The house at 15 China

“I’ve seen that bed before,” the old man said.

“Oh, you haven’t,” his wife of many years said. “You’re just imagining things.”

He was insistent, however, racking his brain to remember where he had seen it.

The bed was ornate with a hand-carved walnut headboard. It was in the bedroom of a restored Vicksburg mansion, and on opening day there was someone in each room to give a history.

The bed wasn’t original to the house but had been purchased when another house had closed. The other “house” was at 15 China Street, a bordello that existed in Vicksburg for over a century.

The late Josephine Alexander from Yokena was the docent in the bedroom, but she told me she thought it best not to tell the old man where he had seen the bed “because I didn’t want to break up a marriage.”

The house at 15 China St. was a plain three-story brick building just down the hill from Washington Street. The basement floor was a warehouse and upstairs was a whorehouse. Steps led from the street to the second floor where there was a beautiful ballroom. There were also rooms for gambling, a kitchen, and a dining room. (I wonder if they had tarts on the menu.)

Vintage photo by William Goldman, around 1892.

The proprietor, or madam, had her quarters near the head of the stairs. On the third floor were a dozen rooms, the boudoirs of the girls who worked there. In flush times it was rare to find an empty bed.

At the end of the ballroom was a player piano—one that played a variety of tunes when you dropped a coin into a slot. In the Roaring ’20s, a much more elaborate musical contraption blared forth the sounds of a small band, perfect for dancing or listening.

Furnishings at 15 China were fine Victorian pieces. Mirrors with gold-leaf frames practically covered the walls, and lighting was from crystal chandeliers. Furnishings were of walnut, rosewood, and brass.

15 China was in business during Vicksburg’s early days and was thriving when the first shot was fired at Fort Sumpter, and many were the girls who worked there and the madams who ran the house. Next door was a famous mercantile store, Baer Brothers, and locals jokingly referred to 15 China as “Bare Sisters.”

In its glory days on pleasant afternoons, some of the girls, wearing fine dresses and stylish bonnets, would ride in an open carriage on Washington Street. As the horses plodded along, many of Vicksburg’s most prominent residents chatted with the merchants in front of the stores until spotting a familiar face. One of the sweet young things might wave and call out, “Hello, Mr. Jones,” and like magic, the street became deserted and quiet except for the gaily painted tittering females in the carriage who were enjoying an afternoon drive on a warm summer afternoon.

After dusk settled over the city’s waterfront, rollicking ragtime rhythms of the player piano reverberated against the walls of the building along the dark hillside street, and sounds of revelry penetrated the murky night until the early hours of dawn as the girls at 15 China entertained the men who had earlier been ashamed to be recognized by them with “society” watching.

Seldom did the girls use their real names. One called herself Martha Washington, but the most famous madam was Mollie Bunch, who came to Vicksburg from Louisiana.

In 1861, shortly after Mississippi had seceded, the memory of George Washington was observed on his birthday. Mollie and her girls held the traditional Birthday Ball. Such affairs were not unusual, and most of the time the city fathers ignored such, but this time the girls went too far: They sent invitations to ministers and to men of some of the most respectable families.

On the evening of the ball, about 11 at night, fire bells rang and one of the engines, manned not by firemen but by enraged young men, took the fire hoses and broke up the ball, the streams of water demolishing the sumptuous supper and smashing some of the furniture. They then proceeded to Pat Gorman’s coffee house which he rented to “the girls” and the mob destroyed his bar and liquor supply.

The next morning at city court the witnesses and the curious crowded the courtroom, but nothing was done to Mollie. Gorman wasn’t so lucky—his liquor license was revoked.

Often in census records, such prostitutes were named in a group living at one address as “seamstresses.” However, in an 1886 city directory, a woman was listed as Mrs. A.B. Adams and her profession was a madam at 15 China.

Possibly no other private address has achieved such nationwide recognition as 15 China, rivaling the House of the Rising Sun in New Orleans. Not many years ago, in the 1960s, a local ham radio operator was asked by someone in Hong Kong, “Is 15 China still in business?”

Vicksburgers paid little attention to the brothel and the “sportin’ women” who lived and worked there. It usually existed with little notice —but not always. Many years ago, there was a ball given for local volunteer firemen, and false alarms were turned in from all over town, breaking up the frivolities.

Despite the gaiety about which 15 China was remembered, it was a tragic life for many. One of the girls was murdered by an enraged customer, and another committed suicide.

It has been said that during World War I, 15 China was closed, and troop trains didn’t stop in Vicksburg, but after the war years, it was business as usual with the price going from $3 to $5. In later years it became little more than a flophouse with a sign hanging over the sidewalk, illuminated by a bare light bulb that proclaimed it “The Regular Play House.” The building was demolished in the 1970s during Urban Renewal.

Stories keep the history of 15 China alive. In the 1920s when Ruth, a well-known madam, died, the search was on to find six pallbearers. One man unhesitantly volunteered, telling the funeral home director, “When I consider all the good times that my father and grandfather had at her place, I deem it an honor to be one of her pallbearers.” (The story was told to me by the man’s widow many years ago, but their names shall remain anonymous).

And here’s another story:

My father’s cousin was courting (that’s an old expression for dating) a pretty lady, and I heard her tell my Aunt Malena that someone told her they had seen her boyfriend go into 15 China.

The lady friend confronted him about it, and he said he just went there to play the piano. It was an old-timey player piano where you put a coin in the slot, and it belted out some ragtime.

“I believed him at first,” she said. “But later I wondered why he went there where he had to pay to play the piano—when he could have played mine free.”

I wasn’t sure what she meant because I was too young to understand double entendre.

There are more stories about Vicksburg’s Red Light District, but they will be for another day. If that old furniture—beds, mirrors, and such—could talk, there really would be no end to the tales of the sportin’ ladies.

Gordon Cotton is the curator emeritus of the Old Court House Museum. He is the author of several books and is a renowned historian.