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.This time her par-ents said yes, so George Winchester accompanied Miss Howell onthe steamboat Magnolia upriver the week before Christmas in 1843.Years later she remembered the boat, with its flowery interior anddelicious food, as a floating palace of luxury, perhaps because itsymbolized the escape from poverty that marriage to Jefferson Davisseemed to promise.4830 this mr.davismiss howell disembarked at Diamond Place planta-tion, about twelve miles from Joseph Davis s residence,CDand the next day George Winchester returned to Natchez,leaving Varina in the care of Joseph s daughter Florida Davis McCaleb.The house was small with modest white pillars, but the plantation,with land as flat as a pancake, was immensely fertile; thus the name.The fields were at rest between cotton seasons, and the landscape wasbursting with life, raw, abundant, and menacing.Only a generationremoved from the wilderness, much of the place was still forested.Hunters scared up huge flocks of geese from the woods, the marshesof iridescent water were constantly in flux, and alligators swam inthe ditches.The family topography was just as complex.For milesaround, the land belonged to the Davises, or, more properly, to Jo-seph Davis.As Varina Howell would discover, this was his domain.1The Davis clan, like the Howells, had traveled vast distances intheir quest for the good life, but their origins are as obscure as theHowells are crisply delineated.About his ancestors Jefferson Davisobserved that none of them had been hanged, and he was so uninter-ested in genealogy that he sometimes confused his great-grandfatherEvan Davis, who emigrated from Wales to Philadelphia in the eigh-teenth century, with his grandfather of the same name.About hisgrandfather, little is known, other than the fact he lived in Georgia,but we know that Jefferson s father, Samuel, joined the Revolutionary31 this mr.davisarmy.After the war, Samuel married Jane Cook, probably a SouthCarolinian, and they had ten surviving children.In the 1790s theDavises moved to Christian County, later renamed Todd County, inKentucky.Samuel owned a few slaves, although he did manual laborhimself, as did his sons and his wife.Here Jefferson was born in 1808or 1809 (probably 1808, although he gave both years as his birthdate)and named for his father s hero, the Virginian in the White House.Inabout 1810 the family moved to what was then called the Southwest,Wilkinson County in the Mississippi Territory.Three of the Davissons fought in the War of 1812, two of them serving under VarinaHowell s grandfather James Kempe, and after the war the clan settledin the Mississippi Valley, where most of them farmed.2Jefferson was singled out for special treatment, perhaps because hewas the youngest son.Samuel Davis regretted his own limited educa-tion, and the family seems to have determined that Jefferson wouldhave the best opportunities.Although some of his brothers did notattend college, Jefferson went to a Catholic boarding school in Ken-tucky and attended both Jefferson College in Mississippi and Tran-sylvania University in Kentucky before he enrolled in West PointMilitary Academy.When he was traveling to Kentucky in 1816 tostart boarding school, he stopped at the Hermitage, the Tennesseehome of war hero Andrew Jackson.The visit made a lasting impres-sion on Davis, and all of his life he venerated Jackson.Jefferson s old-est brother, Joseph, some twenty-four years his senior, guided Jeffer-son s education, even as he built the family fortune, first by his legalpractice in Natchez and after 1827 with his plantation.Called theHurricane after a memorable storm, the place grew to over fivethousand acres; the stretch of land along the river became knownas Davis Bend.In 1840 Joseph owned 226 slaves, whereas Samuelowned only 6 slaves when he died in 1824.The neighboring planta-tion, called Brierfield, was approximately nine hundred acres in sizeand would become Jefferson s place.3But soldiering, not planting, was Jefferson s first occupation.Hewas just old enough to recall troops leaving to fight in the War of32 this mr [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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.This time her par-ents said yes, so George Winchester accompanied Miss Howell onthe steamboat Magnolia upriver the week before Christmas in 1843.Years later she remembered the boat, with its flowery interior anddelicious food, as a floating palace of luxury, perhaps because itsymbolized the escape from poverty that marriage to Jefferson Davisseemed to promise.4830 this mr.davismiss howell disembarked at Diamond Place planta-tion, about twelve miles from Joseph Davis s residence,CDand the next day George Winchester returned to Natchez,leaving Varina in the care of Joseph s daughter Florida Davis McCaleb.The house was small with modest white pillars, but the plantation,with land as flat as a pancake, was immensely fertile; thus the name.The fields were at rest between cotton seasons, and the landscape wasbursting with life, raw, abundant, and menacing.Only a generationremoved from the wilderness, much of the place was still forested.Hunters scared up huge flocks of geese from the woods, the marshesof iridescent water were constantly in flux, and alligators swam inthe ditches.The family topography was just as complex.For milesaround, the land belonged to the Davises, or, more properly, to Jo-seph Davis.As Varina Howell would discover, this was his domain.1The Davis clan, like the Howells, had traveled vast distances intheir quest for the good life, but their origins are as obscure as theHowells are crisply delineated.About his ancestors Jefferson Davisobserved that none of them had been hanged, and he was so uninter-ested in genealogy that he sometimes confused his great-grandfatherEvan Davis, who emigrated from Wales to Philadelphia in the eigh-teenth century, with his grandfather of the same name.About hisgrandfather, little is known, other than the fact he lived in Georgia,but we know that Jefferson s father, Samuel, joined the Revolutionary31 this mr.davisarmy.After the war, Samuel married Jane Cook, probably a SouthCarolinian, and they had ten surviving children.In the 1790s theDavises moved to Christian County, later renamed Todd County, inKentucky.Samuel owned a few slaves, although he did manual laborhimself, as did his sons and his wife.Here Jefferson was born in 1808or 1809 (probably 1808, although he gave both years as his birthdate)and named for his father s hero, the Virginian in the White House.Inabout 1810 the family moved to what was then called the Southwest,Wilkinson County in the Mississippi Territory.Three of the Davissons fought in the War of 1812, two of them serving under VarinaHowell s grandfather James Kempe, and after the war the clan settledin the Mississippi Valley, where most of them farmed.2Jefferson was singled out for special treatment, perhaps because hewas the youngest son.Samuel Davis regretted his own limited educa-tion, and the family seems to have determined that Jefferson wouldhave the best opportunities.Although some of his brothers did notattend college, Jefferson went to a Catholic boarding school in Ken-tucky and attended both Jefferson College in Mississippi and Tran-sylvania University in Kentucky before he enrolled in West PointMilitary Academy.When he was traveling to Kentucky in 1816 tostart boarding school, he stopped at the Hermitage, the Tennesseehome of war hero Andrew Jackson.The visit made a lasting impres-sion on Davis, and all of his life he venerated Jackson.Jefferson s old-est brother, Joseph, some twenty-four years his senior, guided Jeffer-son s education, even as he built the family fortune, first by his legalpractice in Natchez and after 1827 with his plantation.Called theHurricane after a memorable storm, the place grew to over fivethousand acres; the stretch of land along the river became knownas Davis Bend.In 1840 Joseph owned 226 slaves, whereas Samuelowned only 6 slaves when he died in 1824.The neighboring planta-tion, called Brierfield, was approximately nine hundred acres in sizeand would become Jefferson s place.3But soldiering, not planting, was Jefferson s first occupation.Hewas just old enough to recall troops leaving to fight in the War of32 this mr [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]