Hello everyone, I am coming to you from Nashville, Tennessee where I’m presenting and speaking at a conference this week, not podcast related. It’s the TPT Forward conference, Teachers Pay Teachers, it’s my actual job for anyone who’s unfamiliar. Anyway, I really really really wanted to get a full episode out to you this week but it just was not possible. I have been just completely swamped with preparation for this conference and it was the fourth of July and summer and I just, there aren’t enough hours in the day. And so for the first time ever actually, I don’t have an episode for you this week. But I wasn’t just going to leave you hanging. I couldn’t do that. So instead, I am releasing an exclusive mini fix episode that has only been available to patreon subscribers over at patreon.com/historyfixpodcast until now. 

 

This particular mini fix is about Varina Davis, the wife of Confederate president Jefferson Davis, specifically it’s about how she wasn’t at all what you’d expect her to be. And I chose this one, I have a bunch of mini fixes over on Patreon, but I chose this one because of last week’s episode about Thomas Jefferson. This episode also deals with slavery and with the over glorification of an American politician. So it seemed the logical choice. This mini fix was originally released just after episode 66 which was called Uncivil: How a Lack of Punishment for Confederate Leaders Set a Dangerous Precedent about what happened to, or rather what didn’t happen to Jefferson Davis and others after the south lost the Civil War. In researching that one, I had stumbled upon a photograph of a young Jeff Davis with his wife Varina and in the caption it had been postulated, because of her appearance, that Varina was actually mixed race, that she was part Black. And that was a wild enough idea, all things considered, that I needed to dig into it further, which I do in this mini fix. 

 

So, I really hope you guys enjoy this shorter than usual but super special release. Remember, if you want access to all of the many mini fixes I’ve made and continue to make, I try to put out at least one a month, you can head over to patreon.com/historyfixpodcast, it’s always linked in the description. It’s just $5 a month to subscribe and it’s really hugely important for the survival of the show. You can also just purchase a single mini fix episode for $3 or the whole collection for $12 if you aren’t the subscription type. But, to be honest, my Patreon subscribers are keeping History Fix afloat. Thank you thank you thank you if you already subscribe, I hope you don’t mind me sharing some of your exclusive content with everyone else this week. I promise I will be back next Sunday with a brand new full length episode. Okay, without further ado, here is Mini Fix number 10 “Varina Davis” which was originally released on June 19th, 2024.

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Varina Howell Davis, wife of Jefferson Davis and First Lady of the Confederacy played the part well. She was educated, graceful, the picture of antebellum perfection. She hosted elegant soirees at the Confederate white house in Richmond, Virginia and managed a household of around 20 workers, black and white, enslaved and free. But Varina, when examined closely, was not what she seemed. In writing, she referred to herself as a “half-breed” born of the North and of the South. Her political loyalties were suspect as she found herself torn between both causes. And her dark skin and hair. What was that about? People whispered behind closed doors. Was the First Lady of the Confederacy… could she possibly be… Black? Let’s fix that. 

 

Hello, I’m Shea LaFountaine and you’re listening to History Fix where I discuss lesser known true stories from history you won’t be able to stop thinking about. If you’re listening to this mini fix right now, it means you’ve subscribed to my Patreon and I truly can’t thank you enough. Your five dollars a month is going such a long way to making History Fix a sustainable thing so that you can continue enjoying it and, in the meantime, I really hope you enjoy all the exclusive bonus content like this mini fix as well as the regular weekly episodes early and ad free. You guys rock. 

 

In last week’s episode, I tackled the fate of Jefferson Davis, president of the former Confederate States of America during the Civil War. Davis was pro-slavery. He was so pro-slavery that he seceded from the United States and lead a rebel group into a war that cost 700,000 American lives, the deadliest war in US history, and got away with it. When the Confederacy ultimately lost that war, Davis was arrested and charged with treason. But those charges were eventually dropped and Davis lived out the rest of his life in relative luxury. So that’s Jefferson Davis but what about his better half? And I do mean better. In 1845, Davis married Varina Howell who was 19 years younger than him. When Davis became president of the Confederacy, Varina became its first lady but, honestly, the irony, the contradictions abound with Varina because, while she appeared to play the part, she was not at all what one would expect.

 

Varina Howell was born in 1826 and raised in Natchez, Mississippi where her parents lived. But her parents weren’t from Mississippi originally. Her grandfather, Richard Howell, had served in the Revolutionary War and, afterwards, became governor of New Jersey in the 1790s. Her father, William B. Howell, settled in Natchez, Mississippi after serving in the War of 1812. It was there that he met and married Varina’s mother, Margaret who was originally from Virginia. According to Encyclopedia Virginia quote “That Varina, born to a family with roots in both the North and the South, should become the First Lady of the Confederacy is a historical irony,” end quote. 

Varina’s father was a wealthy merchant until he went bankrupt in the late 1830s. Nonetheless, wealthy relatives paid for Varina to receive an education, a good one, in Philadelphia. So she’s away at boarding school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania which is in the north and she made many friends there. She liked the north. She had a quote “lifelong fondness for her northern kinfolk,” end quote. After her schooling, when she returned to the Briars, her family’s plantation in Natchez, her father was truly poor and this hurt her marriage prospects. He couldn’t afford a dowry, he couldn’t even afford to support his own family. She was also, honestly, a little too educated for women in the south. Southern men liked their wives a little dumb, unfortunately. And she wasn’t conventionally attractive for that time in history. Now, she would be stunning, but at the time, tall, thin and with a dark olive complexion - that was not the in look at the time. 

 

When she was 17 she went to visit a family friend, Joseph Emory Davis at his plantation which was called the Hurricane. Joseph was sort of like an uncle figure to Varina. And back then, you didn’t just like go see someone for the weekend. You went and you stayed for weeks or months at a time. So Varina went to stay at the Hurricane with Uncle Joe for two months and it was there that she met his younger brother, Jefferson Davis. He was a handsome older man, a wealthy plantation owner, a hero of the Mexican War. He had good manners, he was well dressed, a perfect gentlemen. Varina was smitten. She quickly fell in love with Jefferson Davis and by the end of her two months stay at the Hurricane, they were unofficially engaged to be married. Varina’s mother, Margaret, on the other hand, was not a fan of the engagement at first. She felt Davis was way too old for Varina. Also, he was a widower. His first wife had died just a few months after their marriage and Margaret feared that Davis would never fully accept Varina and that she would always come second to his first wife, his true love. 

 

But, regardless, they got married in 1845. And turns out Mama Margaret was actually kind of right, of course, cause moms always are. According to Encyclopedia Virginia quote “After they married in 1845, she realized that he had conventional attitudes about gender, and he expected his wife to submit to his wishes; she also discovered that he revered the memory of his first spouse, Sarah Knox Taylor, who died the year he married her. As Davis admitted in her old age, her husband had always loved his first wife more than he loved her,” end quote. So it wasn’t the fairytale fantasy marriage she had imagined it would be. But it did have some perks. Davis became a US Senator and the two moved to Washington DC. And Varina loved Washington. She thrived there and she regularly visited family and friends in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, strengthening her ties to the north. But also, they were rich. Davis was still a thriving plantation owner. They had nice houses and nice clothes. It was a luxurious life. And together Jefferson and Varina had 6 children whom Varina absolutely adored. 

 

They differed somewhat politically though, especially about slavery. Varina once remarked that enslaved people were quote “human beings with their frailties” while Davis had once publicly compared them to animals. She also was not a big fan of the whole secession thing. She thought it was a terrible idea and told a friend quote “the whole thing is bound to be a failure.” But Mississippi seceded from the Union in 1861 and, when Davis was elected as president of the Confederacy, Varina reluctantly followed him to Richmond. According to Encyclopedia Virginia quote “In June 1861, she confided to her mother that the South did not have the resources to win the war, but she had to do her duty; when it was all over, she said, she would “run with the rest.” In Richmond, her cordial remarks about her Northern friends and relatives made her unpopular, as did the rumor that she corresponded with those friends and relatives—a charge that was, in fact, true. She had relatives in both armies, and she visited the wounded, Northern and Southern, in Richmond hospitals. In 1862, she remarked in a private letter that if the South lost the war, it would be because God willed it,” end quote. So, not exactly what you’d expect from the wife of Jefferson Davis, the First Lady of the Confederacy. 

But she played the part as best she could, running the Confederate White House and hosting social gatherings in Richmond. Her education got the best of her though and her peers were often baffled by the literary references she slipped into casual conversations. And then there was her looks. Many whispered then and many have theorized today that Varina was mixed race. Encyclopedia Virginia says quote “white Richmonders compared her to a mulatto or an Indian “squaw,” end quote. She had dark hair and eyes and dark olive skin and she was from Natchez, Mississippi where many Creole people lived. I talked about this some in my Marie Laveau episode, many Creole people in that area, Louisiana, Mississippi, lived as if they were white, even in those times. So some speculate that she was possibly what’s called a quadroon which would be someone with a Black grandparent. So they’re one quarter Black and would, in some cases, pass as white. 

But, there is no evidence that Varina had any Black ancestors. Not saying it isn’t possible. There’s just no evidence of it. However, she does have Welsh ancestry like from Wales. And apparently people from South Wales do tend to have dark hair and eyes and olive skin. A Clark University article about the Forefathers of the English People compares the looks of people from South Wales to people from Spain. But others have looked at old photos of Varina Davis and are certain she was mixed race just by the looks of her. So, part Black or just Welsh, I don’t know. She has living descendants. I would love to get a 23 and me going, do a DNA test. I think that would be super interesting. But, anyway, I guess that’s up to them. 

An interesting incident occurred in 1864 in Richmond and this is coming from a Washington Post article called Jim Limber and the myth of the Confederate President’s adopted Black son. There is a photograph of a half Black boy about 7 or 8 years old and on the back is written quote “James Henry Brooks adopted by Mrs. Jefferson Davis during the War and taken from her after our capture. A great pet in the family and known as Jim Limber,” end quote. So apparently, the story goes, this boy, Jim’s mother had died and left him with a friend or relative or something, a Black woman, who was abusive to him. One day Varina was out running errands in her carriage and she came upon the woman beating him in the street or whatever. So she took it upon herself to adopt, not officially because there’s no record of that, but air quotes adopt Jim. She rescues the child, right? Air quotes rescues. She takes him home, dresses him in her son’s clothing, gives him a room in the mansion and he becomes a playmate to her children. I don’t think I would call him a son though. He’s referred to as a pet in the inscription on the back of that photograph and a letter from a family friend refers to Jim as Varina’s quote “pet Negro.” He seemed to be well cared for by the Davis family, but at the same time, I don’t know how healthy this relationship was. Sydney Trent writes in that Washington Post article that he was likely being groomed to one day serve as valet to one of the Davis sons. 

But this event has been used, I’ll go as far as to say misused, to promote what’s called “Lost Cause” ideology. These are the people who say the Civil War was fought over states rights and not slavery. Trent says quote “In this pseudohistorical narrative, with roots in enslavers’ views of themselves, Black people were faithful, childlike servants guided paternalistically by benevolent masters. “They say, ‘Look at Jefferson Davis. He was willing to adopt a Black boy. So how can you say the war had anything to do with slavery or racial equality?' ”

When Richmond fell in 1865, Varina fled with her children, taking Jim with them.  Although Ellen Barnes, her personal maid and the children’s nurse, was forced to leave her own daughter behind. Which like, nope. Just go ahead and kill me then. When the Davis family was captured soon after in Georgia, they handed Jim off to a Union general they knew and trusted, General Rufus Saxton. Varina wrote of this quote “Believing that he was going on board [the tugboat] to see something and return, he quietly went, but as soon as he found he was going to leave us he fought like a little tiger and was thus engaged the last we saw him,” end quote. So heartbreaking because he believed himself part of this family and yet, to them, to Jefferson and Varina, I don’t think he ever truly was. He was a pet, a future valet, and they just gave him away when he became inconvenient. 

So after they’re captured, Davis is thrown in prison for two years awaiting a trial that never ends up happening. He’s a free man but they had lost their Mississippi plantation. They actually moved to England for a minute but they weren’t feeling that so they went back to Mississippi where a widow named Sarah Dorsey basically gave them her Mississippi estate which is called Beauvoir. Now at this point, despite all his wife has done for him, following him on all his stupid pursuits that she saw right through from the beginning because, spoiler alert, she was smarter than him although he made her hide it. At this point, Davis falls in love with Virginia Clay, the wife of a former Confederate official and he wrote passionate love letters to her for three years. The two were actually discovered on a train together in 1871 and the scandal hit newspapers all over the United States. But, alas, divorce wasn’t really a thing in the 1870s, certainly not for anyone who wanted to preserve and semblance of social acceptance so the Davises just sort of coexisted after that. 

When Davis died of pneumonia in 1889, Varina and their youngest daughter, who was called Winnie, moved to New York City. She was like “peace out Mississippi always hated ya.” Varina lived in New York the rest of her life and supported herself by writing articles for Joseph Pilitzer’s “New York World.” Finally, openly getting to use her intelligence. She lived a middle class life in Manhattan although the city of Richmond offered her a house free of charge. She was like “nah.” She loved the city. There she met Julia Dent Grant, the widow of Ulysses S. Grant, Union general and later US president, and they became fast friends. So, just to put that into perspective, Varina was the wife of the leader of the confederacy and Julia was the wife of the General of the Union army. They were on completely opposite sides during the war. Encyclopedia Virginia reports quote “Their friendship was celebrated in much of the national press, although it was ignored by the most conservative white southerners,” end quote. She also met African American leader Booker T. Washington in 1901 and the two had a quote “brief, civil conversation.” She later wrote in an article for New York World that God in his wisdom had allowed the North to prevail and the United States to survive. 

On October 16, 1906, Varina died of pneumonia in her apartment overlooking Central Park at the age of 80. And yet, she was buried in Richmond, the old capital of the Confederacy, a city she hadn’t much enjoyed. But I think it’s fitting. Because Varina Howell Davis was nothing if not a walking contradiction. 

 

Thank you all so very much for listening to History Fix, I hope you found this story interesting and maybe you even learned something new. Be sure to follow my instagram @historyfixpodcast to see some images that go along with this episode and to stay on top of new episodes as they drop. I also want to thank you again, from the bottom of my heart, for supporting History Fix through Patreon. You are making this possible and I really hope you appreciate the bonus content, like this mini fix, that I’ll be making just for you. 

 

Information used in this episode was sourced from Encyclopedia Virginia, the Washington Post, and Clark University. As always, links to these sources can be found in the show notes.