Signal Corps

Signal Corps. . , On the Edge , Just outside Vicksburg's city limits, Judge Warren Cowan built a mansion near the Vicksburg-Meridian Railroad in 1860. Following the Civil War the home was used by the Union Army as a Signal Corps Station. Fisher Funeral Home moved from downtown to this location in the 1940s and added on to the original house. , The next three homes up the hill were built just after the Civil War. , . The Callen House built in 1875. , . Cherokee built in 1872. , . The Vick Shannon House built in 1870., Modernizing , The nearby railroad was built in the early 1800s reaching only 20 miles east to Clinton, Mississippi. The original purpose was for transporting cotton to Vicksburg where it was loaded on steamboats., Prior to the railroad cotton was transported using ox-drawn carts which were very inefficient and slow. Skinner's Journal of Agriculture reported: "we have seen it [cotton] coming into Vicksburg, hauled by five yoke of oxen carrying 2,500 to 3,000 pounds, and so slowly that motion was scarcely perceptible." , Photo captions: , Top: The Cowan house after Vicksburg surrendered. The flags of the Signal Corps can be seen on the balcony. , Bottom: In the early 1900s a new railroad depot was built across the street from the funeral home along with a "round house" and sleeping quarters for train conductors. The railroad continued to grow easterly connecting to other towns and railways.