Plots to kill political leaders are nothing new. Julius Caesar, Caligula, Pope John VIII, William II, Henry VI and many others have all fallen victim to their own people in some form or fashion. Jefferson Davis was no different. John B. Jones, the famous war clerk, wrote on August 16 that Davis rode through the streets of Richmond every day, with not even aides accompanying him. “[I]t is incredible that he should be ignorant of the fact that he has some few deadly enemies in the city.”[1] Mary Chesnut made that same observation on December 10, 1863. Walking with Varina Davis toward the Executive Mansion, they encountered the President riding alone. “Surely that is wrong,” Chesnut wrote. “It must be unsafe for him, when there are so many traitors, not to speak of bribed negroes.”[2]
In 1887, Davis was interviewed on the matter of attempts on his life. The article, originally appearing in a Baltimore newspaper, appeared nationwide. When asked on the matter, Davis said: “While the Confederate Government was at Montgomery, Ala., in 1861, I received an anonymous letter from Philadelphia, the substance of which was that the Governor of Pennsylvania had released a noted desperado from the Penitentiary upon the condition that he would go to Montgomery and assassinate me, with the promise of a reward of $100,000 if he succeeded. That after release the man stated that he could not probably succeed alone, and gave the name of another convict of character like his own with whose assistance he felt sure of success, and that the second convict was released to accompany the first.”
Davis went on to describe
other events. “Once he discovered a man watching him behind a brick wall
surrounding his residence,” and Davis followed the man. “The man ran and
apparently escaped through the barn…” On another occasion, while “riding out to
visit the defensive works around Richmond, accompanied by Col. Wm. Preston
Johnson, a pistol ball, evidently intended for ‘business,’ passed just between
them. This shot came from an apparently vacant house. Subsequent search revealed
an armed man under the floor. He was sent to Gen. Lee by Mr. Davis’ orders,
with an explanatory note, and the hope he would be ‘put in the front line to
stop a ball intended for a better man.’ On another occasion, in the suburbs of
Richmond, a shot was fired at the President of the Confederacy from behind a
high wall.” While traveling via railroad on another occasion, Davis was
approached by a woman who informed the President of an overheard conversation
in which a group was planning to place obstructions on the track. A detachment of
Confederate troops was “sent who found the obstructions, and some United States
soldiers secreted in a barn near the place where the train was expected to be
wrecked.” [3]
The former
president made no mention of an attempt to burn the Executive Mansion in
Richmond. War Department Clerk John Jones did. He noted that on the night of January
21-22, 1864, someone tried “to burn the President’s mansion. It was discovered
that fire had been kindled in the wood-pile in the basement. The smoke led to
the discovery, else the family might have been consumed with the house.” Jones
blamed the Black population for the fire. He wrote on January 22 that “one of
the servants of the War Department” was under arrest for “participating in it.”[4]
The Richmond Dispatch also reported on the event. Someone broke into the
“President’s storeroom,” stealing various items, and then setting the room on
fire.[5]
One event that Davis
made mention of in his 1887 interview, and a quite famous episode of the War,
is the Dahlgren Raid in late February 1864. The raid was billed as an effort to
liberate Federal prisoners being held in Richmond, and to destroy lines of
communications and supplies. There has been much written on this event, and to summarize,
the raid was a failure. Found on the body of a dead Federal colonel on the
outskirts of the city, Ulric Dahlgren, were papers stating that after the prisoners
on Belle Island were freed, they were to “burn the hateful city, and…not allow
the Rebel leader, and his traitorous crew to escape.” This, of course, produced
an uproar in the Southern press. Many in the Confederate cabinet favored
hanging those Federal cavalrymen caught during the raid. A photographic copy of
the documents was made and sent by Robert E. Lee to Federal commander George
Meade. Lee asked if this was now official Federal policy, and Meade said no.
The debate over the authenticity of the papers continues.[6]
Any time there are covert
activities during a war, the truth of these activities remains difficult to obtain.
William Cooper writes in his biography of Jefferson Davis, that Davis, in a
private letter, “disputed the accuracy of the published account [in the
Baltimore newspaper], leaving the question of real threats unanswered.”[7]
After 160 years, that is probably the best we can do.
