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The city floated $5,000 in bonds to help pay for the building, which was completed in less than four months.
The new city hall contained a board room and offices on the upper floor and a city jail on the ground floor. The jail was used until the construction in 1937 of the Hancock County Jail adjoining, the courthouse. That jail, was replaced in 1986 by today's modern Criminal Justice Facility on Court Street.
But the city's jail is remembered for some early notoriety. On August 14,
1928, Silas Richardson, held on a charge of auto theft, pulled a gun on officers when they entered his cell to search him. He shot and killed officer John V. Damborino and injured Police Chief Mark Oliver before escaping on an L&N freight car to New Orleans. A three-state search ended 10 days later when Richardson returned to his parent's home in Bay St. Louis to retrieve his clothes. He was captured by neighbors Albert and Octave Favre, deputy sheriffs who found him hiding under the house. Within a week, Richardson was found guilty by a Circuit Court jury and sentenced to death.
According to Sheriff Ronnie Peterson, Richardson was the only person to be hanged in the jail, which was equipped for such executions, with a trap door at the head of the stairs outside the cells.
Another story is told about the Bay St. Louis jail by old timers who remember the county's heyday as the "Moonshine Capital of the Nation'." A fashionable place to make a purchase of white lightning was the rear window of the city jailhouse.
Numerous renovations over the years have eliminated the jail and rearranged space within the structure. The most recent restorations, in 1986-88, include the front stairs and porch and offices on the lower and upper floors that house the utility and public works departments, mayor’s office and other city departments.
In 1986 City Hall was added to the National Register of Historic Places by the Mississippi Department of Archives and History.