Dixie After the War. Myrta Lockett Avary
and carried him and members of his Cabinet to the Sutherlin Mansion, which then became practically the Southern Capitol.
The President was busy night and day, examining and improving defenses and fortifications and planning the junction of Lee’s and Johnston’s forces. Men were seeking his presence at all hours; couriers coming and going; telegrams flying hither and thither.
“In the midst of turmoil, and with such fearful cares and responsibilities upon him, he did not forget to be thoughtful and considerate of others,” I have heard Mrs. Sutherlin say. “He was concerned for me. ‘I cannot have you troubled with so many interruptions,’ he said. ‘We must seek other quarters.’ But I would not have it so. ‘All that you call a burden is my privilege,’ I replied. ‘I will not let you go.’ He had other quarters secured for the Departments, but he and members of his Cabinet remained my guests.”
In that hospitable home the table was set all the time for the coming and the going. The board was spread with the best the bountiful host and hostess could supply. Mrs. Sutherlin brought out all her treasured reserves of pickles, sweetmeats and preserves. This might be her last opportunity for serving the Confederacy and its Chieftain.
The Sutherlins knew that the President’s residence in their home was a perilous honour. In case the Confederacy failed – and hope to the contrary could not run high – their dwelling would be a marked spot.
Major Sutherlin had been a strong Union man. Mrs. Sutherlin has told me how her husband voted against secession in the first convention to which he was a delegate, and for it in the second, with deep regret. “I saw in that convention,” he told his wife, “strong, reserved men, men of years and dignity, sign the Secession Ordinance while tears coursed down their cheeks.”
It is just to rehearse such things of men who were called “traitors” and “rebels.” It is just to remember how Jefferson Davis tried to prevent secession. His letters to New England societies, his speeches in New England and in Congress, testified to his deep and fervent desire for the “preservation of the bond between the States,” the “love of the Union in our hearts,” and “the landmarks of our fathers.”
But he believed in States’ Rights as fervently as in Union of States; he believed absorption of State sovereignty into central sovereignty a violation of the Constitution. Long before secession (1847) he declined appointment of Brigadier General of Mississippi Volunteers from President Polk on the ground that the central government was not vested by the Constitution with power to commission officers of State Militia, the State having this authority.3
Americans should not forget that this man entered the service of the Union when a lad; that his father and uncles fought in the Revolution, his brothers in the War of 1812. West Point holds trophies of his skill as a commander and of his superb gallantry on the fields of Mexico. That splendid charge without bayonets through the streets of Monterey almost to the Plaza, and the charge at Buena Vista, are themes to make American blood tingle! Their leader was not a man to believe in defeat as long as a ray of hope was left.
As Secretary of War of the United States, Mr. Davis strengthened the power that crushed the South; in every branch of the War Department, his genius and faithful and untiring service wrought improvements. In the days of giants like Webster, Clay and Calhoun, the brilliant Mississippian drew upon himself many eyes and his course had been watched as that of a bright particular star of great promise. The candidacy of Vice-President of the United States had been tendered him – he had been mentioned for the Presidency, and it is no wild speculation that had he abjured his convictions on the States’ Rights’ issue, he would have found himself some day in the seat Lincoln occupied. He has been accused of overweening ambition. The charge is not well sustained. He did not desire the Presidency of the Confederacy.
In 1861, “Harper’s Weekly” said: “Personally, Senator Davis is the Bayard of Congress, sans peur et sans reproche; a high-minded gentleman; a devoted father; a true friend … emphatically one of those born to command, and is doubtless destined to occupy a high position either in the Southern Confederacy or in the United States.” He was “gloriously linked with the United States service in the field, the forum, and the Cabinet.” The Southern Confederacy failed, and he was “Davis, the Arch-Traitor.”
“He wrote his last proclamation on this table,” said Mrs. Sutherlin to me, her hand on the Egyptian marble where the President’s fingers had traversed that final paper of state which expressed a confidence he could not have felt, but that he must have believed it duty to affirm. He had tried to make peace and had failed. Our armies were still in the field. A bold front on his part, if it could do no more, might enable our generals to secure better terms than unconditional surrender. At least, no worse could be tendered. That final message was the utterance of a brave soul, itself disheartened, trying to put heart into others. All along the way to Danville, people had flocked to the railroad to hear him, and he had spoken as he wrote.
He was an ill man, unutterably weary. He had borne the burden and heat of the day for four terrible years; he had been a target for the criticism even of his own people; all failures were laid at the door of this one man who was trying to run a government and conduct a war on an empty treasury. It must have cost him something to keep up an unwavering front.
Lieutenant Wise, son of General Henry A. Wise, brought news that Lee’s surrender was imminent; on learning of it, he had taken to horse and run through the enemy’s cavalry, to warn the President. Starvation had brought Lee’s army to bay. Men were living off grains of parched corn carried in their pockets. Sheridan’s cavalry had captured the wagon-trains of food supplies. Also, the President was called from the dinner-table to see an old citizen, who repeated a story from some one who had seen General Lee in General Grant’s tent. Other information followed.
Scouts came to say that Federal cavalry were advancing. There was danger that the President’s way to the South might be cut off, danger that he might be captured. All were in haste to get him away; a special train was made up. The Sutherlin carriage drove hurriedly to the Mansion, the President and Major Sutherlin got out and entered the house.
“I am to bid you goodbye,” said he to Mrs. Sutherlin, “and to thank you for your kindness. I shall ever remember it.”
“O, but it is a privilege – an honour – something for me to remember!”
As explanations were being made and preparations hastened, the President said: “Speak low, lest we excite Mr. Memminger or distress his wife more than need be.”
Mr. Memminger, ex-Secretary of the Treasury, was upstairs, very ill; the physician had just left after giving him a hypodermic of morphine and ordering absolute quiet. Friends decided that the sick man and his wife ran less risk in remaining than in following the President. But Mrs. Memminger, leaning over the balustrade, heard; and she and her husband came down and went after the President in a rude farm wagon, the only vehicle Mrs. Sutherlin could impress.
“Mr. Davis kept up a cheerful countenance the whole time he was here,” his hostess has borne witness, “but I was sure that deep down in his heart he was not cheerful – I felt it. He was brave, self-possessed. Only once did he betray evidence of break-down. When he was leaving, I knew that he had no money in his pockets except Confederate notes – and these would buy next to nothing. We had some gold, and I offered it to him, pressed it upon him. He shook his head. Tears came into his eyes. ‘No, no, my child,’ he said, ‘you and your husband are much younger than I am. You will need it. I will not.’ Mr. Davis did not expect to live long. He was sure he would be killed.”
When General Sherman was accused by Stanton of treachery because he was not hotter on the scent of “Jeff Davis and his $13,000,000 treasure-trains,” he retorted indignantly that those “treasure-trains dwindled down to the contents of a hand-valise” found on Mr. Davis when captured.
Mrs. Sutherlin pointed out to me the President’s sleeping-room, an upper chamber overlooking the lawn with its noble trees, in whose branches mocking-birds lodge. At his first breakfast with her, Mr. Davis told Mrs. Sutherlin how the songs of the mocking-birds refreshed him.
Another thing that cheered him in Danville was the enthusiasm of the school-girls of the
In 1793, 1803, 1812-14, 1844-50, Northern States threatened to secede. Of Massachusetts’ last movement Mr. Davis said in Congress: “It is her right.” Nov. 1, Dec. 17, Feb. 23, 1860-61, the “New York Tribune” said: “We insist on letting the Cotton States go in peace … the right to secede exists.”