The Dead House at Ole Miss.
This was the small, two room, “Magnetic Observatory” built in 1860, right next to the Old Observatory, which still stands on campus. It sits today across from The Grove on Sorority Row. It was built by Chancellor Barnard to do magnetic experiments in. It had double walls, double glass panes, and double doors. It had a brick ceiling.
All of that was to insulate the magnetic instruments from sudden weather temperature swings. All the metal used in the building was copper: nails, locks, hinges. The copper would not affect the instruments. It was also probably intended to have a tall, wood, wired mast, sticking out of the center of the building, or right next to it, to better measure the magnetism in the atmosphere.
The instruments were never delivered, before the War. This building never served its intended purpose.
The War came, and the University was turned into a Hospital before the Battle of Shiloh. At least 3000 sick and wounded patients came through the University Hospital in three years. At least 392 of them died. This building served as a morgue. Thus, it was given the name of, “The Dead House“. Here the dead patients were prepared for burial. They were put into coffins, until the wood ran out. After that they were wrapped in blankets. They were buried in the University Hospital Cemetery, out behind the Tad Smith Coliseum, today.
The Ole Miss academic community thought “Dead House” was a unique name for our Hospital campus morgue. When I got the Internet in 1997, one of the first things I looked up was the term, “Dead House”. It turns out that was a common name for morgues in that era.
After the War, the building served as Faculty housing, a Frat house, and the Law Journal offices. It was torn down in 1958 in order to enlarge the Law School Library. What a sad fate this building had, from beginning to end.
In the 1970’s, after many of the Dead House building bricks had been stolen, what was left was moved to a barn out at College Hill, ten miles North of Oxford.
I put out a plea about 5 years ago that if anyone knew where they were, I would LOVE to have one. I was offered one the next day. It sits on a bookcase to my right, as I type this. I would not trade it for anything in the World. It is another connection to the OLD University for me.
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