Perhaps no block in Vicksburg contains such a dense array of architectural styles as the former St. Francis Xavier School and Convent, nor such a long, unbroken history. In October 1860, six Sisters of Mercy, an Irish order, established a school and convent in the Cobb House (see YB17) at 1011 Crawford, renaming it St. Catherine’s Hall. During the siege of Vicksburg, it became a military barracks. The school re-opened in September 1864, and in 1869, the Sisters moved into their new convent next door ( pictured above). The three-story symmetrical brick structure has a one-story wooden entrance porch, a bracketed pressed-metal cornice, lancet windows, and Gothic Revival trim.
During the yellow fever epidemic of 1878, the Sisters nursed the sick, losing four of their number to the disease. After the epidemic passed, they continued nursing duties in the community and in the 1950s established Mercy Hospital on Grove Street.
Although male students were transferred to nearby St. Aloysius College in 1879, the school’s growing female student population necessitated the construction in 1885 of the Academy building for classroom and auditorium space. Designed by William Stanton, the Italianate building is punctuated by tall round-arched windows and has a bracketed cornice. Two twentieth-century building projects—an Art Deco elementary building (1937, R. W. Naef) and the modernist O’Beirne Gymnasium (1955, James T. Canizaro)—expanded the campus to Clay Street and created a large interior courtyard. In 1991, dwindling numbers and shrinking financial backing forced consolidation with St. Aloysius High School on a new campus. The few remaining nuns moved to a different convent, vacating the institution that had operated for over 130 years. Bought by the city and operated by the Southern Cultural Heritage Foundation, the campus today is only partially occupied.