The Life of Jefferson Davis

The following vivid and powerful description of the more prominent incidents of the battle is from the pen of Hon. J. F. H. Claiborne, of Mississippi:

“The battle had been raging sometime with fluctuating fortunes, and was setting against us, when General Taylor, with Colonel Davis and others, arrived on the field. Several regiments (which were subsequently rallied and fought bravely) were in full retreat. O’Brien, after having his men and horses completely cut up, had been compelled to draw off his guns, and Bragg, with almost superhuman energy, was sustaining the brunt of the fight. Many officers of distinction had fallen. Colonel Davis rode forward to examine the position of the enemy, and concluding that the best way to arrest our fugitives would be to make a bold demonstration, he resolved at once to attack the enemy, there posted in force, immediately in front, supported by cavalry, and two divisions in reserve in his rear. It was a resolution bold almost to rashness, but the emergency was pressing. With a handful of Indiana volunteers, who still stood by their brave old colonel (Bowles) and his own regiment, he advanced at double-quick time, firing as he advanced. His own brave fellows fell fast under the rolling musketry of the enemy, but their rapid and fatal volleys carried dismay and death into the adverse ranks. A deep ravine separated the combatants. Leaping into it, the Mississippians soon appeared on the other side, and with a shout that was heard over the battle-field, they poured in a well-directed fire, and rushed upon the enemy. Their deadly aim and wild enthusiasm were irresistible. The Mexicans fled in confusion to their reserves, and Davis seized the commanding position they had occupied. He next fell upon a party of cavalry and compelled it to fly, with the loss of their leader and other officers. Immediately afterwards a brigade of lancers, one thousand strong, were seen approaching at a gallop, in beautiful array, with sounding bugles and fluttering pennons. It was an appalling spectacle, but not a man flinched from his position. The time between our devoted band and eternity seemed brief indeed. But conscious that the eye of the army was upon them, that the honor of Mississippi was at stake, and knowing that, if they gave way, or were ridden down, our unprotected batteries in the rear, upon which the fortunes of the day depended, would be captured, each man resolved to die in his place sooner than retreat. Not the Spartan martyrs at Thermopylæ – not the sacred battalion of Epaminondas – not the Tenth Legion of Julius Cæsar – not the Old Guard of Napoleon – ever evinced more fortitude than these young volunteers in a crisis when death seemed inevitable. They stood like statues, as frigid and motionless as the marble itself. Impressed with this extraordinary firmness, when they had anticipated panic and flight, the lancers advanced more deliberately, as though they saw, for the first time, the dark shadow of the fate that was impending over them. Colonel Davis had thrown his men into the form of a reëntering angle, (familiarly known as his famous V movement,) both flanks resting on ravines, the lancers coming down on the intervening ridge. This exposed them to a converging fire, and the moment they came within rifle range each man singled out his object, and the whole head of the column fell. A more deadly fire never was delivered, and the brilliant array recoiled and retreated, paralyzed and dismayed.

“Shortly afterwards the Mexicans, having concentrated a large force on the right for their final attack, Colonel Davis was ordered in that direction. His regiment had been in action all day, exhausted by thirst and fatigue, much reduced by the carnage of the morning engagement, and many in the ranks suffering from wounds, yet the noble fellows moved at double-quick time. Bowles’ little band of Indiana volunteers still acted with them. After marching several hundred yards they perceived the Mexican infantry advancing, in three lines, upon Bragg’s battery, which, though entirely unsupported, held its position with a resolution worthy of his fame. The pressure upon him stimulated the Mississippians. They increased their speed, and when the enemy were within one hundred yards of the battery and confident of its capture, they took him in flank and reverse, and poured in a raking and destructive fire. This broke his right line, and the rest soon gave way and fell back precipitately. Here Colonel Davis was severely wounded.”

The wound here alluded to was from a musket ball in the heel, and was exceedingly painful, though Colonel Davis refused to leave the field until the action was over. For some time grave apprehensions were entertained lest it should prove dangerous by the setting in of erysipelas.

General Taylor, who was deeply impressed with the large share of credit due to Colonel Davis, in his official report of the battle, says: “The Mississippi Riflemen, under Colonel Davis, were highly conspicuous for their gallantry and steadiness, and sustained throughout the engagement, the reputation of veteran troops. Brought into action against an immensely superior force, they maintained themselves for a long time, unsupported and with heavy loss, and held an important part of the field until reinforced. Colonel Davis, though severely wounded, remained in the saddle until the close of the action. His distinguished coolness and gallantry, at the head of his regiment on this day, entitle him to the particular notice of the Government.”

The report of Colonel Davis, of the operations of his regiment, is highly important as a description of the most important features of the action, and as an explanation of his celebrated strategic movement. We omit such portions as embrace mere details not relevant to our purpose.

“Saltillo, Mexico, 2d March, 1847.

“Sir: In compliance with your note of yesterday, I have the honor to present the following report of the service of the Mississippi Riflemen on the 23d ultimo:

“Early in the morning of that day the regiment was drawn out from the head-quarters encampment, which stood in advance of and overlooked the town of Saltillo. Conformably to instructions, two companies were detached for the protection of that encampment, and to defend the adjacent entrance of the town. The remaining eight companies were put in march to return to the position of the preceding day, now known as the battle-field of Buena Vista. We had approached to within about two miles of that position, when the report of artillery firing, which reached us, gave assurance that a battle had commenced. Excited by the sound, the regiment pressed rapidly forward, manifesting, upon this, as upon other occasions, their more than willingness to meet the enemy. At the first convenient place the column was halted for the purpose of filling their canteens with water; and the march being resumed, was directed toward the position which had been indicated to me, on the previous evening, as the post of our regiment. As we approached the scene of action, horsemen, recognized as of our troops, were seen running, dispersed and confusedly from the field; and our first view of the line of battle presented the mortifying spectacle of a regiment of infantry flying disorganized from before the enemy. These sights, so well calculated to destroy confidence and dispirit troops just coming into action, it is my pride and pleasure to believe, only nerved the resolution of the regiment I have the honor to command.

“Our order of march was in column of companies, advancing by their centers. The point which had just been abandoned by the regiment alluded to, was now taken as our direction. I rode forward to examine the ground upon which we were going to operate, and in passing through the fugitives, appealed to them to return with us and renew the fight, pointing to our regiment as a mass of men behind which they might securely form.

“With a few honorable exceptions, the appeal was as unheeded, as were the offers which, I am informed, were made by our men to give their canteens of water to those who complained of thirst, on condition that they would go back. General Wool was upon the ground making great efforts to rally the men who had given way. I approached him and asked if he would send another regiment to sustain me in an attack upon the enemy before us. He was alone, and, after promising the support, went in person to send it. Upon further examination, I found that the slope we were ascending was intersected by a deep ravine, which, uniting obliquely with a still larger one on our right, formed between them a point of land difficult of access by us, but which, spreading in a plain toward the base of the mountain, had easy communication with the main body of the enemy. This position, important from its natural strength, derived a far greater value from the relation it bore to our order of battle and line of communication with the rear. The enemy, in number many times greater than ourselves, supported by strong reserves, flanked by cavalry and elated by recent success, was advancing upon it. The moment seemed to me critical and the occasion to require whatever sacrifice it might cost to check the enemy.

“My regiment, having continued to advance, was near at hand. I met and formed it rapidly into order of battle; the line then advanced in double-quick time, until within the estimated range of our rifles, when it was halted, and ordered to ‘fire advancing.’

“The progress of the enemy was arrested. We crossed the difficult chasm before us, under a galling fire, and in good order renewed the attack upon the other side. The contest was severe – the destruction great upon both sides. We steadily advanced, and, as the distance diminished, the ratio of loss increased rapidly against the enemy; he yielded, and was driven back on his reserves. A plain now lay behind us – the enemy’s cavalry had passed around our right flank, which rested on the main ravine, and gone to our rear. The support I had expected to join us was nowhere to be seen. I therefore ordered the regiment to retire, and went in person to find the cavalry, which, after passing round our right, had been concealed by the inequality of the ground. I found them at the first point where the bank was practicable for horsemen, in the act of descending into the ravine – no doubt for the purpose of charging upon our rear. The nearest of our men ran quickly to my call, attacked this body, and dispersed it with some loss. I think their commander was among the killed.

“The regiment was formed again in line of battle behind the first ravine we had crossed; soon after which we were joined upon our left by Lieutenant Kilbourn, with a piece of light artillery, and Colonel Lane’s (the Third) regiment of Indiana volunteers… We had proceeded but a short distance when I saw a large body of cavalry debouche from his cover upon the left of the position from which we had retired, and advance rapidly upon us. The Mississippi regiment was filed to the right, and fronted in line across the plain; the Indiana regiment was formed on the bank of the ravine, in advance of our right flank, by which a reëntering angle was presented to the enemy. Whilst this preparation was being made, Sergeant-Major Miller, of our regiment, was sent to Captain Sherman for one or more pieces of artillery from his battery.

“The enemy, who was now seen to be a body of richly-caparisoned lancers, came forward rapidly, and in beautiful order – the files and ranks so closed as to look like a mass of men and horses. Perfect silence and the greatest steadiness prevailed in both lines of our troops, as they stood at shouldered arms waiting an attack. Confident of success, and anxious to obtain the full advantage of a cross-fire at a short distance, I repeatedly called to the men not to shoot.

“As the enemy approached, his speed regularly diminished, until, when, within eighty or a hundred yards, he had drawn up to a walk, and seemed about to halt. A few files fired without orders, and both lines then instantly poured in a volley so destructive that the mass yielded to the blow and the survivors fled… At this time, the enemy made his last attack upon the right, and I received the General’s order to march to that portion of the field. The broken character of the intervening ground concealed the scene of action from our view; but the heavy firing of musketry formed a sufficient guide for our course. After marching two or three hundred yards, we saw the enemy’s infantry advancing in three lines upon Captain Bragg’s battery; which, though entirely unsupported, resolutely held its position, and met the attack with a fire worthy the former achievements of that battery, and of the reputation of its present meritorious commander. We pressed on, climbed the rocky slope of the plain on which this combat occurred, reached its brow so as to take the enemy in flank and reverse when he was about one hundred yards from the battery. Our first fire – raking each of his lines, and opened close upon his flank – was eminently destructive. His right gave way, and he fled in confusion.

“In this, the last contest of the day, my regiment equaled – it was impossible to exceed – my expectations. Though worn down by many hours of fatigue and thirst, the ranks thinned by our heavy loss in the morning, they yet advanced upon the enemy with the alacrity and eagerness of men fresh to the combat. In every approbatory sense of these remarks I wish to be included a party of Colonel Bowles’ Indiana regiment, which served with us during the greater part of the day, under the immediate command of an officer from that regiment, whose gallantry attracted my particular attention, but whose name, I regret, is unknown to me. When hostile demonstrations had ceased, I retired to a tent upon the field for surgical aid, having been wounded by a musket ball when we first went into action… Every part of the action having been fought under the eye of the commanding General, the importance and manner of any service it was our fortune to render, will be best estimated by him. But in view of my own responsibility, it may be permitted me to say, in relation to our first attack upon the enemy, that I considered the necessity absolute and immediate. No one could have failed to perceive the hazard. The enemy, in greatly disproportionate numbers, was rapidly advancing. We saw no friendly troops coming to our support, and probably none except myself expected reinforcement. Under such circumstances, the men cheerfully, ardently entered into the conflict; and though we lost, in that single engagement, more than thirty killed and forty wounded, the regiment never faltered nor moved, except as it was ordered. Had the expected reinforcement arrived, we could have prevented the enemy’s cavalry from passing to our rear, results more decisive might have been obtained, and a part of our loss have been avoided…

“I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your obedient servant.

“JEFFERSON DAVIS,“Colonel Mississippi Rifles.“Major W. W. S. Bliss, Assistant Adjutant-General.”

The reputation earned by Colonel Davis at Buena Vista could not fail to provoke the assaults of envy. An effort, equally unwarranted and unsuccessful, has since been made to deprive him of a portion of his merited fame of having conceived and executed a movement decisive of the battle. It has been pretended, in disparagement of the strategy of Colonel Davis, that his celebrated V movement (for so it is, and will always be known) had not the merit of originality, and besides was forced upon him by the circumstances in which he was placed, and especially by the conformation of the ground, which would not admit of a different disposition of his troops. Such a judgment is merely hypercritical. There is no account in military history, from the campaigns of Cæsar to those of Napoleon, of such a tactical conception, unless we include a slightly-analogous case at Waterloo. The movement in the latter engagement, however, differs essentially from that executed by Davis at Buena Vista. A party of Hanoverian cavalry, assailed by French huzzars, at the intersection of two roads, by forming a salient, repulsed their assailants almost as effectually as did the reëntrant angle of the Mississippians at Buena Vista. As to the second criticism, it is certainly a novel accusation against an officer, that he should, by a quick appreciation of his situation, avail himself of the only possible means by which he could not only extricate his own command from imminent peril of destruction, but also avert a blow delivered at the safety of the entire army.

In a lecture on “The Expatriated Irish in Europe and America,” delivered in Boston, February 11, 1858, the Hon. Caleb Cushing thus alludes to this subject: “In another of the dramatic incidents of that field, a man of Celtic race (Jefferson Davis) at the head of the Rifles of Mississippi, had ventured to do that of which there is, perhaps, but one other example in the military history of modern times. In the desperate conflicts of the Crimea, at the battle of Inkermann, in one of those desperate charges, there was a British officer who ventured to receive the charge of the enemy without the precaution of having his men formed in a hollow square. They were drawn up in two lines, meeting at a point like an open fan, and received the charge of the Russians at the muzzle of their guns, and repelled it. Sir Colin Campbell, for this feat of arms, among others, was selected as the man to retrieve the fallen fortunes of England in India. He did, however, but imitate what Jefferson Davis had previously done in Mexico, who, in that trying hour, when, with one last desperate effort to break the line of the American army, the cavalry of Mexico was concentrated in one charge against the American line; then, I say, Jefferson Davis commanded his men to form in two lines, extended as I have shown, and receive that charge of the Mexican horse, with a plunging fire from the right and left from the Mississippi Rifles, which repelled, and repelled for the last time, the charge of the hosts of Mexico.”

These puerile criticisms, however, were unavailing against the concurrent testimony of Taylor, Quitman, and Lane, and the grateful plaudits of the army, to shake the popular judgment, which rarely fails, in the end, to discriminate between the false glare of cheaply-earned glory and the just renown of true heroism.

The term of enlistment of his regiment having expired, Colonel Davis, in July, 1847, just twelve months after the resignation of his seat in the House of Representatives, returned to the United States. His progress toward his home was attended by a series of congratulatory receptions, the people every-where assembling en masse to do honor to the “Hero of Buena Vista.” Mississippi extended a triumphant greeting to her soldier-statesman, who, resigning the civic trust which she had confided to his keeping, had carried her flag in triumph amid the thunders of battle and the wastes of carnage, carving the name of Mississippi in an inscription of enduring renown.

During his journey homeward, there occurred a most impressive illustration of that strict devotion to principle which, above all other considerations, is the real solution of every act of his life, public and private. While in New Orleans, Colonel Davis was offered, by President Polk, a commission as Brigadier-General of Volunteers, an honor which he unhesitatingly declined, on the ground that no such commission could be conferred by Federal authority, either by appointment of the President or by act of Congress. As an advocate of States’ Rights, he could not countenance, even for the gratification of his own ambition, a plain infraction of the rights of the States, to which respectively, the Constitution reserves the appointment of officers of the militia.9 The soldier’s pride in deserved promotion for distinguished services, could not induce the statesman to forego his convictions of Constitutional right. The declination of this high distinction was entirely consistent with his opinions previously entertained and expressed. Before he resigned his seat in the House of Representatives, the bill authorizing such appointments by the President was introduced, and rapidly pressed to its passage. Mr. Davis detected the Constitutional infraction which it involved, and opposed it. He designed to address the House, but was suddenly called away from Washington, and before leaving had an understanding with the Chairman of the Committee from which the bill had come, that it would not be called up before the ensuing Monday. On his return, however, he found that the friends of the measure had forced its passage on the previous Saturday.

This is but one in a thousand evidences of an incorruptible loyalty to his convictions, which would dare face all opposition and has braved all reproach. It is an attribute of true greatness in the character of Jefferson Davis, which not even his enemies have called in question, to which candor must ever accord the tribute of infinite admiration.

CHAPTER IV

MR. DAVIS IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE, FIRST BY EXECUTIVE APPOINTMENT, AND SUBSEQUENTLY BY UNANIMOUS CHOICE OF THE LEGISLATURE OF HIS STATE – POPULAR ADMIRATION NOT LESS FOR HIS CIVIC TALENTS THAN HIS MILITARY SERVICES – FEATURES OF HIS PUBLIC CAREER – HIS CHARACTER AND CONDUCT AS A SENATOR – AS AN ORATOR AND PARLIAMENTARY LEADER – HIS INTREPIDITY – AN INCIDENT WITH HENRY CLAY – DAVIS THE LEADER OF THE STATES’ RIGHTS PARTY IN CONGRESS – THE AGITATION OF 1850 – DAVIS OPPOSES THE COMPROMISE – FOLLY OF THE SOUTH IN ASSENTING TO THAT SETTLEMENT – DAVIS NOT A DISUNIONIST IN 1850, NOR A REBEL IN 1861 – HIS CONCEPTION OF THE CHARACTER OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT – LOGICAL ABSURDITY OF CLAY’S POSITION EXPOSED BY DAVIS – THE IDEAL UNION OF THE LATTER – WHY HE OPPOSED THE COMPROMISE – THE NEW MEXICO BILL – DAVIS’ GROWING FAME AT THIS PERIOD – HIS FREQUENT ENCOUNTERS WITH CLAY, AND WARM FRIENDSHIP BETWEEN THEM – SIGNAL TRIUMPH OF THE UNION SENTIMENT, AND ACQUIESCENCE OF THE SOUTH

Within less than two months from his return to Mississippi, Colonel Davis was appointed by the Governor of the State to fill the vacancy in the United States Senate occasioned by the death of General Speight. At a subsequent session of the Legislature, the selection of the Governor was confirmed by his unanimous election for the residue of the unexpired term. Seldom has there been a tender of public honor more deserved by the recipient, and more cheerfully accorded by the constituent body. It was the grateful tribute of popular appreciation to the hero who had risked his life for the glory of his country, and the worthy recognition of abilities which had been proven adequate to the responsibilities of the highest civic trust. Doubtless Colonel Davis owed much of the signal unanimity and enthusiasm which accompanied this expression of popular favor to his brilliant services in Mexico. The military passion is strong in the human breast, and the sentiment of homage to prowess, illustrated on the battle-field and in the face of danger, is one of the few chivalrous instincts which survive the influence of the sordid vices and vulgarisms of human nature. In all ages men have declaimed and reasoned against the expediency of confiding civil authority to the keeping of soldiers, and have cautioned the masses against the risk of entrusting the public liberties to the stern and dictatorial will educated in the rugged discipline and habits of the camp. Yet the masses, in all time, will continue their awards of distinction to martial exploits with a fervor not characteristic of their recognition of any other public service.

But the tribute had a higher motive, if possible, than the generous impulse of gratitude to the “Hero of Buena Vista,” in the universal conviction of his eminent fitness for the position. His service in the House of Representatives, brief as it was, had designated him, months before his Mexican laurels had been earned, as a man, not only of mark, but of promise; of decided and progressive intellectual power; of pronounced mental and moral individuality.

Of all the public men of America, Jefferson Davis is the least indebted for his long and noble career of distinction to adventitious influences or merely temporary popular impulses. The sources of his strength have been the elements of his character and the resources of his genius. Never hoping to stumble upon success, by a stolid indifference amid the fluctuations of fortune, nor engaged in the role of the trimmer, who adjusts his conduct conformably with every turn of the popular current, his hopes of success have rested upon the merits of principle alone. He has succeeded in all things where success was possible, and failed, at last, in contradiction of every lesson of previous experience, with the light of all history pleading his vindication, and to the disappointment of the nearly unanimous judgment of disinterested mankind.