Varina Howell
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Varina Howell (May 7, 1826 – October 16, 1905) was an American author best known as the second wife of Confederate President Jefferson Davis during the American Civil War.
She was born to William B. Howell and Margaret Kempe. In the 1880 U.S. Federal Census for Biloxi, Mississippi, Varina Howell's place of birth was listed as Louisiana; her father's place of birth was listed as New Jersey, and her mother's as Virginia. Her grandfather, Richard Howell, was Governor of New Jersey for numerous terms.
Varina attended Madame Greenland's school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 1844, when she was 17 years old, Varina met 36-year-old Jefferson Davis. In 1845, the two married at the Briars, her parents' home in Natchez. Jefferson Davis served in both houses of the U.S. Congress as a Representative and a Senator and was the United States Secretary of War in the cabinet of President Franklin Pierce.
She became the First Lady of the Confederate States of America, when Jefferson Davis became the President of the Confederate States. In May 1861, they moved to Richmond, Virginia, and lived in the White House of the Confederacy, during the American Civil War (1861-1865).
After the war, her husband was imprisoned at Fort Monroe in Phoebus, Virginia for two years. Although eventually released on bail, and never tried, Jefferson Davis lost his home in Mississippi and his U.S. citizenship as well (his U.S. citizenship was posthumously restored in the 20th century). In the early 1870s, with the help and aide of a friend, Sarah Doherty, Jefferson and Varina purchased Beauvoir, the beachfront Mississippi estate to which they had retired.
Following her husband's death in 1889, Varina published Jefferson Davis, A Memoir (ISBN 1-877853-06-2) in 1890. She then moved to New York City in 1891 to pursue a literary career, and gave Beauvoir to the state of Mississippi as a Confederate veterans' home.
Varina Howell Davis died in New York City on October 16, 1905, aged 79, survived by only one of her six children.
The former "First Lady of the Confederacy" is interred at Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond, Virginia adjacent to the tomb of her famous husband.
On August 23, 2005, Beauvoir, which housed the Jefferson Davis Presidential Library, was nearly destroyed when it took the full brunt of wind and water damage from Hurricane Katrina. As recently as the fall of 2006, the house remained largely in disrepair.
[edit] Trivia
- In modern times, it is commonly thought in the Richmond area, where Mrs. Davis was the only first lady of the "Lost Cause", that the community of Varina, Virginia was named for her. However, the name originated hundreds of years earlier as John Rolfe and Pocahontas lived at his Varina Farms tobacco plantation on the James River in 1614.
