Jefferson Davis Essay, Research Paper
Jefferson Davis
Jefferson Davis was born on June, 3rd, 1808, in Christian
County, Kentucky. He was educated at Transylvania University and at
the U.S. Military Academy. After his graduation in 1828, he served in
the army until bad health forced him to reside in 1835. He was a
farmer in Mississippi from 1835 to 1845. Then he was elected to the
U.S. congress. In 1846, he resigned his seat in order to serve in the
Mexican War and fought at Monterrey and Buena Vista, where he
was wounded. He was a U.S. Senator from Mississippi from 1847 to
1857, and a U.S. Senator again from 1857 to 1861. As a Senator, he
was in support of slavery and states’ rights. “He also influenced Pice
to sign in the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which favored the South and
increased the bitterness of the struggle over slavery. ” In his second
term as a Senator he became the spokesman for the Southern point
of view. He opposed the idea of secession from the Union as a way
of maintaining the principles in the South. Even after the first steps
toward secession had been taken, he tried to keep the Southern
states in the Union. When the state of Mississippi seceeded, he
withdrew from the Senate. On February 18, 1861, the congress of
the Confederate States made him president. He was elected to the
office by popular vote for a 6-year term and was inaugurated un
Richmond, Virginia, the new capital of the Confederacy. He failed to
raise enough money to fight the Civil War and could not obtain help
for the Confederacy from foreign governments. One of the
accomplishments of Jefferson Davis, was the raising of the
Confederate army. Davis had a difficult task to preform. He was the
head of the new nation in the beginnings of a major war. The South
had inferior railroads compared to the Union, no navy, no gunpowder
mills, and a reat lack of arms and ammunition. “The South’s only
resource seemed to have been of cotton and courage.” (Davis, W. P
128). Despite this, the Confederates demolished the North at the
battle of Bull Run. Somehow, with limited resources, Dacis made
facotries for arms, cannons, powders and ammunition. Old naval
yards were restored and gunboats were built. Davis sent agents to
Europe to buy arms and ammunition and representatives were sent
to try and secure help from England and France. These
representatives were unsuccesful. In 1862, Davis appointed Robert
E. Lee as the leader of the Army of North Virginia. Lee remained
Davis’ most favored commander and one of the strongerst and most
loyal of Davis’ supporters. In May of 1865, Lee, without the
authorization of Davis, surrendered to the North. Upon hearing this,
Davis and his cabinet fled farther to continue the struggle. He finally
realized defeat and was captured by Northern troops. He was
imprisoned for two years, and then released without trial. Jefferson
made some minor accomplishments once he was released.
Although these are not as great as being the president of the
Confederacy, they are quite important to Davis’ life. After he was
released and had regained his health he wrote “The Rise and Fall of
Government”. He became the main spokesperson for the defeated
south and was asked to rejoin the Senate, but he declined. He
neither apologized nor asked for amnesty for his actions during the
Civil War. He believed that he had done nothing wrong. He believed
that he needed to stand up for the states’ rights no matter how bad
the conditions got. In other words, he stood up for what he believed
in. He never regained citizenship with the United States. He died in
1889 of a complicated bronchial ailment, and was given a huge
funeral by southern supporters. He was buried in Hollywood
Cemetery, in Richmond, Virginia. I learned about the only president
the Confederacy had.
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