The Desperate Finale
After evacuating Richmond, President Jefferson Davis and key Confederate officials arrived in Danville, Virginia, on April 3, 1865. With no communication from the Confederate armies still in the field, the situation was dire. Nevertheless, in his last official proclamation as president on April 4, Davis issued this handbill reassuring the citizens “that nothing is now needed to render our triumph certain but the exhibition of our own unquestionable resolve.” In his A Short History of the Confederate States (1889), Davis would admit that when the proclamation was “viewed by the light of subsequent events, it may fairly be said it was over-sanguine.”
After evacuating Richmond, President Jefferson Davis and key Confederate officials arrived in Danville, Virginia, on April 3, 1865. With no communication from the Confederate armies still in the field, the situation was dire. Nevertheless, in his last official proclamation as president on April 4, Davis issued this handbill reassuring the citizens “that nothing is now needed to render our triumph certain but the exhibition of our own unquestionable resolve.” In his <em>A Short History of the Confederate States</em> (1889), Davis would admit that when the proclamation was “viewed by the light of subsequent events, it may fairly be said it was over-sanguine.”