Jefferson davis biography civil war map
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Early Years
Jefferson Finis Davis was born on June 3, 1808, in Christian County, Kentucky, less than a hundred miles from where future U.S. president Abraham Lincoln would be born eight months later. Davis was one of ten children; his father owned an inn and was a veteran of the Revolutionary War (1775–1783). The family left Kentucky a few years later and Davis was raised on a small plantation in Mississippi. He returned to Kentucky to attend boarding school in Bardstown and subsequently studied at Jefferson College in Mississippi and Transylvania University in Kentucky before entering the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. He finished twenty-third in his class in 1828 and was assigned to the 1st Infantry Regiment in Wisconsin.
Davis missed the Black Hawk War (1832) due to illness—Lincoln, however, battled the Sac and Fox tribes as a member of the Illinois militia—but returned in time to escort the Indian ledare into captivity. (Davis “treated us all with much kindness,
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Jefferson Davis
Jefferson Finis Davis, the first and only President of the Confederate States of America, was a planter, politician and soldier born in Kentucky and raised in Mississippi. Davis was the tenth and youngest child of Revolutionary War soldier Samuel Davis and his wife Jane Cook Davis (Finis in Latin means final—the couple wanted no more children after Jefferson). Born June 3, 1808, he was heavily influenced by his oldest brother, Joseph, who saw to it that he was well educated. Davis attended college in Kentucky at Transylvania before entering the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in 1824.
As a military cadet, Davis’ performance was only adequate. When he graduated in 1828 he placed twenty-third in a class of thirty-four. He went on to serve briefly in the Black Hawk War in 1832. While stationed under Colonel Zachary Taylor (future President of the United States) the following year, he met the colonel’s daughter, Sarah. Jefferson Davis married her in 1835 against he
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Jefferson Davis
President of the Confederate States from 1861 to 1865
This article is about the president of the Confederate States. For the governor of Arkansas, see Jefferson Davis (Arkansas politician). For other uses, see Jefferson Davis (disambiguation).
Jefferson Davis | |
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Photograph by Mathew Brady, c. 1859 | |
| In office February 22, 1862 – May 5, 1865 Provisional: February 18, 1861 – February 22, 1862 | |
| Vice President | Alexander H. Stephens |
| Preceded by | Office established |
| Succeeded by | Office abolished |
| In office March 4, 1857 – January 21, 1861 | |
| Preceded by | Stephen Adams |
| Succeeded by | Adelbert Ames (1870) |
| In office August 10, 1847 – September 23, 1851 | |
| Preceded by | Jesse Speight |
| Succeeded by | John J. McRae |
| In office March 7, 1853 – March 4, 1857 | |
| President | Franklin Pierce |
| Preceded by | Charles Conrad |
| Succeeded by | John B. Floyd |
| In office December 8, 1845 – Octob | |