Jefferson Davis, American

by William J. Cooper

  While Davis was getting used to Beauvoir, Varina remained in London. Even in the summer of 1877, illness still kept her from rejoining her husband. Her extended absence stirred thoughts of home: “I so often long for that old shackle-down house on Court Street where I had all my children in my own home,” she confided to Jefferson. Finally, in October, she sailed from Liverpool to New York, where Burton Harrison met her and sent her on her way to Memphis and her daughter.2

  Varina did not go to Beauvoir. While in England she learned from newspaper accounts that her husband had taken up residence there with Sarah Dorsey, whom she had known in Natchez and as a schoolgirl in Philadelphia. Varina did not welcome the regime at Beauvoir. She told Jefferson that though she was grateful for Sarah Dorsey’s kindness to him, she never wanted to see the place. “Nothing on earth would pain me like living in that kind of community in her house or that of another,” she asserted. Because she could say nothing positive about his benefactress, she wrote Jefferson, she would say nothing. Polly concurred, writing her mother that she did not like Sarah Dorsey. Moreover, she had given her father her opinion and said her mother should never go there. In Memphis, Varina stood her ground; she even moved into a boardinghouse when her daughter had houseguests for an extended period.

  In April 1878 Jefferson urged his wife to meet him in New Orleans. Varina agreed, but made it clear she did not want Sarah Dorsey at their reunion. “I cannot see her and do not desire ever to do so again, besides I do not wish to be uncivil and embarrass you.” We just have to disagree, she concluded. “I will bear my separation from you as I have the last six months—as best I can—and hope for better times the history being once over.”

  Varina’s boycott did not end easily, but ultimately she realized her husband had nowhere else he could work on his book, and she also had no place else to go. In May she appeared at Beauvoir, where Sarah Dorsey had arranged a party in her honor, though uncertain that Varina would appear. Harmony seemingly reigned, but Varina’s performance dramatized the tension in the household. Just before the reception she ran into the nearby woods. Sarah Dorsey followed her and somehow sufficiently allayed her distress so that she returned for the gathering, where she sparkled. A truce was established between the two women that over time would lead to genuinely warm relations. Varina replaced her former nemesis as Jefferson’s helpmate on his book. Then, in the fall of 1878, when Varina fell seriously ill, Sarah Dorsey nursed her with unstinting care and kindness.3

  When Davis settled at Beauvoir, his main goal was to prepare his memoirs. Providing his own account of the Confederacy had been discussed for a decade. His brother Joseph as well as his wife had broached the idea to him just after his release from prison. At that time he responded that he was not capable of the task, either physically or emotionally. Three years later Preston Johnston urged him to undertake the work because of his special qualifications to tell the Confederate story. As early as 1869 Davis began seriously to consider taking on such a project and broached the possibility of his wartime assistant’s replicating that role in a literary endeavor. Davis recognized that because his presidential papers had been scattered, a major effort would be required to collect materials. He also wondered about the best location for preparing the book.4

  He had no doubt, however, about his purpose in writing his book or in the thrust of his account of the Confederacy. Most important to him was “the duty of doing justice to the cause.…” In fact, an early working title was “Our Cause.” To Davis, justice entailed vindication. “My motive in writing is the Justification of the South in the act of Secession and in the prosecution of the war,” he informed a friend. Davis was convinced that holding to that course would enable him “to make a valuable contribution to history before I go hence, and thus complete a long life of service to the people of the South.” In addition, he hoped “to add wherever I could another leaf to her crown of glory.”5

  Not only did Davis embrace utterly the conviction that right and virtue lay with the South and the Confederate States of America, he also clung to the belief that his view of the cause would ultimately triumph. “Force,” he declared, “may prevail over right, but cannot destroy truth.” “Truth is not less dear to its votaries,” he wrote, “because it has been borne down by physical force, and those who suffer for its sake may find consolation in its deathless character.” Referring to a former Confederate who had joined the Republican party because the North had won, Davis asserted “that one who could suppose force could prove the Southern Cause to be wrong, and the sword decide the question at issue, must have fought without knowing what he was fighting for.” Faithful to his gospel, Davis admitted conversion of others might not be immediate. Still, he preached, “the truth should be stated by those who alone know it, and if not in our time, it may at some time overtake swift falsehood.”6

  With absolute certainty about the righteousness of his mission, Davis found a fellow believer, William T. Walthall, to assist him. Davis had not been able to finalize arrangements with Preston Johnston. An Alabamian, Walthall had been a Confederate officer and an agent for Carolina Life in Mobile when Davis came to know him. The two men shared a common absorption in the Confederate past and a joint commitment to the holiness of the Confederate cause. Moreover, Walthall considered working for Davis, whom he believed a great man, an honor and a privilege. For his part, Davis gave Walthall high praise: “He was a faithful confederate soldier, &… still carries the flag at topmost.”7

  In 1875 Davis authorized Walthall, who still lived in Mobile, to find a publisher for his proposed book. Aware of Davis’s plans and believing he wanted a southern publisher, Turnbull Brothers in Baltimore ardently pressed him. One of the Turnbulls even came down to Vicksburg to see him, but they stumbled over a nonnegotiable Davis demand: an advance was essential to cover Walthall’s expenses during the course of the project. Davis did not like pressing for an advance, which in his mind placed obligations on him, but he realized he had no money to pay the man whose assistance he had to have. Turnbull Brothers initially protested that publishers did not give advances; then they said they needed time to decide whether to break that rule.8

  In the meantime, Walthall had contacted D. Appleton & Company in New York City. Appleton immediately showed interest and emphasized its superior sales force. After extensive discussions chiefly between Walthall and Appleton editor Joseph C. Derby, a longtime veteran of the publishing business, a contract that included an advance was hammered out in the fall of 1876. Appleton would pay $250 per month directly to Walthall until delivery of the manuscript, specified on November 1, 1877, or “as soon thereafter as possible,” with the finished product not to exceed two volumes of 800 pages each. Appleton would pay a royalty of 10 percent on the retail price of all copies sold up to 20,000, then the percentage would move up to 12.5 and jump to 15 at 30,000 copies. When Davis went over the contract in New Orleans in December, he made a few clarifying alterations to which Appleton readily agreed. Author and publisher had a firm deal.9

  While contract deliberations were taking place, Davis initiated a massive campaign to gather documents that lasted almost to the completion of the book. He strove to bring together his own dispersed archives. In doing so he discovered that some of his papers had been irretrievably lost and that not all of the guardians of his documentary trove had been faithful either to their duty or to him. Particularly victimized was his correspondence with Lee, which Burton Harrison had placed for safekeeping with an ex-Confederate officer and avowed supporter of Davis, who then purloined what he pleased. Davis, and Walthall in his behalf, wrote Confederates of all ranks, from cabinet secretaries and generals to men considerably less prominent, who had special knowledge about critical events for recollections as well as documents. Davis also dispatched agents, including Walthall, to Washington in not always successful attempts to gain access to Confederate materials held by the U.S. War Department.10

  Once at Beauvoir, Davis started slowly. Sarah Dorsey disclosed that his e
motional and physical debility seriously hampered his labor. Throughout the four years between the beginning and completion of his book, his health adversely affected his work schedule. He and those close to him—Varina, Sarah Dorsey, and Walthall—all noted when ailments from recurring neuralgia, bronchial difficulties, eye disease, and problems with his right hip and leg regularly interrupted the process of composition.11

  “Process” is the appropriate term, for Davis did not simply sit at his desk and write away. He dictated opinions, reminiscences, and thoughts on constitutional issues and other topics first to Sarah Dorsey, later to Varina, and at times to Walthall. And all the while he engaged continually in lengthy conversations with these three on myriad subjects designated for inclusion in the book. The dictation went to Walthall. Initially that meant the pages were sent to Mobile; but in the summer of 1877 Walthall moved to Mississippi City, just a few miles west of Beauvoir. His move made delivery easier and regular personal contact possible. Walthall took the dictated material, correlated it with the appropriate sources, and prepared the manuscript for publication. At least, that was what Davis understood Walthall to be doing. The plan was that when Walthall finished his task, he would bring the manuscript to Davis for final review and approval. This process commenced in 1877 and lasted until 1880.12

  Jefferson Davis on the porch of his cottage at Beauvoir, probably late 1870s.

  State Historical Society of Wisconsin (photo credit i18.1)

  While Davis and his team labored in Mississippi, his publisher became increasingly anxious about the contents of the book being prepared, as well as about what seemed like interminable delays in getting it finished. After seeing two chapters Walthall sent to New York in 1878, Appleton returned them with a caution flag. The publisher told Walthall that without fundamental changes the book would fail. Appleton did not want a long rehashing of constitutional history, but rather a book recounting Davis’s actions as president of the Confederacy, which the publisher asserted was what the public wanted and would buy. Late in the year Appleton sent to Beauvoir a staff member, W. J. Tenney, a states’-rights Democrat, who excelled in getting troubled manuscripts into publishable shape. He talked with Davis, whom he grew to admire, and with Walthall. He left thinking the project was headed in the right direction.

  Beauvoir, c. 1880s.

  Beauvoir, The Jefferson Davis Home and Presidential Library (photo credit i18.2)

  But no manuscript was delivered. The due date passed, then weeks more, which turned into months. Appeals streamed with regularity from New York to Mississippi. Attempting to use self-interest as a motivator, Appleton kept declaring the market was right for substantial sales. In part, sales of the book would be handled by subscription agents. When the demand from those agencies reached a certain level, Walthall and Derby responded with a printed circular stating that Appleton would handle appointments and announcements about publication. As time passed, Appleton became greatly concerned about its financial commitment. The contract was extended in December 1878, along with advances to Walthall. Still no manuscript appeared in New York.13

  At the beginning of 1880 Appleton forcibly intervened. Derby journeyed to Mississippi in February, and was appalled at what he discovered. After a cordial reception by Davis, he asked to see the manuscript. Responding that Walthall had it, Davis confessed that he himself had seen but few finished pages, and he arranged for Derby to visit Walthall at his home. There Derby found copy that he said would not make even a 300-page book, even if it were in publishable form, which it was not. This news distressed Davis, who told Derby, “strange as it may appear, I was but little better prepared than yourself to find how little had been done in a form to be sent to the press.” He had obviously not been overseeing Walthall’s work with any care. The now troubled Davis said he wanted to honor the contract and return the money advanced, but he did not have the available cash. And Derby, with over $8,000 already advanced, did not want to give up on the book. He suggested that Tenney come back to Beauvoir and take over the preparation of the manuscript. Davis, who had warmed to Tenney on his earlier visit, thought this an excellent idea.

  Shortly thereafter, Tenney took up residence in a cottage at Beauvoir, where he set about making a book. He looked askance at what Walthall had done, or, more accurately, not done. Although the material for the first volume had been arranged, the work had not substantively advanced in the more than two years since his first discussion with Walthall. With Tenney in charge, the pace quickened markedly. Davis relayed to a friend that the final portion was done in considerable haste.14

  On May 1, 1880, Davis severed all connections with Walthall. Let go by the man he still looked up to as a hero, the latter expressed no bitterness toward Davis, though to a companion he did register dissatisfaction with Davis’s treatment of him. He told Davis that he was unhappy with his own performance, which Davis had every right to censure. Walthall said that when he had claimed to have the manuscript ready, he meant he had looked up all the references and prepared all the material. His great error came in misjudging how long it would take him to turn what he had put together into a coherent manuscript.15

  Finally, Tenney and Davis finished their task. In 1881 The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government appeared in two fat volumes, the first almost 700 pages, the second 100 pages longer. Completion brought an emotional time. For Davis personally, publication was a momentous event; he had built his monument to his cause. On the title page of both volumes of his personal copy he penciled a quotation from the Roman dramatist and philosopher Seneca: “Prosperum et felix scelus virtus vocatur” (“A prosperous and successful crime is called virtue”). Varina described to Winnie the passion generated during the months of composition: “The weary recital of the weary war, to be compiled in a splendid but heartbreaking record of cherished hopes now blasted, brave warriors bleeding and dying, and noble men living, yet dead in that they are hopeless—this tremendous record is being given to the world, and the while as he writes the graves give up the dead, and they stalk before us all gory and downcast, but for all that a gallant, proud army, ready if they could again put on their fleshly shield to do battle for their rights.” And after that painful journey, exultation: “Well, dear love, the book is done & coming out—‘whoop La.’ ”16

  Davis had clearly announced the dual purpose of Rise and Fall: to vindicate and to prove right and wrong. Thus these two volumes do not constitute a memoir as generally understood. Much of the first volume reads like a treatise on the compact theory of the Constitution, highlighting the constitutional legitimacy of secession, with lengthy appendices containing documents, mostly his prewar speeches, that he felt helped make his case. In addition, this argument regularly reappears throughout the book. In fact, much of the book repeats themes that Davis had long emphasized. For Davis, demonstrating that the South had acted constitutionally proved the South was right. Slavery, which in 1861 and before he had regarded as central, he now downplayed as the cause of secession. “The truth remains intact and incontrovertible,” he proclaimed, “that the existence of African servitude was in no wise the cause of the conflict, but only an incident.” Davis maintained that the North was wrong not only for refusing to accept the constitutional secession of the southern states, but also for prosecuting a destructive, uncivilized war and imposing an oppressive peace on honorable men who had laid down their arms.17

  In numerous comments Davis took pride in what he considered his scrupulous fair dealing with all Confederates, even those he detested. And it is true that the overbearing and arch criticism of gray-clad opponents so often found in Confederate memoirs is basically absent from Rise and Fall. While Davis lauded what he saw as the principled heroism of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson and even upheld a controversial figure like Braxton Bragg, he did not directly smash men like Pierre Beauregard and Joseph Johnston, whom he held responsible for terrible disasters. A close reading leaves no doubt that he believed the former lost Shiloh and the latter Atlanta, yet pe
rsonalities never assume a central place in these volumes. His attention held steadfast to his goal—vindication for his cause.

  The response to the published Rise and Fall was predictable. Ardent Davis supporters found the two hefty volumes profound and filled with a masterly exposition of constitutional and Confederate history. Thus the Southern Historical Society Papers called the work one of “rare power” and “thrilling interest,” and its overall assessment matched Davis’s own: “this noble and triumphant defense of the Confederate cause.” National periodicals, however, gave little notice to Davis’s opus. Some of his friends decried the paucity of reviews even in Democratic newspapers. The Atlantic Monthly did publish a lengthy review, which credited Davis with a clear and forcible statement of his view of states’ rights. Other substantive reviews contested Davis’s interpretation of the Constitution and denounced his labeling of the North as the aggressor. All depicted him as a man of the past, out of touch with the world of 1881.18

  Despite the lack of widespread notice, despite too its bulk and its controversial content, Rise and Fall sold astonishingly well. Both the publisher and Joseph Derby, so instrumental in the book’s ever coming out, were quite pleased with the sales. Not everyone involved in selling it shared that pleasure, however. Agents in South Carolina and Davis’s own Mississippi, which had under 1,400 subscribers and even fewer buyers, grumbled about poor sales. Yet overall, Rise and Fall did well. Although annual sales figures do not exist, as of November 18, 1890, 22,943 copies had been sold. And as late as 1907, Appleton stated that sales remained strong.