Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederacy during the American Civil War, was a hero of the U.S. Army during the Mexican War and U.S. Secretary of War. Born in Kentucky, Jefferson Davis represented the state of Mississippi in the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives. Jefferson Davis was the only individual to serve as President of the Confederacy. In the last days of the war, Jefferson Davis fled the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia, and was captured by Union cavalry in Georgia. Jefferson Davis was imprisoned and indicted on treason charges but received a presidential pardon in 1868. He died in 1889 at the age of 81.
Jefferson Davis
Confederate Maj. Gen. Gideon Pillow. After gaining ground trying to cut an escape path for the Confederates during the February 1862 siege of Fort Donelson by Union forces led Brig. Read more
Jefferson Davis
As the Civil War continued in the spring of 1864, a Shenandoah Valley resident lamented, “Our prospects look gloomy, very gloomy.” Read more
Jefferson Davis
On September 3, 1864, a triumphant Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman telegraphed Washington, “Atlanta is ours and fairly won.” Read more
Jefferson Davis
The title of the 128-book, 138,579-page work was a suitably large mouthful: The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies. Read more
Jefferson Davis
A slight knee wound brought the New Jersey boy to a Washington military hospital, but “his mind had suffered more than his body,” wrote volunteer nurse Louisa May Alcott. Read more
Jefferson Davis
On August 24, 1862, newly promoted Captain Raphael Semmes of the Confederate States Navy called his largely English crew to the quarterdeck of his new command, the 220-foot battle cruiser Alabama, lying off the coast of Terceira in the Azores. Read more
Jefferson Davis
Robert E. Lee’s surrender at Appomattox, presaging the subsequent surrender of other Confederate forces in the West and the capture of Southern President Jefferson Davis a few weeks later, marked the triumphant end of the nation’s great sundering. Read more
Jefferson Davis
Four hundred Confederate sailors and marines, their small arms loaded and ready, awaited their orders. Some men had their cutlasses within easy reach. Read more
Jefferson Davis
Lieutenant Colonel Horace Porter, personal aide to Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, maneuvered his mount past ammunition wagons, ambulances, stragglers, and prisoners jamming the muddy roads leading back to headquarters from Five Forks, Virginia, on the evening of April 1, 1865. Read more
Jefferson Davis
In November 1861, word swept through London that an American warship, James Adger, in port at Southampton, was planning to put to sea and intercept a British ship bringing Confederate emissaries to Europe. Read more
Jefferson Davis
The prospect of running the Federal blockade at Wilmington was easy in the beginning. North Carolina’s principal seaport was blockaded by a single warship, USS Daylight, and no one took the threat seriously. Read more
Jefferson Davis
Under a bright, high sun in a pale blue Midwestern sky, six companies of the United States Cavalry’s 1st Regiment rode into a grassy valley bordering the south fork of the Solomon River in northwestern Kansas on the afternoon of July 29, 1857. Read more
Jefferson Davis
The White House was a somber place in the summer of 1862. The Civil War was in the midst of its second costly year, and the Union armies had yet to win a significant victory in the eastern theater. Read more
Jefferson Davis
Few Civil War officers, in either army, were as polarizing as Union Maj. Gen. William “Bull” Nelson. Read more
Jefferson Davis
When the end came, on April 2, 1865, Confederate President Jefferson Davis was sitting in his customary pew at St. Read more
Jefferson Davis
By Edward Holub and John Marchetti
“For God’s sake, if Mr. Forrest will let me alone, I will let him alone. Read more
Jefferson Davis
Despite the increasing effectiveness of the Union naval blockade, more and more steamers plied the waters between the few remaining Confederate ports and Nassau, St. Read more
Jefferson Davis
A caravan of traders bound for Santa Fe left Cantonment Leavenworth near the Missouri River on June 3, 1829, escorted by four companies of the 6th U.S. Read more
Jefferson Davis
When Confederate general John Bell Hood assumed command of the embattled Army of Tennessee at Atlanta in mid-July 1864, he was already grievously wounded in both body and spirit. Read more
Jefferson Davis
The year 1864 was shaping up to be a critical one in the three-year-long Civil War. During the previous year, Federal armies had gained control of the Mississippi River and consolidated their grip on Tennessee. Read more
