Jefferson Davis

The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government - Volume I (Dodo Press) Jefferson Davis

Jefferson Finis Davis (1808-1889) was an American politician who served as President of the Confederate States of America for its entire history from 1861 to 1865 during the American Civil War. During his presidency, Davis was never able to find a strategy that would defeat the larger, more industrially developed Union. Davis's insistence on independence, even in the face of crushing defeat, prolonged the war, and while not exactly disgraced, he was displaced in Southern affection after the war by the leading general, Robert E. Lee. After Davis was captured in 1865, he was charged with treason (although never convicted) and was stripped of his eligibility to run for public office. A West Point graduate, Davis prided himself on the military skills he gained in the Mexican-American War as a colonel of a volunteer regiment, and as U. S. Secretary of War under Franklin Pierce. As Davis explained in his memoir, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government (1881) he believed that each State was sovereign and had an unquestionable right to secede from the Union.