At this castle-like, Gothic Revival-style structure (1850), with its lovely interior rotunda, representatives in January 1861 voted to withdraw from the Union and form a separate nation (the republic existed for four weeks). Today the building houses..

The main level features a stunning, marble-sheathed Memorial Hall, and the House and Senate chambers. Views from the 27th-floor observation gallery encompass the river and the Pentagon barracks, established in 1819 to house a US army garrison serving..

Visitors may view an open-hearth cooking demonstration in the detached kitchen before touring the gracious house (c.1791), considered one of the finest examples of Creole-style architecture in the area.

The former Fletcher-class destroyer known as the "Pirate of the Pacific" has been turned into a museum commemorating the service of the US armed forces contains exhibits of aircraft that flew over the South Pacific and a black granite monum..