal tavern within his grocery” during those years, and that it grew into a restaurant by the 1970s. New Orleans Magazine says he opened a bar “despite Prohibition,” then adds, “but that was New Orleans.”
That is as far as the sources go. None says what the tavern poured, whether it was raided, or the year it opened.
How loosely New Orleans enforced Prohibition
John Magill, writing for The Historic New Orleans Collection, gives the clearest picture:
- By 1920, an estimated 10,000 New Orleanians had already broken the law by making their own brew.
- Federal dry agents worked out of the U.S. Custom House, but there were too few. Louisiana’s Hood Act required local police to help; Magill calls the help “half-hearted,” and says some officers were moonshiners or lookouts for smugglers.
- On August 11, 1925, 200 out-of-town agents made a “clean-up” and found 10,000 cases of liquor.
- In 1927, New Orleans had “more padlocked ‘speakeasies’ than any other city in the nation.”
That last line cuts both ways: padlocks mean enforcement, and a record number of them means a record number of places selling. The 21st Amendment took effect December 5, 1933, per Magill.
The Pimm’s Cup
Pimm’s is an English gin-based fruit cup, created by James Pimm, who owned an oyster bar in the City of London. A Pimm’s Cup mixes it with lemonade and garnishes such as cucumber.
The timing is looser. Two bar professionals quoted by Southern Living date the drink at the Napoleon House to the 1940s, one of them to 1940 (Southern Living via AOL). If that is right, it arrived well after repeal and is not a Prohibition drink. The same piece says British-style lemonade was hard to find in the U.S. then, so bartenders used the sodas they had, with ginger ale a common substitute. Punch describes the house version as Pimm’s, lemonade, and lemon-lime soda with a cucumber slice.
Charles’s own take is the Ginger Gentleman, a Pimm’s Cup variation: 2 oz Pimm’s No. 1 and 1 oz gin over a full glass of ice, topped with a bottle of ginger beer.
As of November 2026, the Napoleon House’s site lists 500 Chartres Street, open seven days a week from 11 AM to 10 PM, with no reservations.
Sources
- Napoleon House: History
- Napoleon House: home page
- Nicolas Girod and the History of Napoleon House in New Orleans, Shannon Selin
- Napoleon House, Clio
- “1905,” New Orleans Magazine
- Prohibition and New Orleans: The City That Forgot to Care, New Orleans Magazine
- “The Liquor Capital of America,” The Historic New Orleans Collection
- Napoleon House, Punch
- How a Classic British Cocktail Became a New Orleans Icon, Southern Living via AOL
- Napoleon House, Wikipedia
- Nicholas Girod, Wikipedia
- Napoleon, Wikipedia
- Pimm’s, Wikipedia
- Ginger Gentleman, cocktails.charlessieg.com
