Parking Lot – Former Site of Gratiot Street Prison
Once the location of McDowell’s College, a medical school run by Dr. Joseph Nash McDowell, this site was confiscated by Federal authorities in the spring of 1861. By December of that year, it was converted into a prison, later renamed, though early records often referred to it as “McDowell’s College.”
Situated in the heart of St. Louis’s affluent neighborhood, the prison stood near General Fremont’s headquarters in the Brant Mansion. Across the street was the Harrison family’s estate, and next to it stood the Christian Brothers Academy. Unlike other Civil War prisons, Gratiot held a wide variety of individuals. Confederate soldiers, civilians, women, children, confiscated slaves (“contrabands”), spies, saboteurs, political prisoners, guerrillas, bushwhackers, and even Federal troops accused of misconduct were all confined here.
Many Confederate prisoners were sent from battles along the Mississippi River, extending as far south as New Orleans, before being processed and transferred to Alton and other eastern prisons. Soldiers from Missouri and Arkansas often found themselves detained here as well.
After the war the building was left to ruin rumors of it being haunted were common. The building was demolished in 1878 and is now the site of a parking lot.
