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"Built in 1856 as a wedding gift by successful businessman Duff Green for his bride Mary Lake, the mansion was designed for entertaining. Prior to the siege of Vicksburg, the home was well known for the many lavish parties that set the standard for hospitality and good taste.

In 1863, the home was hit at least five times by Union cannonball. The Greens hastily offered the Mansion for use as a hospital as a means to try and save their new home, and retreated to two caves built in the side yard. In one of these caves, Mrs. Green gave birth to her son and named him William Siege Green.

Both Union and Confederate wounded were moved to the Mansion. The Union troops were placed on the top floor with Confederates housed on the main floor. The kitchen on the bottom floor was converted to an operating room where hundreds of soldiers were treated.

After the surrender of Vicksburg on July 4, 1863, the Mansion was leased to the United States Government for use as a Soldiers Home where wounded soldiers could recuperate before their respective journeys home.

In 1866 after all soldiers had left, the Greens moved back in their home where they continued to live until Mr. Green’s death in 1880.

Mrs. Johnston, a generous philanthropist, donated the Mansion for use as a boy’s orphanage and later as a retirement home for elderly widows. When she died in 1931, her estate sold the property to the Salvation Army for $3,000.00.

The Salvation Army ministered to the needy from their mansion headquarters with weekly church services, daily meals, and a safe place for transients to stay for fifty-four years.

The combined efforts of The U.S. Department of the Interior, The Mississippi Department of Archives and History, and Tuminello insured the accuracy of the restoration. As many as twenty-seven layers of paint were removed, thirteen fireplaces restored, and fifteen bathrooms added. Magnificent chandeliers grace the fifteen and one-half foot tall public reception rooms painted in vivid historic colors. The entire mansion is decorated with period antiques and accented with works of art."
- www.duffgreenmansion.com/his.html

Now a B&B.

Haunted: paranormalincorporated.blogspot.com/2010/05/case-files-du...

Where Coca-Cola was first bottled in 1894.

"Joseph Biedenharn was born on December 13, 1866, in Vicksburg, the eldest of eight sons and four daughters. His father, Herman, and Uncle Henry, founded a retail confectionary business known as Biedenharn and Brother. Joe eventually took over the operation of the candy business and it became the Biedenharn Candy Company.

In 1890, Joe and his father Herman built a two-story brick building at 1107 Washington Street which served as Joe's wholesale candy company on one side and his father's shoe store on the other.

The Biedenharns bottled Coca-Cola here and in other locations in downtown Vicksburg until 1938 when the new Coca-Cola plant was constructed at 2133 Washington Street.

The building was sold out of the family and used for a variety of commercial purposes. In 1979, the family repurchased the building and began a rehabilitation using historic photographs to restore the building’s major spaces and to install exhibits interpreting the Biedenharn’s Coca-Cola heritage. The family then donated the building to the Vicksburg foundation for Historic Preservation."
- www.biedenharncoca-colamuseum.com/building.htm