Life of Jefferson Davis, with an authentic account of his private and public career, and his death and burial; together with The life of "Stonewall Jackson" ... including his glorious military career and his tragic death on the battlefield

Chapter I

Parentage and birth — His father a soldier in the American war of Independence — Eemoves to Kentucky, where JeSerson Davis is born — His father again removes to Mississippi — Jefferson graduates at West Point — Enters the army— Black Hawk war — Marries and becomes a planter — Enters Congress — Distinguished in the Mexican War — Elected to the United States Senate.

Samuel Davis, the father of Jeflferson Davis, was a soldier in the American War of Independence, serving as a cavalry officer in the local forces of the State of Georgia. From Georgia he removed to Christian County, (now Todd Co.,) Kentucky, where the Confederate leader was born, June 3, 1808. Soon after the birth of his son, Samuel Davis removed to the State of Mississippi, then only a territory of the United States, where he settled near Woodville, in Wilkinson County.

By a singular coincidence, the same State in which Jefferson Davis was born (Kentucky), a httle more than half a year afterwards, witnessed the nativity of Abraham Lincoln. It would geem as if even now was foreshadowed the divergence which marked the future careers of these men. Only a very few years of the childhood of each was passed in this Border State, when their parents, again seized with the prevalent migratory passion of tho country, removed to regions not more diametrically opposed in geographical than in social position. Thomas Lincoln sought the wilds of free Indiana ; Samuel Davis elected to cast his destiny and that of his posterity in the slave-holding territory of Mississippi Those antlu-opologists who hold man to be a natural cosmopolite, may be right in the physical aspect of the question, but socially and reUgiously, he is, alas, a denizen, imbibing and assimilating the ideas of his locality as he does its fruits 1 Let the partizan, of whatever creed, who reads these lines, here pause and contradict history by sending Thomas Lincoln to Mississippi and Samuel Davis to Indiana 1

After receiving a good academic education, Jefferson was sent to Transylvania College, Kentucky, where he remained until 1824, when he was appointed by President Monroe a cadet in the celebrated miUtary school of the United States at West Point. He graduated with honor in 1828, at twenty years of age. He was soon after appointed brevet second lieutenant in the United States army, and at his own request, at once assigned to active service in a regiment commanded by Colonel Zachary { Taylor. He continued in the United States army for seven years, and served as an infantry and staff officer in the Black Hawk war of 1831-2 with distinction. Mr, Davis's gallantry and skill were rewarded with a commission as first lieutenant of dragoons, in which capacity he was employed in 1834 in various expeditions against the Comanches, Pawnees, and other hostile Indian tribes.

After seven years of active service, Lieutenant Davis, in 1835, resigned his commission in the army. Three years before his

LIFE OF JEFFESSON DAVIS.

resignation he had married (clandestinely) a daughter of General Zacliary Taylor, afterwards President of the United States, IIo now retired to private life, and became a cotton planter in the State of Mississippi. For several years he only varied the monotony of his retirement with such legal and political studies as fitted him for the very prominent political positions he afterwards occupied. It was not until 1843 that he began to take an active part in public affairs. He was from the first identified with the Democratic party, and, in 1844, was chosen one of the presidential electors of Mississippi, and in that capacity he cast the vote of hia constituents for Mr. Polk, who was duly elected President.

In November, 1845, Mr. Davis was elected a member of the House of Representatives, where he soon proved himself an active, energetic, and able supporter of the measures of his party. He participated actively m the discussions of the session on the tariff, the Oregon question, and more particularly upon the questions connected with the prosecution of the Mexican war, and upon the constitutional principles involved in the organization of State militia when called into the service of the United States.

Still imbued with the old attachment of his youth for military life, he could not resist an active participation in the Mexican war ; and being informed while in Congress, that the first regiment of Mississippi volunteers had elected him its colonel, he promptly resigned his seat and hastened to place himself at its head. Overtaking bis command at New Orleans on its way to the seat of war, he led it to reinforce the army of General Taylor on the Rio Grande.

Colonel Davifi took an active part in the storming of Monterey, d Llt'E OJ" JEFFERSON DAtlS.

September, 1846, and was one of the commissioners for arrangbig the terms of the capitulation of that city. In the beginning of the next year, February 23, 1841, was fought the fiercely contested battle of Buena Yista. In this engagement, he acquitted himself with great distinction. His regiment, attacked by an immensely superior force, for a long time mamtained theu" ground wholly unsupported, while Colonel Davis himself, although severely wounded, remained in the saddle until the close of the action.

Of his conduct in that action it has been said that "Jefferson Davis at the head of the ' Mississippi rifles ' had ventured to do that of which there is perhaps but one other example in the military history of modern times. During the invasion of the Crunea, at the battle of Inkerman, in one of those desperate charges, there was a British officer who ventured to receive the charge of the enemy without the precaution of having his men formed in a hollow square. They were drawn up in two lines, meeting at a point like an open fan, and received the charge of the Russians at the muzzles of their guns and repelled it. Sh- Colin Campbell for this feat of arms, among others, was selected as the man to retrieve the fallen fortunes of England in Ivu? He did, however, only what Jefferson Davis had prp"«">ry done in Mexico, who in that trying hour, when with c- .dst desperate effort to break the lines of the American army, the cavalry of Mexico was concentrated in one charge against the American line — then, I say, Jefferson Davis commanded his men to form in two hues extended as I have shown, and receive that charge of the Mexican horse with a plunging fire from the right and left from the Missis

UFE OF JEFFEE80N DAVIS. 1

sippi rifles, which repelled, and repelled for the last time, the charge of the hosts of Mexico."*

For his extraordinary gallantry in this engagement he was deservedly complimented by the commander-in-chief in his despatch of the 6 th of March following.

The term of the mere handful that remamed of the first Missis- Bippi volunteers expired in July, 1847, and Mr. Davis was ordered home. He soon after received a high testimonial of the appreciation of his services at Washington, in the ofifer by President Polk of a commission as brigadier-general of volunteers. But Mr. Davis belonged even at that period of his political career to the extreme wing of the State-righta Democracy. At the session of Congress which unmediately preceded the commencement of hostilities, he had taken a decided stand against the power of the general government to organize and officer the militia of the States even when engaged in the service of the general government. He could not therefore consistently accept an office in the State troops at the hands of the Federal executive, and refused tne offer. This mcident, though trivial enough in itself, is worth noticing, as at once illustrating the personal character and political principles of the late Confederate chief The question had been decided against hun by the vote of Congress, including a large portion of his own party, and the right of appointment was sanctioned, and on this occasion exercised by the now chief oi that party. Yet such was the firmness or obstinacy of Mr. Davis, and such his estimate of the dignity and prerogatives of the separate State governments, that he rejected on this occasion the de- "Lecture delivered February 11, 1858, Boston, by Hon. Caleb Coshing.

cisions of both. In August, 1847, he was appointed by the governor of Mississippi to fill a vacancy in the United States Senate, and at the ensuing session of the State legislature, January 11, 1848, was unanimously elected to the same office for the residue of the term, which expired March 4th, 1851.

LITE OF JEFTEESON DA\18.

Chapter II. I

Repudiation.

White Mr, Davis, in 1849, was filliug the term of his special appointment as United States Senator from Mississippi, an old controversy was revived in regard to what is known as the Mississippi Repudiation. It was begun by the publication in the " Washington Union" of a letter from Mr. Davis, in which he endeavored to prove that the accusations against his State imputing a disregard of its honest obligations in the premises, were unfounded. To this letter a reply appeared in the money article of the London " Times," of 13th of July, 1849, followed soon after by a rejoinder from Mr. Davis. In July, 1863, the prominent position filled by the President of the Southern Confederacy again occasioned the revival of the subject, which was treated at great length in a letter qf the Hon. Robert J. Walker, since published in book form. The gist of the whole question may be stated thus :

In 1838, the Legislature of Mississippi pledged the faith of the State to the payment of certain bonds issued by the Union Bank of Mississippi, at the same time subscribing on behalf of the State for the greater part of the stock issued. The bank failed about two years afterwards, and the Legislature, in pur-' Buance of the recommendation of the Governor, declined the

JO life of JEFFEESON DATtS.

payment of the bonds, mainly on the ground that the preceding Legislature, in contracting the obligation, exceeded its authority, and that the obligation was, therefore, void. The Constitution of Mississippi provides that —

" No law shall be passed to raise a loan of money upon the credit of the State for the payment or redemption of any loan or debt, unless such law be proposed in the Senate or House of Representatives, and be agreed to by a majority of the members of each house . . . and be referred to the succeeding Legislature . . . and unless a majority of each branch of (such succeeding) Legislature . . . shall agree to and pass such law."

The law which authorized the issuance of the bonds in question, was enacted in strict compliance with the requirements of the Constitution, but after its passage by the second Legislature, that Legislature passed a second act which materially modified the first by making the State itself the chief stockholder in the bank, and thus converting the State into the principal debtor instead of a mere surety as the first act contemplated. This second, or supplementary act was not, in accordance with the requirements of the Constitution, submitted to any succeeditig Legislature, and hence was void ; nor was its unconstitutionality at all cured by the declaration of that Legislature that it was constitutional.

It was asserted on the other side that as Mississippi actually received the money, this constituted a ratification of the agency of the Legislature. But to this Mr. Davis replies that the tiS'E OF JEFFERSON DAVIS. il

State did not receive the money, it having been all paid over to the Union Bank and disposed of by that corporation ; and to the objection that the State was the largest stockholder in that bank, his rejoinder was, that the law making the State a stockholder was tlie very portion of tlie enactment which lacked a Becoud legislative sanction, and was therefore void. That a great part of the money passed by way of loan into the hands of citizens of the State was true, and upon those individuals rested a clear obligation to the amount received. In reply to the objection that the constitutionality of the legislative act had been determined in favor of the creditors by the judicial tribunals created by the Constitution to decide such questions, it was answered that this was true, but tlia-t the Constitution never intended that the judiciary should dictate to the Legislature the p;u-s:ige of certain laws, it being designed to create in that department merely a check analogous to the executive veto upon unauthorized acts of power by the law-making body. That the Legislature, therefore, might well differ with the courts upon the constitutionality of the late act contracting the debt in question, and could certainly refuse to impose the taxation necessary for its payment.

Mr Da-v is, during his present imprisonment at Fortress Monroe, In speaking to his physician. Dr. Craven, on this subject, declared that the stories in circulation that he had effected the repudiation of the Mississippi bonds were utterly false :

" There is no truth in the report," he said. " The event referred to occurred before I bad any connection with politics —

13 LIFE OF JEFFEB30N t>Ayid.

ray first eutrance into which was in 1843 ; nor was I at any time a disciple of the doctrine of repudiation. Nor did Mississippi ever refuse to acknowledge as a debt more than one class of bonds — those of the Union State Bank only.

" To show how absurd the accusation is," continued Mr. Davis, " although so widely believed that no denial can affect its currency, take the following facts : I left Mississippi when a boy to go to college ; thence went to West Point ; thence to the army. In 1835, I resigned, settled in a very retired place in the State, and was wholly unknown, except as rer^iembered in the neighborhood where I had been raised, i . the time when the Union Bank Bonds of Mississippi were issued, sold and repudiated — as I believe, justly — because their issr^ was in violation of the State Constitution — ^I endeavored to ha^<i them paid by voluntary contributions ; and subsequently I sent agents to England to negotiate for this purpose."

Chapter III

Btate of parties — Mr. Davis's position — Division in the ranks of the Democratic party — Debate on the Missouri Compromise — Mr. Davis defeated in election for governor of Mississippi.

It has been said, that Mr. Davis was a Democrat in his political principles. But in that ever-widening divergence of opinion which finally ushered in the open rupture of the party, the general term, Democracy, after a time ceased to clearly define the tone and actual positions of men and parties. At least this was the case with the great and all-absorbing question of slavery restriction. The Missouri Compromise of 1820, which prohibited the extension of slavery to any of the public territories of the United States north of 36° 30', was, like every compromise, ever adopted on that, or perhaps any other question, totally lacking in the very necessary quality of explicitness. While slavery was prohibited north of the line, a cautious silence is preserved in regard to the domain on the south side, and a wide margin was left for future cavil. It so happened, however, that for thirty years every new State which applied for admission into the Union, from the south side of the line, elected a slave constitution, and no occasion arose for a conflicting construction of the Missouri Compromise during that time. Indeed, so insignificant was the extent of the public domain in that direction, that the question of the extension or non-extension of slavery thereto was a matter of no practical importance, and would doubtless have been yielded by the North.

On the other hand, so immense was the territory to the north* west wholly devoted by the terms of the Missouri Compromise to free labor, that there could be no doubt, that when formed into States, it would give to the North the three-fourths majority requisite to change the constitution itself, and thus abolish slavery in the States where it already existed. It was this bveut, anticipated and feared by far-seeing statesmen like Mr. Calhoun, which first turned the attention of the Southern people to the acquisition of new territory in the South-west, wherewith to preserve the equilibrium between the Free and Slave States.

With this view, Texas was annexed. But Texas was already a Slave State, and although opposition, and most strenuous opposition,* was made to the annexation itself, no question could arise as to slavery extension. But the immense territories of Arizona and New Mexico, acquired during the Mexican war, aroused afresh the fierce controversy which had slumbered so long. Even before the end of the war Mr. Wilraot introduced bis famous proviso tor the prohibition of slavery throughout all that vast region. The agitation culminated before the approaching Presidential election of 1848, and by that time the seeds were Down of that division in the ranks of the Democratic party which wrought its dissolution ten years later. The question which had been discreetly ignored by the Missouri compromise, was forced upon the country by the very magnitude of the stake at

* Many leading Abolitionists, as Mr. John Quincy Adams, pronounced tho acquisition of Texas a good cause for dissolution of the Union.

LIFE OF JEFFEE80N DAVIS. 15

issue. " The immense territory of the South-west must not, shall not be devoted to slavery," said the Abolitionists. *' We fought for and paid for these common lauds as well as yourselves," said the South, " and insist on the right to occupy them, and carry with us all of our property of every kind, and jn the exercise of this right claim the protection of Congress." " You are both wrong," said the Douglass Democrats ; " Congress has not the power either to protect or proliibit slavery in the territories ; the question must be left to the people of the territories themselves."

The Presidential election of 1848 resulted in the choice of the Whig candidate. General Zachary Taylor. General Taylor received a strong support in the South, for which he was indebted to the fact of being a large slaveholder. Mr. Davis was better acquainted with the genuine sentiments of his father-inlaw on the subject of slavery -extension, and illustrated the unbending strength of his convictions by throwing the whole weight of liis influence against his election.

The first act of the new President convinced the South that interest is not always to be relied on as a test of principle. The slaveholding President hurried on, by every means in his power, the admission of California as a Free State, thus presenting to the South their first instalment of that compensating balance of power which they expected to derive from their Mexican acquisitions. It is necessary to hasten over the events which followed. To allay the dangerous excitement which succeeded the admission of California, Mr. Clay brought forward in 1850 his famous compromise. Occupying the middle ground, one acceptable to the bulk of the people, it was adopted by Congress, and be-

16 LIFE OP JEFFERSON DAVIS.

came, — the basis of fresh disputes. In commoa with the De« mocracy who advocated Congressional protection in the territories, Mr. Davis promptly placed himself in opposition to the measure The concluding remarks of one of his speeches during the Congress of 1850, clearly defines the position assumed at this period by his party : —

" But, sir, we are called upon to receive this as a measure of compromise — as a measure iu which we of the minority are to receive something, A measure of compromise 1 I look upon it as but a modest mode of taking that the claim to which haa been more boldly asserted by others ; and, that I may be understood upon this question, and that my position may go forth to tiie country iu the same columns that convey the sentiments of the Senator from Kentucky, I here assert, that never will I take less than the Missouri Compromise line extending to the Pacific Ocean, with the specific recognition of the right to hold slaves in the territory below that line ; and that, before such territories are admitted into the Union as States, slaves may be taken there from any of the United States, at the option of the owners. I can never consent to give additional power to a majority to commit further aggressions upon the minority in this Union ; and I will never consent to any proposition which will have such a tendency, without a full guarantee or counteracting measure as connected with it."

The debates on the Compromise Resolutions of Mr, Clay, occurred in January, 1850. In March of the same year, Mr.

LIFE OF JEFFER80N DAVIS. 17

Davis, in a debate with Mr. Cass of Michigan, expressed hia views as to the Missouri Compromise.

" Mr. Cass. — I wished to ask the honorable Senator from Mississippi if he could vote for the Missouri Compromise ?"

" Mr. Davis. — I will answer the Senator from Michigan with great pleasure. I have stated on several occasions that I would take the Missouri Compromise. This I have said deliberately and decidedly on several occasions, and explained at some length in a recent speech on the resolutions of the Senator from Kentucky. I have stated that I considered it an ultimatum, less than I believed to be the rights of the South, but which I would now accept, to stop the agitation which now disturbs and endangers the Union."

" Mr. Cass. — As I had a conversation with the Senator on this subject in the morning, I supposed he understood the pre cise object I had in view. As this, however, appears not to be the case, I will ask him if he would accept the Missouri Compromise as it was reported by the statute providing for the admission of Missouri into the Union."

" Mr. Davis. — I understood the Senator, in a conversation this morning, to make that inquiry. I then told him I would not. I now answer before the Senate, No. To meet this inquiry, I waited in the Senate chamber expecting that he would, at the expiration of the morning hour, address the Senate ; but as he did not, I left here to answer the summons lo see a sick friend. I returned in a few minutes, as I was informed, after the Senatoi; from Michigan commenced his address, and learned that he had signified a wish to ask me a question It seemed to me proper

18 LIFE OF JEFFEE80N DAVIS.

to remind him, at the close of his remarks, of the wish he had aunouuced. I now answer his question in its modified form. I would not take the terms of the Missouri act, but would accept its spirit if presented in terms expressible to tliis case. When I spoke of the Missouri Compromise, I spoke of it as an arrangement by which the territory was divided between the slaveholding and the non-slaveholding interests ; I spoke in reference to the result — the intent of that compromise — which gave to each a portion. I have always been ready to rebuke that mean spirit that would evade its true meaning by a delusive adherence to its words.

" I would not take the Compromise in the terms by which it was applied to the remaining part of the territory acquired under the name of Louisiana. I would not take it as applied to Texas, when that state was admitted into the Union, because the circumstances of both were different from those of the Mexican territory ; but I would take it if more applicable to the existing case, and extended to the Pacific. I considered that wlien the Senate had yesterday voted to receive petitions and to refer them to committees to consider upon the power of this government over slavery in the territories, over slavery in the District of Columbia, and over the future admission of slave Btates, we had taken one great step in advance, and one which should awaken the apprehension of the South ; and when in close connection with this action of the Senate, followed the remark of the honorable Senator from Michigan, that the Missouri Compromise could not be extended to the recent acquisitions from Mexico, I looked upon it as a conjunction in our political firmament, which boded one of those likely to be destroyed by the joint attraction of these planets. It was therefore that 1 spoke of the declaration as a thing to be noted — marked as the foreshadow of an event. If we are not to have non-intervention, the right to go into tliese territories and there claim whatever may be decided to be ours by tlie decree of nature — if we are to be debarred from acquiring by emigration, by enterprise, by adventure, by toil and labor equally with otliers from the common domain of the Union — if we are to be forbidden to use the commons belonging to the common field, of which we are joint owners — if, in addition to all this, we are told that no division can be made — that all of that of which we own in common must finally become the exclusive property of the other partners — in truth, sir, we are rapidly approaching that state of things contemplated by the Senator from South Carolina (Mr, Calhoun,) when, without an amendment of the constitution, the rights of tiie minority will be held at the mercy of the majority. Give us our rights under tiie Constitution — the Constitution fairly construed — and we are content to take our chance, as our fathers did, for the maintenance of position and the Union. We are content to hold on to the old compact and, as we believe in the merits of our own institutions, we are willing to trust to time and fair opportunity for the working out of our own salvation. If wej are to be excluded by Congressional Legislation from joint ])oi- 1 session on the one hand, and denied every compromise which, by division, would give us a share, on the other— neither permitted to an equality of possession as a right, nor a divided occupation as a settlement, between proprietors — I ask wliat is the hope

20 LIFE OF JEFFERSON DAVI8.

which remains to those who are already in a minority in this confederacy ? What do we gain by having a written constitution, if sectional pride or sectional hate can hurt it, or passion or interest, or caprice may dictate ? What do we gain by having a government based upon this written constitution, if, in truth, the riglits of the minority are held in abeyance to the will of a majority." i

The Compromise was effected. The South yielding to the urgent appeals made to her in behalf of the Union, and influenced by the conspicuous talents of another of the Senators, Mr. Clay, gave her reluctant consent to the measure. In the various State elections of 1850, for Governors, Congressmen, &c,, the question was put to the people whether they were ready to secede from the Union upon the failure to procure Congressional protection for slavery in the territories. In every State except South Carolina the decision was in the negative. lo Mississippi the question came up in the elections for Governor, Mr. Davis being the secession, and Henry S. Foote the Union candidate. Mr. Davis was rejected, but his opponent was elected by a majority of a little over nine hundred votes. It is cited as an instance of the personal popularity of Mr. Davis in his own State, that while he was defeated by fewer than a thousand votes, the majority in favor of the Union Convention two montha before was seven thousand.

The South, in accepting the Compromise of Mr. Clay, declared that it was the last concession they conld make to the North, and that they would resist any further aggression on their rights, even to the extremity of the dissolution of the Union. But

LIFE OF ^FFEESON DAVIS. 21

this declaration was derided in the North, and the anti-slavery sentiment became bolder with success, as had been predicted by

Mr. Calhoun, Mr. Davis, and the other opponents of compromise, [

and now aspired to the complete overthrow of the peculiar in- i

stitution that had distinguished the people of the South from j

those of the liorth. !

CHAPTER IT.

Mr. Pierce's Administration — Mr. Davis is made Secretary of War — Kanss*- Nebraska Struggle — Lecompton Constitution — Dred Scott — Secession re- Bolved apon — Mr. Lincoln Elected — Secession — Mr Davis's Adieu to tha Senate.

In the meantime, Mr. Davis continued to occupy the position of United States Senator. On the elevation of Mr. Pierce to the Presidency, ia 1852, he was made a member of the Cabinet In the capacity of Secretary of War — a post for which his peculiarly administrative talents well fitted him.

Many measures of importance were introdnced by him into his department. Among these were, the revision of the army regulations for the better observance of discipline ; the increase o' the medical corps ; the introduction of camels ; the introductior of the light infantry or rifled system of tactics ; rifled muskets and the minie ball ; the increase of the army, and the expluration of the western frontier.

Closely occupied during Mr. Pierce's administration in the routine of office, Mr. Davis is not particularly identified with any of the political events which occurred from 1852 to 1856. Nevertheless, in order to preserve somewhat the conne<|tediiess of the previous and subsequent events of Mr. Davis's career, it is essential to devote a passing notice to that great straggle for territoTial dominion which seemed even more than the events of 1850 to threaten a great catastrophe.