each week, american history tv's american artifacts visits historic places. during the civil war, president jefferson davis and his family lived in this mansion in richmond, virginia. now, referred to as the white house of the confederacy. the residence wasaved from molition in 1896. since 1988 has been restored to its war-time appearance. american history t vcv visited war house to learn about the senator to became leader of the con federal states of america. this is part one of a two-part program. this house was built in 1818, the private residence for john brokenbraw, a doctor and the president of the bank of vary v.a. he lived here with his family until 1844. the house passed through several more private owners after that. in 1857, it was purchased by lewis crenshaw, a wealthy flour

mill owner. he added the third floor, put in a bathroom on the second floor and completely refurnished the house with all the latest mid-victorian styles. in 1861, when he learned that the con federal government was moving from montgomery, alabama, here to richmond, he sold the house with everything in it to the city of richmond that rented it to the confederate government. in august of 1861, jefferson davis moved into the house from august of 1861 until april of 1865. today, the house is restored to its wartime appearance or as close as we can come. we have a lot of the original furnishings, the things that were here when jefferson davis lived here. the other furnishings are period antiques. the only reproductions are tex tiles, carpets, wallpapers, draperies and upholsteries, the

kind of things that don't last 150 years. so come on inside. this is then trains hall. visitors in the 1860s would have come in through these doors and stopped here to wipe their boots off. the streets were filthy, unpaved garbage dumps and what we have here is a cotton covering on the floor. it is a heavy cotton canvassing. this one is painted to look like tile. people would wipe their boots off on to it before going on and walking on the nice, fancy, expensive carpets in the rest of the house. it is a practical thing. it is also a decorative object, a false surface. that was very popular in this time period. things designed to look like other things. very simply put, all around us, we have wallpaper designed to c look like marble.

we have comedy and tragedy. they are painted to look like bronze but they are made of plaster and have been here since the 1820s. they have never left the house. where a visitor went once they got here and cleaned up a little bit depended on who they were, why they were here, where jefferson davis was, if davis was receiving visitors, if a visitor was here to see davis specifically, they would probably be shown upstairs into the waiting room. if davis wasn't here, the visitor might leave their calling card for him over here. if the visitor was here for a more social event, party, reception, they might be shown through those doors into the central parlor. if the visitor was here for a formal meal or maybe a military meeting, they might be shown around this corner into the state dining room. the white house of the confederacy or confederate white house is mostly a post-war name. i think there are one or two 1860s references to it being called that. it is really more of a museum

dung the war, it was called many different things, the broken bra after the first owner, the executive mansion, called jeff davis' house, generally not the white house of the confederacy. one point to make about that. this house wasn't meant to be the direct counterpart of the white house in washington. the white house in washington is a residence and office for the u.s. president. this house was really meant to be just a residence for the con federal president and his family. davis did do a great deal of work here. it was intended to be just residence. his executive office was in a different building. mrs. davis referred to this room as the state dining room, partially to distinguish it from the family dining room down in the basement below where i am standing right now. the davises took most of their ordinary meals down there.

this would have been reserved for special occasions, holiday meals with the family, parties, banquets and sometimes military meetings. we have the table, which is an original piece, set up for a military meeting. with he know a number of details about one particular meeting that took place here around this able on april 14th of 1862. the topic of discussion was the union army siege of yorktown, virginia. the men present at the discussion were president jefferson davis, george wythe randolph, the confederate secretary of war. randolph was also a grandson of thomas jefferson. davis and randolph were meeting with four con federaljerrells, robert e. lee, joseph johnson, james long street and gus ta vary smith. union general george mcclelland had an army at yorktown.

the confederate was john mcgruder, prince john. he was quite clever, an interesting, flamboyant, theatrical man. magruder put on a show for george mcclelland. he marched his men in a circle ndndin front of a gap in the forest that separated the two armies. he told him men to be as noisy as they possible could and shout out orders to nonexistence units. he had men in the back of the lines chop down trees, strip from branches, paint them black and set them up horizontally on hillsides so they looked like cannons. all this stuff worked. george and his spies were apparently fooled by these tricks being played on them by

general magruder. davis and his advisers were pleased that magruder was holding mcclelland off but at some point, they knew they would probably have to faceis threat to richmond. they were discussing overall strategy, to do about this army that posed a threat to richmond and the confederacy. they discussed all sorts of options, whether they should hold at yorktown as long as possible or withdraw all forces here to the gates richmond or attack north into philadelphia or even new york city. all these things discussed that evening, april 14th, 1862, from about 7:00 p.m. to 1:00 in the morning around this table. you will notice a portrait of george washington. the confederates tried hard throughout the war to draw connections between themselves and the revolutionaries,

especially george washington. washington's image was in the center of the great seal of the confederacy. it was on conderate currency and poseage stamps, letterheads, and envelopes and anything else they could think of. the confederates inaugurated jefferson davis for his term as confederate president on george washington's birthday, 1862. in front of the statue of george washington in virginia's capital square just blocks from where they are. they felt they were fighting the second american revolution, the second war for independence. they felt that washington w something like the grandfather of the confederacy. they felt he would have been o their side if he had been arrive in 1861. that's a theme that the con federal, political and to some extent military leaders hit upon throughout the war, especia jeffern davis. s never lost sight of this concept that he and his fellow

confederat were fing war much like the one that washington and his fellowrevolu some yrs earlier. back here is a mirror. that is an original and a small bust of thomas jonathan jackson, better known as stone wall jackson. general jackson died after being accidentally wounded by his own men at the battle of chancellorsville. he died we later of pneumonia. his body was brought here to richmond. ator took a bust of jackson and it sat there through the rest of the war. in this room, we have a lot of original pieces. this table is an original. the gas alear is an original. the as an original, the side board over here, this sofa and both of these tables. those are just bigger pieces. a lot of the smaller pieces around here are original too.

several of those decanters, even the shot glasses are original. over here, the berry bowl and tripod to the right side is original. if you see the red goblets and the red decanter, those are original. those little dem me tas cups are original and the white punch bowl. a lot of pieces were here when jefferson davis lived here. thearyeperies are exact reproductions. we at museum own one of the drapes that was hung in this room. it clooks just like that. we used that to make exact reproductions. the wallpaper we know was this color. we did find a small scrap of the original to know about the color. i think, by and large, davis

would recognize this room. i think it looks a great deal like what it looked like when he lived here. very large hse. probably a large staff to serve a big dinner like this. tell us about theop who had worked here and how many of tm would have been slaves and what do you know about them? >> first of all, we don't know as much as we would like to. the information about the slaves and the servants here is fragmentary at best some cases. an overview would be at any one point, they would have about 10 or 12 slaves and servants working here. they fell into nour categories, davis slaves, slaves owned by jefferson davis brought here from his home in mississippi. those numbered as far as we can tell just two. davis owned over 100 slaves back home in mississippi. he only brought two of them here. davis hired slaves from owners in this area. that was a practice more common in the upper south and more

common in cities in the upper south. so richmond, it certainly happened in richmond a fair amount. that, of course, means owners of slaves would rent them out to other people and davis, we know, did that. he also employed free black servants. in the census of 1860, there were 2,500 free black people in the city of richmond and he employed white servants, tycay european immigrants, especially from ireland. many didn't live here on the grounds. many of them lived probably not very far from here. they would come here, do their work and go home to wherever home was. the ones that did live here. again, this is somewhat of a speculation. we knew there were out buildings along the eastide of the house. we think that the ones that did live here slept on the second floors of those buildings. theris at least one exception to that. the nurse slept in the nursery, whicis directly above us. this is the ctral parlor.

the daviss had a lot ofparties and receptions in this room. one typical arrangementor a recession would be to have a receivinline down the center of t room th jefferson davis here at head of the line. visitors coming in from the street, into the entrance hall and then into here and shaking hands down the receiving line. in times like these, the windows would be opened up. these windows are triple hung. they are three sashes that go down to the floor. the lower two would have been slid all the way up level with the top one. the shutters would swing out open on hinges like doors. these rear windows are also rear doors. visitors coming through during one of these events would see a lot of the things that we have here today. ughly half, more than half of the furnishings in these two ors parle originals. also, in these two nrooms, the upho, the draperies and

ext reproductions of what was here. notice also this, ber paper or architectural paper, used to simulate fluted columns. another very good false surface in this room. this is jefferson davis. this is the only wartime portrait of jefferson davis. it was done in this house from life in august of 1863 when he was 55 years old. we believe that this portrait hung in the house somewhere. we are not sure where, after it was finished. with he do know tha took it with him when he left richmond in april of 1865 and gave it to someone in south carolina when he was passing throh the museumot i and we have displayed it ever since. jefferson davis was born in kentucky, the same state that abraham lincoln was born actually. both men were born in kentucky. neither of them stayed there

that long. davis' family moved sou soon after davis' birth. they moved to louisiana and then over to mississippi. davis grew up mostly in ssisi. although, he returned to kentucky a couple times both for educational reasons. he went to boarding school inke trania usylvanversity in kentucky before going offto t u.s. military academy at west point. lincoln, by contrast spent about the first seven years of his life in kentucky until his parents moved to indiana, which is where lincoln grew up. he didn't move to illinois until he was 21. below davis, on the mantle, are various th that were made by confederate prisoners of war in union pis camps, out of anything they could find, shells, wood, bones, glass, whatever they could pick up in those northern prison camps. throughout ruffoughly the middl two years of the war tharks was a regular prisoner exchange

service. many confederate prisoners who had been exchanged for union prisoners would come through richmond and give the davises things like this that they made in the camps and the davises displayed them like this. these two flags are replicas of the first and second national flag of the confederacy. this was the first called the stars and bars, adopted in march of 1861 as the national flag of the confederacy. that's before the war started. when the war did start, they used this on the battlefield. that proved to be pretty confusing. on a battlefield with smoke and fire and other confusion, it looked like the u.s. flag. so after the first big battle of the war at manassas, virginia, they stopped using this on the battlefield. however, they kept it as the national flag for almost two more years. in the wake of the failure of this one on the battlefield, they came up with ear designs specifically for battlefield

use. by may, 1863, however, they completely did away with this one and came up with this one to replace it. this is the second national flag of the confederacy. th was created by taking one of the battle flags, this square by itself was the battle flag of the army of northern virginia. they put this on a field of whit this became the second, the new national flag of the confederacy. it is sometimes called the stainless banner. also, no good for a battlefield. they kept it off the field but kept it as their national flag until march, 1865, very late in the war when they created a third national flag by essentially taking this flag but then putting a red bar down one side of that flag to take away a lot of that white. so that flag was the third national flag of the confederacy. this is the second national and this is the first national.

>> how is it that the flag that everyone thinks of as the confederate flag is part of that? >> that has more to do with what's happened since the war. this design and really more often today we see it in a rectangular design, just caught on as caught on as the emblem of the confederacy. one of the reasons is that this is robert e lee's army flag. his was the most successful of armies. it is a striking design and it certainly achieved the stated goal of being difference from this flag and also from the u.s. flag. now, i mentioned that we usually today see a rectangular design. that is the battle flag of the army of tennessee or the coate naval jack. technically speaking, during the war, the square pattern was the battle flag of the army of

northern virginia another thing to comment about that, sometimes that is called the stars and bars. that is not correct in terms of the terminology the confederates used. the confederates called this the stars and bars. the next room is the west parlor which looks a lot like this room actually. this is the west parlor, also known as the ladies parlor or mrs. davis' parlor or the drawing room. aus can tell, deck rat tifl, it is quite similar as the center parl. the two rooms were often used together as one big roomth wi the pocket doors open and they could shut those for more privacy typically when a group of people split by gender. during one of the receptions, most of the guests would file through and go on outside. mrs. davis and the female vip guests you might say w. would withdraw into this room where as mr. davis and the men would stay

in the center parlor or perhaps go back into the dining room for cigars and brandy and that sort of thing. behind me is another image of mr. davis. when he was preparing to evacuate richmond, he was worried about this bust. he didn't want to leave it here for the union army to find. he also didn't want to take it with him. he knew heou moving around and bit a he wanted to travel light. so he left this bust in town with a friend of his who wrapped it up in cloth and buried it in some ashes in his yard and l it there for years until he thought it was safe enough to dig itac up. here it is. we have had since 1907. davis himself when he left richmond on april 2nd, 1865 about 11:00 p.m., was not running away or fleeing. he was in his mind moving the

confederate government to a different location. evacuated richmond and established the confederate capital at danville, virginia. it last as the third confederate capital for one week. davis kept moving. he went into north carolina, south carolina and then georgia. by the time he got to georgia, he seems as though he was looking west as though he was trying to cross the mississippi river and get out into texas there was still a confederate army in texas. he was hoping to link up with that army and presumably start a new capital in texas but he was captured by the union army in georgia on may 10th of 1865. that ended the war for jefferson davis. over here are several original pieces. the mirror is an original. the clock which is made of alabbasster from france is an original. perhaps most interestingly, the fire place is an original. that's one of the older pieces

in this house, installed by the first owner and made of italian marble. mrs. davis wrote about this fire place in her memoirs. she said her young boys would shower these ladies with kisses. this crib badge board belonged to judah benjamin. he was attorney general for the confederacy and served briefly as secretary of war for the confederacy he was theconfedera. he worked very closely with president davis. as w also friendly with mrs. davis. when he left richmond, left this cribbage board ine h he stayed in. we acquired it and thought it might b appropriate to have something of his in this house since he was a frequent visitor to this house. jefferson davis and judah benjamin became acquainted in

the united states senate. davis was a senator from mississippi and a mexican war veteran. judah benjamin was a sator from louisiana with no military experience. they were discussing atary appropriations bill on the floor of the senate and things got a little heated & jefferson davis apparently made a sneering reply to something na judah benjamin said andd davis if, indeed, he had made that remark and davis replied that, yes, indeed, he had. there are some records that suggest that jefferson davis said that he was not expecting to be met with the argents of a paid attorney in the senate chambers. this was a very serious insult. not only is he suggesting strongly that benjamin was bought and sold by outside

interests but perhaps also with a slap at his jewish heritage, 30 pieces of silver or something like that. benjamin challenged davis to a dual davis, somewhat uncharacteristic cli backed down immediately. he ripped up the dual challenge and said was all wrong and went out and on the sun nat floor apologized publicly to benjamin and to the entire u.s. sen nal. that's as best as we canell is pretty much how the two of them became acquaied. during the war, they wo very closely together throughout al four years of the war. benjamin was here a lot. unfortunately, benjamin burned all ofis papers. i thinkone of his biographers said that he left sixies of paper when he died, meaning only six pieces of paper. he w a pretty secretive guy about many things, especially about his service during the war

but it seems clear from other sources that benjamin was here a lot. both working with mr. davis but also it seems socializing with mrs. davis. it seems the two of them were pretty friendly. benjamin was clearly well-suited for a diplomate's role. he was squa suave and elegant and very well-spoken, charming, had a way with men and women. well, we call this the library. the daviss called it the snuggery, a warm, private, snug little room used mainly by the family for private affairs. jefferson davis would do workin here, more often later in the we know he met with robert e. lee in this room tdiscuss militaryragy and it seems pretty clear he met with other people in this as well, mrs. davis probably used it to

have ea meet with a the children had some of their tut toring sessions in this room. we know a fair amount about the meeting that he had with lee. mrs. davis wrote about it in her memoirs. late in the war, general lee , this house and through the front doors and apparently walked directly into this room without wiping his boots off sufficiently. in her words, this is almost an exact with a vow and an excuse for walking on the white carpet in his splashed boots, general lee sat down and plunged into discussion of military situation with president davis, who was reclining, quite ill on a divan. later, lee noticed a sauce pan he noticed a sauce pan. he said thats a comfortable and pretty little thing. what ou use i for?

mrs. davis took it as a hint at general lee was thirsty and eeated up the coffee that was in that sauce pan and served it to him. from that little anecdote, we have done a lot. we picked a white base for the carpet, for instance. this is the onlylue to the caet pat tirns we have in the hoe. we know they had carpets. we know they had russell style wool wall to wall carpets throughout the house. we have no idea what they look like with this one partial have had to make lts of exception. we have selected a devon, because he was reclining quite ill on adevan. this place. it is another falssurface. it is painted to look like marble but it is actually made of cast iron. another famous visitor is abraham lincoln. he was here april 4th of 1865. jefferson davis had left town

april 22nd. the union army took over the city and this house on the morning of april 3rd. abraham lincoln was here april 4th. he came in through the front doors and walked all around this floor much as we have just done. he had lunch somewhere on this floor. we don't really know where. it seems safe to say he saw every room on the first floor and spent most of his time here in this room. here, he met with union general godfrey ze the head of an all blac 25 unio jame lincoln met with general weitzel in this room and with john campbell. campbell was former justice of the u.s.preme court and the assistant for the confedecye was the only high-ranking general left when lincoln got

here. when he got word that campbell wanted to speak with him, he was hoping that campbell would speak to him on authority from jefferson davis to discuss a surrender or possible end to the war that was not the case. when he got here. it was clear, he was speaking for himself trying to get virginia back into the union as quickly and painlessly as possible. lincoln listened to him. was disappointed he wasn't here to talk about a surrender of the confederate government or an end to the campbell, unlike davis, saw the writing on the wall knew the war was almost over. >> that was part one of a two-part look at the white house ofheonfe cracy. americanrtifacts every sunday at 8:00a.m. an10:00 p.m. e timastern