Reading a news account last week about some historic buildings at The W possibly being torn down brought to mind the many landmarks and irreplaceable buildings that over the years have been demolished in Columbus.

I hope that with guidance from Mississippi Department of Archives and History, the integrity of the campus and its historic setting will be preserved and only buildings that absolutely have to be removed are lost. That news caused me to reflect on several local landmarks that have forever been lost.

First comes to mind the 1860s Gilmer Hotel, which was demolished only a few years before a national move to restore and promote historic hotels. The old hotel served as a hospital during the Civil War and later hosted many important events and distinguished guests. Several cities in Mississippi including Starkville, West Point and Natchez restored their historic hotels. In Starkville and Natchez, they remained hotels, while in West Point the Henry Clay became a senior retirement community. What replaced a wonderful historic structure in Columbus was first a Downtowner motel and now a vacant downtown lot.

A few years ago, what appeared to be a mid-1800s small frame house a block east of Military Road on Fifth Avenue was demolished. What the frame exterior covered was a log house, probably built by a Mr. Gray as a farm house around 1820. One of the oldest houses, not only in Columbus but also in north Mississippi, was replaced by a metal building.

I recall a brick house between Franklin Academy and the Columbus-Lowndes Public Library. It was built by Silas McBee during the early 1820s. It may well have been the oldest brick house in Mississippi north of Vicksburg. McBee was credited with naming Columbus, and in 1819 while living on Magby (originally McBee) Creek he represented Marion County, Alabama, in the Alabama Legislature. That was when Columbus was believed to be in Alabama. His historic house by Franklin was replaced by a parking lot.

The old First Christian Church next to the courthouse was used by the Legislature when Columbus served as Mississippi’s capital during the Civil War. The wonderful brick church served as a hospital early in the Civil War and then as the chambers for the state Senate when the state capital was moved to Columbus toward the end of the war. It was destroyed so that another parking lot could be built.

My own family has not been immune to loss. A three-story Victorian home built by my great-grandfather, T.C. Billups, at 905 Main St. in 1889 was the first house I lived in and a place full of memories. It was torn down around 1970 to make room for a bank and is now the site of a law office. I have wonderful memories of my great-uncle Dr. John Richards who lived there after he retired from his medical practice in New York. I especially recall his stories of his friend Roy Chapman Andrews, who was my childhood hero.

Andrews was a world famous explorer in the 1920s and ‘30s, he hated snakes, carried a bull whip, fought bandits in the Gobi Desert, discovered the first dinosaur eggs and worked his way up from janitor to director of the American Museum of Natural History. In retrospect, he seems like someone who could have been the basis for a movie character. My interest in fossils and in archaeology were cultivated and encouraged by Uncle John and my cousin Jack Kaye. An often unrecognized beauty of old buildings is the memories they contain.

One of my favorite quotes is from a 1917 Collier’s Weekly article about Columbus written by Julian Street. Street, writing for Collier’s, had toured cities across America including Columbus and Vicksburg in Mississippi. Of Columbus he said:

“Columbus may perhaps appreciate the charm of its old homes, but there is evidence to show that it did not appreciate certain other weatherworn structures of great beauty. I have seen photographs of an old Baptist Church with a fine (and not at all Baptist-looking) portico and fluted columns, which was torn down … and I have seen pictures of the beautiful old town hall. … The destruction of these two early buildings represents an irreparable loss to Columbus, and it is to be hoped that the town will some day be sufficiently enlightened to know that this is true and to regret that it did not restore and enlarge them instead of tearing them down.”

Those two old buildings Street mentioned in 1917 were very beautiful structures but were showing their age. The old city hall that was torn down in 1902 to be the site of the new city hall had been Columbus’ second city hall. The town’s first city hall had been destroyed by a fire in 1854. In 1856, the city purchased a downtown building that had first been a private residence and then a bank.
Architect and contractor William O’Neal was hired by the city to remodel the structure into the new city hall. O’Neal remodeled it into a beautiful and impressive Greek Revival structure. The building served as city hall from 1856 to 1902.

The First Baptist Church was designed and built by architect James Lull. Construction started in 1835, and the church was completed in 1839. Lull wrote, “I have built one of the best churches in the Southern states erected at the expense of $27,000.” The church bore a striking resemblance to the National Landmark circa 1752 St. Michael’s Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina. Lull’s classic structure, which was considered one of the most beautiful churches in the South, was torn down to make way for the former First Baptist Church on Seventh Street in 1908. There are accounts of older members of the church sitting on nearby porches and crying as they watched the old building come down.

I often think of the many wonderful historic buildings that have graced the streets of Columbus. While we have lost many of them, many still remain but only if we are good stewards of them so that they not also become only a fading memory. Someone once said that parking lots have destroyed more historic buildings in the South than Generals Grant and Sherman combined.

Rufus Ward is a Columbus native a local historian. E-mail your questions about local history to Rufus at [email protected].

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