In 1820, the City Council, following the belief that the contagions of yellow fever, cholera and other pestilential diseases were spread by “miasmas” emanating from cemeteries, wanted to find a new site for a cemetery farther removed from the center of population. The Council insisted on locating a new cemetery at least 2,400 feet from the city limits and the nearest practical site, on what is now Claiborne Ave. between Canal, St. Louis and Robertson Streets, was only 1,800 feet from Rampart Street. The matter was finally settled by an enabling act of the State Legislature. The city deeded it to the wardens of the Cathedral and the site was fenced. The church consecrated it for burials in August 1823.