The Church of Sacrifice was a short-lived death cult that may not have actually existed. Clementine Barnabet, an African American woman who became lined to a series of unsolved axe murders in Louisiana and southeastern Texas, claimed in a confession to have been acting on the orders of such a sect, but its existence and her own guilt have both come into question in the years since.
Barnabet was born around 1894 near St. Martinville, Louisiana, to Dina Porter and Raymond Barnabet, a sharecropper and petty criminal. Contemporary reports described Raymond as abusive toward his family. The family moved to Lafayette in 1909.
The Barnabet family first came to police attention following the axe murder of the Andrus family in Lafayette on February 24, 1911. Raymond Barnabet, who lived nearby, was arrested two days later but released within a week for lack of evidence. He was re-arrested in July 1911 after his children testified that he had returned home with blood-stained clothing and boasted about the killings. Despite conflicting testimony, Raymond Barnabet was convicted on October 19, 1911, and sentenced to death by hanging. His attorneys appealed the verdict, arguing that he had been intoxicated during his plea.
While Raymond remained in jail awaiting appeal, another family — Norbert and Azema Randall and their four children—were killed in Lafayette on November 27, 1911, in circumstances similar to the Andrus case. Clementine Barnabet, who lived nearby as a housekeeper and knew the Randall family, was arrested the same day. Blood traces were found on a back gate at her residence and on an apron, dress, and undergarments in her bedroom. A physician reported that the blood contained human brain matter matching samples from the Andrus home. She denied involvement but later confessed following interrogation in New Orleans.
In her confession, Barnabet claimed she had acted on the orders of The Church of Sacrifice, which she said was connected to the Christ’s Sanctified Holy Church congregation in Lake Charles. She stated that she and several accomplices had killed 10 people who “refused to obey the message from God,” and also confessed to murdering a woman and her children in Rayne. Her testimony led to the January 1912 arrests of her brother Zepherin Barnabet, “King Harris” Harrison, the leader of the Lake Charles congregation, and two others.
Despite these arrests, additional axe murders of African American families continued through early 1912. By January’s end, 26 deaths had been attributed, often without evidence, to The Church of Sacrifice, which local authorities described as a ritual-murder sect. Barnabet temporarily recanted her confession but offered another on April 2, 1912, in which she claimed involvement in 35 murders, 17 “with her own hands,” later revising the number to 20. Her stated motives changed over time; she first claimed to have killed randomly, later alleging that families with infants were targeted, although crime records showed otherwise.
Barnabet’s confessions contained numerous inaccuracies. She claimed always to enter through the front door and said she had shot Norbert Randall in the body, though he was found shot in the forehead. Her statements frequently contradicted police evidence and changed in detail. She named four accomplices but only identified two of them. She said her immunity from capture came from “conjure bags” obtained from the Church of Sacrifice or a “hoodoo doctor” in New Iberia.
Newspapers heavily sensationalized the case, depicting The Church of Sacrifice as a cult “founded on Voodooism.” Reports frequently conflated Voodoo and Hoodoo and portrayed the murders as examples of “barbarity” or “religious superstition.” Journalists embellished the story with unsubstantiated claims that the killers collected victims’ blood, performed rituals over the bodies, or sought immortality. The coverage fueled public fear across southern Louisiana and linked later, unrelated murders to the same alleged sect.
Clementine Barnabet’s trial began on October 21, 1912. Court-appointed physicians determined that she was sane but “morally depraved, unusually ignorant, and of low mentality.” Her attorney argued that her confessions were coerced and that her troubled upbringing had compromised her credibility. On October 25, 1912, she was convicted of the murder of Azema Randall and sentenced to life in the Louisiana State Penitentiary. Her father Raymond and siblings Zepherin and Pauline were released for lack of evidence.
In prison, Barnabet was reported to be a compliant inmate. On August 28, 1923, she was released following a surgical operation performed by the prison physician and an inmate surgeon. The operation was said to have “cured” her condition; although details were not disclosed, it was not a lobotomy, which was unknown in the United States at that time. No public records document Barnabet’s activities or whereabouts after her 1923 release.
Modern researchers have questioned her role in the killings, citing inconsistencies in her confessions and the continuation of similar murders while she was imprisoned.
Key Sources:
Elliott, T. C. (2015). Axes of Evil: The True Story of the Ax-Man Murders.
Gauthreaux, A. G., & Hippensteel, D. (2015). Dark Bayou: Infamous Louisiana Homicides. McFarland.
Greene-Hayes, A. (2023, Mat). “A Very Queer Case”: Clementine Barnabet and the erotics of a sensationalized voodoo religion. Novo Religio.
The New York Times. (1912, April 3). Woman Confesses Killing 17 Negroes; Leader of Church of Sacrifice Explains Creed Which Called for Wholesale Murders.
Encyclopedia of Cults, Sects, and New Religious Movements 