Varina Howell

Varina Howell
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division · Public domain · source
Name	Varina Howell
Caption	Varina Howell Davis, c. 1869
Birth date	07 May 1826
Birth place	Natchez, Mississippi
Death date	16 October 1906
Death place	New York City, New York
Resting place	Hollywood Cemetery, Richmond, Virginia
Spouse	Jefferson Davis (m. 1845; died 1889)
Children	6, including Margaret Davis Hayes
Father	William Burr Howell
Mother	Margaret Louisa Kempe

Varina Howell. Varina Howell Davis was the second wife of Jefferson Davis, the President of the Confederate States of America, and served as the First Lady of the Confederate States during the American Civil War. A complex and often controversial figure, she was a well-educated woman from a prominent Natchez, Mississippi family whose views on secession and race evolved significantly over her long life. Her later years in New York City and her published writings provided a unique, sometimes critical, perspective on the Lost Cause of the Confederacy and its leadership.

Early life and family

Born at the Briers plantation near Natchez, Mississippi, Varina Anne Banks Howell was the daughter of William Burr Howell, a merchant and planter from New Jersey, and Margaret Louisa Kempe, whose family was part of the wealthy planter class in the Mississippi Delta. She received an unusually thorough education for a woman of her time, studying classical literature, history, and politics at the prestigious Madam Greenland's School in Philadelphia. Her family's connections placed her within the elite social circles of the Antebellum South, though financial instability following the Panic of 1837 affected their standing. Through her mother's lineage, she was related to several influential political figures, including Joseph Davis, the elder brother of her future husband.

Marriage to Jefferson Davis

Varina Howell first met the widower Jefferson Davis, then a United States Senator and hero of the Mexican–American War, in 1843 during his visit to Natchez, Mississippi. Despite a significant age difference and initial family reservations, the couple married on February 26, 1845, at the Briars. Their marriage, which produced six children, was marked by deep affection but also by the strains of Jefferson Davis's political career, his frequent absences, and the tragic deaths of four of their children. During his service as United States Secretary of War under President Franklin Pierce, Varina Howell Davis became a skilled hostess in Washington, D.C., navigating the complex social and political landscape of the capital and forming friendships with figures like Mary Todd Lincoln.

First Lady of the Confederate States

Following the secession of Southern states and the formation of the Confederate States of America, Jefferson Davis was inaugurated as its president in Montgomery, Alabama, in February 1861. As First Lady of the Confederate States, Varina Howell Davis presided over the official residence, the White House of the Confederacy in Richmond, Virginia, during the American Civil War. Her tenure was fraught with hardship, public scrutiny, and personal tragedy, including the death of her young son Joseph Evan Davis in a fall at the Confederate White House. She faced criticism for her perceived haughtiness and political opinions, which were sometimes at odds with the Confederate cause, and she became a target of hostility in the Confederate press, particularly from editors like Edward Alfred Pollard of the Richmond Examiner.

Later life and widowhood

After the collapse of the Confederacy and the imprisonment of Jefferson Davis at Fort Monroe, Varina Howell Davis worked tirelessly to secure his release, which was finally effected in 1867. Following her husband's death in 1889, she moved to New York City, where she forged a career as a writer and editor for Joseph Pulitzer's New York World. In her later years, she expressed increasingly moderate views on Reconstruction and race, and she completed her husband's memoir, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government. She developed a lasting friendship with Julia Dent Grant, widow of Ulysses S. Grant, symbolizing a spirit of national reconciliation, and spent her final years in an apartment at the Hotel Gerard in Midtown Manhattan.

Legacy and historical assessment

Varina Howell Davis remains a subject of significant historical interest and reinterpretation. Her two-volume memoir, Jefferson Davis, Ex-President of the Confederate States of America: A Memoir by His Wife, published in 1890, provides an invaluable but carefully curated primary source on the Confederacy and its president. Modern scholars often contrast her intellectual independence and post-war life in the North with the traditional image of a Southern belle, examining her nuanced and evolving stance on issues like slavery and states' rights. Her final resting place beside Jefferson Davis at Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond, Virginia places her physically within the landscape of Confederate memory, while her life story complicates simplistic narratives of the Lost Cause of the Confederacy.

Category:1826 births Category:1906 deaths Category:First Ladies of the Confederate States Category:People from Natchez, Mississippi Category:People of the Confederate States of America Category:American memoirists Category:Davis family