Railroads were strategically important in the Civil War in East Tennessee because they carried military supplies and allowed armies to concentrate quickly. This brick depot, built in 1854 at Niota, then called Mouse Creek, is the only surviving Civil War-era depot along the East Tennessee and Georgia Railroad line. Mouse Creek first entered the war’s official records in January 1862, when a Union spy reported a Confederate company stationed there. After Union Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside occupied East Tennessee in September 1863, Union troops held the railroad line, including Mouse Creek, and artillery units such as Co. C, 2nd Ohio Heavy Artillery garrisoned the depot at different times. Because the brick structure offered strong protection, soldiers did not build the timber fortification usually used at such posts, instead removing some bricks to create shoulder-height gun ports in the walls, which are still visible. In the war’s last year, both sides repeatedly fought for control of the railroad, and although Confederate Gen. George G. Dibrell’s Tennessee cavalry brigade tore up tracks for miles on both sides of Mouse Creek in August 1864, the depot was not captured and remained in Union hands until the war ended. Co. C, 1st Wisconsin Heavy Artillery remained there until July 1865.