James Wylie Gettys, Jr.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hosted On-Line at RootsandRecall.com, Louise Pettus Archives Department, Winthrop University, Rock Hill, South Carolina

1 C. Vann Woodward, ed., Mary Chesnut’s Civil War (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988), 773.

 

Copyright 2024 by James W. Gettys, Jr.

All rights reserved

 

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For the one to whom I owe so much . . .

Sandra Lockaby Gettys

 

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Contents

 

Title Page
Copyright
Dedication

 

Contents – Chapters

A Man of Certainty and a Half-Breed

Varina and the Gold Train

Danville: End of the Confederate Government

Davis traveled with more publicity than Dan Rice’s caravan enjoyed.

Five Gray Brigades and a Blue Shadow

He could not be got to move.

Disbursement of Gold, Silver, and Veterans

The Leviathan

Davis tried not to escape from an enemy that tried not to shoot.

Last Disbursement

“‘The Mississippi Rose’” became “‘that Western Squaw.’”

Abbreviations

Acknowledgements

Bibliography

Index

 

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Chapter One: A Man of Certainty and a Half-Breed

He believes “that everybody agrees with him when he expresses an opinion, which offends me. . . .” Varina’s first impression of Jefferson.

Even today this sphinxlike, complex man, with so many virtues and so many faults, is not really understood by modern historians. Clement Eaton

Varina Howell Davis was a nineteenth century woman prepared for the twentieth century, while Jefferson Davis was a man of the nineteenth century. She was highly intelligent, and had a superior education, but was challenged as a young girl by insecurities resulting from her father’s bankruptcy and inability to support his family at a level commensurate with its social standing. During her adult life she sought and valued security. She seemed fearless, and her family’s adversities taught her to face obstacles with resilience. Her social skills were polished, and she conversed meaningfully with wealthy and politically powerful men, no mean thing for an antebellum female. Perhaps most importantly, she understood the course of the war, and before its outbreak, anticipated defeat. Her concerns were based on her evaluation of the power differential between the Confederacy and the United States. One side, a developing industrial power with standard railroad gauge, the other with a nascent industrial base and multiple railroad gauges. She loved Jefferson Davis, but their relationship was frequently not harmonious, largely because his narcissism smothered her personality.  He was not always faithful and ignored her ideas.^[2]

Varina’s ancestor, William Howell, knew George Washington, was a Revolutionary War hero and served four terms as governor of New Jersey. Margaret Kempe Howell, her mother, was from a slaveholding family. Varina called herself a half-breed and lived in both sections, spending her last sixteen years in New York. She mentioned in an interview that she “observed that everyone was a ‘half-breed’ of one kind or another and they were smarter than so-called full bloods.” Varina seemed to follow the Aristotelian Golden Mean, not just in her lineage, but in her politics, her finances, her friendships and in her attitudes toward race. She opposed abolition but was not a strong secessionist. She was pro-slavery but also pro-Union. She endorsed the Confederacy but was realistic about an unlikely Confederate victory. She wrote that she was not like Jefferson and his radical friends because she believed in compromise. These ideas were in juxtaposition to the unbending dogmatism of Jefferson Davis who always knew his was the correct way.

Joseph Davis, Jefferson’s elder brother, threw himself into creating his huge plantation empire, working alongside his slaves, in the manner of Thomas Supten. Joseph had several plantations covering thousands of acres located in a large bend of the Mississippi known as Davis’ Bend. He saw that Jefferson was well educated and able to live as a privileged aristocrat. Jefferson graduated from West Point, served under Zackary Taylor, and married, contrary to Taylor’s wishes, his daughter Sarah Knox Taylor. She was the love of Jefferson’s life but died three months after their marriage. After Sarah’s death, Jefferson lived in seclusion on Briarfield, a 900-acre plantation, owned by Joseph. In December 1843 Joseph Davis, possibly playing matchmaker, invited seventeen-year-old Varina Howell to Hurricane, his 5,000-acre plantation at Davis’ Bend. Varina’s tutor, George Winchester, took her to Diamond Place, owned by Florida McCaleb, Joseph’s married daughter. Varina attended Joseph’s Christmas party at Hurricane where she met and fell in love with Jefferson. Varina wrote her mother after she first met Jefferson. The thirty-four year old widower made a strong impression on the seventeen-year-old Varina who wrote her mother that he was “a remarkable kind of man, but of uncertain temper, and has a way of taking for granted that everybody agrees with him when he expresses an opinion, which offends me. . . .”  In The Long Surrender, Burke Davis contended, “the young, inexperienced Mississippi country girl had accurately plumbed the personality that was to baffle so many of Jefferson Davis’ Confederate cohorts and historians of later years.”^[3]

Jefferson seemed concerned about Varina’s health, perhaps from a hypersensitivity because of Sarah Taylor Davis’ short life. Ironically, in Embattled Rebel James M. McPherson asserted that Davis had more chronic maladies than any other chief executive in American history. Burke Davis wrote that Jefferson Davis was “pale, feeble, and distraught. He had become an incurable insomniac . . .” by 1865. Varina and Jefferson were engaged in February 1844 and married on February 26, 1845. Their wedding trip included a visit to Jefferson’s first wife’s grave. Clement Eaton, in Jefferson Davis, wondered “what Varina must have thought of such a pilgrimage on her honeymoon.” They had different ideas about gender. Jefferson anticipated that Varina would always defer to him. She had her own mind. Her mother, a lover of books, bequeathed this passion to Varina. George Winchester, a native of Salem, Massachusetts with a Yale degree, tutored Varina in Latin and classics for twelve years. She attended Madame Deborah Grelaud’s Seminary in Philadelphia. At Grelaud’s Seminary she was exposed to abolition and early women’s rights activities. Jefferson and Varina had had serious conflicts. Briarfield, Jefferson Davis’ plantation, was owned by Joseph Davis. This arrangement bothered Varina because if Jefferson died, she would be homeless and unable to care for her children. She argued with Jefferson, but as with every other issue, Jefferson brooked no disagreements. They were separated when Jefferson was serving in the army and in Washington. In Jefferson Davis, Confederate President, Herman Hattaway and Richard Beringer wrote that when Jefferson was in Washington his relationship with Varina was “marred by acutely strained relations between him and Varina.” Their arguments over Briarfield made them, to some degree, estranged. Divorce was not an alternative given gender relations in the 1840s, and Varina’s inability to support her children outside marriage. Jefferson did bestow expensive gifts on Varina and gave generously to her family members who constantly needed assistance. Davis was pictured as a loving father who played on the floor with his children. Allen Tate, poet essayist and Vanderbilt Agrarian, wrote Jefferson Davis, His Rise and Fall. Tate quoted a letter from Jefferson to Varina addressed to “Winnie” from “Banny,” an unexpected signature from a man who seemed so officious. Virginia Caroline “Jennie” Clay noted that Davis was “cold and haughty,” in public, but in private he was “informal and frank.” Clement Eaton saw the significant contrasts between the personalities of Jefferson and Varina. He concluded that “conflict was dissipated by Jefferson’s agreeable personality with the family,” in a milieu that favored male authority. Varina eventually followed her mother’s advice to accept Jefferson’s will, the only alternative, given Davis’ inflexibility. Eaton suggests Jefferson’s sisters, accepting the southern standard of female subordination, were deferential to him, reinforcing his narcissism.^[4]

Generally, historians have not treated Davis well, and he suffers from those who compare him with Abraham Lincoln. James McPherson pointed out that “Lincoln’s side won the war. But that fact does not necessarily mean that Davis was responsible for losing it.” The power relationship between North and South was enormously asymmetrical.  The North was an emerging industrial and transportation power while the South consisted of a group of states dependent on chattel slave labor. “They confronted different challenges with different resources and personnel.” McPherson found Davis came “off better than some of his fellow Confederates of large ego and small talents who were among his chief critics.” The negative descriptions of Davis’ personality come from persons “who often had self-serving motives for their hostility.” He did not tell others what they wanted to hear, and he did not suffer fools gladly. One Georgia Congressman changed his mind about Davis after he got to know him. He wrote his wife that Davis was not the

puffed-up man he was supposed to be. “‘He was polite, attentive, and communicative to me as I could wish. He listened patiently to all I said and when he differed with me, he would give his reasons for it.’” Davis’ “‘enemies have done him great injustice.’”^[5]

In 1850 Jefferson entered the Senate, and Varina’s social skills, intellect and organizational talents boosted his career. Varina was a highly successful hostess in Washington. “A brilliant conversationalist, she enjoyed talking with prominent political leaders, who paid great deference to her.” Varina had sixty-two Senators and 234 Congressmen to dinner at least once every year. Every Tuesday afternoon she hosted a reception where she conversed with the political elite about the latest literature. She was appreciated by those, like John C. Calhoun, Charles Ingersoll and James Buchanan, who had “advanced views on the parity of the sexes and pioneered this behavior, speaking to women as their equals and listening in return, a quality that Varina Davis especially appreciated.”^[6] Her attitude and attention were always bipartisan. Her social skills smoothed out disagreements, an especially important talent for the wife of Jefferson Davis. She expressed strong opinions to Jefferson, but he was “too strong-willed and opinionated to be swayed by petticoat influences.” Secretary of State Judah P. Benjamin became a close friend because of his love of books and enlightened views on gender. His serenity settled Varina in times of stress.^[7]

Varina absorbed the Washington etiquette established by Dolly Madison and she quickly assembled a wardrobe in the latest French fashions. Elizabeth Keckley, a free person of color, was Varina’s seamstress. When Varina departed, Keckley was employed by Mary Todd Lincoln. Varina was one of the first women in Washington to wear hoops. As First Lady of the Confederacy in Richmond, she found an absence of Washington’s rules of etiquette and the dominance of a culture enamored with the past. First Families of Virginia still mattered and Martha Pierce Stanard, the doyen at the time, hosted groups whose discussions were less than intellectually stimulating. Stanard informed newcomers that she had not read a book since she became an adult. Varina worked assiduously in support of Jefferson and even chaperoned young people on excursions down the James River.^[8]

As the end of the war approached, trusted slaves ran away from Richmond to the Union lines. James Dennison and his wife Betsey, both household slaves for the Davis family for years, ran away. Betsey had been Varina’s maid, and she took eighty dollars in gold and $2,000 in paper money with her. Shortly after Betsey and James left, a fire broke out in the Davis’ basement, leading to confusion. Henry, a butler hired some few months before, was seen no more. Ellen Barnes, a biracial enslaved woman, took over Betsey’s duties. Ellen was in her mid-twenties, had been a servant of a Richmond druggist and was abandoned by her husband when he fled north. Ellen was illiterate but very observant and appeared “faithful.” She was present when Davis was captured. Some witnesses said Ellen was disguised and assisted Jefferson in his foiled escape. After the war she expressed “great affection” for Varina but that she would “‘rather be free, much rather.’” A picture was made of Ellen holding “Winnie,” Varina’s last baby, named Varina Howell Davis, born on June 27, 1864, and known as the “daughter of the Confederacy.” W. C. Davis called Ellen a nurse for the Davis children, a position of trust. Varina hired a white woman, Mary O’Melia, to run her house. William Jackson, Davis’ slave coachman, ran away to the Union lines. He was taken to Washington where Secretary of War Edward Stanton questioned him. This incident received widespread coverage in the northern press, portraying Varina and Jefferson negatively. Varina hired James H. Jones, a free African American, to work for her as a coachman. Jones, like Ellen, faithfully served Jefferson and Varina until they were captured. Jefferson and Varina were pictured as terrible slave owners in the northern press, but southerners believed they were kind and benevolent owners. African American slaves who knew Jefferson and Varina give varied evaluations of them as owners. A few slaves seemed positive about the Davises as owners after the war. James Lucas, a slave, evaluated Jefferson and Varina with the statement, “‘he wuz good but she was better.’”^[9]

Neither Jefferson nor Varina agreed with the scientific racism of the 1850s. Some researchers and scientists advocated polygenism, that there were multiple types of humans created but that African Americans were a separate and inferior type of humanoid. Joan E. Cashin never found an instance of Varina’s using the word “nigger.” She always used “Negro.” While one can only speculate how Christians could have owned humans, it is evident the Davises were not harsh owners, but were irrevocably attached to chattel slavery. Davis supported the effort to arm slaves. In the acerbic debate over this issue Robert Mercer Talliaferro Hunter broke with Davis and joined those who argued that the South was fighting a war to keep slavery the cause of the war.^[10]

Varina also understood the realities of the Civil War and understood that the cause was doomed. As early as 1862 she began to worry about her future and that of her children. In the spring of 1865, she became bitter and depressed. By the end of March many on both sides thought Davis should surrender and several people blamed his reluctance to surrender on Varina’s influence. But that decision, as all major decisions in their lives, was made by Jefferson. When Jefferson told Varina she should leave Richmond, she hastily gave away household furniture or just left it in place. She packed away “about two thousand in gold, a revolver, and some books.” They managed to sell property they could not move and had a check for $28,550 which Jefferson forgot to cash. Since $60.00 in Confederate money was worth about one dollar in gold, they would receive about $450.00. Jefferson sent the check with an aide to the Bank of Richmond which was closed. The check was non-negotiable. By the time he reached Danville, Davis had about five dollars in gold.^[11]

Footnotes – Chapter One:

[1] C. Vann Woodward, ed., Mary Chesnut’s Civil War (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988), 773

[2] Joan E. Cashin, First Lady of the Confederacy: Varina Davis’ Civil War (Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2006), 33–36.

[3] Cashin, First Lady, 35. Burke Davis, The Long Surrender (New York: Random House, 1985), 10.

[4] Cashin. First Lady, 33-36, 44, 97, 253, 285, 292. Eaton, Jefferson Davis, 23- 25, 28, 31, 32. James M. McPherson, Embattled Rebel: Jefferson Davis as Commander in Chief (New York: The Penguin Press, 2014), 7-8. McPherson noted Davis’ malaria, corneal ulceration of his left eye possibly causing neuralgia with its extreme pain, nausea and headaches, “Dyspepsia” (ulcers or acid reflux), lack of appetite causing the gaunt appearance, bronchial problems, insomnia, and boils. He often had to work from home and once was out of his office for a month. McPherson speculates that Davis suffered from stress and that there could have been psychosomatic problems. He also considered the possibility that Davis’ “perceived irritability and peevishness” was a consequence of his illnesses. Burke Davis, The Long Surrender, 7-8, 10. Allen Tate, Jefferson Davis: His Rise and Fall (Nashville: J. S. Sanders & Co., 1929, 1998 edition), 278. Madame Grelaud, an exile from Saint-Domingue during the Haitian Revolution, operated her Seminary or French School as it was called, in Philadelphia between 1809 and 1849. Herman Hattaway and Richard E. Beringer, Jefferson Davis, Confederate President, (Lawrence Kansas: University of Kansas, 2002), 10.

[5] McPherson, Embattled Rebel, 4-7.

[6] Cashin, First Lady, 43, 65. Eaton, Jefferson Davis, 26.

[7] Cashin, First Lady, 122-123. Clement Eaton, Jefferson Davis, 26, 30. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 30.

[8] Cashin, First Lady, 66, 102, 111. Tate, Rise and Fall, 214-219. Tate noted Thursday was the day for her legislative receptions in Richmond.

[9] Cashin, First Lady, 38, 40, 126, 143, 145-146, 148-149, 164-165, 246. William C. Davis, An Honorable Defeat: The Last Days of the Confederate Government, (New York: Harcourt, Inc., 2001), 302. The American Civil War Museum https://issuu.com/acwmuseum/docs/acwm_magazine_fall_2019/s/16394285, accessed March 11, 2024, states it is not possible to know if Ellen Barnes McGinnis were slave or free.

[10] George Robins Gliddon, Louis Agassiz and Josiah Clark Knott, Types of Mankind (Scholar’s Choice, 2015 reprint of the 1854 original). Cashin, 62, 63, 97, 98. Tate, Rise and Fall, 262. Hunter, a national politician before the war, served as Secretary of State (1861-62 and senator (1862-65).

[11] Cashin, First Lady, 133, 150, 154, 155, 157. James C. Clark, Last Train South: The Flight of the Confederate Government from Richmond (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 1984) 11. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 27, 29, 52. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 207.

 

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Chapter Two: Varina and the Gold Train

Abbeville: “a more fitting setting for a May Day festival than for the scene of the disruption of a government.”                                                                                                                                 Burton Harrison 

In her camp near Washington, “the ground felt very hard that night as I lay looking into the gloom and unable to pierce it even by conjectures.” Varina Davis, May 2, 1865

Varina Howell Davis left Richmond at around 10:00 p. m. on March 31, three days before the Confederate capitol was evacuated, bound for Charlotte. With Varina were daughters of Treasury Secretary George Trenholm, Burton N. Harrison, Jefferson Davis’ personal secretary, and James Morris Morgan, a naval officer assigned by Secretary of the Navy Stephen Russell Mallory, as escort for Trenholm’s daughters. Morgan was engaged to Betty Trenholm, and they later married. Three servants were also aboard: Ellen Barnes, her maid, a nurse, and Varina’s coachman, James H. Jones. Davis had purchased carriage horses for Varina in Western Virginia, but Varina sold them in Richmond because forage became too expensive. Some gentlemen purchased them for $13,000 in Confederate money (about $260 in gold) and returned them to the President’s wife. These carriage horses were seized when Davis was captured. Family members who accompanied Varina were Margaret “Maggie” Graham Howell, Varina’s sister, and Varina’s children: Margaret Howell Davis “Maggie” (10, 1855-1909), Jefferson Finis Davis, Jr., “Jeff, Jr,” (8, 1857-1878), Joseph E. Davis, “Joe” (5, 1859-1864), William Howell Davis, “Billy”, (3, 1861-1872) and Varina Anne Davis (“Winnie” “The Daughter of the Confederacy,” 1864-1898), who was less than a year old during the flight. Morgan found the passenger car filthy, worn out and “very suggestive of the vermin with which it afterwards proved to be infested.” The ruined interior had weathered paint, peeling varnish and smoky oil lamps with “soiled brown plush seats which were infested with fleas.” Mary Chesnut declared that soldiers were “packed like sardines in dirty RR cars. Which cars are usually floating inch deep in liquid tobacco juice.”^[12]

In February 1864 Varina, riding in her carriage on the streets of Richmond, saw an African American man beating a young boy beside a Richmond Street. She rescued the five-year-old-boy and took him to her home. His father had escaped to the North and his mother, a free African American, had died. He said his name was James “Jim” Limber. He was free because of his mother’s status. Jefferson Davis secured his freedom papers but was unable to find a member of his family. On February 16 Mary Boykin Chesnut “saw in Mrs. Howell’s room the little negro Mrs. Davis rescued from his brutal negro guardian. The child is an orphan. He was dressed up in little Joe’s clothes and happy as a lord. He was very anxious to show me his wounds and bruises, but I fled. There are some things in life too sickening, and cruelty is one of them.” James remained in the Davis household, seemingly a playmate of the Davis children. The boys, Joe and Jeff, Jr. belonged to a neighborhood group known as the Hill Cats, and Jim joined the gang. When Varina fled Richmond, Jim went along with the family until they were captured. In Savannah a captor ordered that James leave the family. Varina sent him to a Radical Republican she had known before the war, Brigadier General Rufus Saxon, stationed in Beaufort, South Carolina. ^[13]

Thomas Conolly, an eccentric Irish Member of Parliament, and Confederate sympathizer, rode a train to Greensboro

on March 6, 1865, and experienced conditions similar to those of Varina. It was “a rough journey in filthy carriages. . . .” He found the “whole place full of soldiers in all manner of garb, prisoners returning on parole & all the strays and waifs of war.” When he left Greensboro, the cars were filled “with motley troops armed & covered with picturesque crowds camping on top and rolling themselves in their large blankets with nothing but beards & sloughhat and rifle protruding, etc.” Everyone and everything was “covered & splattered with red mud.” The slouch hat was first worn by soldiers in the English Civil War during the 1640s and had gained popularity all over the British Empire. It had a wide brim and the front and back sloped downward to shed water.^[14]

Varina’s dilapidated locomotive “balked” after twelve miles. Engineers spent the night resuscitating the engine and, in the morning, it climbed the slight “up-grade” that had stymied it. Burton Harrison spent $100.00 in Confederate money to purchase milk and crackers for the children. Varina endured such conditions until she reached Charlotte, a three-day trip that steam engines after the war made in six or seven hours. Varina remained in the Queen City until April 13^th, the day after the Army of Northern Virginia surrendered. Jefferson Davis, along with government personnel who fled Richmond, established offices in Danville. Davis stayed at the Danville home of William T. Sutherlin from April 3 through April 10. Jane Patrick Sutherlin, hostess for Davis and his cabinet in Danville, believed Davis seemed to have rapid mood swings between optimism and resignation and ate little or nothing. According to Danville accounts, the Sutherlin home, “the last capitol of the Confederacy”, was where “Davis assembled his cabinet for the last official conference and signed the last documents of the Confederacy before the surrender of Gen. Lee.” Robert E. Lee signed the armistice on April 9. Davis was informed of the armistice on April 10, was shocked, packed quickly and went fifty miles south to Greensboro. The government papers, so recently unpacked in Danville, were repacked in boxes. John Cabel Breckinridge, Secretary of War, had these papers, essential for government, stored in Charlotte so that the history of the Confederacy could be written. Most Confederate

bureaucrats went home from Richmond or Danville. After the boxes left Danville there was no functioning Confederate government. On April 12^th Joseph Eggleston Johnston and Breckenridge agreed that the “Southern Confederacy was overthrown.” Varina’s position in Charlotte was tenuous. Morgan remembered, “the inhabitants, however, did not rush forward to offer the lady in distress hospitality as they might have done a year or two before misfortune had overtaken her.” News of Varina’s arrival spread quickly in Charlotte, “which was thronged with stragglers and deserters – conscripts – the very scum of the army, and a mob of these wretches gathered around the car in which she sat. The wretches reviled her in most shocking language.” Morgan and Harrison closed the Pullman’s windows so Varina could not hear the language. “We two men were helpless to protect them from the epithets of a crowd of some seventy-five or a hundred blackguards. . . .” Varina had been thrust “in a forlorn position, as nobody wished to shelter her for fear that the Union troops would destroy their homes if they did. Every road through the country was infested by deserters who would have given her scant consideration if they wanted anything she possessed. . . .”^[15]

Harrison found shelter for Varina and her family with Abram and Barbara Weill. Harrison described Weill as an “Israelite” merchant whose house stood at 237 South Tryon Street, where the Fed Ex building was later built. The United Daughters of the Confederacy erected a monument at this location in 1948. It was removed in 2020.[16]

On April 2 William Harwar Parker received a wire from Stephen Mallory requesting that Parker be at the Danville Depot in Richmond at 6:00 p.m. Parker was assigned the duty of transporting Confederate gold and silver from

Richmond to the Charlotte Mint. For the last three years of the war Parker ran the naval school for Confederate midshipmen in a Confederate naval steamer originally named the Yorktown. It was rechristened the Patrick Henry and anchored below Drewry’s Bluffs, on the James River at Richmond. Students lived in cottages until the last year of the war, when the Patrick Henry was towed upriver to Rocketts where the students lived on board. The bilge water became fouled, some midshipmen were hospitalized, and others were moved to a tobacco factory in Richmond. Parker commanded from sixty to a hundred midshipmen from the Confederate Naval Academy. Numbers declined as time passed. Charles Iverson Graves, of the Treasury Department, joined Parker along with several clerks and their families.^[17]

The midshipmen left their quarters at 4:00 p. m. on May 2. They marched to the Danville Depot, entrained, and saw the wooden containers holding gold and silver. The amount was casually estimated at about a half million dollars, and included Mexican silver dollars, American double eagles, ingots, nuggets, silver bricks, and a chest of jewels donated by women for a warship. The Midshipmen quickly dubbed these containers “The Things.” Parker also had a company of uniformed men from the Naval Yard. Most of these men were from Portsmouth, Virginia, but few had used weapons. In Danville Clerk Micajah H. Clark, after several allocations, placed a value of $327,022.90 on the Confederate treasury fund. This was substantially less than the casual estimate when the train left Richmond. The difference between the casual estimate and the more careful estimates in Danville resulted in “wild and misleading rumors” that Davis took millions in gold and silver. Davis and advisers obtained $35,000 for their expenses and $39,000 to pay Joseph E. Johnston’s army. On April 10 Parker and his men arrived in Charlotte where the gold and silver were deposited in the Charlotte Mint, and the “midshipmen feasted at the leading hotels.” As conditions deteriorated, Parker realized he had to move the specie. Union forces had destroyed telegraph lines, leaving Parker bereft of communication with superiors. Fearful of Major General George Stoneman’s cutting telegraph lines and destroying bridges to the west and William Tecumseh Sherman’s massive army near Greensboro, Parker took it upon himself to move the specie to Macon, Georgia, presumably a safe location. He requisitioned supplies and prepared to board the train to Chester. He had specie, government papers, treasury clerks with their wives and a thirty-man slave work force. Before leaving Charlotte, Parker invited Varina and her family to join the treasure train. She demurred, but “I rather pressed her on the point as I feared she would be captured, and I could not bear the idea of that.” Varina wrote that since “there seemed to be a panic imminent, I decided to go with my children and servants, on the extra train provided for the treasure, which could only run as far as Chester, as the road was broken.” Parker’s cargo included up to $450,000 in specie from private banks in Richmond. The Confederate specie was packed in “The Things:” wooden boxes of gold, and small wooden kegs containing silver. Parker never saw the gold and silver, but kept his eyes focused on “The Things.”^[18]

Parker’s entourage left Charlotte bound for Chester on April 14, 1865. The train was slowed because it was “heavily loaded and crowded with passengers – even the roofs and platform steps” were occupied. This was a hint of the impact on transportation lines and local communities when tens of thousands of Confederate veterans and deserters were homeward bound. It was inevitable that these waves of former soldiers without sustenance would resort to pillaging.

Lieutenant General Joseph Wheeler’s Confederate cavalrymen were notorious marauders, although soldiers from any command without food or money had to find subsistence. In 1865 men who “represented themselves as Wheeler’s Cavalry, were now plundering the country, impressing mules and horses” around Chester, South Carolina. Eugenia C. Babcock’s grandfather “had a beautiful saddle horse to which he was much attached.” Her grandmother fed the soldiers, and the same men stole the prized horse. When Wheeler’s men came through Chester, they “helped themselves to the commissary stores packed away in the various warehouses.” To be fair to Wheeler’s men, Babcock reported that commissary stores were opened, and citizens took what they wanted. Girls “went up there and got their aprons full of sugar; everything was in a demoralized condition.” About twenty miles away from Chester at Steele’s Crossing, where the Lower Lands Ford Road crossed the Saluda Road, Mattie Steele was proactive. When word came that Federals were burning the nearby railroad bridge over the Catawba River, she sent wagons of possessions to the mountains. She also wrapped jewelry and three gold watches in her riding skirt and buried it in the barn. “She put on three of her best dresses and sat for three days upon her trunk containing clothing and valuables.” Federal cavalry never came but many suffered from “the depredations of Wheeler’s men.” Mattie’s father had five valuable horses and mules. “Miss Mattie seized a pistol, in the use of which she was an expert, and ran to the barn. The soldiers approached to get the horses but found a brave girl in the stable door with a cocked repeater in her hand, and, as it was horse flesh and not lead they were looking for, they concluded; ‘Discretion was the better part of valor’ and departed.” Matilda Boyd Gettys lived a few miles from Steele’s Crossing near the Chester County boundary line. She lost her husband and a son to the Civil War and by the spring of 1865 found herself a widow with ten children between the ages of fifteen and two. Foraging veterans stripped her of most of her food including chickens, hogs, and cattle. She hid her two youngest children under the barn. Later another marauding group took what was left, then went after her mule. She stood in the barn door with an old musket pointed at them and said, “One of you may get this mule, but the other one will be dead.” She survived on Irish potatoes and gifts from neighbors. With the mule she could produce another crop. The old musket remains in her family. Caroline Jenney contended that, “Confederates recognized that plenty of less-than-desirable characters had filled the ranks of their armies. And now that they had been set loose from an formal military control, their outrages might know no bounds. . . .” Bushwhackers, deserters, and skulkers perpetrated crimes against Confederate citizens.^[19]

After Sherman burned bridges in the midlands of South Carolina, Chester became a major link in the Confederate logistical system. When Stoneman’s forces burned the railroad bridge over the Catawba on April 19, 1865, a cornucopia of food and supplies backed up in Chester. This bonanza attracted former soldiers as well as many locals who were destitute or simply unable to resist the largess.

When the telegraph gave notice of arriving soldiers, “men and women were seen running in the streets,” preparing assistance. Tables were in a shed near the southern depot “on which the ladies were to place the tempting viands.” A committee found rooms for sick and wounded men. The men with Parker and Varina’s party were well fed in Chester, but this town was at the end of the line when the bridge over the Catawba burned. Mary Boykin Chesnut was a refugee in Chester at 126 Main Street. Abraham Henry DaVega, who owned the building, had his dentist office on the first floor and his living space on the second floor. Mary occupied rooms on the third floor. Soon after arriving, Mary Chesnut was told a raid was imminent in Chester. She asked, “Why fly? They are everywhere, these Yankees – like red ants – like the locusts and frogs which were the plagues of Egypt.” Mary pointed out that there was no army to assist the citizens of Chester. “Plenty of officers – no men.” She wrote that the stream westward never ceased. “Lee’s army must be melting like a Scotch mist.”^[20]

Mary Chesnut had spent years in Richmond with her husband, James C. Chesnut, a Brigadier General, and aide-de-camp to Jefferson Davis. When Varina arrived in Chester early in the morning of April 14^th, James Chesnut began collecting transportation and supplies for her.  He and Mary were obligated to do whatever possible for Varina because she and Jefferson were so kind during “their days of power” in Richmond. Mary Chesnut went down to the cars to receive Varina and noted that “lovely little Piecake, the baby, came, too.” The family called her “Winnie.” Mary went to the depot and ate dinner prepared by Chester women. Mary wrote, “I went down with her. She left about five o’clock.” Mary found some residents “so base as to be afraid to befriend Mrs. Davis” because of the presence of “Yankees” who “might take vengeance on them for it.” Mary wrote that her heart was like lead but that Mrs. Davis was “as calm and smiling as ever.” One member of her staff did not rise when Varina entered the room and Mary commented, “could ill manners go further!”^[21]

During the afternoon of April 15, the specie was transferred to a wagon train. James Chesnut had secured a large ambulance and one or two wagons for luggage. These vehicles transported Varina, her servants, her sister Maggie Howell, and the children. Men walked, but women rode in the wagons. Thirty laborers managed the wagons and cargo, made camps, cooked, and performed other labor. Varina had close ties to two of the midshipmen: her brother Jefferson Howell and Jefferson Davis’ grandnephew. Varina recalled it was after dark before she was able to follow the treasure train. She was a determined woman who must have been terrified but showed a façade indicative of being in complete control. Varina probably thought often during the war about this end game. Mrs. Benjamin Huger recalled that a year before the war, Varina told her, “‘The South will secede if Lincoln is made president. They will make Mr. Davis president of the whole southern side. And the whole thing is bound to be a failure. So, her worst enemies must allow her the gift of prophecy.’”^[22]

One advantage Parker enjoyed in South Carolina was its system of road signs. Major roads had milestones to guide travelers. Byroads and crossroads had wooden signs. Kinloch Falconer, a member of Joseph E. Johnston’s staff, rode home to Bridgeville, Mississippi between May 4^th, and June 3^rd, 1865. In South Carolina “it is almost impossible to lose one’s way.”^[23]

Rains converted the dirt road from Chester to the Woodward Baptist Church into a muddy morass, evidently in places a quagmire. “The ambulance was too heavily laden in the deep mud, and as my maid was too weak to walk and my nurse unwilling, I walked five miles in the darkness in mud over my shoe tops, with my cheerful little baby in my arms.” The church sheltered women on the night of April 14^th. “A little bride who had accompanied her husband, who was with the bank treasure, told me kindly, ‘We are lying on the floor, but have left the communion table for you out of respect. . . .’” Varina declined that offer because “the additional comfort of the table did not tempt one to commit sacrilege.” Parker was kind and attentive to Varina. He “slept in the pulpit, being the head of the party.” Varina slept in the first pew with her family members. It was a weary night, but the treasure train departed at daylight. W. S. Culpepper was a seventeen or eighteen-year-old young man and a midshipman with the treasure train. On that rainy first night he said Varina came to the door with a glass of wine to help him sleep. On April 15^th Mrs. Isaiah Mobley provided breakfast for Varina and her family at Nine Mile Plantation. Mobley, a loving mother, for the rest of her life, told everyone she met, that her daughters “were held by the President’s wife.” The first day the company from the Navy Yard led the treasure train and the midshipmen followed. Some men walked alongside the wagons that contained the specie. On April 16^th the two groups switched positions and this pattern continued.^[24]

Morgan, the “Rebel Reefer,” recalled the first night out of Chester. “The midshipmen who were not on guard duty lay down under the trees outside in company of the mules.” An escort for Varina, he was attentive to every present

danger as the wagon train lumbered along sodden roads. “Not far away, on either flank and in their rear, hovered deserters waiting either for an opportunity or the necessary courage to pounce upon the, to them, untold wealth which those wagons contained. Five years of warfare had exhausted supplies and support for the war in the countryside.”^[25]

The years of warfare distressed the isolated countryside. Clara Dargan Maclean, a refugee, returned home and along her route she saw “road-iron twisted like ribbons about the telegraph poles” as the first sign of destruction. “Below Chester began the ‘destruction of desolation.” Not a fence or house or living animal where once I had remembered such happy homesteads . . . embowered in orchards and gardens.” Of course, this was the route taken by so many thousands of veterans whose passage left a countryside as if it had had a visitation from a starving plague of locusts of biblical proportions.^[26]

Varina found that food at “hostelries and even the private houses, was fifty cents or one dollar for a biscuit, and the same for a glass of milk.” She had difficulty feeding her children, “except when we reached the house of some devoted Confederate, and then I did not like to avail of their generosity.” Parker feared elements from Stoneman’s command were trailing him. He kept pressing on until he reached Newberry where a courier had a train waiting. The transmission of information within relatively isolated rural populations astonished Parker. “During the march I never allowed any one to pass us on the road, and yet the coming of the treasure was known to every village we passed through. How this could be was beyond my comprehension.” Varina also expressed fear from Union forces. “There were various alarms of ‘Yankees’ at Frog Level and other places on the road. . . .”^[27]

The treasure train followed roads that ran parallel to the Broad River, and they spent the night at Salem Crossroads, located today on highway 34 between Newberry and Winnsboro. Parker had served on the USS Yorktown with Midshipman Edward C. Means and slept at his former shipmate’s home. Parker set a pace indicative of his concerns for safety. “One day we marched 30 miles, between our camp at Means’ and Newberry . . . I did more walking than anyone else.” Means “took all the ladies to his house and made them comfortable for the night.” They began very early the next morning and reached a pontoon bridge at noon. “That afternoon we arrived at Newberry, after a march of twelve hours’ duration.” Parker’s courier had a train ready to take his party to Abbeville. “We transferred the treasure to the cars and left the same evening at sunset.” The railroad station at Hope was three or four miles from the pontoon bridge on the south side of the river. The specie and passengers entrained at Hope, two or three miles beyond what is now Peak, on the bank of the Broad River. R. H. Fleming, a Midshipman, remembered they reached Newberry and “took cars for Abbeville. . . .” The Newberry Tri-Weekly Herald of Tuesday, April 18, 1865, reported that Mrs. Davis passed through Newberry on Sunday, April 16. The train reached Abbeville after midnight on April 16, so they arrived in town on the morning of April 17. Varina mentioned passing through Frog Level (today’s Prosperity) located between Hope and Newberry, but she gave no date.^[28]

Joseph Henry Latimer of Atlanta was the engineer of the John C. Calhoun, a steam locomotive that transported Varina and her party to Abbeville on the spur track from the Greenville and Columbia railroad. The John C. Calhoun belonged to the Nashville, Chattanooga, and St. Louis Railroad Company, and was sent to Abbeville after Atlanta was captured. George W. Syfan was the engineer on the regular Greenville to Columbia train, and the engines were named the John Belton O’Neall and the Dar. The Dar “was small and had a peculiar smokestack but she was ‘the fastest on the line.’” Parker wrote that the John C. Calhoun’s passengers “arrived at the station in the middle of the night so all remained on board until the morning.” Varina and her “family left and went to the house of the Hon. Mr. Burt. . . .” Parker quickly formed a new wagon train, transferred “The Things,” on the morning of April 17, and “set off across the country for Washington, Georgia.” When James Morris Morgan departed Parker’s entourage in Abbeville, he found every residence surrounded by a garden: “a more fitting setting for a May Day festival than for the scene of the disruption of a government.” Burton Harrison experienced similar sentiments upon his arrival that May. “Abbeville was a beautiful place, on high ground; and people lived in great comfort, their Houses embowered in vines and roses, with many other flowers everywhere.” John Taylor Wood rode into Abbeville with Davis and was impressed with Armistead Burt’s house covered in roses. Wood’s father married Ann, Zachary Taylor’s oldest daughter. Wood was not only the grandson of an American President but was also the nephew of the Confederate President.^[29]

Armistead Burt, from Newberry, served in Congress and was an attorney in Abbeville. When Jefferson Davis entered the Senate in 1850 Burt was a member of Congress. The two families shared a rented house in Washington. Burt resided in a Greek Revival house on the north end of Main Street in Abbeville known today as the Burt-Stark Mansion. George A. Trenholm’s two daughters were refugees with Burt. Trenholm, who was said to have been the wealthiest man in the South in 1860, added about nine million dollars to his fortune with blockade runners. He purchased the Marshall House near Burt’s home to be used by refugees. Varina wrote to her husband that Armistead’s family provided more personal kindness than anyone else she had met on her trip.  Maggie Howell became ill on the trip from Newberry and received rest in the Trenholm house “across the street.” Jefferson “Jeffy D.” Howell, Varina’s brother and a midshipman, became ill and was also housed at the Trenholm house. An apocryphal story is that Varina was reluctant to stay at the Burt house fearing Federal retribution for hosting the wife of Jefferson Davis. Burt replied, however, that “there was no better use to which his house could be put than to have it burned for giving shelter to the wife of a family of his friend.” This oft-repeated comment was not noted by Varina in her Memoir, but she understood their hospitality involved risk. She wrote that “Mr. Armistead Burt and his wife received us in their fine house with a generous, tender welcome, though fully expecting that, for having given us shelter, it would be burnt by the enemy.” She spent two weeks with the Burt family until she heard disturbing reports. Negotiations between Sherman and Joseph E. Johnston led her to realize that the surrender of the Army of Tennessee would force her husband to go west of the Mississippi and that the South was “at the mercy of Federals.” She instinctively knew she had to move.^[30]

Henry Leovy, a refugee from New Orleans and friend of Jefferson, delivered her letter to Davis at Lafayette Young’s house in Laurens County on the lane known today as Jefferson Davis Road. Varina referred to these refugees from the Mississippi area in a 1905 letter. She wrote that when she was in Abbeville, “the Confederacy went to pieces.” When she received news of Lincoln’s assassination, she shed tears for his family, and for the “inevitable results to the Confederate President. I felt unwilling, if all was lost east of the Mississippi River, to hamper the Confederate President in his effort to reach the trans-Mississippi, and thereby enforce better terms than our conquerors seemed willing to grant.” She thought that her presence in Abbeville encouraged her husband to come to the town. Her message carried by Leovy informed Davis that she “would not wait his coming,” but would get out of the country and “meet him in Texas or elsewhere.” Varina’s presence in Abbeville may have contributed to Davis’ visit, but his destination was determined more by Union military pressure forcing him to abandon his original objective. Initially he planned to go to Anderson, cross the Savannah River west of that town at Hatton’s Ford, and continue by rail to the Trans-Mississippi South. Once Union forces blocked this route, Abbeville became his objective. From Abbeville he anticipated entraining in Washington, Georgia for the Trans-Mississippi region.^[31]

Abbeville, as many communities in the rural Confederacy, attracted refugees from areas overrun by Union forces or confronted with military action. Refugees were appreciated for spending money, but there were tensions between permanent residents and refugees. It was natural for Harrison and Varina to rely on refugees who lived along the Mississippi River because the Davis family was part of a large network of families along that river. South Carolinians living elsewhere reflected the same attitudes as those found in Abbeville over the presence of refugees. Mary Elizabeth Anderson from Pleasant Falls near Spartanburg, wrote her brother John Crawford Anderson, a cadet at the Citadel, explaining the relationships that developed between refugees and their hosts. She reported some refugees in Spartanburg County were dissatisfied because they thought “the country people might put up with any and every privation for them.” She believed refugees should “be content with what they can get just now.” David Duncan, one of Wofford College’s first three professors, spoke very severely to a “Charlestonian who was complaining a good deal, and at length silenced him.” Mary Anderson’s parents were talking of hosting a refugee, but she opposed the idea. “We might take them in for the sake of humanity but if they can go elsewhere, I say let them go.” Refugees at her grandfather’s house were “very much dissatisfied” with food but the garden was producing delicious vegetables. In contrast Harriet “Hettie” Thomas from Mount Hope in the Ridgeway section of Fairfield District, corresponded with her cousin, Elizabeth “Lize” Catherine Palmer, a Charleston refugee. Hattie was delighted that Lize was safe and received good treatment. Mary Anderson lived in an Upcountry yeoman farmer culture while Hattie was related to the Charleston elite. Lize was a refugee with her aunt, Mrs. Richard Yeadon, wife of the Charleston Courier editor. Fine gradations of social position meant everything in antebellum South Carolina. A proud, self-sufficient, and industrious Upcountry family could quickly take offense at what was perceived as feelings of superiority among Low Country elites. In Abbeville District there were connections between the town’s first families and refugee elites.^[32]

Jefferson Davis was in Charlotte by April 23 when he sent a message to Armistead Burt introducing his secretary, Burton Harrison, who was traveling to Abbeville to assist Varina. Harrison entrained in Charlotte with his horse, rode to Newberry and took the train to Abbeville. He had only Confederate money and found that it was no longer accepted. In Newberry an inquisitor asked if he had any news about Mr. Trenholm. Harrison told the man he would have to wait until he boarded his horse and then he would tell everything about Trenholm because he had recently been with him. Harrison had acquired a traveling partner in Chester, also bereft of funds. His companion laughed as they boarded horses with the man because Harrison’s knowledge of Trenholm had secured food and a bed. The inquisitor, a Newberry banker, provided exquisite hospitality. The next morning after breakfast they departed with a haversack of supplies as they entrained for Abbeville.^[33]

Armistead Burt and Harrison urged Varina to leave Abbeville. Davis wrote a letter to Varina when she was in Abbeville, asking her to hasten to “seek safety in a foreign country.” He suggested that she try to escape to Texas or a foreign country. He wrote that he intended go to Texas and if he had problems he could cross into Mexico and find some place in the world. Harrison found a refugee, John S. Williams of Kentucky, who was recuperating in the countryside south of Abbeville. Williams was on a farm owned by Nathaniel Jefferson Davis, known to one and all since childhood as “Jeff Davis.” Williams feared if he loaned wagons and horses, he might never get them back because equines were stolen constantly. “But he gallantly devoted them to Mrs. Davis, putting his property at her service as far as Washington, Georgia, and designating the man to bring the wagons and horses back. . . .” Harrison never knew if they were returned. Another nearby refugee, Judge Thomas Monroe of Kentucky, Henry J. Leovy’s father-in-law, and his family were refugees in Abbeville. Jefferson Davis, a friend of Monroe, sympathized with him because he was “driven from the land of his birth” to become a refugee. Monroe hosted three Kentucky cavalrymen, Leeland Hathaway, Jack Messick and Winder Monroe who were on sick leave with Judge Monroe. They were capable of accompanying Varina to Washington.[34]

Varina remained in Abbeville until April 29. Her departure on that Saturday was prior to a burial reported by Fannie Calhoun Marshall. Women in Abbeville, like those in Chester, did their best to care for wounded and ill soldiers. One such soldier with smallpox was isolated and nursed but died on May 2. He was buried at the foot of Secession Hill, just above the railroad tracks. Fanny Marshall speculated that he could have been “the last soldier who gave up his life for the cause. His grave is marked by a cedar, planted by a little girl who never forgot to place flowers on his grave.” Everyone in Varina’s group had been vaccinated except Winnie, Varina’s baby. The entourage stopped at Hohenlinden, John Oliver Lindsay’s plantation, on the ridge above Vienna. Lindsay found an African American boy with smallpox from whom he extracted a fresh scab. Lindsay performed the inoculation. Hohenlinden was twenty miles from both Abbeville and Washington, an ideal location for Varina to spend the night. There is no documentation, however,  identifying where she stayed on the night of April 29. The party continued across the pontoon bridge connecting Vienna with Petersburg in Georgia, then traveled to Washington, passing through Chennault and Danburg. Harrison was the guest of John Joseph Robertson, a bank cashier who lived in the bank building. Jefferson Davis stayed with the Robertsons after Harrison left.^[35]

Varina remembered that on April 29, “about half an hour’s travel out of Abbeville, our wagons met the treasure” returning. Parker had taken the Confederate specie from Abbeville to Augusta, encountered federal forces around Augusta, and returned to Abbeville. Charles Iverson Graves and some midshipmen, with Parker’s permission, left from Augusta homeward bound. Parker found Washington “in a state of most depressing disorder.” News of Joseph E. Johnston’s surrender resulted in quartermasters and commissaries being looted. This sort of pillaging by local citizens, deserters, soldiers going home, and others of that ilk, occurred in Virginia, Charlotte and Greensboro as well as Griffin and Augusta in Georgia. Robert M. Willingham blamed a Texas regiment for a riot in Washington, Georgia on May 1, 1865. Anger over the scarcity of rations, they broke into commissary goods and were joined by other soldiers and local residents.  “By the end of the day, there was little food left, most cloth, thread, paper, and pens destroyed, and many horses and mules stolen.” The next day pillaging became more rampant, ordnance stores at the depot were taken and the commissary cleaned out. On May 3^rd proles stole equines, even unhitching two horses on the town square. Willingham succinctly stated the situation, “By May 2^nd Washington was a madhouse with the inmates running the asylum.”[36]

Harrison sent a private message by Henry Jefferson Leovy to Jefferson Davis at 7:30 a. m. on April 29. “We had intended starting yesterday afternoon, but we were detained by the rain. Are just getting off now. The ladies and children are very well, in good spirits. They move in a good ambulance and carriage and will reach Washington in two day’s drive from this place.” He explained this plan was “determined by your telegrams, and by the belief that you would move westward, along a line from this place.” Harrison notified Davis that Henry Leovy would verbally “explain our plans, &c. He will tell you everything.” Leovy was born in Augusta in 1826, moved to New Orleans and studied law under Judge Thomas D. Monroe in Frankfort, Kentucky. He published a codification of New Orleans laws, a book on Louisiana laws, and edited the New Orleans Delta. During the Civil War he was appointed as a military Judge in Virginia with the rank of Colonel of Cavalry.[37]

After arriving in Washington on April 30, Harrison went to the quartermaster’s camp near Washington, obtained army wagons with four good mules for each, and the best harnesses available. He secured a driver for each team, “and several supernumeraries, friends of theirs, were recruited there, with the promise, on my part, that the wagons and mules should be divided between them at our journey’s end.” All were from Mississippi, so by volunteering to help Varina they were traveling toward their homes. To be safe the Harrison group went some distance from the quartermaster’s camp, a wise move. During the night the quartermaster’s camp was raided and all the healthy equines, including exceptionally strong mules belonging to Louis T. Wigfall, were stolen. Willingham believes the raid was by the Eighth Texas Cavalry, known as “Terry’s Texas Rangers,” who stole rations out of frustration. The next morning, May 2, Harrison and Varina departed with wagons loaded with supplies sufficient to “take us to Madison,” a Georgia town on the route to Florida. Harrison lacked sleep and was weak because he had been sick with a terrible bout of dysentery. The party consisted of Harrison, Varina, her sister Maggie Howell and four children, her maid Ellen Barnes, and coachman James H. Jones, who drove Varina’s horses from Richmond. The Kentucky cavalrymen, Leeland Hathaway, Jack Messick and Winder Monroe, remained with Varina. Colonel George Vernon Moody, an attorney from Port Gibson, Mississippi, and Major Victor Moran of Louisiana, accompanied her for the duration of her flight. Varina’s brother Jefferson Howell, who had been paroled, joined her. William Wood Crump, an assistant to the Secretary of the Treasury who administered the day-to-day functions of the office in Richmond, carried a small fund with him. He was a refugee in Washington. He gave a few hundred dollars for Harrison’s group and $110 to Varina, loans to be repaid from Harrison’s and Davis’ future salaries. Later Crump contributed to the bond to release Davis from prison. Everyone was sworn to secrecy and the party left in a due south direction. Nugent, Jefferson Davis’ nephew-in-law, delivered a message expressing Davis’ “bitter regret” that he arrived in Washington too late to see Varina. Nugent returned with Varina’s request that Davis not “seek an interview” because it could compromise his safety.^[38]

On May 2 at 10:15 a. m. Harrison sent a message to Davis from Washington, Georgia. He had “excellent drivers, teams, and conveyances, a supply of forage and provisions and are prepared for a long and continuous march. The ladies and children are well and have been kindly entertained at Dr. Ficklen’s, where they still are. . .” Fielding Ficklen was born on December 23, 1801, in Wilkes County, Georgia. He had seven children and seven female slaves in 1850. In 1839 he graduated from the University of Pennsylvania Medical School with a major in Gastritis. Varina and the children were at the Ficklen home on the nights of April 30 and May 1, 1865. Harrison reported to Davis that Varina was very anxious to see him but was willing to leave before he arrived if that were preferable. On May 2 at 10:15 a. m. Harrison sent a message to Jefferson that Johnston’s surrender of all territory east of the Chattahoochee River necessitated a change in plans, and he thought it best to “carry her to a place of safety in or beyond Florida.” Davis responded on May 3 at 9:00 p. m. that his family “is safest when farthest from me.” Harrison moved the wagon train with Varina and the children out of Washington on May 2, the day Jefferson and the five brigades left Abbeville at 11:00 p. m., bound for Washington. Varina remembered they pitched tents and made tea “in the awkward manner of townspeople camping out.” She recalled, “the ground felt very hard that night as I lay looking into the gloom and unable to pierce it even by conjectures.” She was a woman of strong constitution, stronger will, and always a rock of support for the man she loved.[39]

Footnotes – Chapter Two:

[12] Burton Norvell Harrison, “The Capture of Jefferson Davis,” Century Magazine, November 1883, reprinted in Jesse Burton Harrison, ed., Saris Sonis Focisque: Being a memoir of American Family, The Harrisons of Skimino, and Particularly of Jesse Burton Harrison and Burton Norvell Harrison (privately printed, 1910, London: Dalton House, Forgotten Books, n.d.), 225-26. James Morris Morgan, Recollections of a Rebel Reefer, (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1917), 229-33. James C. Clark, Last Train South: The Flight of the Confederate Government from Richmond (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 1984), 5-7. William Harwar Parker, “The Gold and Silver in the Confederate States Treasury: What Became of it,” SHSP, vol. 21, 1893, 306, 307.  Parker, Recollections, 356.  Varina Davis, Jefferson Davis, Ex-President of the Confederate States of America, A Memoir by His Wife. (New York: Belford Company Publishers, n.d.), reprint by Kessinger Publishing. vol. 2:608, 611. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 386. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 15. Samuel Emory Davis (1852-1854), the first child, called “le man” by Jefferson, died from measles and died at the age of 1 year and 11 months. Margaret Howell Davis Hayes “Maggie” died at the age of 45 on July 18, 1909. “Jeff, Jr.” contracted Yellow Fever and died when he was 21. Billy died of diphtheria on his 11th birthday (October 16, 1872). Winnie died on September 18, 1898, a month after she contracted an illness from riding in an open carriage in an Atlanta parade, substituting for Varina who was ill. C. Vann Woodward, ed. Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981), 776.

[13] Cashin, First Lady, 145-146, 160,165. James mentioned the name Brooks. The 1870 Census lists a twelve-year-old African American, James Lambert, living in Pleasant Grove, Lunenburg, Virginia. Woodward, Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, 568.

[14] Nelson D. Lankford, ed, An Irishman in Dixie: Thomas Conolly’s Diary of the Fall of the Confederacy (Columbia, The University of South Carolina Press, 1988), 38. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 15. Wikipedia, accessed November 13, 2023, describes the many variations of a slouch hat, including those worn by Union and Confederate armies, Australians, and Americans in western and southern states.

[15] Morgan, Rebel Reefer, 229-33. Davis, An Honorable Defeat, 67, citing Leeland Hathaway Recollections, Southern Historical Collections, University of North Carolina, 110-111. Lankford, An Irishman in Dixie, 38. Harrison, Memoir, 225- 26 227, 236, 242-43. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 28. Joseph E. Johnston, Narrative of Military Operations (Columbia, South Carolina: Made in the USA reprint of the 1873 original, no pagination), Chapter 12. Tate, Rise and Fall, 274-75. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 398-99, 499. Today the Sutherlin mansion houses the Danville Museum of Fine Arts and History at 975 Main Street. The Macon (Mississippi) Beacon, January 20, 1911, 2, copied Jane Patrick Sutherlin’s obituary from a Danville newspaper.

[16] Harrison, Memoir, 227, 243, 243. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 176. Weill was also spelled “Weil” and his home was used by members of Jefferson Davis staff when they stayed in Charlotte for a few days later in April.

[17] William Harwar Parker, Recollections of a Naval Officer, 1841-1865, (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1883), Miami, Florida: HardPress Classic Series reprint, 355-356. William Parker, “Gold and Silver,” 304-313. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 214. John W. Harris, “Confederate Naval Cadets,” CV., vol. 12, April 1904, 171. Harris quoted from the diary of Midshipman R. H. Fleming, a member of the Treasure Train crew. The dates in Parker disagree with those from Fleming’s diary. Fleming’s dates appear more reliable.

[18] Harris, “Naval Cadets,” 171. John C. Stiles, “The Confederate States Naval Academy,” CV,” vol. 23, September 1915, 402. Stiles’ dates seem more correct, but he failed to date every day. Varina Davis, Memoir, vol 2, 608. The railroad to Columbia from Charlotte ran from Chester to Columbia. At Alston there was a junction with the railroad from Columbia to Greenville that crossed the Broad River between Alston and Hope (later Peak). This railroad went to Prosperity, (in 1865, “Frog Level”), Newberry, Greenwood, and Hodges where there was a spur to Abbeville. The bridge over the Broad River had been burned by locals to foil Sherman, but a pontoon bridge was available. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 214-217. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 25, 53, 60, 65.

[19] Mrs. James Conner, et. al. eds. Eugenia C. Badcock, “Personal Recollections of the War Between the States,” South Carolina Women in the Confederacy, vol. 2. (Columbia: The State Company, 1907), pp. 143-44. South Carolina Division, United Daughters of the Confederacy, eds. Recollections and Reminiscences, 1861-1865 Through World War I, Ann Poag Hickin, “Sketch of the War Life of Mrs. Leroy D. Poag, nee Mattie Steele” vol. 1, published by the UDC (1990), pp. 621-22. Joseph M.  Gettys, My Cup Runs Over: “Life is Full, Life is Fun!” (Columbia: The R. L. Bryan Company, 1996), 2-3. Caroline E. Janney, Ends of War: The Unfinished Flight of Lee’s Army after Appomattox (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press2021), 135.

[20] South Carolina Division, United Daughters of the Confederacy, Recollections and Reminiscences, 1861 Through World War I, vol. 1, 1900, Catherine Bradley Hood, “Behind the Lines – The Achievements and Privations of the Women of the South – A Memorial,” pp. 597-98. Woodward, Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, 764, 766, 777, 785, 790, 800. Mary was in Chester by March 21 and on May 2 she was back in her home near Camden, South Carolina.  Chester County Historical Society, A Walking Tour of Chester S. C. (Chester, South Carolina: 107 McAliley Street, n. d.), 14. DaVega, spelled DaVaga in sources but DeVega in the census records, operated a hotel in 1850. His wife, Eliza McClure DaVega and Davega children.

[21] Woodward, Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, 783 – 785. This source provides the key to the chronology of the trip. The train left Charlotte on April 14, arrived in Chester on April 15. Page 784 is a picture of Mary Boykin Chesnut’s handwritten 1880s manuscript clearly dated. Lowry P. Ware, Old Abbeville: Scenes of the Past of a Town Where Old Time Things are not Forgotten (Columbia: SCMAR, 1992), 96. Jefferson Davis, Rise and Fall, 247, 319, 321, 326. As a Colonel, Chesnut was an aide-de-camp to P. G. T. Beauregard in 1861. From 1862 until the end of the war he was with Davis.

[22] Parker, Gold and Silver, 306, 307, Parker dated their arrival in Chester as April 12. Parker, Recollections, 356.  Varina Davis, Memoir, vol. 2, 611. Woodward, Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, 800. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 73. Richard Nugent carried information from Jefferson Davis to Varina outside Washington, Georgia and was identified as Jefferson’s nephew-in-law.

[23] Fredrick W. Moore, ed., “The Diary of Kinloch Falconer,” CV, vol. 9, September 1901, 409.

[24] Varina Davis, Memoir, vol. 2, 611-12. Parker, Gold and Silver, 307. Parker, Recollections, 356. Michael Ballard, A Long Shadow: Jefferson Davis and the Final Days of the Confederacy (Jackson: University of Mississippi Press, 1986), 119. Mrs. James Conner, et. al., eds. Carolina Women in the Confederacy, vol. 2, (Columbia: The State Company, 1907). Eugenia C. Babcock, “Personal Recollections of the War Between the States,” 145-46. Mrs. John Wilkes, “The Confederate Naval Yard in Charlotte, N. C.,” SHSP, vol 40, 187. James C. Clark, Last Train South, 66. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 73. Hanna, Flight to Oblivion, 34. Hanna identifies Mrs. Mobley’s home where the group had breakfast as being on the Ashley Ferry Road.

[25] Morgan, Rebel Reefer, 234.

[26] Clara Dargan Maclean, “Return of a Refugee,” SHSP, vol. 13, 507. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 74.

[27] Parker, Recollections, 358. Ware, Old Abbeville, 96 Ware quoted Burton Harrison from the November 1883 issue of Century Magazine. Varina Davis, “Memoir,” vol. 2, 611, 612.

[28] The Newberry Tri-Weekly Herald, Tuesday April 18, 1865. The paper stated that General Hood and Mrs. Davis passed through Newberry on Sunday. Varina Davis, Memoir, vol. 2, 611, 612. Parker Recollections, 357-58. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 74-75. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 215. Hope was about three miles from the Broad River, replaced later with Peak, on the bank of that stream.

[29] Abbeville Medium, March 10, 1898. Robert R. Hemphill had lunch with J. H. Latimer on March 3, 1898, and reported the substance of their conversation. Parker Recollections, 357.  Harris, “Naval Cadets,” 171. Morgan, Rebel Reefer, 235. Harrison, “Memoirs,” 245. Royce Gordon Shingleton, John Taylor Wood: Sea Ghost of the Confederacy (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1979), 3-4, 155. James C. Clare, The Last Train South, 32. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 75.

[30] Cashin, First Lady, 54. Ware, Old Abbeville, 96-97. Ware cited the Abbeville Press and Banner, September 18, 1863, on the Trenholm purchases. Varina Davis, Memoir, 612, 615. Morgan, Rebel Reefer, 237. Harrison, “Memoirs,” 245. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 45-46.

[31] OR., series I, vol., 47, part 3, 832. Varina Davis, Memoir, vol. 2, 615. Varina stated that Henry Leovy was to meet Davis at the Saluda River with her letter. The river was not far from Lafayette Young’s house, standing on Jefferson Davis Road today.

[32] Ware, Old Abbeville, 96-97. Tom Moore Craig, ed., Upcountry South Carolina Goes to War: Letters of the Anderson, Brockman, and Moore Families, 1853-1865. (Columbia: The University of South Carolina Press, 2009), 89-90.

[33] OR., series I, vol. 47, part 3, 832. Davis, Memoir, 615-16. Harrison, “Memoir,” 244.

[34]https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/7489837/leeland-hathaway, accessed October 3, 2023, Hathaway, a Lieutenant in the 14^th Kentucky cavalry, was captured and released just as the Confederacy collapsed. He was in Abbeville when Varina arrived and decided to accompany her. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 413-15. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 292. Leeland Hathaway, “Recollections,” Southern Historical Collections, Wilson Library, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, accessed on-line. The Times-Democrat (New Orleans), October 4. 1902, 4. Henry Leovy studied law under Judge Monroe.

[35] Fannie Calhoun Marshall, “Reminiscences of Fannie Calhoun Marshall,” UDC, vol. 10. 75. Varina Davis, Memoir, vol. 2, 615. Harrison, “Memoir,” 245-46, 246-47. Harrison spent two nights and a day in Washington. Varina described camping out near Washington. Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, vol. 1 (Richmond: Garrett and Massie, 1938, originally published in 1881, Da Capo Press paperback edition, 1990), 342. Bobby F. Edmonds, The Making of McCormick County (McCormick, South Carolina: Cedar Hill, 1999), 254. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 89-90. E. Merton Coulter, Old Petersburg and the Broad River Valley: Their Rise and Fall (Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 1965), 31, 48, 70. Tate, Rise and Fall, 269. The Census of 1850, Washington, GA, dwelling, 649, family 639. The Census of 1870, Washington, Georgia dwelling 123, family 124 includes Mary E. Robertson, “keeping house.” There is no Find-A-Grave or any other listing for Elizabeth Hay Robertson. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 259-60, 267-68.

[36] OR., series I, vol. 49, chapter 6, part 2, 1274. Varina Davis, Memoir, vol. 2, 615-16. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 130-1341. Parker, Recollections, 363, 365, 367, 369. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 418. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 214-18. Janney, Ends of War, 172, 174-75. Robert M. Willingham, Jr., The History of Wilkes County, Georgia (Washington, Georgia: Wilkes Publishing Company, 2002), 180. This work was brought the writer’s attention by Linda Crowe Chesnut whose assistance is greatly appreciated. She has been able to find images that add immeasurably to this work. Robert M. Willingham, “‘It’s All Over:’ Jefferson Davis and the Final Acts of the Confederate Government in Washington, Georgia,” unpublished manuscript, described to the writer by Robert Willingham, March, 2024. Robert M. Willingham, Jr., No Jubilee: The Story of Confederate Wilkes (Washington, Georgia: Wilkes Publishing Company, 1976), 202-203.

[37] OR., series 1, vol. 49, part 2, 1269, 1274, 1275, 1277, 1278. The Times-Democrat (New Orleans), October 4, 1902, 4.

[38] Harrison, “Memoir,” 247-50. Varina Davis, Memoir, 2:615-617, 644-45. Daily Southern Reveille, 9 (Port Gibson, Mississippi) Nov. 27, 1858, 4. This issue included an advertisement by George Vernon Moody, attorney. Vicksburg Evening Post, September 26, 1895, 4.. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 131. Burke Davis identified Richard Nugent as Jefferson Davis’ nephew. H. C. Binkley, “Shared in the Confederate Treasury,” CV, 38. March 1930, 87-88. The Constitution (Atlanta), April 17, 1934, 9. Henry Clay Binkley enlisted at the age of 25 and served under Nathan Bedford Forrest. Varina Davis, Memoir, 2:617. Harrison, “Memoir,” 247. Harrison did not identify where Varina stayed but wrote she was “comfortably lodged in the town.”  Mrs. Jefferson Davis, New York City, to S. A. Cunningham, October 13, CV, November 1905, 486-487. Varina defended Jefferson Davis against an article critical of his “leisurely” ride through South Carolina. Willingham, “‘It is All Over’”. Wikipedia article on William Wood Crump. Find-A-Grave article on William Wood Crump. The Virginia Magazine of History and Biology, vol. 5, January 1889, 349, Crump Necrology. The Savanah Morning News, February 28, 1897, 1. Crump obituary.

[39] OR., series 1, vol. 49, part 2, 1269, 1274, 1275, 1277, 1278. Find-A-Grave, Census of 1850 and 1860, “College Students Lists”, The Philadelphia Inquirer, April 4, 1823, 3. Varina Davis, Memoir, 2:617. Willingham, History of Wilkes County, 180.

 

________________

 

Chapter Three: Danville – End of the Confederate Government

“It would be one of the greatest of human crimes for us to attempt to continue the war; for, having neither money nor credit, nor arms but those in the hands of solders, nor ammunition but that in their cartridge-boxes nor shops for repairing arms, . . .”

                                                                        Joseph E. Johnston to Jefferson Davis, April 13, 1865

Herman Hattaway and Richard E. Beringer’s seventeenth chapter in Jefferson Davis, Confederate President is titled “The End in Virginia” and the next chapter is entitled “The Pseudo-Confederacy.” From the perspective of more than 150 years their nomenclature appears excellent. Davis wrote to Lee on April 12, 1865, that the Tredegar Iron Works lacked sufficient supplies to keep men working. Varina remembered this period in her Memoirs. “Events now rapidly culminated in the overwhelming disaster he and our brave people had striven so energetically to avert. The gloom

was impenetrable.” The war was lost. Davis left Danville in a positive mood, thinking the Confederacy could recover. There were 140 miles of disintegrated railroad tracks between Richmond and Danville, reducing the speed to an average of about ten miles an hour. At one location the floor of a car collapsed “throwing a half dozen screaming soldiers under the moving wheels.” During some delays, citizens approached Davis’ car “to gawk at the Chief Executive or shake his hand.” When Davis disembarked, Danville became the temporary Confederate capital. But before government workers could find their way to Danville, secure space and unpack boxes, Davis was in Greensboro. Workers left Danville for home before they could function, and the government disintegrated.[40]

By April 13 Danville had the first working railroad south of Richmond, and on that morning over 3,000 Confederate veterans arrived. “For several days the men flowed out just as they flowed in.” But the railroad was unable to maintain service and an ammunition explosion exacerbated the situation, plunging the town into chaos.[41]

Henry Wemyss Feilden, Assistant Adjutant General for the Department of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida, understood the situation and thought the cause was hopeless by March 22. On April 6 he wondered “what our leaders are going to do; a prolongation of the war appears nothing but a further useless loss of life.” His analysis was identical to that of his leaders.[42]

W. H. Swallow spent Saturday, April 1, with his commanding officer, Rear Admiral Raphael Semmes of the Alabama, at the war department in Richmond, packing documents in wooden boxes to be moved with the Confederate Government. Secretary of War John C. Breckinridge joined them, along with other Confederate cabinet members. Clement C. Clay, Jr. dropped by Davis’ house and found the President packing a valise with little heaps of paper scattered about the room. Stephen Mallory remembered there was “no confusion, no noise, no undue excitement; for this contingency had long been anticipated, and to a large extent provided for.” Robert E. Lee had informed Jefferson Davis that Richmond could no longer be protected. By the night of April 2^nd, the last train had left Richmond. Swallow and many other clerks were unable to find space on the crowded trains. They rode horses to arrive at Burkesville Junction late on the night of April 3^rd after crossing the Appomattox River. Burkesville was “encumbered with broken down trains,” and it was afternoon before they were able to board a functioning locomotive. They finally arrived at Danville, Virginia where clerks Micajah H. Clark and Swallow began opening wooden boxes and “fixing up rooms” with Breckinridge and Jefferson Davis. By April 10^th the rooms were ready, but news of the Appomattox armistice resulted in clerks repacking boxes for their move to Charlotte by wagons. Rail lines were shut down. Swallow followed the Confederate leadership from Danville to Greensboro where Joseph E. Johnston’s Army of Tennessee faced William Tecumseh Sherman. “Along the way we could see how unfriendly the people were to us. Nearly every man with whom we conversed showed in a manner not to be mistaken how glad he was at the fall of Richmond. And stranger still, almost everybody seemed to think that Mr. Davis was personally responsible for all our misfortunes. . . .” E. T. Watehall witnessed the fall of Richmond and saw African Americans, directed by federals, working fire pumps. He thought the fires were accidental and Yankees thought the fires impeded their progress. Union cavalry rode in with bands playing The Girl I Left Behind as African American soldiers marched to the tune of Dixie. Citizens of the city welcomed Union troops who established law and order. “Some women and boys stood on the corner and waved little Union flags.” When Swallow was preparing to leave Greensboro, he had to secure a horse because five minutes after Davis’ train crossed a tall trestle on the Haw River north Greensboro, Stoneman destroyed the bridge ending rail service. “When Davis was told of his narrow escape he said only, ‘A miss is as good as a mile.’” The Confederates rode horses or wagons from Greensboro to Charlotte. These modes of transportation, according to Swallow, “presented an appearance little calculated to produce enthusiastic admiration.” After a long trek Swallow arrived in Abbeville, South Carolina and found it to be “as lovely a little spot as can be found in the South.” He had found a “beautiful village on an eminence.” His observations reflected the dichotomy between locations where armies clashed and places unscathed by war.^[43]

The “crushing intelligence of what had transpired at Appomattox C. H. on the 9^th,” extinguished the last spark of hope in many Confederates. Conditions in Virginia and North Carolina were chaotic with the collapse of both the government and the Army of Northern Virginia. Davis left Danville on April 10, the day before Lee’s army surrendered, passed through Salisbury and reached Greensboro on May 11. Micajah H. Clark wrote that Stoneman “caused delays because he was cutting railroads” and he persisted in this work at will. George Stoneman was a Major General of the United States Volunteers over the District of East Tennessee, a section of the Department of Cumberland commanded by Major General George Thomas, “The Rock of Chickamauga.” Stoneman’s directive from Thomas, “to operate against Charlotte and forces moving south,” indicated the Army of the Cumberland was attacking from the west while W. T. Sherman’s forces surrounded Joseph E. Johnston’s Army of the Tennessee near Greensboro. Stoneman moved so rapidly his predations were surprises. Stoneman attacked the Salisbury area when Davis was in the town and continued destroying objectives there until after 2:00 p.m. on April 13. His presence represented the possibility of a pincer movement that could capture the Confederate high command.^[44]

On April 4, in William T. Sutherlin’s library, Jefferson Davis composed a message noting that even though the evacuation of Richmond was a moral and material defeat, it could lead to a benefit. Losing control of cities that demanded so many resources, he argued, would provide Confederate armies the mobility to strike the enemy then move rapidly into the Confederate heartland where local supplies were sufficient to support military forces. Hattaway and Beringer noted that historians such as Emory Thomas, William C. Davis, and Michael Ballard believed Davis was proposing guerrilla warfare. W. C. Davis thought Jefferson Davis’ proclamation “promised fantastical results based on his misrepresentation of circumstances that simply did not exist, and he, more than anyone else, except Lee and Breckinridge, was armed with information and experience . . . to demonstrate the utter impracticability of his plans.” Hattaway and Beringer endorsed William C. Davis’ position that, if Jefferson Davis were sincerely calling for guerrilla warfare, he was delusional. Whatever Davis intended on May 4, when he reached Greensboro, he seemed not depressed but ready to continue the war. Judah Benjamin had Davis’ message printed and distributed. This distribution was limited because telegraph wires had been cut. John Wise, son of former Virginia Governor Henry Wise, served Davis as a courier. On one night trip Wise could look ahead and see fires on the sides of the tracks. As the train approached, he realized there were Union engineers using the light from the fires to change the gauge to the Union’s standard gauge. Davis sent Wise to find Robert E. Lee to ascertain his situation. Wise returned to the Sutherlin home and informed the President that Lee’s only alternative was to surrender. After conferring with his Cabinet, Davis asked Wise to return to Lee the next day, April 9, 1865. [45]

Colonel John Taylor Wood moved his family from Richmond to Greensboro and boarded “in rooms that were few and small.” He took in Jefferson Davis while other officers remained in railroad cars characterized by Mallory as “dilapidated and leaky.” He contrasted “this pitiable phase of human nature” to the trip from Charlotte to Washington, Georgia when Davis was given “uniform kindness, courtesy, and hospitality.” Mallory found that in Greensboro citizens’ “doors were closed and their ‘latchstrings pulled in’ against the members of a retreating government.” There was some hospitality exhibited when local men supplied the presidential party with liquor.

Mallory noted that, “like true men of the world”, those in the “Cabinet car” were in good humor, “seasoned by a flow of good spirits, which threw a charm around the wretched shelter and made their situation seem rather a matter of choice than of necessity.” Burton Harrison was in Greensboro and observed the citizens’ “indifference to what should become of us.” A few with whom he spoke explained “their fear that, if they entertained us, their houses would be burned by the enemy. . . .” Harrison reported that the owners of the house where Wood boarded preferred that Davis leave because “they were unwilling to have the vengeance of Stoneman’s cavalry brought upon them by his presence in their house.” James C. Clark noted that there were pro-Union meetings in Greensboro during the war and that when Davis entered the city, he “crossed the line from leader of a country to a hunted criminal.”^[46]

In April 1865 conditions in the Salisbury-Charlotte area grew worse. A special three-car train (an engine, a flat car, and a boxcar) was sent from Charlotte to Salisbury for the Davis group. John T. Moore, a Confederate soldier in Charlotte, was assigned as one of five men who rode this train. Confederate veterans headed home captured the train, “crowded on as long as a man could hang on, and then they opened the throttle of the engine and ‘let her go.’” Moore claimed the five Confederate guards on the second train to Salisbury were told “to shoot any soldier who got on the train without permission.” On April 20^th Breckinridge, who was negotiating with Johnston and Sherman, wrote to explain that the train he waited on had not arrived in Salisbury. “I presume it was seized by paroled prisoners and straggling solders to convey them to Charlotte. On its arrival there the ringleaders should be seized and severely punished.” It was an outrageous situation when a group of former soldiers could seize and use trains designated for the President and the Secretary of War. Breckinridge learned Stoneman had destroyed the Haw River trestle between Charlotte and Greensboro. The day before the April 9^th armistice between Robert E. Lee and Ulysses Grant, Braxton Bragg reported that one thousand “straggling cavalry from Lee’s army” were said to be “marauding and

plundering.”[47] Greensboro was a logistical center for the Confederates with warehouses for munition and supplies. On April 15 “a crowd composed of soldiers, desperate civilians, and former slaves . . . ransacked a Confederate storeroom.” These incidents reflect the chaos following the collapse of the Confederate government and army. The anarchy that reigned in Greensboro imitated that of Danville.[48]

When he accompanied Davis to Greensboro Harrison witnessed a Home Guard unit break a charge of Confederate cavalry. Greensboro had large stores of supplies to support Johnston’s Army of Tennessee. After days of threats a Confederate cavalry “charged down the road in considerable force” but the troopers were beaten off by with one volley. Harrison saw “saddles emptied,” as the charge was broken. More insidious for the Confederacy, he noted “pilfering from the stores went on briskly all the time; and I fancy that, immediately after we left, there was a general scramble for what remained of the supplies.”^[49]

Evidence that Confederates were deserting was common in the piedmont regions of South and North Carolina in 1865. On March 30, 1865, Mary Boykin Chesnut, in Chester, told a visitor, “‘I pass my days and nights partly at this window. I am sure our army is silently dispersing. Men are passing the wrong way – all the time they slip by. No songs or shouts now. They have given the thing up.’” This marching was without “tap of drum.” She saw a woman in a “cracker bonnet at the depot in Charlotte who signaled her husband as they dragged him off. ‘Take it easy Jake – you desert again, quick as you kin – come back to your wife and children.’ And she continued to yell, ‘Desert Jake! Desert again, Jake!’”^[50]

Robert E. Lee was sufficiently concerned about morale as early as February 24, 1865, that he wrote Breckinridge about “the alarming number of desertions that are now occurring in the army.” He attributed high desertions to families back at home who were “despondent as to our success.” He advocated a “stern enforcement of the law, but that alone will not suffice.” The only solution to the problem he knew was to change public opinion. “These desertions have a very bad effect upon the troops who remain and give rise to painful apprehension.” Burton Harrison rode to Lee’s camps in the spring of 1865 and reported that the army was melting away. Davis seemed oblivious to conditions and the events after February 1865 only exacerbated his inability to face reality.^[51]

On April 18, 1865, Broomfield L. Ridley, a Captain serving under Joseph E. Johnston, wrote in his diary, “desertion every night is frightful.” Joseph Haw, an Ordinance Department clerk and the newest and youngest member of Brigadier General George Gibbs Dibrell’s brigade, was deputized to talk with Dibrell on April 27^th. He found Dibrell on the bank of the Catawba in a small “A” tent, sitting with other officers. Haw told Dibrell that they were supposed to escort Davis across the Mississippi, but he had heard the men talking about going home. Dibrell “answered me in five words: ‘we are not going home.’” By April there were ominous indications members of Johnston’s Army of Tennessee owed their allegiance to their homes. On April 14, Brigadier General Alfred Iverson of Johnston’s Army reported on demoralization among the men and that Virginia troops wanted to go home. On the same day Brigadier General Collett Leventhrope reported a “material alteration in the morale of the troops” at Greensboro. “Desertions are becoming very numerous. About 200 men of one battalion abandoned their post last night, and the remaining men of this force state openly their intention to return to their homes.” There were gallant men in his command, “but the fact of the demoralization of the majority is, I fear, indisputable.” Colonel A. M. Booe wrote that men from Lee’s and Johnston’s armies were leaving and that made his men “very impatient under the present excitement. . . .” Booe found it “almost impossible for me to hold them together. Please instruct me what to do.” Lieutenant General William Joseph Hardee understood the situation in Salem, North Carolina on April 18. “A large number of my command deserted last night, some with horses from the reserve artillery. I anticipate many more will go today and tonight.” Broomfield F. Ridley found that “desertion every night is frightful.” A group of officers in North Carolina requested Jefferson Davis to disband their unit so the men could go home to protect their “wives and little ones” in Virginia. Davis refused, and responded that “our best hope of recovery from the reverses and disasters to which you refer” was to continue fighting. “You will agree that duty to the country must take precedence of any personal desire.” Davis seemed devoid of empathy. Most men believed their primary duty was to their families who had to cope with anarchy. Davis was out of touch with his men. This message was sent on April 19^th, ten days after Lee signed the armistice offered by Grant, and eight days before Johnston surrendered to Sherman, leaving no Confederate forces east of the Chattahoochee River in Georgia.^[52]

The absence of Confederate defenders and the presence of Union forces encouraged lawlessness. Major General Jacob Dolson Cox, commanding the Twenty-Third Army Corps, United States Army, distributed a circular the day the Army of Northern Virginia surrendered. “Since we left Goldsborough there has been a constant succession of house burning in rear of this command. This has never before been the case since the corps was organized, and the prospect of speedy peace makes this more than ever reprehensible.” He ordered division commanders to punish any Union soldier, regardless of his unit. “Anyone found firing a dwelling house, or any building in close proximity to one, should be summarily shot.” He ordered the advancing division to leave a sentry at every inhabited house they passed, “to be relieved in succession from other divisions as they come up. . . .”^[53]

In Greensboro Joseph E. Johnston and Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard met in Johnston’s private railroad car within sight of Jefferson Davis’ car on April 12. Aware of the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia, they anticipated discussing with Davis the continuation or termination of the war. When Davis, Benjamin, Secretary of Navy Stephen Mallory and Postmaster General John Henninger Reagan met, it quickly became apparent that Davis’ objective was “to give not obtain information. . . .” Davis opined that “in two or three weeks he would have a large army in the field by bringing back into the ranks those who had abandoned them in less desperate circumstances, and by calling out the enrolled men whom the conscript bureau with its forces had been unable to bring into the army.” The military officers argued “that men who had left the army when our cause was not desperate, and who under the same circumstances, could not be forced into it would scarcely, in the present desperate condition of our affairs, enter the service upon mere invitation. Neither opinions nor information was asked, and the conference terminated.” Confederate logistics were insufficient as they were and suggesting that armies might move around was absurd. Davis’ suggestion created the specter of guerrilla warfare, anathema to northern and southern military leaders because it would cause excessive loss of life for years without changing the inevitable outcome.^[54]

The same day Secretary of War John C. Breckinridge visited Johnston’s private car. The two agreed that the “Southern Confederacy was overthrown.” Both agreed to inform Davis that the only power he possessed was to terminate the war and that should be accomplished rapidly. Breckinridge promised to let Johnston have a hearing at the meeting with Davis scheduled for the next morning. Mallory visited Johnston and urged him to broach the subject of peace talks with Davis. Johnston thought this message was best delivered by “constitutional advisers,” and relayed this exchange to Breckenridge.^[55]

The next morning, May 13^th, Davis met with cabinet members and after some time the generals were invited to join the meeting. The President inquired about the relative number of combatants in the war, and the generals estimated the Union had seventeen or eighteen servicemen for each Confederate combatant. Johnston told Davis, “It would be one of the greatest of human crimes for us to attempt to continue the war; for, having neither money nor credit, nor arms but those in the hands of solders, nor ammunition but that in their cartridge-boxes nor shops for repairing arms. . . .” He argued that termination of hostilities was essential. Johnston warned that to continue fighting would “complete the devastation of our country and the ruin of our people.” He recommended Davis exercise the only power he had left and negotiate peace. Breckenridge, Mallory, and Reagan thought it was “absolutely necessary to make peace.” Benjamin did not urge peace. Hattaway and Beringer suggested that what Benjamin said was not what he sincerely believed. William C. Davis thought Benjamin’s support of Jefferson Davis was part of his attempt to convince Davis to leave the country as soon as possible. Johnston told Davis that in similar situations in the past, military adversaries had initiated discussions. He volunteered to approach Sherman. Davis said he would make such a contact in a letter to Sherman. Johnston suggested that Mallory, who was recognized as an effective writer, quickly compose a message. On May 14^th, Mallory’s letter was taken to Wade Hampton who sent it to Sherman. Negotiations began and continued until April 26. The Army of the Confederate States of America (ACSA) used the same rank system as the United States army. The top rank was General (Four Stars, sometimes called a full General). There were five ACSA Generals: Samuel Cooper (Adjutant and Inspector General), Albert Sidney Johnston, Robert E. Lee, Joseph E. Johnston, P. G. T. Beauregard, and Braxton Bragg listed in order of seniority. By the middle of May 1865 three of the six had been terminated (Albert Sydney Johnston by death) leaving only Joseph E. Johnston, P. G. T. Beauregard, and Braxton Bragg. In the middle of April, two of the three strongly recommended that Davis terminate the war and Bragg made the same recommendation when he next met Davis. Davis’ refusal to follow his own leadership was a remarkable example of narcissism. Federal military leaders realized the Confederate army was impotent and not provocative.^[56]

After a tentative agreement was reached, Reagan wrote the draft that might serve as a surrender document. Sherman proposed a meeting with Johnston at 8:00 a. m. on April 17^th “at a point midway between our advance at Durham and his [Johnston’s] rear at Hillsboro.”  The two men met at the house of James Bennett near the midway point.

Sherman referred to the asymmetrical power between the two armies. Johnston agreed that “further fighting would be ‘murder’” and proposed they make a peace embracing all forces. Sherman believed that the general population of the North harbored no ill feelings toward the soldiers of the Confederacy, but most had vindictive feelings toward Jefferson Davis and his close advisers.^[57]

Prior to the meeting Sherman was at the Durham depot when the first accounts of Lincoln’s assassination began to arrive on the telegraph. After the meeting Sherman invited Johnston to ride with him back to the Durham depot to read the wires. Sherman said that his men loved Lincoln and he feared that some citizens of Raleigh would make disparaging remarks about Lincoln “and that a fate worse than Columbia would befall Raleigh.” News of the assassination spread quickly, and the local population seemed somber, not celebratory. Varina Davis heard of the assassination and immediately thought it put Jefferson Davis’ life in danger.^[58]

Sherman returned to discuss surrender terms with his generals. They covered all possibilities they could envision. One consideration was an anticipated question regarding Jefferson Davis. One suggested that Davis could be allowed to escape with his fugitive cabinet. One general suggested “if asked for, we should even provide a vessel to carry them to Nassau from Charleston.” Burke Davis, commenting on Lincoln’s last cabinet meeting the day before he died, indicated Sherman’s position on Davis may have come from Lincoln. Postmaster General William Dennison, Jr. stated he did not think Lincoln would be sorry to have the Confederate leadership “escape out of the country,” to which Lincoln replied, “I should be following them pretty close to make sure of their going.”^[59]

On April 18^th Sherman was at the Bennett house at noon but Johnston arrived around 2:00 p. m. Johnston asked if Breckinridge, Secretary of War, might join the discussion and Sherman refused because the discussions were between belligerents. Johnston pointed out that Breckinridge was a major general and Sherman changed his answer. After discussions began a messenger arrived with the proposed terms of surrender written by Postmaster General Reagan. Sherman read Reagan’s peace proposals and found them to be too general and verbose. Sherman then wrote terms using the ideas expressed by Lincoln at the March 27^th meeting of Lincoln, Grant and Sherman at City Point, Virginia. Sherman’s writing style, succinct and excellent, was a precursor to twentieth century authors. Breckinridge and Johnston read Sherman’s proposals and agreed at once. While copies of the agreement were being handwritten, the generals involved went into the yard and mingled with their officers. Sherman advised Johnston to “get away” as soon as possible because there would be retribution for a United States Vice President who took up arms against his country. Sherman also advised “him that Mr. Davis too should get abroad as soon as possible.” Breckinridge had discussed the issue of leaving the country with Reagan. They decided their first duty was to Jefferson Davis and they would risk capture to get Davis out of the country. This decision reached by Johnston, Breckinridge and Sherman effectively ended the war. The generals on both sides feared guerrilla warfare with an inevitable extension of bitter fighting. These generals worked together from this date to May 10^th when Davis was captured to avoid further armed conflict. Davis constantly challenged this decision. ^[60]

The agreement reached on April 18 was rejected in Washington. Caroline Janney succinctly elucidated the dilemma: “has the eleven seceded engaged in war, or in insurrection?”  With the former alternative, no one committed treason. In the latter case, former Confederates could be executed. Grant’s terms at Appomattox “promised that Lee’s solders would be left alone so long as they observed the law of the land.” Sherman’s terms could be interpreted as an acknowledgement that no one committed treason, “thereby undermining the legality of emancipation and confiscation of land.” Lincoln telegraphed Grant to avoid political questions when negotiating with Lee. “Sherman’s job was not to adjudicate such political terms but to force a military capitulation.”[61]

Certainly, Sherman’s attitude toward Davis was at odds with those who thought Davis may have been involved in the assassination. On April 18^th Sherman wrote General Henry Wager Halleck, “I cannot believe that even Mr. Davis was privy to the diabolical plot but think it the emanation of a set of young men of the South who are very devils.” One persistent rumor was that Davis had amassed a huge amount of specie to take across the Mississippi and rebuild his military. That, in fact, was Davis’ plan, but his funding and troop numbers were insignificant. United States Brigadier General David Palmer submitted a report of his actions from mid-April to May 6.  Davis and his escort crossed the Broad River into Union County, while Palmer passed on a report that they had $10,000,000 in specie. Michael Lightner, a member of the Fifty-fifth Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment, was a spy embedded in Davis’ escort. Lightner reported there was $15,000,000 in coins contained in fifty wagons. Every man who reached the Mississippi with Davis, Lightner had heard, would get $100.  On May 3, 1865, Major General George Thomas, in Nashville, passed on a report that Davis had been in York, South Carolina in April, with between $6,000,000 and $8,000,000 in gold. When Sherman and Johnston came to an agreement, Secretary of War Edward Stanton informed Stoneman that Davis had $6,000,000 to $13, 000,000 in specie, and to “spare no exertion to stop Davis and his plunder.” General Grant was sent to consult with Sherman, and the surrender agreement was signed on April 26 to take effect on April 27. The surrender of  Johnston’s Army relinquished all Confederate territory from the Atlantic to the Chattahoochee River on the western border of Georgia. All Confederate personnel had to swear allegiance to the United States, disarm, receive a parole, and go home. Persistent rumors of Confederate gold and silver, utterly empty of truth, did influence decisions and probably were most influential during the negotiations between Johnston and Sherman. However, Confederate resources were depleted, a fact that became more evident every day. Sherman understood the enormity of the misinformation about the Confederate gold and silver riches. He wrote that “the thirteen millions of treasure, with which Jeff. Davis was to corrupt our armies and buy his escape, dwindled down to the contents of a valise!”^[62]

Janney’s research shows that young officers inclined to continue to fight after April 12, 1865, were well-educated elitists who were the most extreme exponents of secession in the 1850s. But this group did not advocate guerrilla warfare. “If the specter of guerrilla warfare motivated Grant’s generous parole policy in the wake of Appomattox, it drove Sherman to offer Confederates far more than they might have dared to expect.”[63]

The dramatic events between April 2 and April 18 were difficult for Davis to assimilate intellectually and emotionally. Confederate deserters and veterans were strewn out along railroads and highways between Virginia and all points south and west. The Confederate government had disintegrated. Micajah H. Clark, destined to be Acting Secretary of the Treasury, wrote that “from Danville on, I saw the government, with its personnel, slowly but surely falling to pieces.” Soldiers who were determined to continue the war tried to join Johnston’s Army of Tennessee, but before they could do so it was no more. The end of the Army of Northern Virginia shocked many, but anyone cognizant of the military situation understood the inevitable outcome. On March 29 Louis Trezevant Wigfall, the cantankerous Texan who had resigned his commission, told Mary Boykin Chesnut, “‘The game is up.’” He was going home. She wrote: “when the hanging begins, he will step over into Mexico.”^[64]

While Davis and his chief advisers were in Greensboro, Confederate forces in the west were falling apart. Brigadier General Basil Wilson Duke commanded Kentucky cavalrymen, many of whom were without mounts in April 1865. Shortly after April 2^nd news that Richmond had been abandoned, arrived. Duke’s command prepared to move east and join Joseph E. Johnston’s army near Greensboro. On April 10^th a courier informed Duke that Lee had surrendered. “I never expected anything so dreadful as this, and the announcement almost stunned me.” He and his fellow officers decided not to tell their troops, but the soldiers quickly knew. “The indescribable consternation and amazement which spread like a conflagration through the ranks . . . can scarcely be imagined. . . .” Southerners “had lived under a separate government of their own and had looked upon themselves as constituting a distinct nationality.” That night no one slept. Bonfires were lit and the “men rushed from one crowd to another, hundreds sometimes collecting about a peculiarly fervid speaker.” Some advocated guerrilla warfare, others wanted to march to the “Trans-Mississippi and thence to Mexico.” Many men who lived in western Virginia simply left to walk home after that night. Most who remained wanted to join Joseph E. Johnston near Greensboro. The next morning infantrymen were furloughed for sixty days because they would be unable to reach Johnston. They were to return to duty if the army survived. Cavalry horses spent the winter some distance away where there was sufficient food, forcing Duke’s men to find horses or use mules. Artillery batteries were spiked, and carriages burned. “The artillery horses and several hundred mules . . . were turned over to my brigade that I might mount my men.” Some cavalry commanders, “declared their convictions that further resistance was impossible” and went home. Duke and Brigadier General John Crawford Vaughn believed their obligations were not “absolved from our military allegiance.” On the evening of May 11^th, he and Vaughn began a march which ended “with the final surrender of the last Confederate organization east of the Mississippi River.” Duke and Vaughn reached Charlotte on April 18^th, the same day Jefferson Davis arrived from Greensboro with Brigadier General George Gibes Dibrell and Colonel William C. P. Breckinridge, John C. Breckinridge’s cousin. Waiting for them in Charlotte was Brigadier General Samuel Wagg Ferguson. These Kentucky men led the escorting brigades for Davis from Charlotte to the Savannah River.^[65]

When Davis and his staff traveled from Greensboro to Charlotte, without a rail connection, they found roads turned into mud. At times occupants would have to get out of the conveyances, find fence rails, and pry wagons out of the mud. Burton Harrison, Judah P. Benjamin, and General Samuel Cooper rode in a worn-out ambulance at “a snail’s pace” with mud over the wheel hubs at times. The first night, April 15, they had an excellent meal but poor accommodations at the home of John Hiatt four miles north of Jamestown. A servant thought Samuel Cooper was Davis and gave him the choice bed, while all others had to sleep on the floor. When they left, Hiatt gave Davis a handsome filly. They passed the village of High Point on April 16, and that night camped out in a pine grove four miles from Lexington. This was the first night they had to camp out since leaving Richmond. In both Lexington and Salisbury, they faced the “same cold indifference” encountered in Greensboro. On the night of April 17^th at Salisbury, Thomas G. Haughton, rector of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, invited Davis to sleep in a bed. The others slept on the front piazza. A few days before they arrived Stoneman had wrought havoc on Salisbury’s streets. In Concord on the night of April 18, Davis stayed with Judge Victor C. Barringer and his wife, Mariah A. Massey Barringer. After the war Barringer spent twenty years as a judge on the International Court of Appeals in Egypt where he spoke fluent French and Arabic. During Davis’ horseback trip from Greensboro to Charlotte, Harrison perceived Davis as a different person. He was “singularly equable and cheerful; he seemed to have a great load taken from his mind, to feel relieved of responsibilities, and his conversation was bright and agreeable.” He talked of men, books, dogs, sports, flora, roads (and how to make them) and birds. He displayed an extraordinary memory. As they neared Charlotte, Harrison sent a courier to Mrs. Davis. Perhaps Davis’ cheerfulness could be attributed not to the negotiations but to his anticipation of a reunion with Varina. If so, he may have become morose later because Varina had left the Queen City. Davis was anxious for word about Varina and asked Harrison to find his family, probably in Abbeville, and to use his judgement about what to do. He said he would “make his way as quickly as possible to the Trans-Mississippi Department, to join the army under Kirby Smith.”^[66]

On April 13, 1865, Stoneman sent a message stating he had remained in Salisbury for two days and was moving to the south side of the Catawba River to operate against Charlotte.^[67] Stoneman’s move to the area created fear among residents and made it difficult to find rooms in Charlotte. Abram Weill, who took in Varina and her children, housed Judah P Benjamin, his brother, St. Martin Benjamin, and Burton Harrison. George and Anna Trenholm went to the William F. Phifer house, and George Davis was a guest of William Myers.^[68]

Burton Harrison wrote that it was difficult to secure lodging for Davis because people in Charlotte were afraid “that whoever entertained him would have his house burned by the enemy.” Lewis F. Bates, Davis’ host, was a man of northern birth who lived alone with his servants. He was the local agent for the Southern Express Company. His “broad, well-equipped sideboard” was always available, “not at all a seemly place for Mr. Davis.” A crowd gathered and the President was called on to speak. Before, during or after Davis’ speech a telegram arrived and was read to the crowd, creating quite a controversy over the details. This message informed Davis that Abraham Lincoln had been assassinated. On April 19, 1865, Bates testified that Davis read the telegram from John C. Breckinridge announcing the assassination of Lincoln. Harrison remembered that Davis entered the house without reading aloud the message about Lincoln’s death, but another man got the note and read it. At least one observer wrote that during his address Davis proclaimed that no foot of Virginia soil would be lost. Confederates would “return again and again to rescue it.” Harrison quoted Davis as saying he would “not despair of the Confederacy,” but would remain to the last. Later in Charlotte, Davis seemed relaxed and told Harrison “I cannot feel like a beaten man!”^[69]

On April 22 Breckinridge and John Reagan, who also were negotiating with Johnston and Sherman, returned to Charlotte. President Davis called a meeting for the next day at 10:00 a. m. at the William Pfifer House. Everyone had a copy of the proposed terms negotiated by Johnston and Sherman. Davis asked each person to put his ideas on paper. Breckinridge told Reagan that Sherman informed Johnston that if Davis would escape quickly, he would not interfere. Davis was informed of this offer and was incensed with the idea that he might follow any suggestion from Sherman. Reagan remembered that Davis replied, “‘I shall do no act which will put me under obligations to the Federal Government.’” Sherman’s offer of assistance seemed to encourage Davis’ determination not to surrender. Sherman wrote to John A. Rawlins, Chief of Staff in Washington, DC on May 9th that he was under the impression that Henry Halleck, Secretary of War, would prefer that Davis “escape from the country. . . .” If Sherman were correct, Henry Halleck probably gave Sherman that impression before Lincoln’s assassination changed everything. After the assassination a $100,000 bounty was offered to anyone who captured Davis.^[70]

John Archibald Campbell, a native of Washington, Georgia, was a member of the United States Supreme Court who resigned and returned to become Assistant Secretary of War for the Confederacy. In March 1865 he reported on the nature of the Confederate cause to Secretary of War Breckinridge. The war department’s debt, between four and five hundred million dollars, “paralyzed” the department for “want of money and credit.” His estimated expenses for 1865 were $1.3 billion. There were few conscripts, the attempt to use African Americans as troops had failed and Campbell estimated there were 100,000 deserters in southern states. Troops could not obtain subsistence because the abundant supplies in some areas could not be moved where they were needed. This paucity of supplies was “aggravated by the subjugation of the most productive parts of the country, the devastation of other portions, and the destruction of railroads.” He thought conditions in Georgia were “in a state that may properly be called insurrectionary against Confederate authorities.” He noted serious divisions in other states. Campbell’s report emphasized the hopelessness for the Confederacy as Breckinridge negotiated to end the war.[71]

Davis called a meeting on April 23^rd in the directors’ room of the Bank of North Carolina, his office during his sojourn in Charlotte.[72] Breckinridge responded to Jefferson Davis’ request that advisers write down their recommendations before meeting. He noted that Joseph E. Johnston’s army had only 14,700 effective soldiers. Breckinridge found it incredulous that anyone would consider fighting Sherman’s army of 80,000 with less than 15,000 men. “Our ports are closed, and the sources of foreign supplies lost to us.” United States forces occupied most or all of Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, and North Carolina “and move almost at will through the other states east of the Mississippi.” Union forces captured Selma, Montgomery, Columbus, Macon, and other towns, “depriving us of large depots of supplies and of munitions of war.” Confederate troops who remained with their commands contained many unarmed men, and the ordnance department was unable to provide 5,000 small arms. Breckinridge estimated it to be impossible to assemble 30,000 men anywhere east of the Mississippi. To continue the struggle would be “to lose entirely the dignity of regular warfare.” Southern states would make peace with the Union so that the situation would “probably degenerate into that irregular and secondary stage out of which greater evils will flow to the South than to the enemy.” Breckinridge wanted “to put a stop to the war. The terms proposed are not wholly unsuited to the altered condition of affairs.” Breckinridge thought Davis was the “only person who can meet the present necessities.” In all the discussion from Charlotte to Washington, Georgia and beyond, Davis retained his own plan to cross the Mississippi and continue the war. Breckinridge did not ignore Davis’ vision of a resurrected Confederate army; he lent an ear to a plan from Wade Hampton. He also asked Joseph E. Johnston’s opinion about the possibility of protracted conflict in a handwritten note. Johnston responded the next morning. “Your dispatch received. We have to save the people, save the blood of the army, and save the high civil functionaries.” Hampton’s plan, Johnston wrote, “can only do the last.” Hampton’s plan did get some traction, but, as noted below, failed. Johnston thought what they could accomplish was to avoid invasion, make terms for the soldiers, and give the President a cavalry escort to get him out of the country “without loss of a moment.” He characterized the plan as impracticable.  The generals “believe the troops will not fight again.”^[73]

The Cabinet’s advice, that there was little hope of saving the Confederacy, was anathema for Davis. His civilian and military advisers were determined to save Davis from himself by getting him out of the United States. This loggerhead was repeated in all similar discussions during the journey that ended in Irwinville, Georgia on May 10^th.^[74]

Secretary of War Breckinridge described the details of Johnston’s surrender to Sherman at a presumably secret and brief meeting in Charlotte just after dawn on April 26. The surrender included a statement that Confederates who accepted it had “an obligation not to bear arms against the United States. . . .” With the surrender, Johnston’s Army of Tennessee ceased to exist. Davis and his cabinet contended their escort was composed of legal troops because they were detached from their commands, and arrived in Charlotte before Johnston’s surrender. The soldiers in Davis’ escort were cognizant of their ambivalent position. Basil Duke wrote that when Breckinridge returned from the meeting with Johnston and Sherman on April 22, his Kentucky troops who were “warmly attached to him” welcomed him enthusiastically. A number of these men sat and conversed with him for over an hour. They wanted to know the terms of the agreement and “he answered all questions with perfect frankness.”  Breckinridge then “carried the same message to Duke and his men when he visited their camp that very afternoon.” He spent hours talking with them frankly and he continued to be their favorite.^[75]

One of the persisting myths of the Civil War is the belief that in early 1865, Confederates were woefully outnumbered. Contemporary research in the Official Records of the War of the Rebellion demonstrates that both Lee and Johnston had large numbers in March 1865. Of course, the quality of those Confederate soldiers was much below that of Union men, largely due to the protracted nature of the war, a smaller population base, and the necessity of dealing with millions of slaves anticipating freedom and collapsed logistics. The Confederate logistical system, always inferior, simply wore out. The United States logistical system constantly expanded. According to William Marvel, Lee had 77,000 men in March 1865 but lost 20,200 deserters by April 3, leaving between 51,200 and 57,200. He calculated between 25,000 and 27,000 obtained paroles at Appomattox. A more recent study by Elizabeth R. Varon concludes that Grant had approximately 60,000 men within ten miles of Appomattox and that Lee began his retreat with 60,000 men and ended it with 30,000 within four miles of Appomattox. This precisely agreed with Emory Thomas’ estimate of Lee’s force on April 1, 1865. Varon calculated that there were 28,000 parole slips issued by the Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox. Marvel and Veron developed their statistics from the Official Records of the War of the Rebellion, produced decades after the war. Thomas, Marvel and Varon agreed that there were 60,000 Confederate soldiers in the Richmond area on April 1, 1865. Caroline Janney wrote that by April 15 there were 12,000 men from the Army of Northern Virginia who had not surrendered, were floating around floating around and eventually went home.^[76]

Davis later wrote that he was confident, and anticipated reinforcements when he reached Washington, Georgia. When he arrived in Washington his escorting brigades refused to go farther, demanded pay in silver and went home. Davis’ recollections seem fantastic considering the constant discussions and intransigent position of his advisers.^[77]

There were two waves of soldiers that left Virginia by mid-April 1865: deserters or those incapacitated before May 2^nd; those who marched out of Richmond on May 2^nd but were not in the vicinity of Appomattox (they were wounded or scattered in the fighting or simply began walking home without a parole); and those 28,000 who received paroles at Appomattox. The massive flow of soldiers that streamed out of Virginia was overwhelming. These hordes put demands on residents along travel routes. These men were Confederate veterans, and not soldiers. Some who left Appomattox intended to join Joseph E. Johnston but did not understand the April 12^th surrender meant they could not fight. Janney quoted Beauregard who declared he would “‘uphold the honorable rules of civilized warfare.’” The course of events negated the possibility of many men from the Army of Northern Virginia joining the army of Tennessee. Joseph E. Johnston had to surrender his “effective fighting force” of less than 14,179 by April 27^th. A second flood of veterans marching homeward exacerbated the pressure on routes from Virginia to the south and west. Many families, including African Americans, fed and cared for the returning veterans while others suffered from the hordes of hungry men. Union officials attempted to distinguish between Confederate veterans going home and those who might become guerrillas.  Joseph E. Johnston continued working for his men after he surrendered. He tried to move his defeated army out as units to lessen the problems coincidental to tens of thousands moving south and west with inadequate logistical support. Davis wrote, in The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, that if all the Confederate troops drifting around had gravitated to Charlotte, Reconstruction might have been avoided. But these hordes were veterans, and no longer soldiers. The massive movement of Confederate soldiers described above was homeward bound and away from, not toward further conflict.^[78]

Wade Hampton contacted Davis on April 19, suggesting an alternative to surrender. He thought enough cavalrymen from Johnston combined with soldiers headed home could cross the Mississippi, unite with trans-Mississippi Confederate forces, and raid Union states. This idea challenged the opposition to a guerrilla war. When the initial agreement between Sherman and Johnston, coming just after the assassination of Lincoln, was rejected in Washington, Hampton visited Davis again and obtained permission to lead cavalry across the Mississippi contingent on Johnston’s approval. On April 25, Breckinridge contacted Johnston, suggesting that he might release cavalry to Hampton with transportation and “animals as they may require.”  That was the date of Hampton’s second visit with Davis. Hampton reached Johnston after the April 26 conclusion of negotiations signed the next day, and Hampton’s proposal was dead in the water. Hampton met with his men, explained the situation and, according to some present, there was a tearful departure. Hampton told Breckinridge he would join the Davis group. What happened to Hampton is not clear. He rode all night but did not find Davis and his escort, who was, by this time, west of the Catawba River. Breckinridge left Brigadier General Zebulon York at the Catawba River bridge to contact Hampton. Zebulon York informed Breckinridge, on April 29, that he had answered Hampton “at every point along the line, informing him that the ferry at this point was in good order and that you had ordered me to hold it till he came, which I shall do regardless of the consequences. . . .”  Robert Ackerman, who wrote Wade Hampton III, noted that Hampton reached York, where his wife was a refugee, too late to catch Davis. Walter Cisco, in Wade Hampton: Confederate Warrior, was not concerned with Hampton’s reaction to the surrender. Rod Andrew, in Wade Hampton, Confederate Warrior to Southern Redeemer, was more positive about Hampton’s plan and his determination not to concede defeat. On May 2 Hampton arrived in York where Mary, his wife, convinced him not to ride farther. Hampton’s quixotic plan was the last gasp of Davis’ attempts to continue the struggle. Hampton, like Sanco Panza, was tilting at windmills on behalf of his Don Quixote.^[79]

Footnotes: Chapter Three

[40] Herman Hattaway and Richard E. Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 384, 391, 401. Varina Davis, Memoir, vol. 2, 579. Noah Andre Trudeau, Out of the Storm: The End of the Civil War, April-June 1865 (New York: Little Brown and Company, 1994), 189, 197.

[41] Janney, Ends of War, 83-85.

[42] W. Eric Emerson and Karen Stokes, eds., A Confederate Englishman: The Civil War Letters of Henry Wemyss Feilden. (Columbia: The University of South Carolina Press, 2013), 108, 116.

[43] Hataway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 388, 390, 401. W. H. Swallow, “Retreat of the Confederate Government from Richmond to the Gulf,” Magazine of American History, vol. 15, June 1886, 596–600, 605. Stephen R. Mallory, “Last Days of the Confederate Government,” McClure’s Magazine, December 1900, 102. Stewart Sifakis, Who Was Who in the Civil War (New York: Facts on File,1988), 580. Semmes was appointed brigadier general by Davis, but the government fell before the appointment could be confirmed. E. T. Watehall, “Fall of Richmond,” April 3, 1865,” CV, vol. 17, May 1909, 215. James C. Clark, Last Train South, 23. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 62.

[44] H. W. Bruce, “Some Reminiscences of the Second of April 1865,” SHSP, vol. 9, May 1881, 210. Micajah H. Clark, “The Last Days of the Confederate Treasury and What Became of its Specie,” SHSP, vol. 9,  November-December 1881, 542. OR., series 1, vol. 49, part 1, 323-24. James C. Clark, Last Train South, 55.

[45] Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 394-96, 402. Trudeau, End of the Civil War, 95-96, 114-15, 117-18, 192, 198-99. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 80-83, 110-11. Emery M. Thomas, The Confederate Nation, 1861-1865, (New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1979), 301.

[46] Burton N. Harrison, “The Capture of Jefferson Davis,” Century Magazine, November 1883, in Jesse Burton Harrison, ed., Saris Sonis Focisque: Being a Memoir of an American Family, the Harrisons of Skimino, and Particularly of Jesse Burton Harrison and Burton Norvell Harrison (privately printed, 1910, Forgotten Books reprint, London: Dalton House, n.d.), 233-34. William C. Davis, Breckinridge: Statesman, Soldier Symbol (Baton Rouge: Louisiana: Louisiana State university Press, 1974), 509. Mallory, “Last Days,” 1900, 107. James C. Clark, Last Train South, 55-56. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 63-64, 68. Tate, Rise and Fall, 276.

[47] John T. Moore, “Varied War Experiences,” CV, vol. 17, May 1909, 213. OR., series I, vol. 47, part 3, 772, 818., 819. Clark, “Specie,” 542.

[48] Mallory, “Last Days,” 1900, 104. Janney, Ends of War, 127.

[49] Harrison, “Capture of Davis,” 234.

[50] Broomfield L. Ridley, “Captain Ridley’s Journal,” CV, vol. 3, April 1895, 99. Woodward, Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, 773.

[51] OR., series 1, vol. 46, part 2., p. 1254. Tate, Rise and Fall, 258.

[52] Joseph R. Haw, “Last of the C. S. Ordnance Department,” CV, vol. 34, December 1926, 450- 452. OR., series I, vol. 47, part 3, pp. 799, 800, 809.  Ridley, “Ridley’s Journal,” April, 99. OR. series I, vol. 47, part 3, 810. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 33.

[53] OR., series I, vol. 47, part 3, 188-89.

[54] Joseph E. Johnston, Narrative of Military Operations (Columbia: South Carolina, 1874, reprinted with no pagination), Chapter 12. Tate, Rise and Fall, 274-75.

[55] William C. Davis, Breckinridge: Statesman Soldier Symbol, 509. Harrison, “Capture of Davis,” 240. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 69. Janney, Ends of War, 123-25.

[56] Johnston, Military Operations, Chapter 12. Sifakis, Who Was Who, 43-44, 68-69, 142, 235-46, 316-17, 346-47, 380-81, 601-02. Beauregard was terminated on May 10^st, Joseph E. Johnston on May 2^nd, and Bragg on May 10^th the dates they were paroled. Edmund Kirby Smith was a General in the Provisional Army of the Confederate States (PACS). John Bell Hood was appointed General of the ACSA but was not confirmed and remained a Lieutenant General. The ranks for general were Brigadier General (one star), Major General (two stars), Lieutenant General (three stars), and General (four stars). Davis, Breckinridge, Statesman, 509–14. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 70-7, 78-81. Hattaway and Beringer. Jefferson Davis, 404-406. Trudeau, The End of the Civil War, 202-204.

[57] William Tecumseh Sherman, Memoirs of General Sherman (New York: Viking Press, 1990), 835-38.

[58] Sherman, Memoirs, 837, 839. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 89.

[59] Sherman, Memoirs, 840.  Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 72, 79.

[60] Sherman, Memoirs, 840-42. Davis, Breckinridge, Statesman, 514. Caroline E. Janney, Ends of War: The Unfinished Fight of Lee’s Army after Appomattox (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2021), 157-58.

[61] Janney, Ends of War, 145-149.

[62] OR., series I, vol 47, part 3, p. 245. OR., series I, vol. 47, chapter 59, part 1, pp. 29-32; OR., series I, Vol. 47, Ch. 59, Pt. 1, 1080-1084. OR., Series I, vol 49, part 1, p. 548.  OR., series I, vol 49, chapter 61, part 2, p. 622. Though he had some misinformation, Lightner, was a reliable spy. OR., series I, vol 49, chapter 61, part 2, 593. OR.,. series I, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1. 546. Sherman, Memoirs, 861.

[63] Janney, Ends of War, 131-32, 134.

[64] Woodward, Mary Chesnut, 771. Clark, “Retreat from Richmond,” 294.

[65] Basal W. Duke, “After the Fall of Richmond,” Southern Bivouac, New Series, vol. 2, August 1886, 157-58, 160-161.

[66] Harrison, “Capture of Davis,” 236-41, 244. Duke, “After the Fall,” 162. Shingleton, Sea Ghost, 154. Clark, Last Train South, 55. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 80-82, 84. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 409-410. The Charlotte Observer, May 28, 1896, 6.

[67] OR., series I, vol. 49, part 1 p. 323.

[68] Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 85-86, 91.

[69] Joseph G. Fiveash, “When Mr. Davis Heard of Lincoln’s Death,” CV, vol. 15, August 1907, 366. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 77-179. Davis, in Chapter Six, footnote 12, devoted a long discussion to the many accounts of the reading of this telegram and had two conclusions: the telegram was read, and Jefferson Davis had no response. Haw, “Ordinance Department,” 451. Harrison, “Capture of Davis,” 242-43. Lincoln Assassination Conspiracy Trial Home  http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/FTrials/lincolnconspiracy/davistestimony.html accessed  October 2, 2023. Bates stated that Davis said “‘If it were to be done, it were better it were well done.” Bates testified that two days later Davis repeated the sentiment in the presence of John C. Breckinridge who regratted the assassination very much and Davis agreed. Bates interpreted the sentiments that the assassination was unfortunate for the people of the South.

[70] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 178, 179 192, 197. Jefferson Davis held the meeting at the Pfifer home because George Trenholm was bedridden there. Sifakis, Who Was Who, 71-72. Breckinridge had been Vice President of the United Sates before becoming Secretary of War in the late summer of 1864. Breckinridge also outranked all except Bragg because he had advanced to the rank of Major General on April 14, 1862. OR., series I, vol. 47, chapter 59, part 1, 37-38. OR., series I, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 566, Proclamation of President of U. S., May 2, 1865, 566-567. John H. Reagan, Secession, and the Civil War Memoirs of John H. Reagan (Big Byte Books, 2014 reprint of the 1906 original), 169.

[71] OR., I, vol. 51, part 2, 1064-1067, March 5, 1865. Campbell reported massive desertions and was very concerned that Confederate states would begin negotiations with the United States government .

[72] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 117-18.

[73] Clifton Rodes Breckinridge, ed., “Letters and Telegrams of the Confederate Correspondence of General John. C. Breckinridge.” SHSP, vol. 12, 1884, 100-102. Clifton, John C. Breckinridge’s son wrote this article and certified the handwriting was that of his father’s secretary, Colonel James Wilson. There were, he noted, “here and there” a few small changes in the handwriting of his father. John C. Breckinridge’s letter to Joseph E. Johnston, April 24, 1865, 11:00 p. m., “Cypher”, SHSP, vo. 12, 1884, 98. Joseph E. Johnston letter to John C. Breckinridge, April 25, 1865, 10:00 a. m. SHSP, vol. 12, 1884, 98. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 91-94.

[74] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 185-192. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 92-94.

[75] OR., series I, vol., 47, chapter 59, part 1, 29, Sherman to John A. Rawlins, Chief of Staff, Washington DC, May 9, 1865, 31-38; OR., series I, vol. 47, ch. 59, Pt. 1, 1080-1084, report of Maj. Gen. Benjamin F. Cheatham’s corps [from a journal kept by Maj. Henry Hampton, acting assistant adjutant-general January 27–April 27, 1865; Basil Duke. The Civil War Reminiscences of General Basil Duke (Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday, 1911, reprint by Cooper Square Press, 2001), 283. Gary Robert Matthews. Basil Wilson Duke, CSA: The Right Man in the Right Place (Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 2005), 199.

[76] William Marvel, Lee’s Last Retreat: The Flight to Appomattox. (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2002), 201-206. Elizabeth R. Varon, Appomattox: Victory, Defeat, and Freedom at the End of the Civil War (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 70-76. Marvel and Varon used data from the records of both armies. OR., series 1, vol. 47. part 3, 872-73. Thomas, Confederate Nation, 302. Janney, Ends of War, 48-53.

[77] Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1912, original in 1881), vol. 2:694-95.

[78] Davis, Rise and Fall, 2, 696. SHSP, vol. 12, March 1884, 100-102. C. R. Breckinridge, ed., “Letters and Telegrams, 100-102. C. R. Breckinridge identified the handwriting of the letter to be a copy of the original in the handwriting of Col. James Wilson on his father’s staff.  J. C. Breckinridge endorsed the letter with his signature. OR., series I, vol. 47, part 3, 836. Janney, Ends of War, 83-85. 100-101, 128, 129-30.

[79] Sherman, Memoirs, 836, 840, 841-42. Matthews, Right Man, 199-200. OR., series 1, vol. 47, part 3, 813-14, 837, 852, 854. Edward Wells, Hampton and Reconstruction (Columbia: The State Company, 1907, 66-67. “Wade Hampton to Jefferson Davis,” SHSP, vol, 27, January-December 1899, 132-135. This article is a summary of the Official Records. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 208. Edward Wells, Hampton and Reconstruction (Columbia: The State Company, 1907, 66-67. Robert K. Ackerman, Wade Hampton III (Columbia, The University of South Carolina Press, 2007), 88-89. Rod Andrew, Jr., Wade Hampton, Confederate Warrior to Southern Redeemer (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2008), 298-303. Walter Brian Cisco, Wade Hampton: Confederate Warrior. Conservative Statesman (Washington, DC: Brassey’s Inc., 2004), 160-163. Cisco, like Andrew, emphasized Hampton’s determination to continue fighting and how Mary’s influence was so strong .

 

______________

 

Chapter Four: Davis traveled with more publicity than Dan Rice’s caravan enjoyed.

Stephen F. Mallory

Davis “‘was predisposed to go exactly the way that his friends advised him not to go.’”

Clement C. Clay, Jr.

At the brief meeting in Charlotte on April 26, Davis’ escort agreed to move quickly westward toward the Tran-Mississippi South. The route was west of Greensboro, so that the column would be moving as directly away from Sherman as possible to lessen the feasibility of attack from that quarter. Before the meeting, Attorney General George Davis asked Postmaster General John H. Reagan to support his resignation. George Davis was a widower with small children staying with friends near Charlotte. He had no financial support. His home and property in Wilmington were in the enemy’s hands. Reagan, who “did not see what good he could do by going on with us,” supported the idea in the meeting. The resignation was endorsed by all present. General Samuel Cooper, the highest ranking general in the Confederacy, told Jefferson Davis he was too old and infirmed to undertake the trek. There were five brigades, and it is difficult to determine the number of cavalrymen. There were accretions when a soldier or group of soldiers would join and, beginning on May 27, desertions. Davis wrote, “The number was about 2,000. They represented five brigades. Though so much reduced in number,” they would be efficient. Before he left Charlotte Breckinridge made his chief contribution to Confederate history. He set aside the Confederate archives with orders that the papers would be surrendered to Union officers as soon as they arrived. The Great Seal of the Confederate Government was deposited in the Mecklenburg County Courthouse. Since there was no engraver in the South, this seal was devised and engraved in England and smuggled into Virginia through the blockade in 1864. The seal bore a depiction of an equestrian stature of George Washington in front of the Virginia capital building symbolizing the continuity of governments. It was never used and taken from Charlotte to The Museum of the Confederate Government in Richmond. Unfortunately, Judah P. Benjamin burned the Confederate Secret Service records before leaving Charlotte.^[80]

After a ride of less than twenty miles on April 26, Davis spent the night at the home of Andrew Baxter Springs , Springfield Plantation in Fort Mill, South Carolina. George A. Trenholm and others stayed with William Elliott White because Trenholm’s poor health precluded further travel. Cavalry escorting the Davis group were demoralized with the slow pace. Basil Duke estimated “we made not more than twelve or fifteen miles daily.” He thought “this slow progress was harassing, and a little demoralizing withal, as the men were inclined to construe such dilatoriness to irresolution and doubt on the part of their leaders.” Milford Overly was a cavalryman serving under Captain Given Campbell who protected Davis’ small group. Overly remembered they left Charlotte, “leisurely, quietly, and without hinderances of any kind through South Carolina. . . .” Secretary of Navy Stephen Mallory wrote they traveled “slowly and not at all like men escaping from the country.” Hattaway and Beringer wrote that Davis traveled more like a president and not like a fugitive.” There were many comments on how women and children along the way (where there had been no fighting) gave Davis flowers as they waved and shouted to him. Contrast that pace to the distance traveled by Union Second Lieutenant, Theodore Mallaby, Jr. of George Stoneman’s command, who was ordered to join the search for Jefferson Davis. On one day Mallaby rode thirty-nine miles and on the next forty-nine miles.  Varina’s trip by wagons from Abbeville to west of Washington on May 2^nd was over forty miles. Gary Robert Matthews noted that Duke routinely spent twenty hours a day in the saddle and was unaccustomed to covering only twelve or fifteen miles a day with Davis. Davis met with other cabinet members without consulting John H. Reagan, and all agreed with Davis that Reagan should be the next “Secretary of Treasury, ad interim.” Reagan cited his duties as Postmaster General and “manager of telegraph”, and argued, to no avail, that these duties already demanded most of his waking hours. More than likely these consultations contributed to the belief that there was a cabinet meeting in Fort Mill.^[81]

“Fort Mill, South Carolina, Site of the Last Confederate Cabinet Meeting,” was the title of an article by the Florence Thornwell Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. As proof of this assertion the writers offered a very accurate accounting of the departure of each cabinet member of Davis’ escort from Fort Mill to Washington, Georgia.^[82]

Sometime after 4:00 p.m. when Davis’ entourage arrived, the sons of Baxter and Grace Allison White Springs, eleven-year-old Eli and thirteen-year-old John, were playing marbles in the parlor. Davis and Reagan joined Eli while Benjamin and Breckinridge were on John’s side. Breckinridge was considered a ringer because he was considered the best marble shooter of any “public man” since John Marshall. The two Springs boys were surprised that Jefferson Davis knew all the complex rules of the games. This idyllic marble game doubtlessly provided a respite from the depressing issues of escape. As they awoke on the day the war ended for those living east of the Chattahoochee River, they could not fathom the trouble brewing south of the Catawba River, a stream they had to cross to encounter anarchy. On the South Carolina side there was little order and no governmental support. ^[83]

Early in the morning of April 27^th Davis and his advisers held a conference in the yard of Baxter Springs to determine their route. “In the end they concluded that they should move southwesterly toward Lieutenant General Richard Taylor’s army, last known to be near Mobile.” A second meeting was held at the White Homestead because of news about the enemy. There were two “last meetings in Fort Mill.” William C. Davis noted that, “all that day they continued their slow pace, and perhaps sensing the increasingly sullen mood among the cavalrymen, Davis, Breckinridge, and the rest began to mingle with them at every opportunity, often riding among the troopers rather than at their head.”

Duke thought that having cabinet members ride and talk with troopers, “was excellent, largely counteracting the feeling of uneasiness induced by our lack of activity.” Breckinridge assigned George Dibrell’s men to picket duty and as scouts. They had better arms and equipment “and, at the moment, generally under better discipline.” Basil Duke complained that they moved with such deliberation that the Confederate veterans constantly passing on their way to surrender, seriously impaired the morale of the cavalry escort. Separating the five brigades from a smaller escort group with Davis, relieved some frustration and resulted in brigadier generals talking with their men, and enhancing their morale.^[84]

At the Catawba River a malevolent force had prepared for their arrival and would be with them until Davis was captured. The inexorable Union power must have seemed omnipotent. George Stoneman telegraphed Major General George H. Thomas, that on April 19^th a detachment of the Twelfth Ohio Cavalry under Major Erastus C. Moderwell destroyed “the railroad bridge, 1,125 feet long, over Catawba, between Charlotte and Chester. . . .” This trestle was used by William H. Parker and Varina Davis on their trip with the Confederate Treasury about ten days before

Jefferson Davis was forced to ford the stream. There were complaints about the heavy baggage of Cabinet members and the impact this would have on horses and mules.^[85]

Erastus Moderwell created a major logistical problem for the Confederacy. After Sherman’s campaign in South Carolina, logistical support was significantly disrupted. Supplies were routed from Columbia and Charleston to Chester and then to Charlotte. General P. G. T. Beauregard reassured President Davis on April 4 that the railroad from Chester to Danville was safe from Stoneman’s raiders. It did not remain in service for long. S. W. Ferguson, sent to the Catawba to capture Moderwell, arrived too late. He received instructions to remain in position because an engineer would locate and prepare a pontoon bridge. On April 21 Joseph E. Johnston telegraphed Secretary of War Breckinridge that he faced supply shortages, and transportation across the Catawba was essential for logistical support from Chester. The next day Breckinridge sent a dispatch to Johnston that “two trains started from Chester full of supplies for the command and were pillaged by paroled soldiers who had drawn rations from depots.” Johnston notified officials in Charlotte that it was urgent to install a pontoon bridge to maintain a supply chain from Chester. He was afraid the engineers bringing the pontoon bridge had abandoned the army. Johnston then sent a telegram to Major N. W. Smith (in Augusta), the engineer who had sent the pontoon bridge on wagons to Chester. Johnson told Smith, “You will starve us if you don’t get the wagons back immediately.” Johnston’s messages to Smith on April 22 illustrate the urgent need for a pontoon bridge on the Catawba River. Unknown to Johnston, Union Major General James Harrison Wilson had notified Sherman on April 20 that he had captured Macon, Georgia. Wilson quickly established occupation forces in Macon and Augusta. Major Smith’s orders were negated. Davis was concerned and wired Braxton Bragg in Chester, asking if he “could prevent those irregularities to which I suppose you refer. . . .” On April 29, two days after Johnston surrendered, there was no pontoon bridge over the Catawba. Johnston ordered a regiment to Chester to guard supplies being looted, and another force to the Catawba “for the protection of stores.”^[86]

Rather than a restoration of order, the situation degenerated into chaos, as civilians were desperate for food. John Hemphill Simpson, an Associate Reformed Presbyterian minister, wrote that Chester citizens took commissary stores on April 20, 1865. By February 1865, fearful of starvation, Simpson, along with others, helped themselves to supplies and equipment when a train from Columbia, fleeing Sherman’s advance, was sent to Chester but could go no farther. On February 22 Wheeler’s cavalry entered Chester. Simpson reported that the “depot was thrown open to all. I got a sack of coffee, a large looking glass, and the depot clock.”^[87]

By May 3, 1865, the day Jefferson Davis entered Georgia, Johnston received word that Confederates on the Catawba River were distributing supplies to local civilians. General Roswell Sabine Ripley, guarding supplies in Chester, requested additional men. He was ordered to hold his cavalry “to the last possible moment.” Lt. Gen. Stephen Dill Lee, at the Catawba on May 7, informed Johnston that he could not rely on supplies because draft animals were stolen or too crippled for work. “Those at this point are nearly all gone.” By this time pontoons were so damaged they were abandoned. Stephen Lee thought his engineers could construct a pontoon bridge at Hughey’s Ferry on the Broad River. Mules that pulled the pontoon wagons had been stolen. He concluded the only way men would work was to promise them a mule when they left. Lee’s assumption eliminated the mules. On May 9 Johnston received a message that, “all organized commands have passed. I leave with company of engineer troops for Hughey’s Ferry, Broad River. Pontoon bridge at this point and at Hughey’s Ferry will be left in position.” Johnston had lost his soldiers, his logistical support, and his government. On May 5 Johnston informed men from the Army of Tennessee of three routes to take as they marched home. One was from Morganton, North Carolina, the largest number were to go via Spartanburg and Abbeville, and a third column went to Chester and Newberry. It is doubtful these routes were used as contemplated. Once men were free to go home, they followed their own routes. The pontoon over the Savannah south of Abbeville remained opened, because Union forces were occupying the region and needed the bridge from Vienna to Petersburg in Georgia.^[88]

The veterans of the Army of Tennessee were given a farewell by Joseph E. Johnston on May 2, 1865, in his General Orders No. 22. He exhorted them, “to observe faithfully the terms of pacification agreed upon, and to discharge the obligations of good and peaceful citizens at your homes as well as you have performed the duties of thorough soldiers in the field.” This would offer their families comfort and “restore tranquility to your country.” He bid them farewell “with feelings of cordial friendship” and wished them “all the prosperity and happiness to be found in the world.” Johnston devoted enormous energy and leadership in trying to get his men safely home. On May 2^nd Johnston sought in vain for assistance from an officer in Columbia. Johnston wrote, “It is not doubted here that we are abandoned by the Government.” In fact, the Confederate government dissolved at Danville.^[89]

While Johnston struggled to maintain some control for Confederate veterans moving home, Davis and his entourage faced crossing the Catawba’s Nation’s Ford with no trestle and insufficient pontoons for a bridge. Men with small equines sat in a pontoon and held bridles as their horses or mules swam. Wagons, ambulances, and men with larger horses could ride across the Catawba. The column went to York on a road due west of the Catawba crossing. On the Rock Hill side of the Catawba the party climbed the long hill above the ford to the Crossroads where the Catawba Indian Treaty of 1840 had been signed. The right fork at the Crossroads led toward York. Modern development has obscured all traces of the road on the east side of Interstate 77. A section of the old Nations Ford Road is still visible near the Hutchison house, on the west side of Interstate 77. What was Nations Ford Road today crosses US 21 Bypass and joins Eden Terrace. Near the modern intersection of Eden Terrace and Charlotte Avenue, the route joined with Upper Landsford Road. Davis and his staff ate a noon meal with Archibald Whyte at his home; also post office, schoolhouse, and tavern. It was a vernacular “I-house” with a shed roof in front and stood where Manchester

Meadows Soccer Complex is located today, along David Lyle Boulevard. After the meal Davis rode to York on a route close to the modern SC 161 which enters York as East Liberty Street. In downtown York, a left turn onto South Congress Street at the York County Court House led the party to the Rose Hotel. Davis’ officers used the Rose Hotel on the night of April 27. Davis spent the night at the home of Dr. James Rufus Bratton, a large mansion on South Congress Street adjacent to the Rose Hotel. There is a local tradition that residents gathered at the Bratton house, but Davis declined to make a speech. Breckinridge, Davis, and Bratton conversed for some time on Bratton’s porch. Secretary of State Judah P. Benjamin is said to have addressed the citizens of York from the balcony of the Rose Hotel. Dr. Bratton later recounted that his guest was somewhat fatigued and depressed, but warmly embraced his four sons.^[90]

Breckinridge, worried that such a large column would attract Union forces in the area, “ordered General Dibrell and the cavalry brigades to ride on separately and meet them in Cokesbury in a couple of days, choosing Campbell’s company to remain with Davis and the cabinet.” Given Campbell’s company, from the Ninth Kentucky cavalry, and Davis’ personal guard, remained with him until they reached Washington, Georgia. They were detailed for special services and used as scouts, guides, and couriers because the cavalry brigades did not travel with the President.^[91]

One conspicuous feature of that evening was that York was one of the few places the Davis group visited without leaving an oral tradition that the location hosted the last meeting of the Confederate Cabinet.

At 11:30 on April 28^th Davis and his forces left York for the Broad River using the Pinckney Ferry Road, extending from York to the confluence of the Pacolet and Broad Rivers. Pinckney Ferry was just below the mouth of Pacolet River.

Separating the cavalry brigades from Davis’ party boosted the morale of the troops and officers. The two columns traveled separately from April 28^th until they reunited in Abbeville on May 2^nd. After April 28 the five brigades rode to the west of Davis’ party, masking that group from Union forces. Some seven miles from Yorkville the parties split at Blairsville with the cavalry brigades traveling on the Rutherford Road to cross the Broad River at Smith’s Ford. Davis’ party passed the Wallace-Brice House (1632 Old Pinckney Road) and the Samuel Blair House (5260 Lockhart Road), at the time the residence of Rev. Robert Young Russell. Russell wrote that, “Jefferson Davis, with an escort, passed my house . . . on Friday, April 28. They crossed the river at Pinckneyville Ferry.” This route carried Davis within a half mile of Bullock’s Creek Presbyterian Church. Davis visited with local citizens at a tavern about a mile from Pinckneyville Ferry before crossing the river into Union County. Richard F. Carrillo’s 1972 archeological study found Pinckneyville to be located one-fourth of a mile south of the Pacolet River and three-quarters of a mile from the confluence of the Pacolet and Broad Rivers. Pinckneyville Courthouse was created in 1792 but was abandoned before 1800 when courts were moved to towns such as Union. Mills Atlas (1825) depicts the Lockhart Canal downstream from Pinckneyville and farther downstream to Shelton Sims Ferry. Davis spent the night somewhere on the west side of the Broad River, possibly in a house that had remained on the site of Pinckneyville. The Gist home was located very near the river crossing as depicted on Mills Atlas, but there is no certain documentation as to where Davis slept. Burke Davis wrote that Davis’ group stayed on the west side of the Broad River at Love’s Ford. Hattaway and Beringer wrote that Davis encamped on the Broad River. In Roots and Recall Sam Thomas reported his investigation and conclusion, that Davis stayed at the Gist home. The Official Records of the War of Rebellion contains a message from William J. Palmer, 15^th Pennsylvania Cavalry who was sent to find Davis. Palmer reported that Davis passed through York on April 28, crossed the Broad River at Pinckneyville Ferry, and that the cavalry used Smith’s Ford. ^[92]

After Davis left the Pinckneyville area on the morning of April 29^th, the Tenth Ohio Cavalry captured some Confederates at Pinckney Ferry, and ten more were seized at Smith’s Ford. The Confederates were probably deserters because the five Confederate brigades arrived in Union at 11:00 a. m., the hour Davis left Pinckneyville. An earlier departure would have been preferable, but Davis constantly dallied. The five brigades were in Union by the time Davis left the river.^[93]

Davis’ party probably used the same route as the brigades (on or near highway 49), from the Broad River to Union, but the two groups were separated by several hours. The oral tradition is that around 11:00 a.m. on April 29, 1865, Confederate troops in uniform appeared in front of the William H. Wallace home on Main Street in Unionville. The President’s party left the Gist house at 11:00 a.m., arriving in Union well after the escorting brigades. The two groups left Union by different routes.^[94]

A courier arrived at Wallace’s house in Unionville early in the morning, requesting a midday meal for Davis. The Davis party had a “sumptuous” lunch at this beautiful home. During the sojourn at the Wallace house there were discussions, and local gossip interpretated these discussions as the last meeting of the Cabinet. Davis rested and in the afternoon his group left.  Allen D. Charles noted they were “so handsomely entertained that President Davis and his party were loath to ‘eat and run,’ pursuing Yankees or no, and it was late afternoon before they headed southwest out of Union on the Sardis Road.” Breckinridge traveled ahead of Davis to the home of Jane Giles, widow of John R. R. Giles, Colonel of the 5^th South Carolina Regiment, killed on May 31, 1862, at the Battle of Seven Pines (also called the Battle of Fair Oakes). As he successfully led his regiment in a charge into heavy fire, he was shot in the heart. Breckinridge asked Jane Giles if Jefferson Davis might spend the night at her home and she quickly agreed. Jane was so excited that she had her family china, buried to protect it from pillagers, dug up for the occasion. The Giles home was one mile south of Rose Hill Plantation on Old Sardis Road, and seventeen miles south of Union. The route to Mrs. Giles’ was the Old Sardis Road from Union to Rose Hill State Park. In 1960 a curve in the Old Sardis Road (State Road S-44-16) was straightened at the Tiger River. James Wilkinson, a retired mathematics and physics professor at Erskine College and the College of Charleston, was a student at Davidson College in 1960. During that summer he worked on a survey crew for the highway department and remembers that the Sardis Road crossed the Tiger River a distance downstream from the 1960 bridge. It is not possible to determine the exact location of the Giles’ home one mile south of Rose Hill Plantation. Jane Giles’ verbal recollection of the event was published in the Union Daily Times one hundred years later, on April 28, 1967. This oral tradition contended that early in the evening of April 28, 1865, a “body of horsemen came up,” claimed to be in “Wheeler’s command and a part of Jefferson Davis’ escort.” They dismounted and went into her horse lot and made themselves at home. When General Breckinridge unexpectedly rode up, these men quickly rode away, taking one of Mrs. Giles’ mules with them.^[95]

On the morning of April 30^, 1865, Jane Giles presented the men with fresh strawberries, the first of the season, but there were too few to serve everyone. One who did not partake thought the strawberries were “‘an elegant breakfast.’” Davis and his party left the Giles’ home, and continued on the Old Buncombe Road, a route that ran roughly parallel to the Enoree River. Historian Wade B. Fairey was told by Dr. George Douglass, a cardiologist who lived in Charleston, that Jefferson Davis ate at The Oaks, his ancestor’s home on Goshen Hill. Carol Marse confirmed this Douglass family tradition. Carol wrote that, “it is a coincidence that I recently acquired the chair in which Jefferson Davis sat while he was at The Oaks.” After the meal Davis descended Goshen Hill and crossed the Enoree River at O’Dell’s Ford. His group continued through the east side of today’s Whitmire and followed what is now road SC 66 to the Riser Brickhouse where they watered their horses. Davis then rode through Joanna (then known as Martin’s Station) to what is now SC 56. The group turned left and within a mile turned right onto what was subsequently given the eponym of Jefferson Davis Road. In about a mile they reached their destination, the home of Lafayette Young, where Davis spent the night of April 30. Davis, according to the local tradition, slept in the bedroom on the east front corner of the second story.^[96]

This account varies from most who place Davis at Cross Keys, eating a meal incognito. As they were leaving, Davis said to the hostess, Mrs. Warren Davis, that they had the same last name. This story was probably a ploy to direct attention away from Davis’ real route and it seemed to have worked. Allen Charles noted that Davis ate at the Wallace home and remained until late in the afternoon before he left Union on the Sardis Road, which departed from the route to Cross Keys. Davis could not have been in two places at once, and the rumor that he was at Cross Keys deflected interest away from his whereabouts. The five brigades escorting Davis did stop at Cross Keys and continued following a route from contemporary Road 49 to U. S. 72 to the Saluda River. Cross Keys is eight miles west of Rose Hill and about nine miles from the location of Mrs. Giles’ home. The writer had an extended conversation with Lawrence Young, a resident in the Clinton Presbyterian Home. Young emphatically declared that Davis entered Joanna on the road from Whitmire, on neither the road from Laurens nor the road from Clinton. He also insisted the men watered their horses at the Riser House on the road to Whitmire. James P. Sloan did write that the Davis group ate the noon meal on April 30^th at Cross Keys, and then “watered their horses at the Riser House on the present Joanna-Whitmire Road.” This assertion is contradicted above.[97]

James P. Sloan, a local historian in Laurens County, wrote that the New Orleans refugee in Abbeville, Henry J. Leovy, brought a letter from Varina Davis to her husband when he was at Young’s house. William C. Davis thought Varina’s missive must have given Jefferson Davis great solace. Varina later wrote that she feared she would impede Jefferson if he were to meet with her in Abbeville. “I sent a letter to meet him at the Saluda River by Col. Henry Leovy, an intimate friend, in which I begged him not to attempt to join us ever for an hour,” and that she would meet him in the Trans-Mississippi Department. On the morning of May 1^st, the Davis party left Lafayette Young’s house on Jefferson Davis Road, and in a little over a mile reached what is now the Mountville Road. Across the junction of these roads today stands what was known as the Griffin Williams home where other members of the Davis party spent the night of April 30. A crowd of residents gathered, and Davis spoke to them from the second-floor piazza. James P. Sloan quoted Emma Watts, who recorded the scene in her diary. “‘Great Tears rolled down his face’” as he spoke. “‘He rode off with a graceful bow and wave of his hand.’”^[98]

Davis and his men rode a short distance along what is now the Mountville Road, turned left onto Puckett’s Ferry Road and continued through Cross Hill. They watered their horses at John Carter’s sixty-five-foot well about a mile west of Cross Hill and rode to Puckett’s Ferry Road at the Saluda River. On the south side of the Saluda the group followed what is now South Carolina Road 246 through Simm’s Crossroads (now Coronaca Crossroads), passed Stony Point, a Federalist style home built by William Smith, and completed by his son Joel in 1829. Davis’ party stopped at the home of William A. Moore III between Stony Point and Cokesbury, to water their horses. A widespread local tradition is that Moore had named an infant son Jefferson Davis Moore. Upon receiving that information, Davis reached in his pocket, pulled out a gold coin, and gave it to the mother for the infant, as Davis said, “to keep it for his namesake.” It was a foreign piece and Reagan, “supposed it to be worth three or four dollars.” As they rode off Davis said it was his last coin. He had “never seen another like it and that he kept it as a pocket-piece.” Reagan said the mother and child lived in a cabin and the child crawled down the steps. Someone was mistaken because the Moore house was a large Greek Revival house with four piers in the center of the façade supporting the pediment. This route followed the pre-Columbian Cherokee Path. That trade route began on what became Charleston’s King Street, went through Keowee Town, in what is now Pickens County, and reached the Mississippi. Seven miles west of Ninety-Six the Cherokee Path passed Coronaca Creek (west of Simms Crossroads) and followed the watershed ridge west of the Saluda to turn westward near Donalds. In 1865 Davis’ entourage followed the route of the Cherokee Path but turned southward onto Sandy Run East. This lane terminates at Asbury Road in Cokesbury, the site of the Thomas Reeder Gary home. On the first night in May, Davis was the guest of Mary Ann Porter Gary, widow of Thomas and mother of fourteen children, including Confederate Brigadier General Martin Witherspoon Gary. The five Confederate brigades were nearby. Some were encamped near the Gary home, and few slept due to constant reports of nearby federal forces.^.[99]

William C. Davis recounts a dramatic meeting that took place in the large front yard of the Gary home. While in York, Davis sent Aide-de-Camp William Preston Johnston to Chester to bring Braxton Bragg to meet with Davis’ advisers. Bragg was brought to Richmond by Davis to assume some responsibilities. Bragg had assisted Secretary of War James Seddon and Adjutant General Samuel Cooper. Hattaway and Beringer concluded Bragg improved the work of all three. The press and politicians produced a firestorm of criticism against Bragg that haunted Davis for the duration of the war. As time passed Bragg’s contribution seemed short-lived. “He was thought to be an outrageous flatterer, bad tempered and jealous, who spied on his peers and took credit for their ideas.” Bragg was put on the shelf in a meaningless command and left Richmond on October 17, 1864. Bragg was Davis’ “most dependable sycophant” who unfailingly supported the President. Evidently Davis believed Bragg, the third Confederate General remaining in service, would agree with Davis’ flight to the Trans-Mississippi Confederacy. John C. Breckinridge and virtually all Kentucky soldiers despised Bragg who, in their opinions, blamed his own mistakes during the Battles of Stones River and Chattanooga on Breckinridge. Preston Johnston and Bragg reached the Davis group at the Gary dwelling on the evening of May 1st. William C. Davis described the meeting in the Gary yard. “It was something of a scene when they all met. Bragg took off his hat as he stood after Davis asked his views. The president must have been crestfallen when the general said not what he wanted to hear, but that he was entirely with the cabinet and felt that any further fighting was pointless.” Bragg symbolically emphasized his position by walking over to stand beside his nemesis, Breckinridge. Davis’ plan to use Bragg to achieve his goal had backfired. He was to try another ploy, using brigadiers as advisers, in Abbeville.^[100]

Footnotes: Chapter Four

[80] Reagan, Memoirs, 177. Varina Davis, Memoir, vol. 2, 631. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 96. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 25, 390, 416.

[81] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 90-92, 197, 203-205. Reagan, Memoirs, 177- 78. Trenholm was suffering from “Neuralgia.” Clark. Last Train South, 83. OR., series I vol. 49, part 1, 326-29. Gary R. Matthews, Basil Wilson Duke, CSA: The Right Man at the Right Place (Lexington, Kentucky: The University of Kentucky Press, 2005), 201. Mallory, “Last Days,” 1901, 246.  Duke, “After the Fall” 162. Milford Overly, “Escort to President Davis,” CV, vol. 16. June, 1908, 122. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 417.

[82] UDC, vol. 4, 496.

[83] Katherine Wooten Springs, The Squires of Springsteen (Charlotte: William Loftin Publisher, 1965), 234-35. R&R. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 103.

[84] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 203. Basil W. Duke, History of Morgan’s Cavalry (Columbia, S. C.: Unknown, a photocopy of the original, June 30, 2022), 536. Matthews, Right Man, 201. Duke, “After the Fall,” 162. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 103.

[85] OR., series 1, vol. 49, part 1, 446, George Stoneman, Major General of Volunteers to Major General Thomas, April 23, 1865, Stoneman sent the original report of Brigadier General Alvan C. Gillem, that praised Moderwell. Erastus C. Moderwell is listed in the Civil War Pension Index: General Index to Pension Files, 1861-1934 as Major of A, 12^th Ohio Cavalry. Ancestry. Com. Accessed October 11, 2023. OR., series 1, vol. 61, part 1, 330 dated April 24, 1865. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 105.

[86] OR., series 1 vol. 47, part 3, 750, 785, 818, 820, 828-29, 261, 830, 836, 854.

[87] Michael Miller, Echoes of Mercy – Whispers of Love: Diaries of John Hemphill Simpson Transcribed by Mary Law McCormick, 1861, 1862, 1863 and 1865 War Between the States (Greenville, South Carolina: Associate Reformed Presbyterian Foundation, Inc., 2001), 285, 301.

[88] OR., series 1, vol. 47, part 3, 870, 872-74.

[89] OR., series 1, vol. 47, part 1, 1061. OR., series 1, vol. 47, part 3, 862.

[90] R&R, Paul Gettys, who contributes work to R&R, wrote the description of Davis’ route from Nations Ford to the Rose Hotel and the local tradition of Davis’ visit and the subsequent day’s travel from York to the Broad River. See R&R, material from Sam Thomas. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 106. The Herald, March 31, 1949. 9. Paul Gettys located the site of the Whyte house and its description in The Herald. The structure was vernacular but well-built with twenty-inch square cypress piers supporting the shed roof. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 206.

[91] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 206. Clark, “Specie,” 542.

[92] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 205-06. Mills Atlas for Union and York Counties (1820-1825) shows Pinckneyville and Pinckney Ferry. Richard F. Carrillo, Archeological Excavations at Pinckneyville, Site of Pinckney District, 1791-1800. (Institute of Archeology and Anthropology, University of South Carolina, August 1972), 16, 20-22, accessed on-line February 15, 2023. The following sites were noted from 1800 to 1865 in the same general area: Scales Ferry, Skeift’s Ferry, Smith’s Ford, Love’s Ford and Shelton Sims Ferry were mentioned as crossings on the Broad River. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 106. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 418. R&R, Sam Thomas, “Jefferson Davis in South Carolina,” The Palmetto Conservation, 1998. OR., series 1, vol. 49, part 1, 548.

[93]OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 547; John C. Breckinridge, Secretary of War to Lt. Gen. Wade Hampton, April 28, 1865, SHSP vol. 12, 1884, 105. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 205, 212, 282. Henry Hampton, Acting Assistant Adjutant General marched through the South Carolina Upstate in March 1865. On March 3, 1865, he went through Unionville and crossed the Broad River at Skeift’s Ferry. Their “quarters” were at Colonel Gist’s Rose Hill Plantation. OR., series 1, vol. 47, chapter 59, part 1, 1081.

[94] Union Daily Times, April 28, 1967. OR., series I, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 347. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 106. Fold 3, John R. R. Giles who entered service in the 5^th South Carolina Infantry Regiment on June 4, 1961, became a Captain on May 25, 1861, and was elected Colonel on April 23, 1865. In the Census of 1860 slave schedule, he owned fifty-six slaves and the next person listed was W. M. Gist who owned 178 slaves, confirming that their plantations were near each other.

[95] The William H. Wallace House (c. 1850) is located at 430 East Main Street. “Tradition says that his [Jefferson Davis] last full cabinet meeting was held in this old landmark.” Charlotte Observer, August 3, 1952, has a feature on the William H. Wallace House. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 208-9. William C. Davis cited a clipping from an unknown newspaper he found in some of Davis’ papers as well as other sources. This oral tradition is like that found in the Union Daily Times, April 28, 1967, and a microfilm of this newspaper is in the Carnegie Library in Union, South Carolina. The information on the 1960 bridge over the Tiger River came from conversations the writer had with James Wilkinson. Allan D. Charles, The Narrative History of Union County, South Carolina. (Spartanburg, South Carolina:  The Reprint Company, 1987), 187, 204.

[96] Union Daily Times, April 28, 1967. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 106. R&R, research on The Oaks by Paul Gettys. Conversation with historian, Wade B. Fairey on January 20, 2024. James P. Sloan, “Jefferson Davis President of the Confederacy Passed Through Joanna in Flight from Yanks,” Joanna Way, 9.  Jennifer Revels, Eastern Laurens County Historical and Architectural Survey (Columbia: Palmetto Conservation Foundation, 1314 Lincoln Street, Suite 213, 2003), 31. Revels notes that Davis visited the Brickhouse. An interview with Lawrence Young, an excellent local historian in Clinton, South Carolina. Young referred the writer to Sloan’s work but insisted Davis entered Joanna from the Whitmire road. Find-A-Grave, Dr. George Douglass, Sr. born 1804, died June 27, 1875, son of James Douglass and Rebecca Douglass. The 1880 Census listed George Douglass, son of Dr. George Douglass, Sr. as living at Goshen Hill. The Columbia Record, February 22, 1962, 5. James Douglass, Sr. immigrated from Ireland, settled in Columbia, married Rebecca Calvert, and their fifth child was George Douglass, who practiced medicine in Union County near the Newberry County line. Carol Marse’s March 8, 2024, email to the writer confirmed the Douglass family tradition.

[97] Sloan, “Flight from Yanks,” Joanna Way, 9-10. Charles, Union County, 203-205, 239. William C. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 209. Wade B. Fairey’s conversation was with Dr. George Douglass, born in 1936, a cardiologist who practiced in Charleston, S.C. The story that Davis was at Cross Keys lives on in the state historical marker located in front of that house.

[98] James Sloan, “Flight from Yanks,” 10. Ware, Old Abbeville, 97; Other accounts state Leovy gave Varina’s letter to her husband at the Saluda River. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 210-11, 292, 244, 316, 319 and 340. W. C. Clark, “A Beautiful Reply, By Mr. Davis,” CV, vol. 2, December 1894, 354. Mrs. Jefferson Davis, New York City, to S. A. Cunningham, in CV, vol. 13, November 1905, 487. Google Search, June 4, 2019, Leovy published The Laws and Government Ordinances of the City of New Orleans, (New Orleans: E. C. Wharton, 41 Camp Street, 1857).

[99] Sloan, Joanna Way, 10, 11. The Griffin Williams house was remodeled. Reagan, Memoirs, 178. Broomfield L. Ridley, “Coming Home from Greensboro,” CV, vol. 3, August 1895, 234. The best map of the Cherokee Path is Hunter’s 1730 drawing. A. S. Salley, “George Hunter’s Map of the Cherokee Country and the Path thereto in 1730,” Bulletins of the Historical Commission of South Carolina No. 4. (Columbia: The State Company, 1917). Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 107. Watson, Greenwood County Sketches, 375-76, 235. Stony Point was the location of a post office in 1818, the name was misspelled as Stony Point but locals always spelled it as Stony Point. John W. Moore, Old Cokesbury in Greenwood County, South Carolina: Religious and Educational Center in Nineteenth Century (Greenwood, S. C.: Published by the Index Printing Company, 1954). 19, 26. William A. Moore III’s large home decayed or burned decades ago.

[100] Sloan, Joanna Way, 10. Lawrence Young, an elderly local historian of Laurens County, told the writer on March 20, 2018, of the Sloan article. Sifakis, Who Was Who, 241-42. Sifakis repeats a common account that Martin Witherspoon Gary was with the Davis party. The writer has no documentary evidence of Gary’s presence at his mother’s home on the night of May 1-2, 1865. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 209–211. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 270, 297, 302-303. Woodward, Mary Chestnut, 700. Louis De Vorsey, Jr., The Indian Boundary in the Southern Colonies, 1763-1775 (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1966), 115. Moore, Old Cokesbury, 19, 26. The Greek Revival home of Frank Fincher Gary, son of Thomas Reeder Gary, is often pictured as the location of the May 1 meeting called by Jefferson Davis. The meeting took place across the street and a short distance downhill at the “L-shaped” home of Thomas Reeder Gary, father of Martin Witherspoon Gary, whose widow was the hostess.

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Chapter Five: Five Gray Brigades and a Blue Shadow

Basil Duke reported a large body of federal cavalry, “the same I had encountered at Lincolnton, were marching some ten or fifteen miles distant on our flank, keeping pace with us, and evidently closely observing our movements.”

The five brigades, separated from the Davis group at the Broad River on April 29^th, followed a route to the west and parallel with Davis. Both Davis and the five brigades arrived in Abbeville on the morning of May 2^nd. Charles Edwin Gilbert, one of five men detailed to escort Davis from Ferguson’s brigade, was captured with Davis on May 10^th. Gilbert’s estimate of numbers is interesting. He thought there were 3,000 men in Ferguson’s brigade when the war began. When Lee surrendered, Gilbert estimated 300 were left and some companies had only three or four men. His company contained thirteen. The five escorting brigades were said to contain about 2,000 men, consistent with Gilbert’s estimate.^[101]

Desertions occurred, and accretions compensated to some degree. H. C. Binkley was one of twenty-six men with Brigadier General John Hunt Morgan when he was killed on September 4, 1864, at Greenville, Tennessee. Binkley’s group joined Basil Duke in Virginia, had all their horses stolen, and then learned of the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia. Duke told the men they could surrender or join Dibrell’s two cavalry brigades and “act as an escort for President Davis.” They managed to find horses and mules to ride. “Mounted, but without saddles, we took up the march . . . to Charlotte, N. C.”^[102]

Men seemed to have simply fallen in and followed whatever unit they wished. For example, Joseph R. Haw was employed in the Richmond armory. In the middle of April, he was walking home near High Point when a cavalry squad rode up. A trooper told him they were going to escort Davis to the west and offered a horse. It was not a good mount, but he soon got a better one. George Dibrell’s “division” was a small command. Interestingly, when Dibrell’s men were paid specie on the west bank of the Savannah River, each person (cavalryman or officer) received $26. Haw was shocked that he was included because he had been with the command only about two weeks. John T. Moore was walking home when he encountered a Confederate cabinet member in Union, South Carolina. The official told Moore that he was “honorably discharged, but if any of us wished to accompany President Davis to Mexico we could do so.” His “heart was too proud to bear the misfortune of my country.” Moore decided to “seek refuge in Mexico.”^[103] The escort recruited Henry Clay Binkley and his twenty-five friends. There was at least one paroled Union prisoner-of-war with Davis’ cavalry escort who relayed information to the Federals. William Rufus Bringhurst wrote several articles about his experiences as a member of Dibrell’s cavalry. He claimed, as did many similar men in the escort, that “we were the only organized body left in the Army of Tennessee” that had surrendered two weeks after the Army of Northern Virginia. The informality in command was evident. Some members of the escort might have considered it more of a cortege than a disciplined fighting force. Ferguson noted the psychological fatigue of the troopers. He thought “the constant stream of paroled soldiers returning to their homes was sure to have a depressing effect which I feared.”^[104]

The logical route taken by the escort would keep them between Davis’ group and the mounting pressure from Federal troopers. On Sunday, April 30, 1865 Joseph R. Haw recorded they “passed through Cross Keys and over the Enoree River. . . .” Haw noted they marched to the Saluda River and “went into camp to await our turn to be ferried across.”^[105]  Broomfield L. Ridley, a paroled Confederate traveling home from Greensboro, used the same route as Davis’ cavalry brigades. He was unable to meet a fellow officer at Cross Anchor and went by Laurens Court House. On May 13 he crossed the Saluda and wrote, “Mr. Puckett’s ferryman says that President Davis, with his Cabinet, crossed the river here on Monday, May 1^st, and also his escort, Dibrell’s Division, together with Vaughn’s Brigade from East Tennessee.”^[106]

From Puckett’s Ferry the escorting brigades followed the route used by the Davis party to a location at or near Cokesbury on the night of May 1. Duke reported a large body of federal cavalry, “the same I had encountered at Lincolnton, were marching some ten or fifteen miles distant on our flank, keeping pace with us, and evidently closely observing our movements.”^[107] The ominous column consisted of Union forces that shadowed Confederates but took no aggressive action. Alfred Jackson Hanna found that the Union had “almost a continuous line of troops stretching from the Etowah River in the northwestern part of Georgia down to the northern part of Florida.” Confederates understood they were escorting Davis but that they were, after Johnston surrendered, veterans riding home. United States forces seemed to have understood they faced Confederate veterans. It seems as if the two erstwhile combatants were playing roles. Neither side sought combat. The brigades escorting Davis rode on his west side and United States forces shadowing Davis’ escorting brigades rode farther to the west between the Confederates and the mountains. The Union effectively blocked Davis’ route to Anderson, but there were no reported firefights. Scouts and couriers, both blue and gray, kept commanders alert to each other’s positions. Davis understood he could not cross the Savannah west of Anderson and Union commanders realized their tactics were working. Davis went to Abbeville because the route to Anderson was blocked.

Brigadier General William Jackson Palmer, commanding the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Calvary brigade, was ordered to search for Davis. He found that four brigades of Confederates: Duke, Ferguson, Dibrell, and Vaughn, had “evaded the truce” between Sherman and Johnston. The Tenth Ohio Cavalry went to Smith’s Ford on the Broad River and “ran into the rear guard of his [Davis’] escort at that ford and captured ten prisoners, from whom definite information was obtained.” Palmer calculated he was two days behind Davis. In fact, Palmer just missed Davis when he left Pinckneyville. Palmer allowed others to follow Davis, while he rode to Spartanburg on his way to Anderson where he covered crossings of the Savannah, especially Hatton’s Ford. The Federals’ achieved their prime objective of keeping Davis from reaching the Trans-Mississippi Confederacy.^[108]

Davis’ plan to cross the Mississippi River was thwarted by his desultory planning and slow pace. After the meetings in Greensboro, Davis’ officers, as well as Sherman, wanted him out of the country as quickly as possible. In contrast to the Confederates, Federal planners were amazingly effective in moving men with alacrity to shadow Davis and occupy Anderson, Macon, and Augusta, sending units out from those bases. This strategic planning contrasts with the indolent pace of the Davis columns.^[109]

By the time Davis reached Cokesbury on the night of May 1^st, Anderson was occupied by Federals and the area west of his route was swarming with Union forces. Scouts from the five brigades rode in all night with ominous reports of nearby Federals. There was no sleep in Cokesbury on the night of May 1^st. M. H. Clark, riding with the brigades, was concerned about protection “from the Federal cavalry, who were raiding on a parallel line with our route, between us and the mountains.” Union forces to the west of the five Confederate brigades were not anxious to make contact that might result in a firefight. They planned to catch Davis west of Abbeville, knowing their rapid cavalry response forced Davis to change his plans to cross the Savannah at Hatton’s Ford. In the early morning hours of May 3^rd William H. Parker reported a threat to Abbeville from Federal forces in Anderson. Parker was awakened at 3:00 a. m. by his officer of the guard who told him, “‘The Yankees are coming.” Federal cavalry occupied Anderson on May 1. One man who rode from Anderson to Abbeville spread the word that the “Federals would arrive about daylight.” Parker had the treasure moved from a warehouse to a train with steam up ready to leave for Newberry. In fact, Anderson was occupied, not as a staging area for an invasion, but to serve as a base for Union units along the Savannah River to block Davis from the Mississippi.^[110]

Sherman wanted Davis out of the county as expeditiously as possible and he worked to provide logistical support to feed and care for Confederate veterans walking or riding home. It is amazing that firefights did not occur as tens of thousands of former Confederates marched through territories controlled by the United States military. It seems as if everyone officers, and men, blue and gray, conspired to end the savage bloodshed.

Footnotes: Chapter Five

[101] C. E. Gilbert. “The Confederate Treasury,” CV, vol. 38, March 1930, 88. Perhaps Charles Edwin Gilbert, searches in Fold 3, Find-A-Grave and Census records indicated the name was Charles Edwin Gilbert. He was born in 1855 in Livingston, Sumter County, Alabama, the son of Louzinski E. “Love” Gilbert.

[102] H. C. Binkley, “Shared in the Confederate Treasury,” CV, vol. 38, March 1930, 88.

[103] Haw, “Ordnance Department,” vol. 34, 450-45; Joseph R. Haw, “Last of the C. S. Ordnance Department,” CV, vol., 35, January 1927, 15-16. Moore, “Varied War Experiences,” CV, vol. 17, 1909, 213.

[104] William Rufus Bringhurst. “Survivor for President Davis’ Escort,” CV, vol. 34, January 1926, 368. S. W. Ferguson, “Another account General S. W. Ferguson,” CV, vol. 16, June 1908, 263-64.

[105] Haw, “Ordnance Department,” 15.

[106] B. L. Ridley, “Coming Home from Greensboro,” CV, vol. 3, August 1895, 234.

[107] Duke, “After the Fall,” 162. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 205, 212.

[108] OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 547-48. Alfred Jackson Hanna, Flight Into Oblivion (Richmond: Johnson Publishing Company, 1938), 96. The Etowah River flows westward from Cartersville to Rome.

[109] OR.,. series I, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 347. Clark, “Specie,” 544. Matthews, The Right Man, 201. The distance between Union and Confederates varied, of course. Parker, Recollections, 364. Duke, “After the Fall,” 162.

[110] Clark, “Specie,” 544. Parker, Recollections, 364.

 

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Chapter Six: He could not be got to move.  Basil Duke

In the morning of May 2, Davis rode the twelve miles from Cokesbury to Abbeville. The Hodges to Abbeville Road followed the 1850’s railroad and is known today as the Old Hodges Highway. Davis stayed in the Abbeville house built around 1841 by David Lesley, a planter and attorney. In 1862 Armistead Burt, an attorney, and former Congressman from Edgefield, borrowed from Charlestonian Andrew J. Simonds, who ran the Abbeville branch of the Bank of the State of South Carolina, to acquire the Lesley house. Simonds estimated the worth at $10,000 in gold. In 1868 Burt still owed $7,500, a lien on his plantation, and received a lifetime of occupancy. At his death the house would belong to Simonds. Later in 1868 Burt moved into the Marshall House. On May 2 some members of the Confederate Cabinet Stephen Mallory, Judah Benjamin, John H. Reagan, John C. Breckinridge, and others. Breckinridge, who was also a Major General, qualified to attend the military meeting held in the afternoon. Among those present in Abbeville and reporting on the events were John W. Headley and Robert M. Martin, two Confederate spies in Canada and New York, who joined Davis’ escorting brigades somewhere near Chester. Their observations of events in Abbeville matched those in the meeting. Although none of the many refugees or others in Abbeville attended the meeting, everyone seemed to have known the outcome.^[111]

James Morris Morgan, who arrived in Abbeville with Varina, stayed briefly then fled to Augusta to avoid Union forces. Finding the Union forces in Georgia, he returned to stay with the Trenholm family. His first impression of Abbeville as a halcyon town of gardens was replaced with a depressing picture of a town besieged. He found “a stream of paroled men, and men who had deserted before the end came in Virginia, passing through the once peaceful town. While the men committed no outrages when they went into a private home to ask for food or shelter, they adopted a threatening attitude which was very offensive.” Morgan helped keep the unwelcomed visitors on the home’s first floor protecting the second floor “where the ladies secluded themselves.” Betty Trenholm had two large chests filled with silver. Her brother and Morgan waited for a dark night, took the silver into the garden after everyone was asleep and laboriously buried the chests. Realizing with daylight everyone would see the disturbed ground, they spent the duration of the night spading the whole garden to disguise the buried treasure. They finished as the first light revealed “to my consternation,” Betty Trenholm’s butler, “Nat” leaning against the garden fence watching the action. Morgan asked how long the butler had been present. The response was “‘ever since you gentlemen started work.’” Shortly after this exchange Federals occupied the town. Nat, standing over the silver, conversed with a Union officer but the silver remained safely interred. Nat, obviously possessing political acumen, was elected to the state legislature a few years later.^[112]

The generals wanted to move on as fast as possible, but Davis was lethargic. He enjoyed talking with citizens and did not share his officers’ sense of urgency. He called the meeting for 4:00 in the afternoon. Those invited to the meeting were: General Braxton Bragg, Major General John Cabell Breckinridge, Brigadier General George Gibbs Dibrell,

Brigadier General Basil Wilson Duke, Brigadier General Samuel Wragg Ferguson, Brigadier General John Crawford Vaughn, and Colonel William C. P. Breckinridge. Davis understood his cabinet members and military leadership opposed further military action but thought his four brigadiers and a Colonel would support continuing the war in the west. After the “meeting in Charlotte, the president never again appealed to his constitutional council to condone what was now his personal will to continue.”^[113]

The brigade commanders, aware of soldiers’ attitudes, consulted their men before the meeting. Samuel W. Ferguson’s men were demoralized, and, especially the South Carolinians, were reluctant to continue to Georgia. William C. Breckinridge found his men in good condition; some straggled and some stole from civilians, but all knew the war was over. Dibrell thought his men were in good physical condition, but that in recent days his men and those of Col. Breckinridge were demoralized. Vaughn thought his men’s mounts and discipline had given out. When the five brigade commanders entered the room, they found that John C. Breckinridge (also Secretary of War) and Braxton Bragg were in the room with Davis, but neither spoke until Jefferson Davis left the meeting. This was likely the only meeting Davis had with brigadiers who were more closely attuned to the soldiers than officers with more than one star. They loved and respected Davis but they also understood the poor morale among the troopers.^[114]

Duke “had never seen Mr. Davis look better or show to better advantage. He seemed in excellent spirits and humor; and the union of dignity, gracious affability, and decision which made his manner usually so striking, was very marked in his reception of us.”  Davis began the meeting with some general comments. He ‘‘wanted a definite plan upon which the further prosecution of our struggle shall be conducted.’” Davis said he called this consultation because he thought he ought not act “‘without the advice of my military chiefs.’” Duke noticed that Davis “smiled rather archly as he used this expression” because he spoke to only a handful of brigadiers commanding about 2,000. Davis “so recently had been the master of legions,” yet he “said it in a way that made it a complement.” Davis asked Dibrell the condition of his men. Dibrell replied that they were not demoralized but that they were dissatisfied that some South Carolina soldiers had been released near their homes. Those present venerated Jefferson Davis and were loath to disagree with the President. Davis said the thousands of Confederates moving west could be the nucleus around which other forces would rally. Dibrell, the senior Brigadier General, thought his troops would not fight to the Mississippi and that Confederate troops in the Trans-Mississippi were inactive. He called the meeting, “the last military consultation.” According to a member of his brigade with whom he confided, Dibrell “could not count on any fighting men in his brigade,” except to defend Davis or Breckinridge. He feared “every hour was diminishing his hold on them. . . .” He believed “the cause of the Confederacy was lost, and his duty now was to take care of his men.”^[115]

Dibrell was followed by the other four brigadiers with Colonel W. C. P. Breckinridge, cousin of John Cabel Breckinridge, being the last to speak. All agreed with Dibrell, and all seemed to agree with Ferguson who wanted to get Davis out of the country, or barring that, to negotiate a peace like that concluded by Joseph E. Johnston. If that were not possible, then they believed they had to get Davis to the Trans-Mississippi where he could sail to Cuba or Mexico. When Davis stated his desire that the troops available around Abbeville could be the nucleus for renewed conflict, “we looked at each other in amazement,” and all agreed that “prolongation of the contest” was not possible. Davis asked why soldiers remained in the field if they opposed fighting. Duke responded they were there to keep him from being captured, “but would not fire another shot in an effort to continue hostilities.” Davis stated he opposed any plan designed simply to help him.  Duke remembered; “it was the general opinion that Mr. Davis could escape if he really wished to do so, but we feared that his pride would prevent his making the attempt.” Duke remained perplexed because he had “never been able to form a positive opinion as to what Mr. Davis’s real purpose was at that date. It was perfectly manifest to everyone else that there was no hope of further successful resistance.” Yet Davis made an “exceedingly eloquent speech”, urging further conflict and seemed “sorely disappointed” when they declined.^[116]

Samuel Wragg Ferguson had two questions. Could the five brigade commanders cut their way to the Mississippi? If so, would their men remain in service when they came near their homes in Alabama and Mississippi?  His answer to both queries was no. He saw the “the constant stream of paroled soldiers returning to their homes was sure to have a depressing effect which I feared.” Davis became testy and the room was silent for some time. Ferguson wrote that Davis broke the silence and gave way to “bitterness and recrimination.” Basil Duke remembered the silence was broken when Davis arose and “ejaculated bitterly that all was indeed lost.”^[117]

In his History of Morgan’s Cavalry, Duke wrote that when Davis “arose to leave the room, he had lost his erect bearing, his face was pale, and he faltered so much in his step that he was compelled to lean upon General Breckinridge. It was a sad sight to men who felt toward him as we did. I will venture to say that nothing he has subsequently endured, equaled the bitterness of that moment.” Duke, in his 1886 Southern Bivouac article asserted that all who spoke to Davis were united because “they and their followers despaired of successfully conducting the war and doubted the propriety of prolonging it.” Duke thought the people of the Confederacy “were not panic-stricken but broken down and worn out after every effort at resistance had been exhausted.”^[118]

Davis persisted in his vision of getting west of the Mississippi to carry on the war. Two references indicate Davis consulted with cabinet members after his decisive meeting with the brigadier generals. In a 1903 interview Ferguson wrote that he always thought Davis met with cabinet members after his May 2^nd meeting. His reason was that Breckinridge would not have made the decision to pay specie and parole solders without approval of cabinet members. But Ferguson wrote in the Southern Bivouac article that the decision made by the brigadiers was that soldiers would be paid and allowed to surrender. Following the May 2 meeting with the brigade commanders, William H. Parker was approached at 8:00 p.m., by Judah P. Benjamin. Benjamin, “the picture of amiability and contentment” with a “beaming smile on the round face of the rotund” Secretary of State, always had a supply of Havana cigars and was anything but flippant. Benjamin “begged” Parker to have a second meeting with Davis to urge the President to leave Abbeville. “After some demur I consented to do so.” Parker spent another hour trying to impress upon Davis that he must leave Abbeville that night. Parker offered to get some naval officers to escort Davis to the coast where they “might seize a vessel of some kind and get to Cuba or the Bahamas, but he rejected” the idea. Davis told Parker he would meet with cabinet members. Parker left Davis at 9:00 p. m. Shortly after this meeting Stephen Mallory sent Parker a note that “they would leave that night, and he notified me so that I might accompany them if I desired.” Parker, without a horse, declined. Davis consulted with, at least, Benjamin and Mallory, but there is no evidence of a meeting with the cabinet. If such a meeting occurred, it only endorsed the decision made by the brigadier generals.^[119]

Lowry Ware noted that in 1903 Abbeville and Washington, Georgia each claimed the distinction of being the location of the last Confederate Cabinet meeting. Antagonists from each town agreed to ask John H. Reagan, the last surviving member of the confederate cabinet, where the last cabinet meeting was held. Robert R. Hemphill, editor of the Abbeville Medium, reported that “‘the great umpire stated the last cabinet meeting was in Richmond.’” The Abbeville meeting ended as had all such discussions beginning with the one in Greensboro and ending with Abbeville. No one could convince Davis of the impossibility of further military action. Confederate soldiers simply refused to go beyond the Savannah River.^[120]

After Davis left the room, obviously shaken, the others remained. Colonel Breckinridge volunteered, as did others, to escape with Davis. Dibrell and Vaughn thought it would be difficult for their men to go farther than the Savannah River. This was the consensus. They agreed to leave Abbeville at 11:00 p. m., go to Washington, Georgia, and determine their next move from there. Whatever action was decided upon would be carried out, not by orders, but by asking for volunteers. The original plan agreed to in Greensboro of getting Davis out of the country was endorsed. More importantly, as William C. Davis noted, this meeting marked the end of Davis’ active leadership. After the meeting John C. Breckinridge, not Jefferson Davis, was the de facto leader.^[121]

The May 2^nd meeting in Abbeville became a pivotal episode in the town’s history. In the twentieth century an attempt to attract tourists produced the claim that the town was the “birthplace and deathbed” of the Confederacy. Abbeville residents came to believe their town hosted the last Confederate Cabinet meeting. No one remembered Robert Hemphill’s 1903 newspaper article. The Abbeville meeting was when leadership overtly shifted to Breckinridge. The meeting in Washington on May 4^th had no substance, but consisted of Davis’ announcing his intention of going to the west, though any rational observer knew he could never accomplish that goal. Two of his advisors thought Davis understood that rational conclusion.

Abbeville claimed to be the birthplace of the Confederacy because it held the first secession meeting in South Carolina on November 22, 1860. Charleston held a mass secession meeting on November 12 where speakers from various states endorsed secession. November 22 was within the typical period for meetings to advocate secession and elect representatives to a state meeting. York District held numerous meetings in various locations and its District-wide meeting to elect delegates was held on November 22. Trains from Columbia and Charlotte produced a mass meeting in York. Spartanburg’s secession meeting was held on November 21. Lancaster, Pickens and Pendleton held secession meetings on November 23, and Fort Mill did the same on November 24. Edgefield’s secession meeting was on November 9, while Walhalla and Greenville elected delegates at November 17^th meetings. Anderson’s secession meeting was held earlier on November 13. Although the date of the meeting in Chesterfield was not recorded, the Yorkville Enquirer reported, “the sentiment of Chesterfield has been more fully developed than that of almost any District in the State.” Many other locations reported meetings with no dates, but Chesterfield citizens were the first to claim their meeting was the first. All meetings had one thing in common.

Secessionists claimed that the doctrine of states’ rights protected slavery. Robert Kahle Pierce, in his 1965 MA Thesis, “The Charleston Press and Abraham Lincoln, 1860,” presented a succinct explanation of what was protected by states’ rights. Pierce paraphrased the Charleston Mercury of November 8, 1860. Lincoln “was asking the South to give up $3,200,000,000 in slave property,” an inaccurate calculation. While there is no perfect cost estimate, one contemporary calculation estimated the cost of abolishing slavery in 1865 was $4.3 billion or $81 billion in 2024. Editor Robert Hemphill presented a concise statement in the Abbeville Medium. “The slavery question that had so long disturbed the peace and quiet of the North and South . . . was terminated by the Secession of the Southern States. . . . ” Lowry Price Ware noted the myth that Abbeville’s secession meeting was the first in South Carolina was “so self-evident that it needed no documentation.” In reality, “the only daily newspapers in the State, those in Charleston and Columbia, failed to carry even a short notice about the Abbeville meeting of November 22.”^[122]

The Confederacy had numerous deathbeds. William Faulkner’s character declared that the Civil War’s apex for southerners occurred at Gettysburg at 1:15 p. m. on July 3, 1863, the instant when time stopped for young southern boys. But there were two more bloody years before fighting ceased. On April 12, 1865, the Army of Northern Virginia was no more. When Davis was in Danville, the war was over. His soldiers became veterans. On April 27 all Confederates soldiers east of the Chattahoochee River became veterans. The Army of Tennessee was no more. On May 4^th Confederates west of the Chattahoochee surrendered and became veterans. Near Mobile, Alabama Confederate Lieutenant General Richard Taylor, the son of Zachary Taylor and the brother-in-law of Jefferson Davis, surrendered the last Confederates to Union General Edward Richard Sprigg Canby. In Georgia on May 4^th Jefferson Davis held his last meeting in Washington, Georgia and rode off to command Confederate forces in the Trans-Mississippi Confederacy.

Herman Hattaway and Richard E. Beringer present a persuasive argument that when Davis left the Sutherland home in Danville there was only a “Pseudo Confederacy”. The government dissolved there and there was no effective military power.^[123]

Reagan realized that private citizens had suffered from roving soldiers. He thought “that the line between barbarism and civilization is at times very narrow.” On May 3^rd, “very early in the morning”, generals ate breakfast at a farmhouse on the Georgia side of the Savannah. Judah P. Benjamin left after that meal. Henry Leovy, the resourceful New Orleans refugee in Abbeville, arrived with a conveyance and disguises for Benjamin who made his way to England. John Taylor Wood escaped capture and traveled through South Georgia where he encountered Benjamin and Leovy. Benjamin, “with goggles on, his beard grown, a hat well over his face and a large cloak hiding his figure”, was disguised as M. Bofals, a Frenchman with a light wagon driver and interpreter, Henrt Jefferson Leovy. On May 4^th Breckinridge instructed the five brigade commanders to announce that any trooper who wanted to leave would have a furlough and any officer could submit his resignation. From May 4^th officers and men would volunteer for any service and they would not be ordered to do anything against their will. Disbursing the Confederate specie in payment of soldiers was discussed in Abbeville but no clear details were developed.^[124]

After the meeting in Abbeville on May 2^nd, John Taylor Wood, Joseph E. Johnston, and Micajah H. Clark burned government papers but kept documents that would provide resources for a history of the Confederacy.^[125]

The late time of departure from Abbeville, 11:00 p.m. that night, was set in hopes that Federal patrols would be less active after midnight. Ferguson’s Brigade, located on the Vienna Road, marched out at 2:00 a.m. after Davis passed by. Breckinridge rode with Ferguson’s Brigade bringing up the rear. The Vienna Road ran twenty-one miles from Abbeville to the Savannah River where the village of Vienna was located across the river from Petersburg, Georgia. An apocryphal story that conveys reality holds that President Davis approached a youthful soldier and asked if he would go west and fight. The private responded, “Our lives are just as precious to us as yours are to you. The war is over, and we are going home!”^[126]

The Vienna Road exists today from Abbeville, parallel to, then merging with South Carolina Highway 72, then turning southward on highway 823 to Mt.  Carmel. The Vienna Road crosses Little River just downstream from Calhoun Mill and climbs up to the top of the ridge to what is today Mt. Carmel. It went down the other side of the ridge to Hesters’ Bottoms near Russell Creek to Vienna. Vienna was near Fort Charlotte and Petersburg, in Georga, was near Fort James. By 1820 Dionysius Oliver had acquired 5,250 acres including the town of Dartmouth. He obtained permission from the Georgia legislature to build a public warehouse for “the reception and inspection” of tobacco. He laid out lots for a town he named Petersburg at the confluence of the Broad and Savannah Rivers. James Russell, a former Methodist preacher, settled across the Savannah where he unsuccessfully attempted to duplicate Oliver’s success at Vienna. Before the Civil War two ferries ran from Vienna to Petersburg and another connected Petersburg to Lisbon across the Broad River. The pontoon bridge constructed between Vienna and Petersburg was a major conduit for the Confederate logistics after Sherman ended rail traffic.[127]

There were rumors that a large Union force was near the Vienna Road on the night of May 2^nd, 1865, when Davis’ entourage rode from Abbeville to the Savannah. The night was chilly “and at times a slight rain fell.” Stephen Mallory rode in front of Davis’ group. “In approaching the river through a swampy country, I rode in advance of the party . . . of some twenty wagons, several ambulances, and about 150 mounted men.”  Light from a small cabin “shown dimly, I encountered a horseman in the middle of the road, his horse standing still with his head turned toward me.” Mallory noticed the man was dressed in dark clothes with a band of gold lace shining upon his cap, “I supposed at first glance that it was General Duke.” When the rider asked Mallory to identify the group of horsemen and wagons approaching them, Mallory got a better look and realized the rider was a federal officer. He thought the officer was leading cavalry. Mallory responded “evasively and invited him to accompany me. He withdrew to the side of the road, however, and there I left him.” The Davis group rode by without being recognized. This account demonstrated the excellence of the Union plan to capture Davis between Abbeville and the Savannah. That strategy came close to being spectacularly successful, but there was an inexorable and massively organized search on the Georgia side of the Savannah that was successful just a week later.^[128]

Footnotes: Chapter Six

[111] John W. Headley, Confederate Operations in Canada and New York (New York: The Neal Publishing Company, 1906, Scholar Select reprint), 432-437. A synopsis of Headley’s account is found in Ware, Old Abbeville, 104-105. Headley wrote that he and Martin stayed in Chester to allow their horses to rest for several days and joined Duke’s brigade when it came through Chester. The five escorting brigades did not come through Chester. Lowry Ware, Chapters in the History of Abbeville County “The Banner County” of South Carolina. (Columbia: SCMAR, 2012), 40. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 113.

[112] Morgan, Rebel Reefer, 239, 240, 242. Morgan became Trenholm’s son-in-law.

[113] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 222-235; Ware, Old Abbeville, 62.

[114] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 224-26. Davis, Breckinridge: Statesman, 225-231.

[115] Ware, Old Abbeville, 103. Quoting an article published in the Abbeville Press and Banner of March 23, 1866. 98, citing Abbeville Messenger, September 7, 1886. Duke, “After the Fall,” 164-65.

[116] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 227-28. Ware, Old Abbeville, 98-100. Duke, Reminiscences, 385.

[117] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 228-31. William C. Davis noted that Jefferson Davis was so distraught at this meeting that he did not mention it in his memoirs. Ferguson, “Another Account,” 263. Ware, Old Abbeville, 110. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 117-118.

[118] Basil W. Duke, History of Morgan’s Cavalry, (Columbia: Amazon order, photographed, June 2, 2022), 537. Duke, “After the Fall,” 163-64. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 420-22.

[119] Lowry P. Ware, Old Abbeville, 101, quoting an interview Ferguson made with the Charleston Sunday News of September 6. 1903, 107. Parker, Recollections, 368-69.

[120] Ware, Old Abbeville, 64, citing the Abbeville Medium, August 6, 1903.

[121] Ware, Old Abbeville, 64, citing the Abbeville Medium, August 6, 1903, 98-100. Citing an article by Basil Duke from Bivouac Magazine, April 1886, reprinted in the Abbeville Messenger, September 7, 1886. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 230-233.

[122] Yorkville Enquirer, November 29, 1860, published a summary of secession meetings. Many meetings were cited in the November 29^th issue for which there were no dates and Chesterfield was one of those, so the claim that it was the first is undocumented. Keowee Courier, November 24, 1860. The Anderson Intelligencer, November 16, 1860, reported on the November 13^th meeting in that town. Lancaster Ledger, November 28, 1860 reported on the November 23^rd meeting. The Carolina Spartan, November 29, 1860 reported on a mass meeting on secession held on November 24^th. The Southern Enterprise (Greenville), November 1, November 22, December 6, 1860 reported on a large crowd that met on October 23 where speakers declared that the cause of “the South was hopeless in the Union.” It also cited The Pickens Courier’s report of the November 23^rd mass meeting in that town. Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, vol. 11 No. 262 (1860, December 1, 1860, published a picture of the mass crowd that endorsed the call for a state convention that met at Institute Hall in Charleston on November 12, 1860. Robert Kahle Pierce, “The Charleston South Carolina Press and Abraham Lincoln, 1850,” MA Thesis, The University of Omaha, 1965, 90-92. The quotation was a paraphrase. Abbeville Medium, January 31, 1896. Google search, February 3, 2024.

[123] OR., series I, vol. 47, part 3, 77, 854. OR., series I, vol. 47, part 1, 927-38. OR., series I, vol. 49, part 2 , 703, Sifakis, Who Was Who, 643. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 136.

[124] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 147, 233-34, 316-319. Reagan, Memoirs, 211-12. John Taylor Wood, “The Escape of the Confederate Secretary of War,” Century Magazine, vol. 47, November 1893, 110-11.

[125] Shingleton, “Sea Ghost,” 156.

[126] Ware, Old Abbeville, 108. Morgan, Rebel Reefer, 237.  S. W. Ferguson, “Another Account,” 263. Fredrick W. Moore, ed., “The Diary of Maj. Kinlock Falconer’s,” CV, vol. 9, September 1901, 409. The distance from the Savannah at Vienna to Washington, Georgia was noted as twenty miles. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 121-125, Davis thought the departure was after midnight, but it was 11:00 p.m. on May2.

[127] Coulter, Old Petersburg, 31-33, 70, 163. Dionysius Oliver was born near Petersburg, Virginia in 1735.

[128] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 242-43. Mallory, “Last Days,” 1901, 246-47. Hanna, Oblivion, 85. Davis wrote that the pontoon bridge was near Fort Charlotte, below Vienna. Many other sources placed the location at Vienna, a short distant upstream of the site of the Revolutionary War’s Fort Charlotte. Hanna wrote in footnote 5, 260, Davis’ recollection was “more controversial than descriptive.” Little River ARP Church, one of three preaching stations of Thomas Clark, was six miles west of the Assembly Presbyterian Church of Hopewell in the late 1780s. Later it evidently became an Assembly Presbyterian Church that existed for several decades.

 

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Chapter Seven: Disbursement of Gold, Silver, and Veterans

Tillson could hear of no armed bands of rebels in the country, but everywhere officers and men of the rebel army expressed themselves as disgusted with the war, and as having a strong desire to return to peaceful pursuits. United States Brigadier General Davis Tillson

At 9:45 on the morning of May 3^rd John C. Breckinridge wrote to Jefferson Davis in Washington, Georgia. Breckinridge had set up a guard protecting the pontoon bridge across the Savannah. He thought the troops could no longer be relied on as a permanent military force. “I beg leave to repeat the opinions expressed in our room last evening.” Breckinridge intended to see Davis, but was “quite unwell” with dysentery. By 8:00 p.m. Breckinridge, having no response from Davis, informed him that “nothing can be done with the bulk of this command. It has been with difficulty that anything has been kept in shape. I am having the silver paid to the troops and will in any event save the gold and have it brought forward in the morning, when I hope Judge Reagan will take it. Many of the men have thrown away their arms. Most of them have resolved to remain here under Vaughn and Dibrell and will make terms.” Before sending this message Breckinridge received a response from Davis dated 3:15 p.m. so he added a post-script. “The specie train could not have been moved on but for the course adopted. Out of nearly four thousand men present but a few hundred could be relied on, and they were intermixed with the mass. Threats have reached me to seize the whole amount. But I hope the guard at hand will be sufficient.”^[129]

On May 2^nd Basil Duke was entrusted with conveying the specie from Abbeville to Washington, a job he later wrote was the worst of his life. Since he did not know the value of the specie, he had no way of proving he had been trustworthy. He asked for a detail from each brigade as guards of the specie.  “I believed this would be the best method of preventing jealousy and suspicion among the men of the escort, as well as insure greater vigilance.” Breckinridge found it essential to distribute specie in payment because a large majority of the soldiers no longer followed orders, and there were threats to seize the gold and silver. United States forces were sufficiently close to provoke constant rumors of impending attacks. The men knew the money could become United States property, leaving them without compensation. Quartermasters calculated the amount distributed per man in their unit, then disbursed the payment. Breckinridge decided to take sufficient specie and distribute it among quartermasters on May 3^rd and disburse it on May 4^th.^[130]

William H. Parker contended that during his return trip to Abbeville he met “Mrs. President Davis and her family escorted by Mr. Burton Harrison, the President’s Private Secretary.” But Varina was at Armistead Burt’s house until May 2^nd. Parker wrote that he arrived in Abbeville “around” April 28 when he stored the specie in a warehouse. Union forces occupied Anderson on May 1^st, and in the early morning hours of May 2^nd Parker moved the specie to a train prepared to leave at a moment’s notice.  After the specie was turned over to Basil Duke, Parker wrote an order detaching Midshipmen so they could return home. They were to “report by letter to the Hon. Secretary of Navy” as soon as possible. He attended a “May-party” in Abbeville on May 1^st. He witnessed the arrival of Davis from Cokesbury at 10:00 a. m. on May 2^nd and told him about meeting his wife “a few days before.” Parker met with Davis during the night of May 2^nd, and tried, unsuccessfully, to persuade Davis to remain in Abbeville.[131]

John C. Stiles recalled that when Parker dismissed the Midshipmen, he gave them three orders after they returned to Virginia. They were to detach themselves from the Naval Academy, visit their homes, then “report to the Secretary of Navy as soon as possible.” Parker dismissed the men under his command on May 2^nd. “We had about thirty colored servants in the command, and they started for Richmond in a body.” They were in high spirits. “I gave them all as much bacon, sugar and coffee as they could carry; and did the same to the midshipmen and the Charlotte company.” Parker requested that John F. Wheless, Paymaster, provide compensation for the midshipmen and “Marine Corps,” from the Naval Yard.^[132]

Duke recalled that Breckinridge “ordered that the silver coins . . . should be paid to the troops in partial discharge of the arrears of pay due them.” The quartermasters from the five brigades “sat up during the night counting out and dividing the money and prorated it in proportion to the rosters of their respective commands. This procedure elicited a lively interest among the prospective beneficiaries of the distribution. A throng of men surrounded the little frame house where the money was being counted until after daybreak and the windows were blocked with the eager faces of the interested expectants.”  He thought “the sight of so much money seemed to banish sleep.” Each soldier and officer in Duke’s brigade received $32.00 at Breckinridge’s orders. Breckinridge received $32.00. The house, on the Georgia side of the Savannah, was that of David Moss. It sat next to Leeston House’s dwelling, according to Mary House Lane whose older sister married David Moss.^[133]

On May 4^th men from Duke’s command remained near the pontoon bridge protecting the east entry to Washington. Breckinridge sent Ferguson’s brigade west of Washington to block enemy forces from that direction. John S. Jackman, who was in Washington and a member of the Orphan Brigade, noted the arrival of Ferguson’s men on May 3^rd.^[134] The brigades commanded by Colonel Breckinridge and Brigadier Generals Dibrell and Vaughn remained near the west end of the pontoon bridge. Joseph Haw remembered May 4, 1865. “A blanket was spread on the ground, on which a bucket of Mexican silver dollars was distributed in little piles, one for each member of the company, twenty in each pile, and gold and small change added to make very nearly $26.00.” On the next day Dibrell’s men moved their camp a short distance to the confluence of the Broad and Savannah Rivers “in a grove of oaks and hickory, with boulders of gray rock scattered through the wood and the river convenient for bathing.” Everyone knew the war was over. The water washed away filth from bodies as the soothing elixir began to cleanse horrors from minds. They talked of going home, a lot of horse-trading with mares bringing the most, and meeting neighbors against whom they had fought for four years. On May 8 they went to Washington to see United States Army personnel, where “several of the best scribes were busy filling out parole blanks.” On May 10^th, the day Davis was captured, their bugler sounded, “boots and saddles;” they broke camp, and marched off. The terms of surrender precluded calvary keeping their mounts unless they were unable to find a train. In Macon James Wilson created an exception after Dibrell appealed so his men could ride home. Most assumed the men would depart alone or in small groups. Few locations would be able to feed more than a handful, and hosts would be easier to find. But theory does not define human behavior. Basil Duke noted, “while the greater number in each department surrendered in a body, entire organizations being paroled together, there were many who did so individually or in small parties.” ^[135]

Ferguson returned to his command on May 4^th to find desertions and, contrary to orders, men who were taking supplies. He saw white flags all over his encampment. His men were anxious to surrender. Signs that morale was low could be found everywhere. United States forces were aware that Confederate soldiers were disillusioned. Brigadier General Davis Tillson reported that he “could hear of no armed bands of rebels in the country, but everywhere officers and men of the rebel army expressed themselves as disgusted with the war, and as having a strong desire to return to peaceful pursuits. The guerrilla bands in the mountains are reported as being disbanded, the worst men leaving the country, and the others returning to their homes.” ^[136]

Lewis Crawford McAllister, Sr. a member of Ferguson’s brigade, wrote that on May 4, 1865, the Colonel of the Fifty-Sixth Alabama Regiment refused to follow Ferguson’s command to saddle up. He did not believe Johnston’s surrender applied to his brigade even though it was in Johnston’s command. It had been detached and sent to escort Davis. Ferguson answered that Johnston did not include his brigade in his surrender and arrested the Colonel. When Ferguson then ordered the men to prepare to leave, all officers refused. He “hoped his brigade would be the last troops to surrender east of the Chattahoochee River but was unable to enforce his orders” and asked them to ride with him to Breckinridge’s headquarters. Once there he would report to Breckinridge; “that he no longer had a brigade.” Ferguson found that only ninety or 100 men volunteered to accompany Davis as far as the Mississippi River. He reported that Davis did not need an escort and they “should take advantage of Gen. Johnston’s terms of surrender.” Ferguson lined up his men, shook the hand of each one and gave each one a parole signed, “By Command of S. W. Ferguson.” Seven miles west of Washington on the march home they encountered a United States Army unit. The commanding officer asked them to surrender their arms. They left their weapons in a house on the side of the road and continued homeward bound.  Ferguson and his sons joined a decoy group to attract United States forces away from Davis. Quartermaster L. C. McAllister commanded Ferguson’s men on their journey home together.^[137]

When Jefferson Davis held his last meeting in Washington, Georgia, he appointed Micajah H. Clark Acting Secretary of the Treasury of the Confederate States. Davis wrote that this was his last official act.^[138] Reagan had been made Acting Secretary of Treasury but was determined to follow Davis. He, along with Breckenridge, assisted Clark for two days before leaving. Duke was extremely pleased to see Clark assume custody of the specie. There could not have been a better person in the Confederacy to follow Reagan. Clark was efficient, intelligent, creative, and very responsible. He reported to Breckenridge during the night of May 3^rd. Breckenridge and Reagan gave instructions to Clark. He was to burn paper money, keep records of the disbursal of funds, and send specie with various generals as they rode west. These funds were to be used by Davis in the Trans-Mississippi, and not used by those to whom they were entrusted. By May 4^th the Trans-Mississippi Confederacy was no more. Clark kept receipts signed by officers to whom money was entrusted. One peculiar disbursal was made by Breckenridge when he left Washington. He sent a sack of silver left after Ferguson’s men were paid, to the home of Robert Toombs, former United States Senator and irascible Confederate Brigadier General. He and Jefferson Davis did not speak and there was no contact between them in Washington. Toombs took the silver to a United States officer in Washington to be distributed among Confederate parolees for food as they traveled to their homes.^[139]

Micajah H. Clark’s statement of assets he received on May 3 was $288,022.00. He wrote a retroactive record that at Greensboro $36,000 to $40,000 had been paid to Joseph E. Johnston’s forces so that when the treasury reached Danville there was a total of $327,002.90. His last receipt was for $86,000 in gold bullion, “to a trusted officer of the navy, taking his receipt for its transmission out of the Confederacy, to be held for the Treasury Department.”  John Reagan explained that Davis had asked Reagan to turn over Confederate gold to James A. Sample, a bonded naval officer. John Taylor Wood served on the Virginia with James A. Sample, a Navy Paymaster. They would conceal this fund in the false bottom of a carriage and ship it to Bermuda, Nassau where a Confederate agent would transport it to England for the Confederate Government. Before this transfer was made, Reagan, with Davis’ approval, had some of the gold paid out to officers. Such disbursements were made with the understanding the specie would be taken to the Trans-Mississippi area for use there. That there were many rumors of funds confiscated by United States forces is evidence this money, as well as the $86,000, was confiscated by United States forces. The total sum of specie taken out of Charlotte included $450,000 in specie from private banks in Richmond. Micajah Clark and Reagan deposited this private gold and silver in a Washington bank. This specie was retrieved by a private wagon train from Richmond. When it was returning to Richmond it was said to have been attacked by unknown persons near Danburg, Georgia, but the documentation seems confusing. Clark correctly asserted that the Treasury Train was never with Jefferson Davis. He did not go near it when it was in Abbeville, and he left Washington while money was still being disbursed.^[140]

Clark reported that, “the boys told me they got about $26.00 apiece; enough, they hoped, to make them through.” Obviously, these soldiers were not in Duke’s brigade. The per capita distribution varied significantly among brigades so that individual soldiers received wildly different sums. The amount was determined by unit quartermasters and varied from less than $1.12½ to $32.00. Will Miller wrote a letter describing his payment. He received $1.12½. He and a friend threw “heads and tails” for the 2½ pennies. Will won and the next day traded the nickel for $60.00 in Confederate paper money, “the worst trade I ever made.” Broomfield Ridley was told he would receive $180 but he received only $1.15. He gave the fifteen cents to his servant. He paid a New York jeweler $35.00 to engrave the four quarters with his name and rank. These gifts to his posterity were stolen later. William Govan, Quartermaster for Johnston’s Army of Tennessee, reported on April 28^th, the day after the army surrendered, that he had an estimated $37,609 to pay 32,174 men. The amount per soldier and officer was $1.17+48/100 of a penny. ^[141]

On May 4, Alexander R. Lawton, Quartermaster-General, and J. C. Breckinridge endorsed a retroactive statement that $108,322.90, the total taken by quartermasters on May 3, was paid to troops on May 4. John H. Reagan, Acting Secretary of Treasury before Clark, indorsed a retroactive statement that Clark had turned over funds to Major E. C. White, Senior Quartermaster.^[142]

Clark had no conveyance, so Breckinridge gave him an ambulance to use as he travelled between Washington and his position on the road to the Savannah, where he paid out the money. Clark used the ambulance to go to a room in Washington where he burned a mass of currency and bonds worth millions (in Confederate money) in the presence of Breckinridge and Reagan. Clark selected “the shade of a large elm tree as the ‘Treasury Department,’” where he commenced his duties. He was about a mile out of Washington on the road to the Savannah. He made detailed disbursements in the shade of the tree. One was the $1,500 in silver to the Midshipmen and $1,500 in silver to John F. Wheless for the navy servicemen who guarded the specie from Charlotte to Abbeville. On order of President Davis, Clark gave boxes of specie to feed paroled soldiers “who were passing through, to prevent there being a burden to a section already well stripped of supplies.” Clark had a receipt for twenty boxes of silver bullion supposedly worth from $35,000 to $40,000 made out to the “Quartermaster-General and the Commissary-General of Subsistence.” Thousands of men were paid by Clark, assisted by John C. Breckinridge and Reagan, at the elm tree. Even Ferguson’s brigade was paid at the elm tree. Dibrell’s brigade was paid $26.00 per man at the elm tree and a relatively small group went west of Washington with Breckinridge. Some men from the brigades of Dibrell, Duke and Vaughn marched from Washington together, as decoys.^[143]

When Breckinridge addressed the troops, informing them of the Abbeville decision to allow them to volunteer to follow orders, few volunteered. Once paid, soldiers wanted to surrender, obtain a parole slip, and go home. A parole would protect them from United States forces and, perhaps more importantly, provide free conveyance on a train or steamboat. From Washington they could entrain for Atlanta and points beyond, or they could take a train to Augusta where there was steamship service to Savannah. William Rufus Bringhurst and his boyhood friend, Clay Stacker, went to Augusta to be “paroled as a protection, and we reached home about the last day of May.” Caroline Janney found a parolee who used his parole pass for free rail service to Atlanta where “he received three pairs of pants with the same number of shirts, drawers, and pairs of socks. With a fresh wardrobe . . . he set off on the final leg of his journey to Augusta, Georgia.” Horatio Washington Bruce took a train from Charlotte to Chester, bought a horse for $7,000 in Confederate money, and rode to Augusta. He paid $50 for a room in the Planter’s Hotel and bought a pair of cashmere pantaloons for $1,000. He rode to Halifax County, Virginia where he gave his horse away. He spent a week with a friend in Pennsylvania, then rode a train to Richmond, boarded a steamboat bound for Baltimore, entrained for Washington, where he caught one to Cincinnati, and then took a steamboat to Louisville where his tourist excursion ended on June 19, 1865. It was fortunate that transportation services awarded free rides to Confederate parolees. Robert Gillam, a clerk from the Treasury Department who was with the Treasury Train, was paroled in Augusta and went down the Savannah on a stern-wheeled steamboat, visiting at Hilton Head. He and his companions took a steamer from there to Newport News.^[144]

The indefatigable Union General William Jackson Palmer sent a message to Major General Emory Upton in Augusta on May 6^th, and another to Major General J. H. Wilson in Macon for instructions. Palmer crossed the Savannah into Georgia at Hatton’s Ford on May 6^th and found men from the brigades of Dibrell, Duke, Ferguson, and Vaughn, waiting to surrender. Several troopers from Ferguson’s brigade wanted to go to Macon to surrender. Palmer took no action and evidently treated the defeated men well. He reported that the Confederate specie had been distributed to all soldiers. His message moved up the chain of command to George H. Thomas in Nashville who, on May 11, sent a telegram assuring Grant that the Confederates were waiting to surrender.^[145]

Palmer submitted a report on May 24, 1865, noting that about 1,000 men from Ferguson’s brigade were “allowed to march to Macon to surrender to Wilson.” His wording and willingness to observe activities while taking no actions, indicates the Union’s object was to capture Davis and avoid armed conflict. “A large proportion of the rebel soldiers paroled at different posts in the South were without arms, some saying they threw them away others kept them with their commands when furloughed.”^[146]

Attempts to use veterans to divert the attention of United States forces from hunting down Davis were doomed because gossip conveyed Confederate plans to deserters or to Union spies embedded in Confederate units. Braxton Bragg was located by Palmer’s men on May 7^th west of Washington. He informed his captor he was not attempting to escape; he was riding home. Palmer explained that “the people all want peace and provisions and appear strongly opposed to the Trans-Mississippi scheme of Davis.”^[147]

Reagan wrote that William C. Breckinridge created a decoy column with fifty soldiers in front, fifty in the rear and wagons in between. These wagons were said to contain Confederate gold, a ruse to attract attention from Davis. John C. Breckinridge traveled incognito with his cousin’s decoy group. Colonel Breckinridge was willing to risk the role of decoy but wanted Davis to get a boat and escape to another country. He opposed a trip to the Trans-Mississippi Department. Colonel Breckinridge stopped on the road at Elizabeth Wellmaker Thompson’s farm five miles from Washington. His cousin, John C. Breckinridge remained incognito. Clay Stacker was ordered to inform Duke that Breckinridge would be late. Stracker encountered a battalion of Union troopers from Palmer’s brigade commanded by Major Andrew Campbell. Stacker galloped to Colonel Breckinridge, who moved a company into position on the road with directions that they “should not provoke a battle and should avoid bloodshed.” Neither side was belligerent and both ready to bluff to avoid conflict. Johnson Boyd, a cavalryman with Breckinridge, remembered that Clay Stacker, a beardless boy in 1865, took a flag of truce, and carried messages between Campbell and Breckinridge. Breckinridge sent word to Campbell that he had no personal knowledge of Joseph E. Johnston’s surrender, a falsehood, but one that served a higher purpose. The agreement was that each side could use the road to Woodstock. Campbell was willing for Breckinridge to continue in peace until Breckinridge could find confirmation of Johnston’s surrender. W. R. Bringhurst recalled the events and, many years later, wrote Breckinridge about the incident. Breckinridge remembered there were forty-seven men in front of his column and that there were 250 men with Andrew Campbell. Only a small number of Confederates blocked the road; the rest were obscured behind a hill. Campbell was told he faced Colonel Breckinridge’s Brigade, another falsehood. During a long period of discussion John C. Breckinridge “and some other soldiers left in our command, passed through the woods, being guided by a citizen, and made his way to Florida.” Colonel Breckinridge informed Major Campbell that his personal escort of about fifty men would go to Woodstock. Bringhurst, unable to resist bravado, wrote that fifty Confederates under Colonel Breckinridge, “compelled five times their number of Federals to draw off the road and let them go their way.” Bringhurst understood the confrontation consisted of peaceful negotiations that went on a long time. He wrote that both sides knew they “should not provoke a battle and avoid bloodshed.” Clay Stacker recalled that Campbell’s last message to Breckinridge was, “‘go in peace.’” William C. Davis was correct in asserting that this confrontation had the potential to ignite conflict. Perhaps it persuaded John C. Breckinridge that playing with decoys was very dangerous. John C. Breckinridge met M. H. Clark “a few miles south of Sandersville, Georgia” and spent the night with him. As the Kentucky men rode by the Union battalion, they cheered each other.^[148]

Basil Duke remembered that shortly after Jefferson Davis left Washington on May 4, Breckinridge asked him to take a force, prepared to march for two or three days in a direction that would divert the attention of Union cavalry searching for Davis. Duke took two hundred men and rode to the small village of Woodstock. “Here I found myself directly confronted by a very superior force of Federal cavalry. I halted, having no wish, of course, to fight.” A staff officer, under a flag of truce, carried a message to Duke from his commanding officer that Duke, “do nothing to bring on an engagement, for any further bloodshed was much to be regretted.” The officer in command notified Duke “in very courteous terms that he would not attack unless I proceeded toward the west, in which event, he said, he would very much to his regret, be compelled ‘to use violence.’” He thought it proper that Duke surrender, because further bloodshed “was useless and wrong: but that he would not undertake to hasten the matter.” Duke replied that he would not move west while this Federal force was present. He assured the Union officer that he “too, saw no good reason why more blood should be shed,” and that he would give surrender immediate and careful consideration. When some time had passed the Confederates used the same road as the Federals. “The men of the previously hostile hosts cheered each other as they passed, and the “Yanks” shouted, “You rebs had better go home and stop this nonsense: we don’t want to hurt each other.’” In the afternoon Colonel Breckinridge arrived at Woodstock. He conveyed a message from Major General Breckinridge to Duke that “all had been done to assist Mr. Davis that was possible, and that he advised me to make immediate arrangements for surrender.” Breckinridge thought it was “folly to think of holding out longer and criminal to risk the lives of the men when no good could possibly be accomplished.” Bidding the men to “return to the loved land of their birth, he went off into exile.” Ironically, the only way for Duke’s men to go home was westward. But they moved not under command of an officer but as paroled veterans. Bringhurst wrote that after the meeting at Woodstock it was “every man for himself.” H. G. Damon was at Woodstock when Breckinridge and Duke bid their troops farewell. Col. Breckinridge “dissipated” the idea that they would cross the Mississippi. “He told us the war was over, and there was nothing to do but go home and accept the situation.” Duke spoke next, “and the eloquence and pathos of it brought tears to the eyes of nearly every man there.” He thought Breckinridge was the “finest-looking man” he had ever seen.^[149]

After they surrendered, Duke, his staff, and a few others were paroled in Augusta. After being paroled they were asked to swear allegiance to the United States government, and some refused. Others thought accepting a parole, ipso facto, gave them the status of citizens. Some who refused to swear allegiance were put in a stockade, but superior officers soon had them released. Duke resented the order for Confederates to remove uniforms or to remove the Confederate buttons from uniforms. Some soldiers, he noted, had skimpy uniforms and to remove them would leave the wearers unclothed. He, as well as others, covered their Confederate buttons with cloth. Federal General Orders no. 73 gave Union officers the duty of controlling Confederate veterans who were paroled. United States generals rushed to implement the order and quickly provost marshals were ordered to “arrest any rebel still wearing his uniform.” Duke might have resented this order but found a way to retain his buttons incognito.^[150]

John C. Breckinridge reported that citizens in Washington knew everything and passed information to federals. This was understandable because before Union troops had control of Washington, fires destroyed structures. Veterans seemed unconcerned with anything about Davis. When Colonel Breckinridge’s men rode into Washington on May 6 to be paroled, they found Union men waiting. There was no bloodshed because both sides knew the war was over and Union soldiers knew former Confederate soldiers were now veterans.^[151]

Strange emotions stirred in the hearts of Confederates when confronting United States troops after May 4, 1865. When John S. Jackman of the Orphan Brigade entered Washington on May 6^th, the date their unit had agreed to surrender, their flags flew proudly. Then they met the Thirteenth Tennessee Federal Cavalry, the unit to whom they surrendered. “It looked strange not to see them commence shooting at each other.” The Confederates had to secure parole slips before going home. Jackman worked assiduously preparing papers and finished at 10:00 p. m. when the regiment was paroled. But then the “Federal Provost Marshal worked nearly all night paroling us.” Erstwhile enemies were working together so the vanquished could “break up housekeeping” and ride home on May 7.^[152]

Upton and Wilson treated the defeated hordes who passed through north Georgia with kindness and sympathy. They used a supply line from the coast to Augusta by steamboat and from there to other locations by train. On May 3 Wilson sent Upton a telegram at 2:30 p. m., asking for information on Confederates from Joseph E. Johnstons’ Army of the Tennessee. Wilson wanted to be prepared to accommodate the needs of thousands of men who had surrendered and were moving westward through Georgia. These projects originated with William Tecumseh Sherman. Sherman left North Carolina on April 29, 1865, and went to Charleston to create a garrison in Augusta and communicate with Wilson in Macon. On April 30 Sherman was on Hilton Head Island, sending supplies and arranging for regular shipments to Wilson. During their negotiations in April, Sherman wrote to Johnston that he was going to restrain General Stoneman. He wanted Stoneman to “suspend any devastation or destruction contemplated by him. I will add I really desire to save the people of North Carolina the damage they would sustain by the march of this army through the central and western parts of the state.” Sherman feared large numbers of Confederate parolees or deserters, going through the countryside, could produce pandemonium. “The South is broken and ruined and appeals to our pity. To ride the people down with persecutions and military exactions would be like slashing away at the crew of a sinking ship.” He complained that politicians could “use sheriffs, bailiffs, and catch-thieves” to capture Davis, but he did not want to march armed forces across the countryside on a “fool’s errand.” He thought the idea of Jefferson Davis with tons of gold was ridiculous. “We must, if possible, save our country from anarchy.” As early as April 17, Sherman understood that Johnston’s army was “dissolving and fleeing away.” After his first meeting with Johnston, Sherman wrote a report at 7:00 p.m. He thought there was “a great danger that the Confederate armies will dissolve and fill the whole land with robbers and assassins, and I think this is one of the difficulties that Johnston faces.” Johnston feared guerrilla warfare and anarchy as much as Sherman, and that allowed the two to fashion a successful peace. Sherman had communicated with Grant and Abraham Lincoln, and knew they had “no vindictive feeling against Confederate armies.” Wilson sent written descriptions of the situation in Macon to Sherman. Sherman knew Wilson needed “a sure base of supply, so that he need no longer depend for clothing, ammunition, food and forage, on the country, which, now that war had ceased, it was our solemn duty to protect, instead of plunder.” These considerations caused Sherman, on April 29, to order the captured steamer Jeff Davis up the Savannah 250 miles to Augusta, establishing a supply line to James H. Wilson and his 13,000 men in Macon. Shortly after the Jeff Davis left, a second steamer followed. “Hilton Head exploded into activity.” A 1,400 feet long wharf with storage buildings costing $300,000 made it the supply center for the southeast. The Jeff Davis, a stern wheeler, averaged three or four miles an hour and reached Sand Bar Ferry three miles below Augusta in the early afternoon of May 4^th.  By that time Augusta was filled with Confederate veterans headed home. The whiskey flowed freely, but the men in “gray were quiet, well-behaved, and respectful.” Steamers brought clothing, sugar, coffee, and bread from Hilton Head. Officers at Augusta were to maintain this supply line. There was a railroad connection from Augusta to Savannah. Sherman returned to North Carolina, visiting Charleston on the way. When he arrived in Morehead City on May 3^rd, he found that 30,000 Confederates had been paroled in Greensboro. By May 4^th Emory Upton in Augusta was visited by Brigadier General Vaughn. Vaughn noted that, in North Carolina, horses were not confiscated from cavalrymen. Upton knew that Vaughn’s men were returning to loyal states so he would follow Sherman’s example. Sherman gave captured stock to people in need and Upton gave equine stock to farmers.^[153]

The enormity of sustaining the massive flow of Confederate veterans was revealed in Sherman’s Memoirs. Major General John McAllister Schofield at Greensboro, NC reported he had paroled 36,817 Confederates. Major General James Harrison in Macon had paroled 52,453 in Georgia and Florida. The aggregate surrendered under Joseph E. Johnston was 89,270. This number far exceeds the maximum number counted on Johnston’s rolls, but thousands of Confederate veterans from Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia came through the same areas. Robert Willingham thought that by April 27, 1865, some 115,000 soldiers had passed through Washington and the women served about 2,000 rations a day.^[154]

Sherman was establishing logistical support for Federal and former Confederate troops before Jefferson Davis reached Abbeville, and Sherman was back in North Carolina before Davis reached Georgia. The day after the surrender was signed, Sherman wrote to Grant that he did not know if “Mr. Stanton wants Davis caught.” While Wilson, Upton and thousands of other Union men were doing their best to capture Davis, Sherman visited Georgia where he worked to facilitate peaceful movement of Confederate veterans. He seemed unaware that Davis was abroad in that state.^[155]

Davis had breakfast at a house outside Danburg on May 3, and then rode into Washington, arriving at noon wearing a Confederate gray uniform. He had experienced no real sleep since he had spent the night with Lafayette Young the night of April 30^th. He slept scarcely at all on the night of May 1^st at the Gary home in Cokesbury because of constant reports of Union troops abroad. He left Cokesbury on May 2^nd, spent thirteen hours including the emotionally trying meeting in Abbeville, and then left at 11:00 p.m. for Washington. John Joseph Robertson and Mary Elizabeth Bowen Robertson hosted Davis in their residence located on the second floor of a bank building just after Harrison left. Robertson sent Davis’ courier and his son, Willie, to invite Davis to his home. Upon arrival Davis went to his room and rested. His escort was taken to a camp “at the mineral springs a mile south of Washington. Mary’s servants, Mary Green and Harriett Hyrams served a huge meal as a late dinner. There was “soup, fresh local fresh vegetables from the garden, turkey, ham, chicken, lobster, salads, salmon, lettuce, tea, and coffee. . . .” One source contended little was consumed by Davis. That night he had buttermilk and cornbread. While there Davis spent some time conversing with Mary. She thought his mind was so absorbed with joining Major General Edmund Kirby Smith across the Mississippi that he ignored the imminent danger he faced in Washington. Mary Robertson wrote that Varina’s ambulance and baggage wagons were parked in front of Fielding and Frances Wingfield Ficklen’s house. Robert M. Willingham noted this was “in readiness to depart at a moment’s notice.” While the Ficklen’s son, Boyce, took Jeff Jr. fishing. Burton Harrison wrote to Jefferson Davis at 10:15 a. m. on May 2 that “Ladies and children are well at Dr. Ficklen’s house.” Harrison was the guest of Judge Garnet Andrews after leaving the Robertson’s home.[156]

On May 4^th Davis awoke and decided he had to move rapidly to avoid capture. He called a meeting, not for advice, but for a discussion, with Davis doing all the talking and those present listening. Davis asserted that he lacked the constitutional power to dissolve the government, but he could suspend its functions. Cabinet members were scarce.  Judah P. Benjamin disappeared in disguise from the banks of the Savannah. Reagan asked Benjamin where he was going. His reply was “to the farthest place from the United States, if it takes me to the middle of China.” The disbursement was carried out by Clark, Reagan, and Breckinridge. Brigadier Generals Vaughn, Dibrell, Duke, Ferguson, and Colonel Breckinridge were assisting with the details of distributing money, the surrender of their men, and assisting veterans returning home. John C. Breckinridge had become the person exercising military leadership, which is why he was not in the meeting. Elizabeth Bowen Robertson hosted Davis in their residence located on the second floor of a bank building just after Harrison left. Robertson sent Davis’ courier and his son, Willie, to invite Davis to his home. Upon arrival Davis went to his room and rested. His escort was taken to a camp “at the mineral springs a mile south of Washington. Mary’s servants, Mary Green and Harriett Hyrams served a huge meal as a late dinner. There was “soup, fresh local fresh vegetables from the garden, turkey, ham, chicken, lobster, salads, salmon, lettuce, tea, and coffee. . . .” One source contended little was consumed by Davis. That night he had buttermilk and cornbread. While there Davis spent some time conversing with Mary. She thought his mind was so absorbed with joining Major General Edmund Kirby Smith across the Mississippi that he ignored the imminent danger he faced in Washington. Mary Robertson wrote that Varina’s ambulance and baggage wagons were parked in front of Fielding and Frances Wingfield Ficklen’s house. Robert M. Willingham noted this was “in readiness to depart at a moment’s notice.” While the Ficklen’s son, Boyce, took Jeff Jr. fishing. Burton Harrison wrote to Jefferson Davis at 10:15 a. m. on May 2 that “Ladies and children are well at Dr. Ficklen’s house.” Harrison was the guest of Judge Garnet Andrews after leaving the Robertson’s home.[156]

Davis announced he would temporarily suspend the government and reactivate it across the Mississippi. He would not go to Florida but would join Richard Taylor’s army in Alabama. Davis was unaware that West Point graduate and Mexican War veteran Major General Edward Richard Sprigg Canby had accepted the last Confederate surrender from Richard Taylor, Davis’ brother-in-law. William C. Davis quoted Alexander Lawton’s comment to a bystander as he left the meeting: “it is all over; the Confederate government is dissolved.” Joseph E. Johnston, frustrated that he was unable to find support, declared on May 1^st that “I know of no War Department nor other branch of the civil government.” He declared the “civil government seems to have left this part of the country, taking all means of supporting troops.”^[157]

Stephen Mallory, Secretary of the Navy, was present in Washington, but had resigned effective 4:00 p.m. on May 3. Before they reached Washington, Mallory informed Davis of “my determination not to leave the country, and not to cross the Mississippi with him, for I regarded all designs and plans for continuing the war as wrong.” He gave Davis his resignation, joined Lewis T. Wigfall and his wife on a train to Atlanta and La Grange where Mallory’s wife and children were refugeeing. Before he left, he offered to accompany Davis to South Florida and leave the country. Mallory suggested that Davis use the railroad to visit Varina, at the time some twenty miles to the west, then return to Washington. “This he seemed inclined to do when I bade him good-by.”^[158]

Basil Duke attended the Washington meeting as did Bragg and Quartermaster General Alexander R. Lawton. Davis’ aide-de-camp Colonel Francis Richard Lubbock, born in Beaufort, South Carolina, and a former Texas Governor stayed with Davis. Aides-de-Camp Colonel John Taylor Wood, Colonel William Preston Johnston (son of Albert Sidney Johnston) and Colonel Charles Thornburn were in attendance. Wood served on naval vessels, including the CSS Virginia and fought against the Monitor. He was commissioned as a colonel of cavalry and aide-de-camp to Davis. Thorburn, like Wood, had maritime experience. He was a blockade runner who joined Davis at Greensboro. He had secreted a boat on the Indian River in eastern Florida. He and Wood, if possible, planned to move Davis from the Indian River to Texas or Mexico. Felix Robinson, was a nemesis for John C. Breckinridge, an unconfirmed brigadier general under Wheeler who was “just as unreliable as Wheeler. . . .” He led his men as they killed wounded African Americans after a battle at Saltville in southwest Virginia. This was the “Saltville Massacre,” resulting in the Confederate Senate refusing to confirm Robinson’s appointment as a brigadier.^[159]

Davis asked Given Campbell to select ten of his men from the Ninth Kentucky Cavalry, including Lieutenants Lee Hathaway and Winder Monroe, as guards. Campbell’s men were with Davis when he was captured. John Taylor Wood noted that African American servants Robert and James were also in the group. Davis’ assumed name was “Mr. Smith.” He “assumed the role of a Texas member of the defunct Confederate Congress and Reagan played a Texas Judge,” a position he actually occupied.” When Davis departed, he carried a package to keep him well fortified. Mary Robertson, Mary Green and Harriet Hyrams packed a huge lunch of delicacies.^[160]

After the meeting, at about 10:00 a. m., Davis left Washington to eventually move in the direction taken by Varina. Clark wrote that, “President Davis rode up with his party, when what I supposed were farewell words passed between us” and shortly thereafter the treasure train arrived. The location was about a mile out of Washington on the road to Abbeville. Davis rode away from Washington in the wrong direction to foil followers. Despite this ruse federal forces knew not only Davis’ route but various plans to use decoy groups. The thousands of Confederate veterans were rich sources of information and Union spies were embedded with Davis’ escort. ^[161]

Footnotes: Chapter Seven

[129] OR., series I, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 1277. OR., series I, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 1277, 1278. John C. Breckinridge, located a half-mile west of the Savannah River, wrote to Jefferson Davis, in Washington, Georgia, May 3, 1865, SHSP, vol. 12, 1884, 99.

[130] Duke, Reminiscences, 2001, 387-89.

[131] Parker, Recollections, 363, 365, 367, 369. Parker’s chronology was difficult to follow, presumably because his book was published in 1883.

[132] Stiles, “Naval Academy,” 402. Parker, Recollections, 365. Clark, “Specie,” 549-550. John F. Wheless, “The Confederate Treasure – Statement of Paymaster John F, Wheless,” SHSP, vol. 10, March 1882, 140.

[133] Duke, Reminiscences, 389. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 242-284. Davis states that the specie was moved into the home of David Moss on May 3. The 1860 and 1860 Census records for Georgia and South Carolina do not show a David Moss. Ralph L. Hobbs, The Fate of the Two Confederate Wagon Trains of Gold (Columbia: American Systems of the Southeast), 1997, 16-17. Hobbs quoted Mary House Lane, who, in 1925, said the house was the first on the west side of the Savannah River below the confluence of the Broad and Savannah Rivers. Census records include the House family but not the exact location of the dwelling. Duke, “After the Fall,” 164. Duke wrote as if the disbursement took place at night and in a cabin. The wagons would have had to depart from Abbeville well before the brigades at 11:00 p. m. or it would have been daylight long before they crossed.

[134] William C. Davis, ed., Diary of a Confederate Soldier: John S. Jackman of the Orphan Brigade. (Columbia: The University of South Carolina Press, 1990), 167.

[135] Haw, “Ordinance Department,” 1927, 15. Duke, Reminiscences, 391.

[136] Ware, Old Abbeville, 64, 98-100. Duke, “After then Fall,” 161-63. OR., series I, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 623.

[137] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 232-35. Ware, Old Abbeville, 102. L. C. McAllister, “Disbanding President Davis’ Escort” CV, vol. 13, January 1905, 25. Lewis Crawford McAllister, Sr. is in Census records, Ancestry.com and fold3. OR., series I, vol. 47, part 3, 799, 800, 809, 810. OR., series I, vol. 47, part 3, 799. Ridley, “Coming Home,” 99.

[138] Davis, Rise and Fall, 868.

[139] Clark, “Specie,” 99. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 254, 270, 280. The account of Toombs’s disposal of specie does not appear in Clark’s accounting. Some speculated that Breckinridge intended the specie to be sent to England. But Breckinridge suggested to others giving Confederate specie to Union officers for Confederates going home. He was certainly aware that there was no official Confederacy after May 4^th when the last Confederate forces surrendered. Ware, Old Abbeville, 83. Duke, Reminiscences, 388-89. Shingleton, Sea Ghost, 157. John Reagan identified the naval officer as John A. Semple; Shingleton used the name James A. Sample.

[140] Clark, “Specie,” 545, 553-56. Clark, “Retreat from Richmond,” 100. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 263, 274, 338. Reagan, Memoirs, 272, 184. Reagan read about Confederate specie falling into Union hands and mentioned $36,000. Joseph M. Broun, “The Last Confederate Payroll,” CV, vol. 25, June 1917, 258. Broun’s article was also published in Civil War History, vol. 39, June 1961.At the end of the Confederate Veteran article there is a notice from the March 15,1914 Chattanooga Times that Major General J. H. Wilson obtained $80,000 in Confederate specie. OR., series 1, chapter 49, part 2, 703. This could be money from the Richmond private banks, or the $86,000 in specie given to Sample. Ware, Old Abbeville, 83. Ware noted the local paper did not mention the local tradition that the private bank money was hijacked in Abbeville, “perhaps because it was so fanciful.” Shingleton, Sea Ghost, 157.

[141] Clark, “Specie,” 546-556. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 270. Will Miller, CV, vol. 3, June 1895, 162. Broomfield L. Ridley, “Captain Ridley’s Journal,” CV, vol. 3, April 1895, 99. OR., series I, vol. 47, part 3, 850. Census of 1860, Find-A-Grave, names William Hemphill Govan.

[142] Clark, “Specie,” 546-47. SHSP, Vol. 12, 1884, 99. Some troopers reported they received $26.50 each.

[143] W. R. Bringhurst, “Survivor of President Davis’ Escort,” CV, vol. 34, January 1926, p. 369. B. L. Ridley, “Coming Home from Greensboro,” CV, vol. 3, August 1895, p.234. “Coming Home.” H. G. Damon, “The Eyes of General Breckinridge,” CV, vol. 17, August 1899. p. 380. Hereafter cited as Damon, “Eyes of Breckinridge”. OR., Series I, vol. 49 chapter 61, part 1, p. 555. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, pp. 634, 717. Clark, “Specie,” pp. 545-552. Some sources stated Clark took a position under an oak, rather than an elm tree.

[144] Bringhurst, “Survivor,” 369. H. W. Bruce, “Some Reminiscences of the Second of April 1865,” SHSP, vol. 9, May 1881, 211. Janney, Ends of War, 166. Robert Gilliam, “Last of the Confederate Treasury Department,” CV, vol. 37, November 1929, 424. Census of 1860, Find-A-Grave, Horatio Washington Bruce, an attorney.

[145] OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 555. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 634, 717.

[146] OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 555. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 129.

[147] OR., series 1, vol. 49 chapter 61, part 1, 550, 552. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 278-79, 283. McAllister, “Disbanding,” 25. Duke, Reminiscences, 386. Ancestry.com, ibdicates Colonel Breckinridge stopped at Mrs. Thompson’s farm. Census records for 1850, 1860 and 1870 from Ancestry.com show the only Thompson woman in Wilkes County in the period was Elisabeth Wellmaker who married James M. Thompson on September 7, 1860. Thompson mustered into service in March 1862 and died in Charleston in July 1862. Elizabeth and her son were living with her father Israel Wellmaker in 1870.

[148] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 281-283. Reagan, Memoirs, 85-86. W. R. Bringhurst, “One of the Last War Horses,” CV, vol. 5, March 1897, 130. W. R. Bringhurst, “Unwritten History Worth Preserving,” CV, vol. 8, December 1900, 534. Bringhurst, “Survivor,” 368-69. Clark, “Specie,” 553. Boyd Johnson, “Maj. Clay Stacker,” CV, vol. 16, December 1908, 656. P. N. Harris, “Interesting Reply to a Question,” CV, vol. 5, June 1897, 296. Davis, Breckinridge: Statesman, 276-85.

[149] Duke, Reminiscences, 386-87. H. G. Damon, “The Eyes of General Breckinridge,” CV, vol. 17, 1894, 380. Damon had the wrong Breckinridge, Colonel Breckinridge was at Woodstock, General Breckinridge silently slipped away following the advice Sherman gave him. Bringhurst, “Survivor” 368-69.  Duke, Morgan’s Cavalry, 539. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 281-85. Duke, “After the Fall,” 165-66.

[150] Duke, Memoirs, 386-87, 391-92. Clark, “Specie,” 545. Janney, Ends of War, 150,

[151] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 279- 81.

[152] Davis, John Jackman, 168.

[153] OR, series 1, vol 47, part 3, 345-46, 433. OR., series 1, chapter 61, part 2, 587. Sherman, Memoirs, 839, 840, 856-57.  OR., series I, vol. 47, chapter 59, part 1., 35. OR., series 1, vol 47, chapter 59, part 1, 37-38. OR., series 1, vol 47, part 3, 207. OR., series 1, vol 49, chapter 61, part 2, 689. Upton was breveted a Major General. Brooks D. Simpson and Jean V. Berlin, eds., Sherman’s Civil War: Selected Correspondence of William T. Simpson (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1999), 863. Michael Golay, A Ruined Land: The End of the Civil War (New York: John Wiley and Sons, Inc, 1999), 189-191. Goley dated Sherman’s actions on Hilton Head as April 30. Another source dated the arrival of the second supply ship in Augusta as May 2^nd.

[154] Sherman, Memoirs, 859. The statistics were from the Army of Northern Virginia. While some 28,000 were paroled in Virginia, the maximum figure of that army in the months before April 9th was 70,000. Robert M. Willingham, History of Wilkes County, 180.

[155] OR., series 1, vol 47, chapter 59, part 1, 37-38. Sherman, Memoirs, 840, 841-42. OR., series 1, vol. 47, part 3, 334.

[156] M. E. Robertson, “President Davis’ Last Official Meeting,” Publications of the Southern Historical Association, vol. 5, July 1901, 295-96. Robertson wrote that Varina’s wagons were parked in front of Fielding Ficklen’s house. The Philadelphia Inquirer, April 4, 1823, 3. The Spokesman Review, February 6, 2005, 26. The 1860 Census for Washington, Georgia (dwelling 609, family 609), Find-A-Grave, Georgia Wills and Probate Records show that Fielding Ficklen was a native of Wilkes County, Georgia and earned an MD degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1846. Eliza Frances Andrews, The War-time Journal of a Georgia Girl, 1864-1965 (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1908), 84, 91, 113. Andrews wrote that on April 30, 1865, Varina may have been entertained by Dr. Ficklen. William C. Davis, An Honorable Defeat, 259-60. Willingham, History of Wilkes County, 180. Willingham, “‘It’s All Over”. Willingham, No Jubille, 203-205.

[157] Davis, Rise and Fall, 632. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 262-64. OR., series 1. vol. 49, part 2, 703. OR., series 1, vol. 47, part 3, 861. Sifakis, Who Was Who, 643. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 1274. Varina Davis, Memoir, v2, 617. Willingham, History of Wilkes County, 180.

[158] Shingleton, Sea Ghost, 157. Mallory, “Last Days,” 1901, 247-48.

[159] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 241, 260, 264, 307. F. R. Lubbock, “Letter from Ex-Governor Lubbock, of Texas, Late Aid to President Davis,” SHSP, vol. 5, March 1878, 122. Sifakis, Who Was Who, 348, 376, 398, and 728. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 46-49, 126-127. Willingham, “‘It is All Over’”.

[160] Headley, Operations, 436. Davis, Rise and Fall, 695. Jefferson Davis wrote that a Lieutenant Barnwell of South Carolina was also with his small escort. See below. Clark, “Specie,” 545. Shingleton, Sea Ghost, 157. Reagan served as a Judge in Texas.

[161] Clark, “Specie”, 545. Willingham, No Jubilee, 205.

 

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Chapter Eight: The Leviathan

“A cordon of cavalry, more or less continuous, was extended across the State of Georgia from northwest to southeast, and communication established through the late so-called Southern Confederacy.” United States Major General George Thomas

In 1861 Winfield Scott, who served as Commanding General of the United States Army under seven presidents, dusted off an old military plan for combating a rebellion in the South. This plan would blockade ports, occupy the Mississippi River, and isolate the eastern Confederate states. The press dubbed it the Anaconda Plan. The Anaconda’s coils had tightened around the Confederacy, and by April 12, 1865, Lee’s army surrendered, and the life blood was squeezed out of Joseph E. Johnston’s Army of Tennessee. The Anaconda plan had morphed into a Leviathan.

Thursday, April 27, 1865 was a day of astonishing activities in North and South Carolina. Joseph E. Johnston and William T. Sherman signed the surrender agreement. Jefferson Davis and his escort were in Fort Mill, South Carolina on their flight from Richmond. On the same day, Edmund M. Stanton, United States Secretary of War, ordered Major General George Stoneman to move units to Anderson, South Carolina, Davis’ gateway to the Trans-Mississippi Confederacy. Hatton’s Ford on the Savannah River led to a westward rail connection. At 7:00 a. m. that morning, Colonel W. J. Palmer, commanding two brigades of Union cavalry, was ordered to move to York, South Carolina in hopes of intercepting Davis. At 3:00 p. m. that day, George Thomas telegraphed Stanton, suggesting that Major General James Harrison Wilson be relieved from other duties to search for Davis. Before the day was over, George Thomas wired Acting Rear Admiral Samuel Phillips Lee, on the Mississippi, to block Davis from crossing that river. At 6:50 p. m. Thomas telegraphed George Stoneman, asking that he send three brigades from the area between Charlotte and Anderson. This was either an oversight because Stanton gave the same order, or it could have been that Stanton’s order went through Thomas. Either way, it demonstrated the efficiency and thoroughness of the Leviathan. While Davis traveled leisurely through South Carolina, tens of thousands of Union men were set in motion to create a blue cordon from Rabun Gap to west Georgia, blocking Davis from reaching his goal. Alfred Jackson Hanna wrote there was “almost a continuous line of troops stretching from the Etowah River in the northwestern part of Georgia down to the northern part of Florida.” These plans were carried out rapidly, yielding the desired results.^[162]

By April 1865 the United States Army was the most powerful military force on earth. Its ability to provide arms, ammunition, other supplies dramatically contrasted with the failure of the Confederacy to feed and equip its military. The North had enormous railroad superiority over the South whose railroads, always inferior, used multiple gauges, and were degraded by Union armies and the South’s inability to maintain tracks and rolling stock. In April 1865 Jefferson Davis and John C. Breckinridge were stymied from important train trips because Confederate veterans seized special trains intended for their use. Stanton ordered Stoneman and others to “take all measures to intercept” Davis’ escort. If they saw Jefferson Davis they were to “follow him to the ends of the earth, if possible, and never give him up.”^[163]

W. J. Palmer, commanding two brigades of Union cavalry, carried out his orders by traveling though Howard’s Gap, Columbus and then Cowpens, South Carolina. His orders were to parole captured officers and send them to General Stoneman. When he had to confiscate replacement horses or mules, he was to leave worn out mounts. He was ordered to be very careful once he entered South Carolina, and to use a proper process so that confiscated property would be replaced. “This is absolutely necessary in order to preserve the discipline of your command. Strict silence will be observed in regard our destination.”^[164]

On April 27 George Thomas, in Nashville, sent a telegram to Stanton suggesting that “Davis would attempt to get to Texas,” and recommending the Union quickly occupy Selma and Montgomery with infantry, so that James Wilson would be “free to move his whole force in any direction.”  Wilson’s raid had captured both towns. On April 25 Sherman alerted Rear Admiral John A. Dahlgren, commanding the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, that Davis was trying to escape by crossing the Mississippi. Sherman advised Dahlgren to keep his ironclads ready to “prevent the escape of the rebel leader and his accomplices.” On April 28 Admiral Lee answered Thomas’ message, promising that his men were vigilant and had their vessels ready to leave at a moment’s notice to “prevent the rebel Government escaping across the Mississippi.” Thomas was methodical and determined to create a blue cordon blocking Davis’ path to the Mississippi.^[165]

Thomas asked Stoneman to send Brigadier General Davis Tillson from the west to Asheville. Tillson reported from Ashville on April 29^th that he had sent Brigadier General Simeon B. Brown, commanding the Second and Third brigades, to Anderson, South Carolina, about sixty-five miles from Hendersonville, North Carolina. Stoneman reported to Thomas on May 6 that two brigades of his cavalry had passed through Anderson on May 2, “with the intention of crossing the Savannah River and getting in front of Davis; the other brigade when last heard from was in hot pursuit.” Stoneman sent seven brigades in all.^[166]

Before long, George Thomas could report that, “A cordon of cavalry, more or less continuous, was extended across the State of Georgia from northwest to southeast, and communication established through the late so-called Southern Confederacy.” M. H. Clark, while positioned with Davis’ escorting brigades at Cokesbury, understood the nature of this Federal blue cordon. He noted that Confederates moving from Charlotte to Washington needed protection from the “Federal cavalry, who were raiding on a parallel line with our route, between us and the mountains.”^[167]

Thomas relied on Major General E. R. S. Canby, commanding the Union Army of West Mississippi, and Wilson, in Macon, Georgia to cooperate in blocking Jefferson Davis. Thomas had Canby occupy Selma and Montgomery with infantry and alerted Rear Admiral Lee to Canby’s availability. Wilson sent Major General B. H. Grierson to join Canby. Thomas relied on Canby to maintain contacts with James Wilson.^[168]

James Harrison Wilson was a brilliant young officer. He graduated from West Point number six out of forty-one in 1860, and then had a meteoric rise. He became Sherman’s chief topographical engineer, served on Grant’s headquarters staff, became inspector general of the Army of Tennessee (1862-63), and in 1864 went to the War Department as chief of the Cavalry Bureau. In January 1864 he was made a brigadier under Philip Sheridan and shortly thereafter Grant sent Wilson to Sherman as the chief of cavalry in the Military Division of the Mississippi. Grant assured Sherman that Wilson would improve his cavalry by fifty percent. On March 14, 1865, Wilson defeated Nathan Bedford Forrest and seized Selma, Alabama. By April 22^nd he had captured Macon, Georgia after marching six hundred miles in thirty days and capturing 6,000 prisoners. Assigned to capture Davis, he wrote his friend, Adam Badeau, that he “drew a net around Mr. Davis that would have reflected credit upon a detective policeman.”  Wilson did not lack self-confidence. Badeau was a Captain on the staff of Ulysses Grant and helped Grant write the Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant.^[169]

Wilson thought he would be sent to Mobile after he defeated Forrest at Selma. When Wilson took Forrest’s surrender, Forrest confessed that he had been beaten badly. Wilson moved his men in different columns, confusing Forrest who was unable to move fast enough. Wilson was sent into central Georgia. He captured West Point and Columbus, both on the Chattahoochee River about forty miles apart and each with a road leading to Macon. Wilson also had enormous firepower to bring against Confederate defensive works at West Point and Columbus. His 12,500 men were armed with Spencer repeating rifles, each holding six shots. That firepower encouraged defenders to remain hunkered down in trenches. Many Confederates were killed with head shots, encouraging soldiers to maintain a low profile.^[170]

After taking Columbus, Georgia on his “Blitzkrieg” raid, James Wilson sent two regiments to capture the “Double Bridges” over the Flint River. The calvary regiments rode all night and at dawn on April 18^th surprised the small defensive force and captured the Double Bridges. This barrier to Macon was eliminated. The Union troopers saw what they called a funeral march of disheveled, barefoot, and wounded Confederate veterans shuffling westward to their homes. The Federals disbelieved these former Confederates when they claimed to be from the Army of Northern Virginia and that Lee had surrendered. Major General Howard Cobb called out all available forces to defend Macon. Three companies of men turned out to join the reserves, untrained men and “a pitiful force of convalescents.” Cobb received news of the armistice between Sherman and Johnston, calling on all forces to hold their current positions twenty-four hours. He had been a steadfast supporter of Davis but knew the war was over. Wilson refused to hold his position. In addition to an overdeveloped ego, Wilson had orders from his superior, Sherman, to take Macon. Wilson carried out those orders until Sherman sent new orders. Wilson took Macon on April 20. He used Confederate telegraph wires to contact Sherman and on April 21^st, Sherman ordered Wilson to cease offensive operations, begin paying for all supplies and parole all Confederates he could find. Cobb, who was critical of Wilson’s refusal to stand down, worked well with Wilson. Cobb identified the locations of supplies and Wilson quickly gained control of the anarchy in the area. Despite Union surveillance there were some acts of violence. Confederate deserters and paroled veterans ransacked some houses and on April 22^nd two blocks were set on fire. After this, Wilson’s forces were able to control the situation. Sherman notified Wilson the cessation of hostilities included territories east of the Chattahoochee.^[171]

A large military force cannot forage more than two days in one position, when all food is consumed, and residents are without sustenance. Sherman ordered Wilson to send wagons some distance from Macon to purchase food. This allowed citizens to keep sufficient food and reap financial benefits. Sherman and Wilson then began to consider a long-term solution anticipating a massive flow of Confederate veterans moving through Augusta. A foreign-born American citizen approached Wilson to inform him that recently he had seen Jefferson Davis in Charlotte. It was apparent Davis considered himself excluded from the “terms of capitulation” and was fleeing southward. Without reliable communications with Stanton or Sherman, Wilson sent men to Atlanta and General Upton to Augusta on April 27^th to prepare to assist the massive influx of Confederate veterans and organize forces to search for Davis. Wilson began psychological warfare by suggesting to citizens that Davis might be fleeing with all the Confederate gold and anyone who discovered that treasure would be rewarded.^[172]

Wilson was convinced the Confederate’s President would attempt to reach Texas, but resolute in his determination that Davis would be diverted and captured. He sent detachments to watch all crossroads and river crossings along the Savannah River and North Georgia roads. He sent a division southward toward the gulf coast under the astute assumption that Davis would be blocked from the west and forced southward. On May 3 Wilson wrote Thomas that his scouts and detectives had covered crossroads and crossings. “Mr. Davis cannot possibly get through the country with wagons and a large escort, but it will be quite difficult to apprehend him if he attempts it well mounted and with one or two attendants.” Wilson was prescient because that is what Davis attempted to accomplish the day after Wilson sent this message.^[173]

When Palmer received the message to move to Anderson, he notified Tillson that he was thirty-seven miles from York. A reliable informant told Palmer that Jefferson Davis, escorted by Dibrell’s division and two brigades of cavalry, left York on the morning of April 28, headed to Union. Palmer speculated that Davis would go to Abbeville or Laurens and thought the latter direction the more likely route. Palmer crossed the Broad River at Island Ford, went through Greenville, and reached Pendleton. He made sure all mountain gaps from Rabun Gap south were guarded. Palmer sent a telegram to Stoneman from a position between Rutherfordton and Yorkville regarding Davis’ passage through York. He knew that Davis had taken the road to Union Court House and could move from there to Laurens. Palmer had excellent but incomplete information. Davis’ escorting brigades went to Union then Laurens, but Davis went by Mrs. Giles’ and Lafayette Young’s houses, parallel to the route of the five brigades.^[174]

Anderson County was one of the western counties of South Carolina containing Unionists. Imprisoned Union officers from Andersonville who escaped the Lexington, South Carolina prisoner of war camp, were guided at night by slaves from one location to the next. When they reached Anderson County, slave guides were no longer needed because local Unionists took escapees to the mountains occupied by Union forces. On January 20, 1864, Major John Durant Ashmore, who investigated desertions in western South Carolina, was contacted by Henry Wemyss Feilden, Assistant Adjutant General for the Department of North Carolina, Georgia, and South Carolina. Feilden, a British citizen, was responding to Ashmore’s report of “a contemplated Union meeting” to be held in Anderson on January 23^rd. Ashmore was told not to interfere with the meeting, but to have “two reliable and discreet witnesses present who will learn the object of it and the sentiments of the holders.” The witnesses were to wear disguises. Feilden contacted Captain W. L. Simons, Acting Commissary of Subsistence in Anderson, to stand by should Ashmore not receive Feilden’s message or find suitable witnesses. He appointed Simons to cover for Ashmore and “send a discreet person or persons” to report on the meeting. General Robert E. Lee, in February 1865, noted that the Army of Northern Virginia was plagued with deserters, especially from the western sections of the Carolinas. In that area, he wrote, “the bands of deserters so far outnumber the home guards that they will be in no danger of arrest.” On April 25, 1865, Henry Wemyss Feilden joined a posse to defend Greenville, where his wife, Julia McCord Feilden, was a refugee. The fear was of the deserters, outlaws, and “outliers” in the hills west of Greenville. This expedition was thwarted by a Union force armed with Spencer repeating rifles.^[175]

The South Carolina United Daughters of the Confederacy published over a dozen books of oral histories and other material on local conditions during the Civil War. On May 1, 1865, Federals under Stoneman arrived in Anderson and found a complex and disruptive situation. Local citizens knew the war was over, but the milieu of Union soldiers, local Unionists, Jayhawkers, and Wheeler’s soldiers was overwhelming. Men such as Manse Jolly, a man who refused to honor the terms of surrender negotiated in good faith, terrorized the area. Young people were enjoying the annual Anderson May Day picnic when news of the impending arrival of Union men reached them. Some ladies began to walk from the picnic back to town, trying to get to their homes and hide valuables before Federals arrived. Elizabeth Hammons Bleckley described how the Union cavalry rode along on each side of the women, much to their humiliation. To escape this escort the women stopped at a house, entered the yard, and were confronted with an enraged bulldog. They quickly retreated to their position of safety between two lines of United States troopers. The Union cavalrymen drove off the bulldogs, laughed and noted the women were more afraid of bulldogs than Yankees. Bleckley deplored the presence of the “wretches” who were there two or three days, committing depredations and leaving citizens “with nothing to eat and our homes looted of everything valuable.” She praised Sam Moore who hid six gold watches in his peg leg for days. A young African American boy was shot in the back and died, but no one mentioned the killer. Was it a Union soldier, one of Wheeler’s men, a bushwhacker, Manse Jolly or Jayhawk? Mrs. James Webb was especially critical of the depredations of Union men. But when unnamed ruffians threatened her home, Union officers gave her family a guard who provided wonderful protection. Alice Cochran Minor did not condone the actions of Manse Jolly. She reported a confrontation between Federal cavalry and a group of former Confederates, when a shot was fired, and a boy was killed. She did not report who fired the shot. Likewise, she asserted that “A United States soldier, who belonged to an Ohio regiment, was shot in the back of the neck from ambush.” When someone threatened to burn the Minor’s house, a family member woke up a federal officer who got up and sent a squad to protect her home. Alice Minor praised John Catlett and John Hopkins, two Anderson Unionists, whose influence was helpful for everyone. She heard that all the outrages were not committed by United States soldiers, and that a great many were perpetrated by ruffians she called “‘jayhawkwers.’” Alice Cochran Minor described the May Day picnic held at “Silver Brook, the pretty little stream that winds the way through the ‘Silent City’ near our home.” Just as the youth were ready to feast, they were interrupted by Union cavalry. All their “teams were captured,” but the picnic party rode home in their wagons. Federal soldiers rode on each side of the wagons through the square and they “never guarded fairer prisoners than these Southern girls.” Another oral history described a heavy storm that pelted the picnic and frightened horses. That tradition contended that Federal cavalrymen straightened out harnesses and drove the picnickers home, escorting them with a line of troopers on each side. Oral histories contribute personal views from the past. The contributions of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, like all oral traditions, are biased and lack precise details, but these women were recalling events from a time of anarchy in Anderson when there were bitter hostilities between veterans and Unionists, African Americans and whites, Union men and Confederates resulting in violence, plundering and some deaths. Few could remember the exact dates of events, undoubtedly a particular act during a long period of lawlessness that could never be dated precisely. Some events recalled occurred before or after May 1, 1865. There are three features of these stories that are documented. First, Federal cavalrymen acted with some empathy by helping women and the picnickers on May Day. Secondly, Alice Cochran Minor understood that on May 1, 1865, Union forces came to Anderson to capture Jefferson Davis. Federals went in all directions to crossings of the Savannah, Seneca, and Tugaloo Rivers in their search for Davis. Thirdly, these oral traditions confirm the effectiveness of the blue cordon.^[176]

Major General Thomas L. Rosser illustrates the sort of Confederate officer who might have been an effective guerrilla leader in the unsettled region along the edge of the mountains near Anderson. Rosser, Major General Fitzhugh Lee, and Colonel Thomas T. Munford used their cavalry units to protect the Army of Northern Virginia as it moved toward Appomattox. Rather than going to Appomattox Court House, Rosser rode west to see what would transpire. In the negotiations at Appomattox the participants decided that those Confederates who had left the area before April 9^th could not be paroled. Most of Rosser’s men evidently rode to their homes as he suggested they do, to await developments. There were Confederate groups in the area after April 9^th, so Rosser went to Staunton to recruit men. Some Confederates without paroles did follow Rosser’s appeal to gather around Lynchburg between April 18 and 20. By April 28 he had 500 recruits near Staunton. He called on them to gather in Staunton on May 10^th. On May 4^th Rosser informed United States authorities that his men would be in Staunton to sign paroles. Rosser’s men seem to have sought to continue fighting, but were not inclined to fight a guerrilla war. Some former Confederates in Anderson, exemplified by Manse Jolly, were willing to continue fighting.[177]

Major General P. Joseph Osterhaus, located at the headquarters of the Army of West Mississippi in Mobile, sent out an announcement on May 1^st that all officers were instructed to “furnish every facility within their reach” for Allan Pinkerton and his special service officers who were assigned to capture Jefferson Davis and his cabinet. This notice was distributed to Union generals and was not the only attempt to use intelligence to capture Jefferson Davis. Michael Lightner reported to Union headquarters in Atlanta. He was a released prisoner-of-war from the Fifty-fifth Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment. He “fell in” with Davis’ escorting forces at the Catawba River and marched with them to Washington, Georgia. He reported when the Confederate cavalry refused to go farther. On May 10, the day Davis was captured, J. H. Wilson who was unaware of Davis’ status, reported to Sherman. He noted that General Upton had paroled 2,000 Confederate soldiers at Washington, Georgia, including those of Brigadier General Dibrell and Brigadier General Vaughn, who had served as Davis’ escorts. Wilson reported on Lieut. Joseph Yeoman of the First Ohio Cavalry. Yeoman, “a very energetic and capable officer”, had trailed Davis to the Chattahoochee River where Davis attempted an unsuccessful crossing. Yeoman thought Davis had turned south at that point, a comforting thought for Wilson. His men were “all over North Georgia, at Covington, Athens, Madison, Warsaw, Lawrenceville, and other places with scouts on every road. The country southward, eastward, and westward is also thoroughly patrolled.” Wilson, curious about Yeoman, months later contacted Brigadier General Andrew Jonathan Alexander, Yeoman’s commanding officer. Wilson was assured that Yeoman “had great intelligence and coolness” and had served well as inspector general of a brigade. Yeoman and twenty men selected for their abilities were disguised “in rebel clothing”, moved into North Georgia, and joined Dibrell’s cavalry as part of Davis’ escort. These spies marched with Dibrell for two or three days, but everyone watched Davis closely, so they had no chance to kidnap him. The spies had no difficulty going where they wished incognito because escorting brigades were so unorganized, and spies were dressed like the large number of Confederate veterans going home. At Washington, Georgia, Dibrell surrendered, and his men were paroled. Yeoman sent his men “in various bands” of paroled Confederates on the way home. Yeoman kept Alexander informed of all information gathered, and Alexander passed this intelligence on to other Union commanders. Alexander requested that Yeoman be given recognition because he credited Yeoman’s intelligence as a key to Davis’ capture.^[178]

Perhaps more than Allan Pinkerton or Yeoman, it was the constant stream of Union scouts and couriers that followed Davis’ party and his escort, along with the deserters they encountered, that kept the Union army so well informed. Theodore Malloby, Jr., a second Lieutenant in the U. S. Army Signal Corps, reported on his movements after April 29 when he was ordered to find Jeff Davis. The next day he traveled thirty-seven miles to Pickens and on May 1, after thirty-nine miles, arrived in Anderson. The next night he was sent from Anderson to Danielsville, Georgia, traveling forty-nine miles from 9:00 p. m. May 2 until 11 p. m. on May 3. William J. Palmer “had track of Davis and his party all the way from Yorkville.” He reported that Confederates in the escort were dropping away each day. Palmer knew Davis and a small party had crossed the Broad River at Pinckneyville and the escorting brigades of cavalry had crossed that river at Smith’s Ford and had gone on to Union and Abbeville. He received a report from the Tenth Cavalry of Ohio that “ran into the rear guard” of Davis’ escort at Smith’s Ford, “and captured ten prisoners, from whom definite information was obtained.”^[179]

Palmer wanted to concentrate troops near Athens, Georgia in the area where he anticipated capturing Davis. Members of Davis’ escort who had deserted on the Saluda River, told Palmer that Davis planned to head for Athens. That incorrect information was dated. Members of the Fifteenth Pennsylvania Cavalry also captured men from Davis’ escort at the Saluda River who substantiated other reports Palmer had received. By the time Palmer reached Athens, on May 4, he knew he was in front of Davis. By May 5 he knew that Confederate brigades in Davis’ escort were paid on the west side of the Savannah where they were waiting to surrender. By May 6, Union troops had covered all possible routes in north Georgia and western South Carolina and could move with impunity anywhere in the south.^[180]

James Wilson, in Macon, discovered Davis had moved from Abbeville to Washington, and mistakenly thought this had taken place on May 4^th, the day Davis departed Washington. Wilson knew that Davis was blocked from going west across the Mississippi and that he would have to go south. Wilson had 15,000 cavalrymen along the Blue Cordon from north Georgia to Florida. Based on information from spies, he sent Lieutenant Colonel Henry Harnden and the First Wisconsin Regiment south on the west side of the Ocmulgee River, and Lieutenant Colonel Benjamin Dudley Pritchard of the Fourth Ohio Regiment south on the east side of that river. The area of Georgia through which Jefferson Davis traveled was saturated with Federal forces bent on finding the former Confederate President. However, that took time, and this patience was rewarded because there was no bloodshed. When a firefight came on May 10, it pitted Wisconsin cavalry against Ohio cavalry.^[181]

A Leviathan in mythology (Mesopotamian, Judaea-Christian, Greek, Norse, and others) was a sea dragon of unimaginable power. The Union’s position of asymmetrical power over the Confederacy enabled its use of rivers, seas, and an integrated rail system to isolate and strangle the South. That asymmetrical power resembled the asymmetrical power of the mythological Leviathan over ancient people. Southerners were unable to realize the Union’s power in 1860. By 1865 United States military power had grown enormously, while Confederate military power had disintegrated. The Leviathan’s power over the Confederacy was total by 1865.[182]

 

Footnotes: Chapter Eight

[163] OR., series 1, vol. 49 chapter 61, part 2, 1253. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 1257. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 546.

[164] OR., series 1, vol. 49 chapter 61, part 2, 491.

[165] OR., series 1, vol. 47, part 3, 871, 399-400, Dahlgren responded on May 3, 1865; OR,, series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 191, 484-485; 488-89, 498, 555 The Johnston/Sherman truce led to confusion by Union men so Stoneman informed Tillson “hostilities will not cease until the President of the United States so proclaims to the world.” OR., series 1, vol. 49, part 1, 342-45.

[166] OR., series 1, vol. 49, part 2, 555, 637. OR., series 1, vol. 49, part 1, 344-46. Wikipedia accessed October 2, 2023, Brown was a Bvt. Brigadier General who commanded the 11^th Michigan Cavalry Regiment in the Battle of Anderson, and fought three weeks after the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia.

[167] OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 347. Clark, “Specie,” 544. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 370-380; OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 571, 587; OR., series 1, vol. 49, part 1, 372-374.

[168] OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 346; OR., series 1, vol. 49, part 2, 484, 485, 571, 593, 599.

[169] Jones, “Your Left Arm,” 230-31, 237, 241-42. Wikipedia.

[170] James Harrison Wilson, Under the Old Flag (Columbia, South Carolina: BIG BYTE BOOKS, 2018, printed June 3, 2023), 419, 422 438.

[171] James Pickett Jones, Yankee Blitzkrieg: Wilson’s Raid Through Alabama and Georgia (Lexington, Kentucky: The University of Kentucky Press, 1976), 160-161, 164-165, 168-169.The “Double Bridges” across the Flint consisted of one bridge from each side of the river, each reaching an island. Tate, Rise and Fall, 252.

[172] Wilson, Under the Old Flag, 441, 442-443, 450, 453-454. Jones, “Your Left Arm,” 237. There is some discrepancy over the date James H. Wilson captured Macon, April 20^th, or April 22^nd. Jones, Yankee Blitzkrieg, 170-172.

[173]OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 371-72. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 84. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 371-72. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 584.

[174] OR., series 1, chapter 61, part 2, 555, 570.

[175] OR., series 1, vol. 35, part 1, 536. OR., series 1, vol. 46, part 2., 1254. Emerson and Stokes, eds., A Confederate Englishman, xiii, xxii.

[176] A. T. Smythe, et. al. eds. South Carolina Women in the Confederacy. Columbia: The State Company, 1903. Mrs. Sylvester Bleckley, (Elizabeth Hammons Bleckley) “With Stoneman’s Raiders,” in 366-68, A. T. Smythe, et. al. eds. South Carolina Women in the Confederacy. Columbia: The State Company, 1903. Keowee Courier, July 9, 1914, 7. Mrs. James Hoyt (Miss Rebecca Webb) “The Yankee Raid Through Anderson,” 369-371. A. T. Smythe, et. al. eds. South Carolina Women in the Confederacy. Columbia: The State Company, 1903. Alice Cochran Minor, “Incidents of the Anderson Raid,” 372-75. Numerous sources cited herein describe the arrival of Union cavalry in Anderson on May 1. The various names of groups as used at the time, such as “Jayhawkers” and “jayhawkwers”, “Wheeler’s Soldiers”, etc. were terms used by UDC members.

[177] Janney, Ends of War, 18-19, 33-38, 49-50, 99, 166-67, 189, 205-206.

[178] OR., series 1, vol. 49 chapter 61, part 2, 558. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 702-703. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 382. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 571, 622. Lightner’s information was confused but valuable. OR., series 1, vol. 49 part 1, 370-380, this report by Wilson, written in January 1867, gives a complete detailed account of the capture of Davis and emphasizes the contribution of Yeoman. Yeoman’s information was for Wilson, the first reliable identification of Davis’ presence in Georgia, and from these reports Wilson developed the team approach that found Davis. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 135. Jones, Yankee Blitzkrieg, 172.

[179] OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 328.

[180] OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 615; OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 548-49

[181]OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 446; OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 570. OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 1, 345; OR., series 1, vol 49, chapter 61, part 2, 555. OR., series 1, vol. 47, chapter 59, part 1, 370-380. Wilson, Under the Old Flag, 456-458.

[182] While the mythological Leviathan was a malevolent creature, the Union’s Leviathan ended the war with a minimum of death and destruction.

___________

 

CHAPTER NINE:  Davis Tried Not To Escape From An Enemy That Tried Not To Shoot.

When Burton Harrison, Davis’ secretary responsible for Varina, arrived in Washington, Georgia on May 3^rd, he found the situation had changed significantly. Federal forces were expected at any time. He had to secure transportation for Varina, avoid Confederate veterans streaming home, and maintain distance from the enemy. He sent a message to Davis asking for advice and a new route of escape. Davis did not receive Harrison’s message until 9:00 p. m. on May 3. He responded immediately that he “could learn nothing reliable”, but thought Harrison’s change of route was wise. “I think their efforts are directed at my capture and that my family is safest when farthest from me. I have the bitterest disappointment in regard the feelings of our troops and would not have any one I love dependent upon their resistance against equal force.” Davis then added a postscript. “Be governed by the movements of enemy and take no risk for the purpose of gratifying my desire to see all.” On May 3^rd at 8:00 p. m. John C. Breckinridge sent Davis an estimate that only a few hundred cavalrymen in the five brigades escorting Davis could be relied upon, and they were “intermixed with the mass.” James Wilson, in Macon, had 15,000 cavalrymen in north Georgia searching for Davis. Davis seemed to have no memory of what he had been told on April 13 at Greensboro and at every other meeting including that of May 2^nd in Abbeville. He was very much cognizant of the danger Varina faced and that his being with her would increase that danger. Davis was like a moth fluttering around a candle; regardless of their personal relationship at any time, he remained emotionally attached to Varina.

Davis, at times, seemed unable to face reality. But there were other factors contributing to his emotional and mental state. After he left Lafayette Young’s house on May 1^st, he rode all day and had the stressful meeting at Cokesbury where Braxton Bragg, his most supportive general, sided against Davis and with Breckinridge, Bragg’s nemesis. He then spent a sleepless night with constant interruptions from couriers who had encountered United States troops near Cokesbury. On May 2, he rode to Abbeville and had a long and emotional meeting during which his four brigadier generals and a colonel rejected his desire to continue the struggle. He broke down at the end of this meeting and needed assistance from Breckinridge to get to his room. He had individual meetings with Parker and some members of his cabinet. Everyone adhered to the mid-April decision made in Greensboro to take Davis out of the country. At 11:00 p. m. Davis rode down Main Street and turned south on Vienna Street to spend the night in the saddle on the Vienna Road. Two more of his cabinet members, Judah P. Benjamin, and Stephen Mallory, had resigned. Davis had enjoyed little if any sleep for forty-eight stressful hours, weakening his physical status and mental acuity. He was accustomed to giving the orders, but Breckinridge assumed control in Abbeville and Davis found himself powerless.^[183]

Robert A. Toombs, former United States Senator, Brigadier General in the Confederate Army and enemy of Jefferson Davis, offered Varina hospitality. She declined because she “was anxious to get off before Mr. Davis reached Washington,” knowing that his proximity to her made him more vulnerable. Harrison received news that made their departure from Washington imminent. He was informed that James H. Wilson was in Macon with as many as 10,000 troops, with orders to “execute the terms of capitulation” at Macon and in western Georgia. Harrison also heard a rumor that United States forces were moving on Washington, making it “desirable for us to move at once. . . .” He thought the safest route was between Macon and Augusta through Sandersville and continuing into central Florida. Harrison’s understanding was that Davis planned to reach Abbeville on May 2^nd, enabling him to be in Washington by May 3rd. He asked Davis to confirm his suspicions and repeated his request regarding where he should take Varina. She, Harrison reassured Davis, was very anxious to see her husband and Harrison was “quite confident of my ability to carry her to a place of safety in or beyond Florida.” He recommended that Davis not make plans predicated “on our account.” Harrison requested Davis to “send information by return courier . . . and please give me your counsel.” A courier delivered a message from Davis that he was going to Washington, Georgia and then south to cross the Mississippi. Harrison, suffering from dysentery, had to rest before continuing. He then rode on and found Varina’s group in camp.^[184]

Over the next few days Varina’s party encountered crowds of footsore and depressed soldiers walking home. She allowed exhausted and injured men to ride in her vehicles. On the third day after leaving Abbeville, they encountered “disorganized mounted Confederates” who thought her group was carrying some “treasure.” That night by the campfire one man recognized Varina as the woman who dressed his wound in Richmond and any fear dissipated. She assured the men there was no treasure, only clothing and groceries that were shared. One man told her he was sorry she was without treasure, but if she had any they would make sure she kept it. Evidence encountered on the road indicated some enemy was following. George Vernon Moody, a Colonel in the Army of Northern Virginia, found the presumed marauders, encountered a fellow Freemason from Mississippi, and obtained his cooperation. This Freemason said no night attack was contemplated, but he wrote out a “passport” for some of his men stationed at a crossroad. After a long day of travel, James H. Jones left camp in search of milk for Varina’s children. A group of men stole the mule “he was riding and told him that they would have all the mules and horses that night.” These events happened when Varina’s wagons were near Sandersville, Georgia. That night the entourage found a suitable campsite, circled the wagons tying a rope or a chain around each wagon tongue to the rear wheels of the wagon in front. The stock was put in the circle. Harrison and another man served as pickets. During the night they heard soft hoof steps in the sandy soil. Harrison shouted “Halt.” The mounted person said “Friends!” Harrison recognized the voice as that of Jefferson Davis. When Davis reached Varina’s party he remained with them, rode with them a second night, and left after breakfast to return to his party. He was slowed by poor roads and a concern for his family.”^[185]

During the trip there was tension between Burton Harrison and the Kentucky cavalrymen. As always, cavalrymen wanted rapid movement, fifty or so miles a day, especially when being pursued. Hathaway, Monroe and Messick wanted to dump unnecessary baggage and move much faster. These tensions increased when Jefferson Davis joined the entourage. The cavalrymen thought the group had left a trail behind their passage that anyone could follow. Hathaway wrote the rubbish was worthy of an army corps. This observation proved to be prescient.^[186]

Harrison’s “Memoirs” included a note from Jefferson Davis giving his recollection of events. After leaving Washington they traveled for several days. He remembered Reagan’s horse cast a shoe. They found a blacksmith and had the horse reshod. The smithy informed them that pillagers were seeking a party with fine horses, wagons, and mules. Davis believed this was Varina’s group. He did not know Harrison’s route, but assumed it was to the east, so they rode in that direction trying to find wagon tracks in the soaked soil. About midnight they came upon many paroled solders at a ferry. Davis turned directly east on a “bridle path” he was told led to a wagon road. The captain of his guard informed him their horses were unable to continue without rest. Davis left most of his men, took his staff and servant, and pushed on some eight or ten miles. He found Varina’s encampment after what he estimated was an incredible sixty-mile ride. “After traveling several days with you, I concluded that we had gone far enough to the South and East to be free from the dangers of marauders, and resumed my original route to the West, having with that view sent the Captain of my Guard and one of the men to reconnoiter to the West” to discover any enemy in that direction.^[187]

A third group of Confederate veterans left Washington following Davis late on the same night. Micajah H. Clark and Reagan, detained by the distribution of specie, did not leave Washington until 11:00 p.m. on May 4^th. They had guides from Duke’s command and reached the Davis party “as they came out of their bivouac about dawn” on May 5^th. Those with Davis were his staff and a few others, Captain Given Campbell, “Captain of the Guard.” and twelve of his men, Duke’s men, numbering about sixty, “among them my fellow-townsmen, Messrs. W. R. Bringhurst and Clay Stacker.” They offered to go with Davis, but he declined so they went with John C. Breckinridge. In 1890 Micajah Clark wrote Varina that her husband sent him and his wagon train on and left “‘everything on wheels’” to join her. Clark and his train spent the night “a few miles south of Sandersville, Ga.” It was near Sandersville that “stragglers” stole a mule ridden by James H. Jones and threatened the other equines.^[188]

On May 5^th Reagan and Clark encountered Frances R. Lubbock and Colonel William Preston Johnston, two aides-de-camp to Davis, at the blacksmith shop. They informed Reagan that Davis was about a half mile away. Once they connected with Davis, they rode south to the Oconee River and camped there on the east bank. Colonel Johnston walked to a ferry and heard men discussing a wagon train some twenty miles away. The men called it a “quartermaster’s” or “commissary train” that disbanded soldiers intended to rob during the night. From the description Johnston was sure the train was that of Varina Davis. Jefferson Davis had not seen his wife since they left Richmond and did not know her whereabouts. He immediately got his horse and said “‘this move will probably cause me to be captured or killed. I do not feel that you are bound to go with me, but I must protect my family.’” Davis’ escort rode all night, arriving at Varina’s camp before dawn.^[189]

Clark thought he was “a few miles south of Sandersville, Ga.” The specie train was an obvious target endangering Varina and Jefferson, and its pace was insufficient to accompany either. Before he left, Clark proposed, and Reagan agreed, to pay aides-de-camp F. R. Lubbock, William Preston Johnston, and Charles Thornburn, $1,500 in specie since they had only paper money. Clark provided a receipt for the $1,500 with all their names listed. Clark’s “gold train” left on its way to Florida.^[190]

Varina and Jefferson Davis crossed the Oconee River and had a short day’s ride. Davis and Reagan, finding Varina safe, decided to separate from her. They lost their “way, and an hour or so before night we met Mrs. Davis’ company at a fork in the road near the Ocmulgee River.” About midnight a courier informed Burton Harrison that about twenty-five miles north of their position, at Hawkinsville, there were enemy intent on seizing quartermaster supplies. Burton decided to move southward as swiftly as possible. “I started my party promptly, in the midst of a terrible storm of thunder, lightning and rain.” Jefferson Davis had finally separated from Varina and found an abandoned house in Abbeville. He thought his location was secret and went to sleep on the floor. He told Harrison he would sleep during the night and catch up with them in the morning. Harrison and Varina rode through the thunderstorms using lightning flashes to see downed trees. The road was sandy, but not well marked, so they had to weave around enormous pine trees. Davis changed his mind, left Abbeville, and caught up with Varina during the night. Harrison’s party traveled all night and cooked breakfast after leaving Abbeville. Harrison halted at five o’clock after crossing a little creek just north of Irwinville where he camped. He thought they were some fifty miles from Hawkinsville and seventy miles from Florida. They met not a single human after leaving Abbeville. Colonel Johnston rode to Irwinville, purchased eggs, and saw no enemy.^[191]

Charles Thornburn and John Taylor Wood planned to ride to the Indian River in Florida to prepare Thornburn’s vessel. They planned to sail from Madison, Florida to a location outside the United States or in the Trans-Mississippi Confederacy. Everyone agreed that if Davis were going to reach the Trans-Mississippi Department, he must leave Varina’s party at once. Burton Harrison wrote that Davis “positively promised me (and Wood and Thorburn tell me he made the same promise to them) that, as soon as something to eat could be cooked, we would say farewell, for the last time” and he would ride ten miles farther to spend the night. This, Davis said, would leave Harrison’s party time to rest their “weary mules.” Wood remained to accompany Jefferson Davis.^[192]

James Wilson directed Brigadier General John Thomas Croxton and Brigadier General Robert Heratio Menty to send their best regiments toward Dublin, Georgia and the Ocmulgee River. This order was based on information gleaned from Yeoman’s men. Croxton selected Lieutenant Colonel Henry Harnden’s First Wisconsin Regiment. Minty

selected the Fourth Michigan Regiment commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Benjamin Dudley Pritchard, one of the two regiments that captured the Double Bridges on April 18^th. Pritchard and Harnden did not know each other but patiently followed their orders. They went south on each side of the Ocomulgee River. At Dublin Harnden found that Davis had crossed the river on a ferry and taken “the river road.” Confederate veterans were everywhere, and that hampered the search. The Federals were able to follow wagon tracks but, of course, had no way to identify the occupants. They had to repair a bridge at Turkey Creek. On May 8^th the weather stymied their tracking when torrential rains wiped out wagon wheel tracks. They had to ride in circles from the last visible tracks until they struck the location of the next tracks. On the morning of May 9^th Harnden began earlier than Pritchard who had fresher horses and men. The two were not in contact with each other until the afternoon of May 9^th when Harnden rode backward to find Pritchard. They shared information and when Harnden rejoined his men, they had discovered the luncheon location of their quarry: a quarry with the campfire still burning. Pritchard found an African American whose information confirmed Harnden’s suspicion. They were almost certainly following Davis’ party. Harnden and Pritchard knew the intentions of each other, but both had the same rank and neither had thought to establish which

one had seniority. Each operated under separate and distinct orders. Prichard deviated from his orders when he took advantage of the information gleaned from the African American informant. He did not notify Harnden of his change of plans. Prichard took seven officers and 128 men on a route that would ultimately join that of Harnden. The rest of his command would follow the original route known to Harnden. Prichard’s new route went toward the county seat of Irwinville about thirty miles away, ten or twelve miles farther than Harnden’s route.^[193]

Prichard reached Irwinville at 1:00 a.m. on May 10^th. Despite his attempt to maintain silence, his men awakened citizens, especially women and children. In the darkness Prichard’s uniform was not noticed and he reassured residents he was the rear guard of President Davis’ escort. He was quickly told Davis’ camp was a mile and a half north on the Abbeville Road. An African American acted as guide and Pritchard’s command noiselessly approached the Confederates. Pritchard sent twenty-five troopers through the woods to the Abbeville Road to cut off anyone who might escape in the crepuscular light. This group quietly awaited better light so none of the Confederates could get away. Meanwhile Harnden’s men arrived from the opposite direction settling in to await better light. Suddenly Harnden’s men were fired upon from what they thought were Confederates. Harnden ordered his dismounted men to return fire, then led the remainder of his command on a circular path to flank the combatants. Harnden and Pritchard, both acting as commanders, met at the point of heaviest action to end the bloodshed only to discover the firefight was between Union troopers. There were two fatalities, a wounded officer and two wounded men.^[194]

Before the firefight Harnden had sent a captain and a sergeant with a small group to the center of Davis’ camp. These men approached the main tent, peering inside to see a woman in a state of undress. She requested privacy to allow the women to dress and said there were only ladies inside the tent that was owned by Mr. Smith (Jefferson Davis’ assumed name). At this moment the firefight ignited, and the captain rode off leaving the sergeant in command. In a short time, Lieutenant Julian G. Dickson, adjutant of the Fourth Michigan, and Pvt. Andrew Bee, with a few men, rode up to the tent to witness three “‘persons dressed in female attire’” leaving the tent and walking toward a nearby wooded area. Dickson ordered the three to halt but was ignored. He repeated the order and four of his men pointed their Spencer rifles at the figures and moved forward. This brought the trio to a standstill. The three were identified as Maggie Howell (Varina’s sister), Varina and Jefferson Davis. Just as the three were identified Pritchard and Harnden rode up. Davis threw off his disguise and asked who was in command. This was an awkward moment because neither Harnden nor Pritchard knew who outranked whom. Pritchard quickly recovered and said he was Lieutenant Colonel Pritchard with Lieutenant Colonel Harnden and together they would take charge of the situation. John H. Reagan, the first man Harnden and Pritchard saw, according to Harnden, identified Davis. They rode up to him, saluted and asked if he were Davis, he replied that he was President Davis. Davis then threw off his disguise. Women and children were placed in ambulances and the men and baggage occupied six wagons. On May 12 James Wilson was informed by a courier from Pritchard that Davis had been captured in his wife’s clothes. Shortly thereafter Harnden arrived in Macon and informed Wilson, who immediately sent a message to Washington. In his autobiography Wilson demonstrated a sense of regret that his message to Stanton included the notation that Davis was in his wife’s clothes. He insisted this was literally true, but this notice was immediately misconstrued and there were infinitely lurid descriptions of Davis in all sorts of female attire, including hoop skirts. Wilson insisted he said nothing about “crinoline or petticoats”, but Southerners who insisted Davis was not wearing women’s clothing were equally incorrect. James Pickett Jones commented that “perhaps the general saw a chance for increased publicity for himself” when he added the comment that Davis wore women’s clothing. James Pickett Jones found it unfortunate that the former Confederate president was “subjected to such demeaning fabrications.” He was critical that Union officers had added further distortions. “The precise articles of Davis’ disguise were a lady’s waterproof cloak, buttoning down in front, and known in those days as an Aquascutum.” Davis also wore a “small black, long shawl, with a colored, cross border, wrapped about his neck and over his soft felt hat.” To the ordinary soldier the ‘waterproof’ looked exactly like a woman’s course gown for rough weather and while put on over an ordinary suit of Confederate gray, it was certainly intended as a disguise by Davis and his wife and was so taken by those who saw him in it.” Wilson claimed he never saw the disguise. Pritchard collected the dress and shawl and sent them to the War Department where anyone who questioned the account could see them. Hattaway and Beringer wrote that when an officer demanded Varina’s shawl she held out the shawl with one hand and the raglan in the other and told the officer to choose. He took both. Pritchard’s official report listed those captured. Hattaway, Beringer and W. C. Davis named Corporal George Munger as the soldier who captured Davis.^[195]

In a private letter written on May 13^th Wilson informed his friend, Adam Badeau, that Varina and her sister clothed Davis as a woman with a woman’s headdress. One was on each side of Jefferson and they implored the Union men to allow them to get their old mother to safety. His men saw male riding boots “below the skirts of the dress. . . .” This is consistent with Wilson’s official report assuming the shawl was mistaken for a dress.^[196]

Varina was, at times, contentious, when she reported on her conversations with Pritchard. “Mrs. D. insinuates once in a while that the President is not treated with becoming dignity. Upon one occasion she said to Colonel Pritchard that she noticed that whenever the President went out the guard had their guns cocked. Whereupon Colonel P. told her the guns were not cocked, only halfcocked, but the men had orders to shoot Mr. Davis if he tried to escape and would certainly execute the order.”^[197]

James Wilson first saw Davis on May 13^th when he and Varina reached Macon. Wilson observed that the streets were crowded with Confederate supporters, but he saw no one greet Varina or Jefferson. “Not one soul showed the slightest interest in his behalf while he remained at that place.” Eliza Andrews, who visited in Macon, reported “There is a complete revulsion in public feeling. No more talk about fighting to the last ditch; the last ditch has already been reached; no more talk about help from France and England but all about emigration to Mexico and Brazil.”  Wilson concluded Davis had lost his popularity. James Pickett Jones wrote that when the captives passed Union camps the bands played “Yankee Doddle” and men jeered. But when the prisoners reached Macon there were no greetings from Georgians and no shouts from Federal soldiers. At Macon “there was a notable change in atmosphere when the prisoners reached Wilson’s headquarters in the Lanier Hotel. Davis entered between files of Federal troops, who smartly presented arms.” This was “a salute to a fallen foe and the last salute to Jefferson Davis as president of the Confederacy.” Wilson was as kind as possible to Varina and Jefferson and gave them the best hotel room and the best food in Macon. Wilson talked with Jefferson Davis after they ate and for some time before a train arrived for the prisoners. Their conversation covered West Point, their military service, the officers they both knew and the Black Hawk War. Wilson’s account, contrary to others, stated he did not see Varina or Maggie Howell. He may have meant he had no private conversations with either. Davis asked Wilson if Pritchard could accompany them because he had been friendly and helpful. Davis wanted to apologize because he had lost his temper when Pritchard captured him. He asked Wilson to express his appreciation and apology to Pritchard. Wilson appointed Pritchard and twenty selected men to accompany the prisoners on a special train. This locomotive was proceeded by one with four hundred troopers and followed by another with four hundred soldiers. The route was from Macon to Atlanta to Augusta where the captives were met by Major General Upton. The next morning prisoners were put on a river steamer. Alexander H. Stevens, former Confederate Vice-President, was on board, but was segregated from the Davis family because of the antipathy between Davis and Stevens. Stephen Mallory, John H. Reagan, and Clement Clay were also on board. Jennie and Clement Clay visited Eliza Frances Andrews’ family in Washington during mid-May 1865. Eliza was a fanatical opponent of all Yankees, but her father, Judge Garnet Andrews, was a staunch Unionist before, during, and after the war. After Davis was incarcerated in Fort Monroe, Wilson, in his memoirs, wrote that the vindictive treatment of Davis during his incarceration was foolish and unnecessary.^[198]

Quite by accident the Davis family was accompanied by Clement and Jennie Clay. The Clays were in La Grange after their sojourn with the Andrews family and unaware Davis had been captured until Virginia met a railroad conductor who announced there was a reward on her husband. Jefferson had sent Clement to Canada on a diplomatic mission in the waning days of the war, and this led to the reward. Clement proclaimed he did nothing illegal and immediately sent a message to Wilson in Macon, turning himself in. He and Virginia were sent on the same train to Augusta with the Davis family. Clay was one of a very few political prisoners incarcerated after President Johnston released prisoners of war on July 25, 1865. Jennie remembered that as she and Clement Clay entered the car Davis “rose and embraced me” and offered her a seat beside him.

Varina and Clement were already “deep in conversation” nearby. When the car doors closed, an officer shouted, “Order Arms” and the dull thud of musket butts striking the floor reminded the two couples of their status as prisoners.^[199]

In Savannah they were put on the William P. Clyde, an ocean-going sidewheel steamboat that carried them, not to Washington, but to Hampton Roads. Varina spent some time on the ship. Shortly after arriving at Hampton Roads, Jefferson was taken and they “parted in silence.” The ship was anchored a mile or so from shore and tugboats filled with “mockers, male and female,” circled the ship offering “such insults as were transmissible at a short distance.”

Kind and considerate captors were encountered by Varina and Jennie. Jennie noticed a United States soldier who walked by her door, returned, and tossed in a slip of paper. Neither Varina nor Jennie was allowed to communicate with written messages, but the note promised to mail letters from the two ladies “scrupulously.” They bundled letters and enclosed coins to cover the cost. The soldier walked by, and without speaking, took the bundle. Later that evening a person came by Jennie’s room whistling, stuck a hand in and flipped a small piece of gold into the room.^[200]

Wilson’s version of the capture seems the most consistent account. Burke Davis commented on the disparate personal reports that made Davis’ capture so confusing. The accounts varied because observers were scattered, events transpired so rapidly, the lighting was poor, and memoirs were often written years after the events. Burke Davis found that both Lieutenant Julian G. Dickson and Private Andrew Bee, a Norwegian who spoke broken English, and under Pritchard’s command, claimed to have been the first to recognize Davis. They claimed he wore women’s clothing but that could have been the raglan and shawl. These two also claimed that Ellen Barnes begged them to let her, and her grandmother go wash themselves. This is consistent with Joan Cashin’s version that Varina asked Ellen Barnes to walk to the woods with Jefferson Davis as a decoy. “The tall white man and petite black woman,” carried a bucket, but a federal corporal stopped them when he saw Davis’ cavalry boots and spurs.^[201]

Jefferson Davis’ accounts of the capture are not consistent. His memoirs were published in 1881, a decade and a half after events transpired. He and his research assistant, William Thomas Walthall, interviewed many participants and having testimony from so many eyewitnesses could have confused Davis. His narcissism also tended to discourage objectivity. In 1883 Burton Harrison published “The Capture of Jefferson Davis” in the Century Magazine. He sent a copy to Davis before it was published, and Davis responded with comments Harrison added as footnotes. Between 1865 and the 1880s Davis had conversations, read critiques of his actions, and had been embroiled in many arguments. Davis, in his letter to Harrison, said his intent on May 9, 1865, was to leave the encampment that night and execute his original plan to circle Union forces,  join Richard Taylor and Nathan Bedford Forrest, collect reinforcements, and continue the war. He anticipated facing the possibility of Confederate marauders attacking their encampment but was confident he could persuade them to go in peace. He was dressed in his clothes and his horse was saddled. He lay down with Varina in their family tent and simply fell asleep. When awakened he faced Federal troopers holding revolvers. When he saw Union troopers with Spencer rifles, he realized these repeating weapons precluded his firing. Davis told Reagan that he assumed the assault was from marauders attempting to rob Varina’s train. He told Varina that he would go out and try to stop the firing because he thought Confederates would recognize him. When he opened the tent flaps and stepped out, he saw bluecoats, stepped back inside and informed Varina of the enemy. His saddled horse and arms were near the road. In the darkness inside the tent, he picked up what he thought was his raglan but subsequently found it belonged to Varina and quickly left the tent. Varina “thoughtfully threw over my head and shoulders a shawl” that covered his hat. He walked fifteen or twenty feet when a trooper galloped up, aimed his carbine, and ordered Davis to surrender. Davis threw off the shawl and raglan, put his hand under the rider’s foot and attempted unsuccessfully to toss him off his horse. Varina had followed Jefferson, ran in front of him and put her arms around him as a shield.^[202]

William Preston Johnston was determined to refute the story that Davis wore women’s clothing. He explained that Davis had simply taken his raglan, “a light Aquascutum or spring overcoat, sometimes called a ‘waterproof.’” Reagan had an Aquascutum or raglan like the one Davis wore, but of a different color. Davis’ raglan was confiscated as a trophy and Reagan gave his to Davis. Johnston excoriated Union officers who, he claimed, stole watches, jewelry, clothing, and other trophies. Evidently some officers did collect items that were displayed in Washington as trophies. Varina reported a Union soldier opened a trunk of hers. “Out of this trunk the hoop skirt was procured, which had never been worn, but which they purported to have [been] removed from Davis’ person. No hooped skirt could have been worn on our journey, even by me, without great inconvenience. . . .” Reagan, like Johnston, sought to refute the idea that Davis wore any disguise. He reassured his readers that “I saw him a few minutes after his surrender, wearing his accustomed suit of Confederate gray, with his boots and hat on, and I have elsewhere shown that he had no money.” Davis admitted that because it was “quite dark in the tent, I picked up what was supposed to be my ‘raglan,’ . . . it was subsequently found to be my wife’s so very like my own as to be mistaken for it. . . .” As he exited the tent Varina “thoughtfully threw over my head and shoulders a shawl.”^[203]

Burton Harrison suffered more than anyone else on the trek after leaving Washington, Georgia. It was there he suffered an attack of dysentery, and this debilitating condition wore him down. On the night of May 9^th, he went to sleep without eating and a sympathetic friend covered him with a canvas sheet. “I was awakened by the Coachman, James Jones, running to me about daybreak with the announcement that the enemy was at hand!” He contended his was the only original account of Davis’ capture because the only other witnesses were James Jones, Varina, and the first trooper to ride up. “Anyone else who gives an account of it has had to rely upon his own imagination for his story.” His belief was false but the point he made is valid. Many accounts were based on hearsay! As he awoke, “Colonel Pritchard and his regiment charged up the road from the south upon us.” Harrison leveled his revolver to kill the lead Federal trooper, then lowered his sidearm fearful of the firestorm from Spencer rifles his shot would unleash. Pritchard asked Harrison if he had other men. Harrison, thinking of the teamsters camped to his north, said “of course we have – don’t you hear the firing?” Pritchard left one man at Davis’ tent and quickly rode toward the firefight. Some late arrivals, according to Harrison, “stopped to plunder our wagons.” Harrison claimed that Varina emerged from her tent and saw this whole episode. She had a conversation with the guard, the cavalryman took a few steps away from the tent, then stopped. Harrison walked up the side of the trooper’s horse and saw Jefferson Davis emerge from the tent on the side opposite Harrison. Davis, Harrison wrote, walked toward the woods on the east side of the tent and at a right angle to the road. The trooper then moved to his initial position and was joined by several others who “became violent in their language with Mrs. Davis.” Davis was ordered to return, but he continued to walk. Another pointed his Spencer rifle at Jefferson and threatened him. Varina, “overcome with terror, cried out in apprehension.” Davis, some sixty to eighty paces in the woods, returned and reproached the men for their language. One trooper said he recognized Davis and ordered him to surrender. It was not full daylight. Harrison said Miss Howell and the children were still asleep and the rest of the group were sleeping some distance away. Thus, he claimed no one else witnessed what happened. This account omitted any description of disguises or of one or two others accompanying Davis.^[204]

There were at least three members of Davis’ entourage who were not captured on May 10, 1865. Harrison wrote that some teamsters also escaped. Both John Taylor Wood and Charles Thornburn planned to depart the encampment and ride to the Indian River to prepare a boat to transport Davis to Texas. Thornburn was a graduate of the Naval Academy, an officer in the Confederacy and a blockade runner. Wood decided to wait on Jefferson Davis, but Thornburn was anxious to leave before daylight. He and his servant encountered Union troops at Irwinville and there was an exchange of fire. Thornburn and his servant leveled themselves on their horses. Their mounts were faster than those of the Federal cavalrymen and they reached Thornburn’s contact in Lake City. The boat was ready, and they rode on to Madison, Florida, intending to meet Jefferson Davis at that location. Wood, faithfully waiting for Davis, was captured, and left alone with a trooper from Germany barely able to speak English. With a combination of hand signs and words emphasized by the presentation of a twenty-dollar gold piece, Wood lured the guard across the picket line into the bushes along a spring branch. After biting the coin, to assure its authenticity, the guard was compliant. Additional negotiations ended with Wood’s surrender of another twenty-dollar gold piece and the guard’s surrender of his captive. The guard disappeared and Wood remained in hiding until everyone left. Wood emerged slowly and saw a man leading two horses. As the figures drew closer, he recognized Stephen Barnwell, one of the soldiers commanded by Given Campbell, and nephew of Davis’ ally, Confederate Senator Robert W. Barnwell. Abandoned items were strewn about. Wood and Barnwell found two worn saddles and sufficient bridle pieces for two bridles. They encountered a local man who directed them to a farm where they found food and a bed for the night. They rode to Valdosta where another of Stephen’s uncles, Osborne Barnwell, was a refugee. Stephen remained with Osborne and John Wood traveled to Madison, Florida, across the Suwanee River toward St. Augustine. At Orange Lake he met John C. Breckinridge, and they traveled out of the country together.^[205]

Davis “seemed to be entirely unable to apprehend the danger of capture. Everybody was disturbed at this change of his plan to ride ten miles farther, but he could not be got to move.” There will never be absolute certainty over the details of Davis’ capture, but the question of why it happened is more inscrutable. The “who,” “what,” “when,” and “where,” of history deal with tangibles. The “why” of history is intangible.  Basil Duke analyzed Davis’ attitude toward capture. Duke did not believe that Davis “meant or desired to escape after he became convinced that all was lost.” Quite the opposite, Duke thought Davis seemed intent on escape when he intended to be captured. “I am convinced that he felt unwilling to become a fugitive and appear to flee a fate the people would be compelled to face.” He thought Davis left the protection of his cavalry brigades “so that they might surrender and not face combat, and that his small escort would likewise not be at risk.” Duke could understand Davis’ conduct “under no other hypothesis.”  Duke believed the ten troopers under Given Campbell who left Washington with Davis had superior mounts and could have ridden away from any Federal force. He believed Davis “deliberately lingered and procrastinated” with the knowledge he was surrounded by Federal forces searching for him but, that at the same time he hesitated to initiate conflict and shed more blood. Duke could only believe Davis “had resolved not to escape.” Although he was not at Davis’ capture, he “rejected as incredible and absurd the stories told of his having striven to disguise himself.” Mrs. Benjamin Huger expressed Duke’s sentiment to Mary Boykin Chesnut when she reported that “Jeff Davis was traveling leisurely, with his wife, twelve miles a day, utterly careless whether he was taken prisoner or not.” Thomas Daniel Jeffress met John C. Breckinridge in 1870 at the Ballard Hotel in Richmond. Jeffress asked Breckinridge about his and Davis’ escape in May 1865. Breckinridge told Jeffress that Davis had selected a route that would lead to capture. “He was inflexible in his determination to follow the line of escape he had mapped out for himself.” Stephen Mallory wrote that Davis did not do everything necessary to escape. In the 1901 January issue of McClure’s Magazine Mallory wrote that when Davis left Charlotte, he traveled with more publicity than Dan Rice’s caravan enjoyed. Dan Rice was a comedian who performed in circuses and other entertainment facilities. People often believed Dan Rice was the model for Mark Twain’s clown in Huckleberry Finn. The enemy, Mallory believed, knew Davis’ progress and where he spent every night. When Davis reached rural locations not heavily impacted by the war, he was met with adulation. “Wherever Mr. Davis went he found the people of towns and hamlets at their doors . . . ready to greet him and to offer flowers and strawberries, prayers and kind wishes; for the straggling soldiers, passing every day, regularly heralded his progress.” Duke and Mallory seemed to have believed Davis understood Union officers were loath to initiate firefights and content to maintain vigilance until Davis could be captured without bloodshed. Late in April it was evident to most people that Confederate military power had gone from woefully insufficient to nonexistent. Jefferson Davis tried not to escape from an enemy that tried not to shoot.^[206]

 

Footnotes: Chapter Nine

[183] Varina Davis, Memoir, vol. 2, 615-17. Harrison, “Memoir,’” 251. Wilson had 15,000 men scattered over northern Georgia and men from other commands joined the search.

[184] Varina Davis, Memoir, vol. 2, 616-617. Tate, Rise and Fall, 269.

[185] OR., series 1, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 1274. Harrison, “Memoirs,’” 251-53. Varina Davis, Memoirs, 618-619. There is disagreement among sources over the sequence of these events. Jones, Yankee Blitzkrieg, 173. Daily Southern Reveille (Port Gibson, Mississippi), November 27, 1858, 4. Moody was a Solicitor in Chancery. Vicksburg Evening Post, September 26, 1895, 4. He was a Colonel in Longstreet’s Corps.

[186] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 293, 295. Citing Leeland Hathaway Recollections, Southern Historical Collections.

[187] Harrison, “Memoir,” 254. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 137-139.

[188] Clark, “Specie,” 553. Varina Davis, vol.2, 586. Reprint nu HardPress, Miami, Florida, 2006. Davis, Rise and Fall, p. 874.

[189] Reagan, Memoirs, 185. Sources vary on the dates of these events. Clark dated his departure from Reagan as May 5^th, earlier than Reagan’s date. Clark, “Specie,” 553-54. Varina Davis, Memoirs, vol. 2, 640. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 136. Davis thought Clark left $1,500 with Lubbock, Johnson and Thorburn. The sources are confusing, Burke Davis may be correct.

[190] Clark, “Specie.” 542-556, 553 – 556. Duke, Reminiscences, 386-87. Official Records, Series I, vol. 47. Chapter 59. Part 1. 374-380. Davis, Rise and Fall, 874-877.

[191] Reagan, Memoirs, 185-86. Harrison, “Memoir,” 255-56. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 140.

[192] Harrison, “Memoir,” 256, 263. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 142.

[193] Wilson, Under the old Flag, 462-465. Jones, Yankee Blitzkrieg, 172-174.

[194] Wilson, Under the old Flag, 465-466. Jones, Yankee Blitzkrieg, 175. Trudeau, The End of the Civil War, 291-92.

[195] Wilson, Under the old Flag, 466-469. Wikipedia accessed June 6, 2023. John Emaery established a gentleman’s store at 46 Regent Street, London in 1851. In 1853 he invented a method of waterproofing wool and named it Aquascutum, Latin for Watershed. It became a coat for officers in the Crimean War and other wars through the Second World War. OR., series I, vol. 49, chapter 61, part 2, 721. Today it might be called a military raincoat similar to the popular London Fog raincoats of the 1950s and 1960s. Duke, After the Fall, 165. Mallory, Last Days, 246. Woodard, Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, 818. Multiple witnesses testified that Davis threw off his disguise as soon as he was identified so that Harrison, who arrived shortly after the identification, was correct when he wrote Davis wore no disguise. Jones, Yankee Blitzkrieg, 176-178. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 427-29. Hattaway and Beringer credit Corporal George Munger as the man who captured Davis. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 301-303. William C. Davis’s account sustains Munger’s claim. He identified Jefferson Davis’ cavalry boots as inconsistent with the garb of an elderly woman. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 302-303.

[196] Jones, Your Left Arm, 242. Trudeau, The End of the Civil War, 297-98.

[197] Varina Davis, Memoir, vol. 2, 643-46. Jones, Your Left Arm, 243.

[198] Wilson, Under the old Flag, 470-473. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 141-151. Jones, Yankee Blitzkrieg, 178. Andrews, Georgia Girl, 82, 84, 113. Emigration to Brazil was attractive because slavery existed there until 1888. Descendants of Confederate immigrants live in Brazil today. Janney, Ends of War, 171-72. C Virginia Clay-Clopton, A Belle of the Fifties: Memoirs of Mrs. Clay of Alabama, Covering Social and Political Life in Washington and the South, 1853-1866. (BIG BYTE BOOKS, 2014, originally published in 1904), 230-233.

[199] Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 152-153. 10. Clay-Clopton, Belle of the Fifties, 238. McPherson, Embattled Rebel, 4-7., 238. Janney, Ends of War, 243.

[200] Clay-Clopton, Belle of the Fifties, 252.

[201] Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 144-145, 249. Cashin, First Lady, 161.

[202] Harrison, Memoirs, 187-88259. Regan, Memoirs, 187. Varina Davis, Memoirs, vol.  2, 638-641. Some information was not included in Davis’ account but was added in a footnote by Varina. In multiple sources Davis admitted he threw off his disguise. OR., series I, vol. 47, part 3, 494. Johnston, Aide to Davis,” 120. Thomas D. Jeffress, “Escape of Breckinridge and Benjamin,” January 1910, 26-27. Cashin, First Lady, 161.

[203] Reagan, Memoirs, 187-88. Varina Davis, Memoirs, vol. 2, 638-641. OR., series I, vol. 47, part 3, 494. Johnston, “Aide to Davis,” 120. Thomas D. Jeffress, “Escape of Breckinridge and Benjamin,” CV, January 1910, 26-27. Cashin, First Lady, 161.

[204] Harrison, “Memoir,” 257-260. Multiple accounts have two women walking away from the tent and one has three (Jefferson Davis, Ellen Barnes and Maggie Howell). The veracity of Harrison’s confused and inconsistent account suffered because of the rapidity of events, the surprise of the capture and the poor light.

[205] Harrison, Memoirs, 256, 259, 263. Wood, “Escape,” 110-111.

[206] Duke, “After the Fall,” 165. Mallory, Last Days, 1901, 246. Woodward, Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, 818. Thomas D. Jeffress, “Escape of Breckinridge and Benjamin,” CV, January 1910, 26. Thomas Daniel Jeffress served in Co. G, 56^th Virginia Infantry.

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Chapter Ten: Last Disbursement

“In the hearts of the educated and the thinking there was a hush of deep emotion, and it seemed to me as if the gloomy pall hung in the atmosphere repressing active expression.”

Micajah H. Clark

Micajah H. Clark separated from Reagan on May 5 and took the gold train south toward Florida. After he distributed $1,500 to the officers with Davis, he was left with $26,000. Clark found the roads all the way to Florida filled with soldiers, men from Lee’s and Johnston’s armies, escaped prisoners, parolees, and exchanged soldiers “plodding their weary way back to their homes.” He encountered residents along the way who felt endangered and expressed amazement at the absence of riots and violence. “In the hearts of the educated and the thinking there was a hush of deep emotion, and it seemed to me as if the gloomy pall hung in the atmosphere repressing active expression.” They had dedicated themselves to a government that was “dying the death before their eyes”, and they faced an unknown future under a conqueror’s control. On his trip from Danville to Florida, “the people, though they felt and knew that the end of their hopes was near, were true and hospitable always.”^[207]

As Clark moved toward Florida with the treasure train, he dispensed specie in small amounts to soldiers in need as they were encountered. He remained Acting Secretary of Treasury for a non-existent government but was not the person in charge. This arrangement precluded Clark from following the rule he had established that funds would be disbursed in two ways: as payment to soldiers and to Confederate officers to transport the specie to Confederate forces west of the Mississippi. The situation changed after the surrender of Trans-Mississippi forces on May 4^th. Clark operated in a chaotic environment with neither rules nor government.

Davis appointed Watson Van Benthuysen as Quartermaster of the baggage train when he left Charlotte. When Clark departed from Davis’ group, Watson and his brothers, Alfred C. Van Benthuysen and Jefferson Davis Van Benthuysen, went along with Watson. Joseph Davis, Jefferson’s brother, married Eliza Van Bethusysen of New Orleans in 1827 when he was forty-three-years-old, and Eliza was sixteen. Eliza’s mother operated a boarding house in New Orleans. Joan Cashin noted that the couple had no children, but “Joseph and Eliza hosted a cast of nieces, nephews, and relatives of unspecified origin called ‘cousin.’” A. J. Hanna, referred to the three as the nephews of Joseph Davis’ wife, others called them Jefferson Davis’ nephews. Five “Eastern Shore” Marylanders were with Clark: Fred Emory, William Sidney Winder, John White Scott, William Elveno Dickinson, and Tench Francis Tilghman. Two African American servants of Davis, Howard and Staffin, were also in the group. The specie train consisted of a four-mule wagon and two ambulances, one of which was soon abandoned. They crossed the Ocmulgee River on May 11, three days after Jefferson and Varina Davis.^[208]

The gold train entered Florida on May 15, crossed the Suwannee River, and by May 22 it was south of Gainesville at the home of David Levy Yulee. Nancy Wickliffe Yulee, David’s wife, was hostess, but David was spending six months in Fort Pulaski for aiding Jefferson Davis’ escape. On the night of May 22 Clark announced he would pay all involved a fair amount for protecting Davis’ papers, baggage and the $25,000 in Confederate specie; then transport what was left to an English bank to be used at the direction of Davis and Secretary of Treasury Reagan. This announcement provoked a heated discussion between Clark and Watson Van Benthuysen, who argued the specie belonged to the Quartermaster fund. With the end of a Confederate government, all quartermasters and financial agents would appropriate funds. Watson’s brothers and the five Marylanders agreed with him. One-quarter of the gold and silver would be reserved under his care to be given to Varina to support her family. Watson Van Benthuysen distributed to each member of the party $1,940, and $55 for traveling expenses. Clark, in addition, received $120 for one month’s salary. Miscellaneous costs were $250. Howard and Staffin each received $250. Five African American workers each received $20.00. Watson Van Benthuyson reserved 1,400 gold sovereigns at $4.85 each ($6,790) for Mrs. Davis and the children. On July 5, 1867, Jefferson Davis wrote to Watson Van Benthuyson, then in New York City, ordering him to pay Davis’ attorney, Henry J. Leovy, $5,000 in gold coins from the money left in Watson’s hands in May 1865 to assist with Davis’ legal fees and to support his family. In August 1867 Burton Harrison, Davis’ former secretary, went to New York City. He collected $1,500 of the $6,790 Watson Van Benthuysen took for the Davis family. The Van Benthuyson brothers received $5,985.00 and an additional $5,290.00 of the $6,790 set aside for Varina for a total of $11,275. They received over 40% of the total amount of the residual gold of the Confederacy.^[209]

 

Footnotes: Chapter Ten

[207] Clark, “Specie”, 554-56.

[208] Hanna, Oblivion, 108-109. Hanna cited the Diary of Tench F. Tilghman that, in 1938, was in possession of Dr. Tench Francis Tilghman, Sr. of St. John’s College, Annapolis, Maryland. Elsewhere in Oblivion, Hanna stated that Davis’ cook was named Watson. Cashin, First Lady, 35-36, 46-48. Cashin examined the rumors that Joseph Davis had illegitimate white children, ranging in ages from three to nine years. One was born in Kentucky and left that state with the mother. In Mississippi he fathered Florida, Mary, Caroline and a son known only as “W” who died in 1838. Others were Jane (referred to as a cousin), Julia Lyons (referred to as a granddaughter, cousin, or adopted daughter, or daughter, who lived near Vicksburg). The rumors that the three Van Benthuysen brothers were Joseph’s sons are highly unlikely. Cashin has the best research into this issue and she wrote probable children were female.

[209] Davis, Honorable Defeat, 289-90, 337-39. Clark, “Specie.” 542-556. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 188-189.

Hanna, Oblivion, 115-116, footnotes 6 and 7 on 264-65. Each of the Van Benthuysen brothers received $1940 plus $55.00 traveling expenses (a total of $5,985.00) and $5,290 of the $6,790 designated for Varina, for a total of $11,275. The total Clark possessed on May 22^nd was $25,720 (the $18,930 distributed and the $6,790 set aside for Varina), or 43.8% of the total.

 

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Chapter Eleven: “‘The Mississippi Rose’” became “‘that Western Squaw.’”  Burke Davis

Varina lived in the Gerard Hotel in New York until 1906 when she moved to the Hotel Majestic, Central Park West. She wrote that she was “free, brown, & 64,” one of the only times she mentioned her olive skin color. 

Jefferson Davis’ popularity plunged with his capture. He was blamed by many for the debacle at the end of the war. He suffered two years of harsh imprisonment. Clement Eaton judged that the ill-treatment Davis suffered in Fort Monroe resuscitated his popularity in the South and he became more popular than ever. Varina conducted a letter campaign, eliciting sympathy in both sections of the country. She was allowed to live anywhere in Georgia. A friend, George Schley, who lived near Augusta, hosted her free of charge for the duration of 1865. Her three youngest children went to Montreal with her mother where Varina was allowed to join her family. Judah P. Benjamin sent her $12,000 from England and she used this gift to support her Howell family members as well as her own family. In May 1867, Horace Greely raised $100,000 for Davis’ bond, allowing him to join his family in Canada. For years Jefferson and Varina sought suitable positions in England, France, and the United States. In England and Europe, they were hosted by aristocrats and fared well, but Jefferson had difficulty securing suitable employment.^[210]

In April 1865 Robert Brown, Jefferson’s house servant, oversaw the packing of essentials when the family fled Richmond, and continued to provide support for the family. His fidelity and loyalty demonstrated one side of the Davis family as slave owners. In 1865, Jefferson rode in desperation searching for Varina in Georgia’s pine woods. Most of his entourage stopped with worn out horses, but Robert Brown rode at Davis’ side until they found Varina. On May 23^rd when Varina was on the William P. Clyde, her two nurses left, but Robert Brown remained with her. When Varina sent her children and mother to Canada, Robert Brown accompanied them. During the trip a white man cornered Little Jeff and made insulting remarks about his father. Robert Brown asked if the man believed in equality between the two of them. The northerner answered in the affirmative. Brown said to accept his action as equal and knocked the man down with his fist. When Davis rented a cottage at Beauvoir, Robert Brown was there to assist him and remained faithful to Varina and Jefferson.^[211]

In 1869 Varina remained in England where she was under care of a physician, when Jefferson returned to the United States. Clement Eaton believed Davis restrained himself from seeking employment by his pride and his lack of aggression, but Davis was able to obtain a leadership position with an insurance company in Memphis. The South received Jefferson very well, and he wrote to Varina in England that she should join him when he was settled. Jefferson sent Varina a Christmas present, a photograph of himself, and put off the idea of her joining him in Memphis for the time being. Their relationship became strained and his communications less frequent.^[212]

Jefferson may have fallen in love with Virginia Clay, wife of Clement Claiborne Clay, Jr., but he went to England to move his family to Memphis where they boarded in a hotel. There is no evidence Varina knew about an affair and Clement Clay seemed ignorant of, or content with, the situation. Clement C. Clay, an Alabama planter and politician, worked with Davis in the United States Senate before the Civil War. In 1863 Clay lost his re-election campaign for the Confederate Senate largely because of his support for Davis. Clement Eaton included a picture of Clay and Davis sitting and talking together in Jefferson Davis. Hattaway and Beringer characterized Clay as “a servile flatterer whose primary avenue for favor in the government was that he could never say no to Davis.”

On June 25, 1871, the Louisville Commercial assailed Jefferson Davis’ morality “from the camp of the enemy.” Varina had returned from England and lived in Baltimore where her sons were in school and where she was treated by a homeopath. The Louisville Commercial reported gossip of an alleged assignation between Davis and a woman in a Pullman car. Davis left the Peabody Hotel in Memphis on Tuesday July 11, 1871, on a trip to Sewanee, Tennessee. He had agreed to take care of Virginia Clay who also wanted to visit Sewanee. Passengers reported hearing Davis ask that his two berths be made at 8:15 p. m., the lower berth for Virginia and the upper for him. As passengers were chatting, they saw the curtain covering the berths begin to sway and bulge outward and a form move from the upper to the lower berth. They called the porter who opened the curtains to display Davis in the berth with the lady who was “under his chivalric protection.” The porter told Davis to get another berth, but Davis replied he would not because he had paid for two berths and would occupy whichever he wanted. The porter called the conductor and eventually the issue was reported to the railroad superintendent. Burke Davis noted that Virginia had asked her husband to accompany her on the railroad trip with Jefferson Davis to Sewanee. Clay declined, and she wrote, “It wd. Not do for me to accompany Mr. D. without you wd. it.” I mean, with others, of course.” Joan Cashin cited five stories of the incident in various newspapers published in July 1871. Cashin could not find any evidence that Varina ever made a comment about Jefferson’s relationship with Virginia Clay.^[213]

Despite a claim that Davis did not defend himself, he disavowed the story in a card either printed or described in the Baltimore Sun, Chicago Tribune, Richmond Dispatch, New York Herald, Cincinnati Times, and the Louisville Courier-Journal. The story was described by numerous papers, and details varied significantly and generated snide comments. The New York Herald claimed, “Mr. Jefferson Davis has exhibited so much acerbity of temper lately, especially against railroad conductors, that the latter, as a class, whenever they have him as a passenger, have resolved to give him a ‘wide berth.’” Varina would have been exposed to the “scandal story,” as it was referred by newspapers. [214]

Only two people could ever know if Davis and Clay committed adultery. Burke Davis concluded, “the tradition that Virginia Clay was on the Pullman car with Davis should be accepted as no more than tradition, since proof is obviously impossible.” He first heard the story two decades before he published The Long Surrender in 1985. His footnotes demonstrate a very comprehensive search. This tradition is important because of the impact the publicity had on Varina. One can only have sympathy for her. As she aged, she became seriously overweight, and her lifelong feelings of insecurities increased. She might not have made a comment about the story, but she probably carried the scar from the incident to her grave.^[215]

Burke Davis noted that the marriages of Varina and Virginia were under stress in July 1871. Varina wrote a letter complaining about Jefferson’s interest in Mary Stamps, a relative, but apologized later. Clement Clay lived in the country eighteen miles from Huntsville where Virginia maintained an active social life. He asked her to join him in seclusion where she might love him as much as he loved her. She wrote that she was jealous of seeing families living together.^[216]

Sarah Ellis, daughter of Thomas Ellis, a wealthy planter, studied at Madame Grelaud’s with Varina. She claimed friendship with Varina, but that sentiment might not have been reciprocated. Sarah married Samuel Dorsey, inherited her father’s fortune, and built Beauvoir on the Mississippi coast. Samuel died childless. In 1877 Sarah invited Jefferson to live with her at Beauvoir where he would be able to concentrate on writing with her assistance. He rented a cottage for $50 a month including food for himself, Robert Brown and a researcher, Major William Thomas Walthall, while Sarah served as his secretary. This arrangement caused comments among Sarah’s family and friends. Eventually, Sarah sold Beauvoir to Jefferson for $5,000 in three installments and left everything she owned to Jefferson in her will. Varina, still in England, discovered Jefferson’s living arrangements from a newspaper. Jefferson invited Varina to come to the United States and live at Beauvoir but suggested she wait until fall. Varina  responded that she never wanted to see Beauvoir. When people asked what part of Jefferson’s memoirs Varina was writing, she was aggravated with jealousy. In October 1877 Varina arrived in New York, and Jefferson sent Burton Harrison to meet her and take her to Memphis to live with her daughter, Margaret (Maggie) Howell Davis Hays and her husband, J. Addison Hayes. Jefferson visited Varina to persuade her to return to Beauvoir with him. He endured her coolness for ten days, then returned to Beauvoir. He was unable to visit her on their wedding anniversary in 1878 because he was too busy working with Sarah. Gossip spread about the breach between Jefferson and Varina. Burke Davis speculated that this gossip reached Varina’s ears, motivating her to go to Beauvoir. Sarah had planned a dinner in Varina’s honor, but before guests arrived Varina screamed at Sarah, and ran out into the woods. Sarah followed and for some time they talked. Varina returned to reign as queen of the party. She replaced Sarah as Jefferson’s secretary; the two women became friends, and all seemed to be well between Jefferson and Varina. Joan Cashin concluded that the relationship between Sarah Dorsey and Jefferson Davis was platonic. Davis evidently continued his relationship, whatever it was, with Virginia Clay.^[217]

In the summer of 1879 Jefferson was at Briarfield on business. Varina was in Memphis helping Maggie with her new baby. At the same time, Sarah was conducting business with her attorney in New Orleans. Sarah became ill with terminal cancer and Jefferson arrived to sit with her until she died. Beauvoir and all of Sarah’s other properties were left to Jefferson. Sarah’s family sued, but the will was not broken. Jefferson conveyed everything to Varina but stipulated that at her death their daughters would inherit everything, denying Varina the power to dispense the property.^[218]

Jefferson did not become a reactionary. He joined Robert E. Lee in opposing emigration to Mexico and Brazil, and generally supported various changes to enhance the South. He remained a man of the Old South. Rather than putting Winnie in a French school, which she wanted, he sent her to a more traditional German school. Before Jefferson’s death, Winnie fell in love with Alfred Wilkinson, Jr. a patent attorney in Syracuse, New York, and the grandson of an abolitionist. Wilkinson visited Beauvoir to ask for Winnie’s hand in marriage. Jefferson liked Wilkinson but declined to approve the marriage and Winnie accepted her father’s will. Jefferson, after some time, changed his mind but it was too late. Winnie died at the age of thirty-four in 1898, an “old maid.”^[219]

For ten years Jefferson and Varina lived in Beauvoir and together wrote his memoirs. Jefferson continued his letters to Virginia Clay, sometimes dictating them to Varina. Clement Clay died in 1882 and Jefferson received a blow in 1887 when Virginia announced her engagement. Cashin believed Varina knew that Sarah Knox Taylor was Jefferson’s first love, but he also loved Varina. His relationship with Virginia Clay is difficult to comprehend. In November 1889 Davis was working at Briarfield. He had finally inherited it after a legal battle that lasted for years with the final opinion issued by the Mississippi Supreme Court. Neither Briarfield nor Beauvoir provided sufficient income and Beauvoir carried debts. Jefferson developed a respiratory condition and Varina traveled up the Mississippi to nurse him. He died on December 6, 1889. There was competition among burial locations and finally Davis was interred in Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, alongside thousands of Confederates. Deceased children were disinterred and moved to Hollywood where all family members were united in death. Varina was left without insurance and insufficient income. She immediately began writing her memoirs, published in 1890, to secure money for her support.^[220]

Clement Eaton provides an unbiased summary of Jefferson Davis’ life using Arthur M. Schlesinger, Sr.’s suggestion that “‘Comparison is the key to understanding.’” Eaton found that Davis was an honorable but misguided man of exceptional ability who accepted the assumptions of his society. Despite his faults and those of his society, he led the Confederacy for four years against the United States with its overwhelming superiority in manpower, transportation, and material. Clement C. Clay, Jr. found Davis to be “a strange compound, an inscrutable man, ‘he would not ask or receive counsel – he was predisposed to go exactly the way that his friends advised him not to go.’” Eaton agreed with Clay. “Even today this sphinxlike, complex man, with so many virtues and so many faults, is not really understood by modern historians.”^[221]

Varina believed her source of income would be her pen and that New York was the place for writers. Her daughter Winnie, also a writer, assisted Varina when she was writing her memoirs. Varina followed Winnie to New York where she lived in the Gerard Hotel until 1906 when she moved to the Hotel Majestic, Central Park West. She wrote that she was “free, brown, & 64,” one of the only times she mentioned her olive skin color.  It was the declaration for the last chapter of her life. This comment may have reflected criticisms of her skin color. When she was First Lady in Richmond, Marion Meyer, Quartermaster General Abraham C. Meyer’s wife, “remarked that Varina, because of her dark complexion, looked like an Indian squaw. . . .” A year later Congress, anticipating that Davis would promote Meyer, designated the position be held by a brigadier general. Davis appointed Brigadier General Alexander R. Lawton as the new quartermaster general. A conflict ensured, Lawton remained, but Davis made enemies with his defense of Varina. Burke Davis wrote the “sensuous, doe-eyed beauty of her girlhood . . . was no longer “‘The Mississippi Rose’” but was called “‘that Western squaw’”.^[222]

Varina, often accompanied by Winnie, traveled all over the former Confederate states, speaking at dedications of monuments, parades of veterans and other public events. She continued to represent her husband, and Winnie remained “The Daughter of the Confederacy”. While many Southerners criticized Varina’s residence in New York and associations with persons not sympathetic to the Confederacy, her faithful willingness to celebrate the memory of the Confederacy garnered her great support.

Winnie met Joseph and Kate Pulitzer and discovered that William Worthington Davis, Kate’s father, was Jefferson Davis’ first cousin. Kate and Varina had known each other before the war. The Pulitzers found Varina to be “a superior woman.” Varina became a freelance writer for Pulitzer’s New York World, as well as other publications. She had a sufficient income to live comfortably in a nice hotel, help her relatives and donate to charities. But she complained of insufficient income, a lifelong trait following her father’s bankruptcy. In New York she could associate with her northern relatives as well as those in the South.^[223]

Varina occasionally visited Cranston’s Hotel up the Hudson, a nice vacation site. One day she answered a knock on her door and Julia Dent Grant introduced herself. The two visited and a friendship grew. When they returned to New York they discovered they lived twenty blocks apart. The two had much in common, not the least of which was the friendship of their daughters, Nellie Grant Satoris and Winnie. Both husbands were West Point graduates. Ulysses Grant owned four slaves before the Emancipation Proclamation was implemented. Their experiences produced many common acquaintances. Both received criticisms for physical traits: Varina’s excessive weight and Julia’s crossed eyes. Both began to seek reconciliation well before the end of the war. Though Varina never openly endorsed women’s suffrage, she wrote articles declaring men and women to be intellectually equal and Julia privately supported the idea of women’s suffrage.^[224]

Varina’s attitude about gender was more modern than those of her peers. She did not believe an effeminate man should be ridiculed, and she thought that women who loved horsemanship did not indicate masculinity. As a “New Woman” she thought the practice of men leaving the dinner table to meet in another room, smoking cigars, should be abandoned. She translated a column from Le Figaro endorsing women’s rights, and wrote that the woman of the future might be an American woman. She referred to “‘the intermingling of many races.’” This could be seen as a multiracial society of “half-breeds,” but her meaning was not explicit. Varina did not speak out on women’s suffrage.^[225]

Varina’s intellectual curiosity was unbounded and only seemed to expand with age. In 1901 she walked into a hotel lobby and met Prince Peter Kropotkin, the Russian anarchist. Booker T. Washington also entered the lobby, in town to speak at Madison Square Garden. Washington wanted to meet Kropotkin and Varina asked to be introduced to Washington. The three had an extended conversation, though no one knew the subjects covered. This incident, like many other things Varina did in New York, sparked hostility toward her from all over the South. Cashion called Varina’s conversation a “spontaneous decision of civility” as was her friendship with Julia Grant. In 1906, her last year, she criticized Roosevelt for hosting Washington for a dinner at the White House. In the eyes of some Southerners the dinner invitation might have been less serious than Varina’s conversing in public with an African American male which implied social equality. In the same year she wrote that, “white people” were superior to, “black people.”^[226]

Varina’s health began to fail in 1905. She died on October 16, 1906, with Maggie Hays and two of her children, Mary Bateson (Jefferson’s grandniece), Kate Pulitzer, her pastor, and a doctor at her bedside. This eclectic group illustrated both her broad range of acquaintances and her advanced age.^[227]

Footnotes: Chapter Eleven

[210] Cashin, First Lady, 171-172, 183, 185. William C. Davis, Honorable Defeat, 386. Clement Eaton, Jefferson Davis, 262-263. Thomas, Confederate Nation, 142.

[211] Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 29, 127, 201, 206, 249. Virginia Clay-Clopton, A Belle of the Fifties: Memoirs of Mrs. Clay of Alabama, Covering Social and Political Life in Washington and the South, 1853-1866 (BIG BYTE BOOKS, 2014, originally published in 1904), 241, 242.

[212] Cashin, First Lady, 190-196. Clement Eaton, Jefferson Davis, 263. Evidently Varina was exhausted emotionally and physically because of the stressful lifestyle. Hattaway and Beringer, Jefferson Davis, 343.

[213] Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 243- 245. Cashin, First Lady, 198-199, 200-203. Cashin’s citations for the Davis/Clay affair: “Jeff and the Herald,” New York Herald, July 27, 1871, 6. “The Jefferson Davis Scandal,” Louisville Courier-Journal (Louisville), July 18, 1871, 4. This Courier Journal article quoted extensively from articles in from The Cincinnati Times of July 22, 1871, The Memphis Daily Appeal and the Louisville Commercial.  “Jeff-O! Jeff!” New York Herald, July 26, 1871, 7. “Mr. Jefferson Davis,” New York Herald, July 31, 1871, 6. The New York Times, July 17, 1871, 6. Jefferson Davis, Rise and Fall, 147 (picture on opposite page), 177-78,153, 189, 211, 213, 216, 236, 261. According to one source the railroad car was not a Pullman, and some accounts claimed Huntsville, Alabama was the destination.

[214] Baltimore Sun, July 19, 1871, 1. The Richmond Dispatch quoted from the Baltimore Sun. Chicago Tribune, July 22, 1871, 1. New York Herald, July 13, 26, 27, 1871. A Herald reporter had a contentious interview with Davis on July 13 and had not read about the scandal. The Herald did not publish Davis’ card on July 26, apologized and included it on July 27. The Herald published Davis’ card from the Louisville Commercial of July 23. The Herald’s joke about “the scandal,” was published in the issue of July 31, 1871, 6.

[215] Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 303. Burke Davis found strong evidence in the C. C. Clay papers at Duke University that the couple was on the train from Memphis to Huntsville on the night of June 11, 1871. Davis’ correspondence confirms an anticipated visit to Sewanee for graduation exercises. Burke Davis’ research at Sewanee resulted in no evidence that Jefferson Davis was there in 1871, but that he was there for graduation exercises in 1872. Other commentators insisted the sleeping car was not a Pullman. He found that Virginia Clay’s diaries contained no entries for 1870 or 1871.

[216] Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 246-247. Cashin, First Lady, 209, 216-217. Varina seemed to have emotional or psychological problems and wrote that her ability to write was lost for two years. Clement Eaton, Jefferson Davis, 265.

[217] Cashin, First Lady, 218-222. Clement Eaton, Jefferson Davis, 264-265. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 249-251. There are inconsistencies between Cashin’s and Burke Davis’ versions of the relationship between Jefferson and

Varina. For example, Cashin wrote that Jefferson sent Burton Harrison to New York to meet Varina. Burke Davis thought Jefferson did not know Varina was arriving.

[218] Cashin, First Lady, 229-230.

[219] Clement Eaton, Jefferson Davis, 266-267.

[220] Cashin, First Lady, 230, 232-233, 256-264, 266.

[221] Clement Eaton, Jefferson Davis, 267, 268, 275. Burk Davis, Long Surrender, 27.

[222] Clement Eaton, Jefferson Davis, 30-31. James M. McPherson, Embattled Rebel: Jefferson Davis as Commander in Chief. (New York: The Penguin Press, 2014), 169-170. Cashin, First Lady, 112, 269, 270, 305. Burke Davis, Long Surrender, 8.

[223] Cashin, First Lady, 249, 269-274, 276, 278.

[224] Cashin, First Lady, 279-283.

[225] Cashin, First Lady, 296.

[226] Cashin, First Lady, 297-298.

[227] Cashin, First Lady, 305. Varina had two sons, Jeff, Jr (1878) and Billy (1872) who died on October 16^th. Billy was born on October 16, 1861.

__________________

Abbreviations

CV – Confederate Veteran.

OR – Official Records of the War of the Rebellion. 

R&R – “RootsandRecall.com”, an online historical website created by Wade B. Fairey, Sr., hosted by Winthrop University’s Pettus Archives.

SHSP – Southern Historical Society Papers.

UDC – In 1990 a series of works by the United Daughters of the Confederacy began with volume 1 and  continued through numerous volumes cited herein as UDC.

Acknowledgements

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______________

 Index

Ackerman, Robert K.

Alexander, Andrew Jonathan

Anderson, Mary Elizabeth

Anderson, John Crawford

Andrew, Rod

Andrews, Eliza Frances

Andrews, Garnett

Ashmore, John Durant

Babcock, Eugenia C.

Badeau, Adam, 92, 109

Ballard, Michael, 27

Bleckley, Mrs. Sylvester

Barnes, Ellen

Barnwell, Osborne

Barnwell, Robert W.

Barnwell, Stephen

Barringer, Victor C.

Barringer, Nariah A. Massy

Bates, Lewis F.

Bateson, Mary

Beauregard, Pierre Gustave Toutant

Bee, Andrew

Benjamin, Judah P.

Benjamin, St. Martin

Bennett, James, 34, 35.

Beringer, Richard E.

Binkley, Henry Clay

Bleckley, Elizabeth Hammond

Bofals, M.

Booe, A. M.

Boyd, Johnson

Bragg, Braxton

Bratton, James Rufus

Breckinridge, John Cabel

Breckinridge, William Campbell Preston

Bringhurst, William Rufus

Brown, Robert

Brown, Simeon B.

Bruce, Horatio Washington

Buchanan, James

Burnett, Carl

Burt, Armistead

Calhoun, John C.

Campbell, Andrew

Campbell, Given

Campbell, John Archibald

Canby, Edward Richard Sprigg

Carrillo, Richard F.

Carter, John

Cashin, Joan E.

Catlett, John

Chesnut, James C.

Chesnut, Linda Crowe

Chesnut, Mary Boykin Miller

Cisco, Walter

Charles, Allan D.

Clark, James C.

Clark, Micajah Henry

Clay, Clement Claiborne Jr.

Clay, Virginia Caroline, “Jennie”

Cobb, Howard

Conolly, Thomas

Cooper, Samuel

Cox, Jacob Dolson

Croxton, John Thomas

Culpepper, W. S.

Crump, William Wood

Dahlgren, John Adolphus Bernard

Damon, Henry G.

DaVega, Abraham Henry

Davis, Burke

Davis, George

Davis, Jefferson Finis

Davis, Jefferson Finis, “Jeff” and “Jr.,”

Davis, Joseph E., “Joe”

Davis, Joseph

Davis, Margaret Howell, “Maggie,” see Mrs. Addison Hayes.

Davis, Nathaniel Jefferson, “Jeff Davis”

Davis, Sarah Knox Taylor

Davis, Varina Howell

Davis, Varina Anne Howell, “Piecake” or “Winnie”

Davis, William C.

Davis, William Howell, “Billy”

Davis, William Worthington

de Wechmar Stross, Carl, spouse of Margaret Graham Howell after 1870

Dennison, Betsey

Dennison, James

Dennison, William, Jr.

Dibrell, George Gibbs

Dickinson, William Elveno

Dickson, Julian G.

Dorsey, Samuel

Dorsey, Sarah, nee Ellis

Douglass, George

Duke, Basil Wilson

Duncan, David

Eaton, Clement

Ellis, C. Betts

Ellis, Thomas

Emory, Fred

Fairey, Sr., Wade B.

Falconer, Kinloch

Feilden, Henry Wemyss

Feilden, Julia McCord

Ferguson, Samuel Wagg

Ficklen, Boyce

Ficklen, Fielding

Ficklen, Francis Wingfield

Fleming, Robert H.

Forrest, Nathan Bedford

Gary, Martin Witherspoon

Gary, Thomas Reeder

Gary, Mary Ann Porter

Gettys, Matilda Boyd

Gilbert, Charles Edwin

Giles, Jane

Giles, John Russell R.

Gillam, Robert

Golay, Michael

Govan, William Hemphill

Grant, Julia Dent

Grant, Ulysses

Graves, Charles Iverson

Green, Mary

Grelaud, Deborah

Greely, Horace

Grierson, Benjamin Henry

Halleck, Henry Wager

Hampton, Wade

Hanna, Alfred Jackson

Hardee, William Joseph

Harnden, Henry

Harrison, Burton N.

Harrison, James

Hathaway, Leeland

Hattaway, Herman

Haughton, Thomas G.

Haw, Joseph R.

Hayes, J. Addison

Hayes, Margaret “Maggie)” Howell Davis

Headley, John W.

Helen, (Davis family nurse)

Hemphill, Robert R.

Henry, (a butler for the Davis family)

Hiatt, John

Hopkins, John

Howell Davis

Howard, (a Davis servant)

Howell, Jefferson Davis, “Jeffy D.”

Howell, Margaret Graham, “Maggie”

Howell, Margaret Kempe

Howell, William

Huger, Mrs. Benjamin

Hunter, Robert Mercer Talliaferro

Hyrams. Harriet

Ingersoll, Charles

Iverson, Alfred

Jackman, John S.

Jackson, William

Jake (a servant)

Janney, Caroline E.

Jeffress, Thomas Daniel

Johnson, Andrew

Johnston, Albert Sidney

Johnston, Joseph Eggleston

Johnston, William Preston

Jolly, Manse

Jones, James Henry

Jones, James Pickett

Keckley, Elizabeth

Kropotkin, Peter Alekseyevich

Lane, Mary House

Latimer, Joseph H.

Lawton, Alexander R.

Lee, Fitzhugh

Lee, Robert E.

Lee, Samuel Phillips

Lee, Stephen Dill

Lesley, David

Leventhrope, Collett

Levoy, Henry J.

Lightner, Michael

Limber, James, “Jim”

Lincoln, Abraham

Lincoln, Mary Todd

Lindsay, John Oliver

Lubbock, Francis Richard

Lucas, James

Maclean, Clara Dargan

Madison, Dolly

Malloby, Theodore

Mallory, Stephen Russell

Marshall, Fannie Calhoun

Marshall, John

Martin, Robert M.

Marse, Carol

Marvel, William

Matthews, Gary Robert

McAllister, Lewis Crawford

McCaleb, Florida

McPherson, James M.

Means, Edward C.

Menty, Robert Heratio

Messick, Jack

Meyer, Abraham C.

Meyer, Marion

Miller, Will

Minor, Alice Cochran

Mobley, Mrs. Isaiah

Moderwell, Erastus C.

Monroe, Thomas

Monroe, Winder

Moody, George Vernon

Moore, Jefferson Davis

Moore, John T.

Moore, Sam

Moore, William Andrew III

Moran, Victor

Morgan, James Morris

Morgan, John Hunt

Moss, David

Munford, Thomas T.

Munger, George

Myers, William

Nat, Betty Trenholm’s butler

Nugent, Richard

Oliver, Dionysius

O’Melia, Mary

Osterhaus, Peter Joseph

Overly, Milford

Palmer, David

Palmer, William Jackson

Palmer, Elizabeth Catherine, “Lise”

Parker, William Harwar

Phifer, William F.

Pierce, Robert Kahle

Pinkerton, Allan J.

Pritchard, Benjamin Dudley

Pulitzer, Kate

Pulitzer, Joseph

Rawlins, John Aaron

Reagan, John Henniger

Rice, Dan

Ridley, Broomfield L.

Ripley, Roswell Sabine

Robert (a servant)

Robertson, John Joseph

Robertson, Mary Elizabeth

Robertson, Willie

Robinson, Felix

Rosser, Thomas

Russell, James

Russell, Robert Young

Sample, James A.

Satoris, Nellie Grant

Saxon, Rufus

Schlesinger, Arthur M., Sr.

Schley, George

Schofield, John McAllister

Scott, John White

Scott, Winfield

Seddon, James

Semmes, Raphael

Sheridan, Phillip

Sherman, William Tecumseh

Simons, W. L.

Simonds, Andrew J.

Sloan, James P.

Smith, Edmund Kirby

Smith, Joel

Smith, Edmund Kirby

Smith, “Mister” (Jefferson Davis’ code name)

Smith, N. W.

Smith, William

Simpson, John Hemphill

Springs, Andrew Baxter

Springs, Eli

Springs, Grace Allison White

Springs, John

Stacker, Clay

Staffin, a servant of Jefferson Davis

Stamps, Mary

Stanard, Martha Pierce

Stanton, Edwin McMasters

Steele, Mattie

Stevens, Alexander H.

Stiles, John C.

Stoneman, George

Supten, Thomas

Sutherlin, William Thomas

Sutherlin, Jane Patrick

Swallow, W. H.

Syfan, George W.

Tate, Allen

Taylor, Ann

Taylor, Richard

Taylor, Zachary

Thomas, Emory M.

Thomas, George Henry

Thomas, Harriet, “Hettie”

Thompson, Elizabeth Wellmaker

Thornburn, Charles

Thornwell, Florence

Tilghman, Tench Francis

Tillson, Davis

Toombs, Robert Augustus

Trenholm, Anna

Trenholm, George

Trenholm, Betty

Trudeau, Noah Andre

Twain, Mark

Upton, Emory

Van Benthuysen, Alfred C.

Van Benthuysen, Eliza

Van Benthuysen, Jefferson Davis

Van Benthuysen, Watson

Varon, Elizabeth R.

Vaughn, John Crawford

Wallace, William H.

Ware, Lowry Price

Washington, Booker Taliaferro

Washington, George

Walthall, William Thomas

Watehall, E. T.

Watts, Emma

Webb, Mrs. James

Weill (Weil), Barbara

Weill (Weil), Abram

Wheeler, Joseph

Wheless, John F.

White, E. C.

White, William Elliott

Whyte, Archibald

Wigfall, Lewis Trezevant

Winder, William Sidney

Wilkinson, Alfred, Jr.

Wilkinson, James

Williams, John S.

Willingham, Robert M., Jr.

Wilson, James Harrison

Winchester, George

Wise, Henry

Wise, John

Wood, John Taylor

Wood, Ann Taylor

Yeadon, Mrs. Richard

Yeoman, Joseph

York, Zebulon

Young, Lafayette

Young, Lawrence

Yulee, David Levy

Yulee, Nancy Wickliffe

 

—————-

Acknowledgements

The library in Joanna, South Carolina includes copies of Joanna Way, the defunct local newspaper. This source includes information on Jefferson Davis’ trip from the Whitmire area through Joanna (known in 1865 as Martin’s Station). The Union Daily Times, housed in the Union County Museum, was an essential source for Jefferson Davis’ trip on April 29, 1865. The writer appreciates the assistance of the staff at each of these collections for their help in tracing Davis’ route.

Edith Brawley, now deceased, devoted 54 years of her life to McCain Library of Erskine College where she created the archives. She assiduously responded to requests for sources. John Kennerly, currently the Director of Library Services at Richmond Community College, assisted my research in many ways. Sarah Morrison, the Interlibrary Loan Librarian at Piedmont Technical College, was very helpful in securing resources on loan. Frederick Guyette, Reference Librarian at Thrift Library of Anderson University, found copies of obscure articles. Bob Santee, Circulation and Acquisitions Manager at McCain Library of Erskine College, assisted in providing materials and with library technology.

Several persons have spent time and expertise assisting the writer with technology and software. The Information Technology team at Erskine College: Robert Clarke, Stephanie Hudson, Harrison Timms, Sadie Bradley, and Cameron Spires provided needed support and even visited my home to solve an intractable software problem. Patrick Campbell, in Abbeville, South Carolina, helped with software and printer problems.

Graphic Designer Johnny Peterson, at J. P. Studios, provided an excellent map of the routes taken by Varina and Jefferson Davis. Carl Burnett, with a master’s degree in Medieval History from Greifswald University, read drafts of my work and provided insightful comments and beneficial suggestions. C. Betts Ellis, former Chief of Staff at MUSC Health in Charleston, assisted in a protracted search for a physician whose family fed Davis. Carol Marse, a direct descendant of Dr. George Douglass, who hosted Davis for a midday meal on April 30, 1865, verified the meeting and now owns the dining room chair in which Davis sat.

Two individuals who live in Washington, Georgia provided valuable information and copies of pictures of the buildings where Varina and Jefferson stayed. Linda Crowe Chesnut insisted that Varina did not simply ride through
Washington but spent two nights in the town. She also contributed a picture of the house where Varina stayed and put me in touch with Robert M. Willingham. Robert has published several books on Wilkes County and Washington, Georgia that were most helpful. He even provided a copy of a presentation he made which included new research. Robert also provided three images of the Bank of Georgia building where Jefferson stayed.

John Blythe my former student, and a professional historian, provided information and images of houses visited by Jefferson Davis. Perhaps more importantly, John spent hours giving sage advice that helped provide a better
understanding of events. Paul Gettys, my brother, retired from a career working with Councils of Government where he researched houses and published histories of communities, was an invaluable source of information. Paul has continued this work contributing to Roots and Recall. He provided the route taken by Jefferson Davis from Fort
Mill to York on April 27, 1865, an area transformed by the urbanization that obliterated 1865 streetscapes.

Historian Wade B. Fairey, Sr., who created RootsandRecall.com as an on-line historical resource initially preserving York County, S.C. documents, images, and history. Years of work expanded the area to include histories and preservation of all South Carolina counties. The Louise Pettus Archives at Winthrop University now hosts RootsandRecall.com so that it will be a permanent repository of images and stories of the past. Meetings between the writer, Paul, and Wade at the Fairey’s home in rural York County have been a pleasure, especially with Cathy Fairey’s gracious hospitality.

The person contributing more than anyone to this story has been my wife, Sandra Lockaby Gettys. Without her willingness to endure the many hours of my absence, either on the road or isolated in front of a screen, this work would not exist. Sandra has not only endured chores neglected and events missed, but has provided the most important assistance. A former English teacher, she is a superb proofreader and has offered significant criticisms of content with an eye for improvements. Her intellectual observations have been invaluable.

 

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Thomas, Emery M. The Confederate Nation, 1861-1865. New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1979.
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Varon, Elizabeth R. Appomattox: Victory, Defeat, and Freedom at the End of the Civil War. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014.
Vorsey, Louis De, Jr. The Indian Boundary in the Southern Colonies, 1763-1775. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1966.
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