The History of the Jefferson Davis Presidential Library at

Beauvoir,

Biloxi, Mississippi

Colleen Beavers

Colleen.Beavers@eagles.usm.edu

10 May 2012

LIS 631

Fig. 1-2. Jefferson Davis Presidential Library andMuseum (Feb. 2012).

Introduction

Beauvoir, the Jefferson Davis Home, is located in Biloxi,

Mississippi. It was the last home of Jefferson Davis and has

been called the “Mount Vernon of the Confederacy” (Flowers &

Sullivan, 2009, p. 99). The grounds contain the house and several

buildings under construction, including the Jefferson Davis

Presidential Library (JDPL). Other features on the ground will

include a maid’s quarters which will contain a full catering

kitchen, a blacksmith’s shop façade which will house restrooms

and a banquet hall, a rose garden to replicate Varina Davis’s

rose garden, and the JDPL. The library will serve as the focal

point on the grounds, and will include a gift shop, multi-purpose

room, the staff offices, three exhibit spaces, and the library

and archival section. Though not a presidential library in the

same way that the official libraries are, because Jefferson Davis

was the only president of the Confederate States of America, the

library can be considered an unofficial presidential library.

The Jefferson Davis Presidential Library, as a private

special library, serves a specific community, though the incoming

director wishes to expand its foci. Currently the collection

focuses on Civil War history and Jefferson Davis, though

expansion will bring in library and archival collections which

include local history. Scholars throughout the country will be

able to utilize the library and archival collections devoted to

nineteenth century southern history, while local historians and

other interested parties will be able to access the local history

additions.

Biloxi, Mississippi, is located on the Mississippi Gulf

Coast, and is home to 44,054 people. The city is racially

homogenous, with 68.4 percent white and 19.6 percent African

American. Ninety-three percent of the residents are in households

and the city has a median income of $46,550 (U.S. Census Bureau,

2010b; U.S. Census Bureau, 2010a).

Purpose of Study

The purpose of this study is to investigate the history of

the Jefferson Davis Presidential Library from its founding to

current construction. It will document the founding of the

library, the major assets of the collection, and the current

state of the library during the post-Hurricane Katrina years.

Research Questions

R1- Why was the Jefferson Davis Presidential Library founded?

R2- What are some of the major assets in the collection of the

Jefferson Davis Presidential Library?

R3- How did Hurricane Katrina affect the Jefferson Davis

Presidential Library?

Abbreviations

Confederate States of America- CSA

Jefferson Davis Presidential Library- JDPL

Sons of the Confederate Veterans- SCV

United Daughters of the Confederacy- UDC

Limitations and Assumptions

The information contained in this study is limited to the

information obtained in the scholarly literature, on the Beauvoir

Web site, and available through site visits. It is assumed that

all information contained in the scholarly literature is

accurate. It is also assumed that information obtained in

personal site visits was correct at the time of the visit and any

changes have been incorporated.

Importance of the Study

The JDPL is the main repository for works by and about

Jefferson Davis, the only president of the Confederate States of

America. It also has a significant collection of general and

specific works on the Civil War and will begin collecting local

history. A history was conducted on the development of the JDPL

prior to its opening, but no scholarship has occurred since 1998.

This study will increase the scholarship available about

privately funded special libraries, in particular those which are

historically significant. As the sole unofficial presidential

library, the JDPL holds a unique place in the library world. The

only study which has been conducted thus far dates prior to the

opening of the original building in 1998; this study will

continue the literature on the JDPL, documenting its history

following the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina.

Literature Review

A History of Beauvoir

The house which sits on the property and is currently called

Beauvoir was originally built in 1852 as a summer house for James

Brown. He elevated the house on sixty-two piers to provide for

natural cooling, which “inadvertently saved the house from

[later] storm surges,” and constructed two adjacent cottages

(Flowers & Sullivan, 2009, p. 98). Following Brown’s death in

1866, the property was purchased by Sarah Ann (Ellis) Dorsey, a

childhood friend of Varina Davis, Jefferson Davis’s wife. Dorsey

purchased the home and the surrounding 608.8 acres in 1873 and

resided in the home following her husband’s death. She named the

house Beauvoir, which means “beautiful view” (Flowers & Sullivan,

2009, p. 98).

In 1877 Jefferson Davis visited Dorsey and she invited him

to stay in one of her cottages. The cottage became known as the

Library cottage as it was the building in which Davis wrote his

two-volume memoir The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government. He

purchased Beauvoir from Dorsey on February 19, 1879. He remained

living at the property until his death on December 6, 1889

(Flowers & Sullivan, 2009, p. 98-9).

After Davis’s death, Varina sold the property to the Sons of

Confederate Veterans in 1902. She required two conditions upon

the sell: that it be used as a home for Confederate veterans and

their wives and that it be used as a memorial to Jefferson Davis.

Beauvoir remained a veterans’ home from 1903 to 1957. That year

the hospital was converted into the Confederate Soldiers Museum,

and the area under the house became the Davis Family Museum. The

property was closed for several months following Hurricane

Camille in 1969; total damage from the hurricane was estimated at

$700,000. The Combined Boards dedicated the original $4 million

Jefferson Davis Presidential Library and Museum in 1998 (Flowers

& Sullivan, 2009, p. 99).

Library Histories

The study of library histories is a growing trend, and

several studies have been conducted. Löffler (2006) documented

the 150 year history of the Bibliotheek Sociëteit de Witte, the

library of a Dutch gentlemen’s club. As another small private

library, the history of the de Witte Society’s library can be

applicable to the study of Beauvoir’s library. The author

conducted the survey because while the history of the club itself

had been written, the library of the club had never been

investigated. The history of the library seems to be one of

continual expansion as the needs of the clubs’ patrons forced the

library to collect increasing amounts of material. The literary

materials of the club were originally collected inadvertently,

but eventually a reading room was officially opened. By 1855 the

library was staffed and had rules. The library expanded during

the early twentieth century, including a new wing, and an

increase in members. The library was closed and confiscated

during the German occupation of World War II, but following the

war almost a third of the library’s original collection was

returned. Though declining membership in the 1970s and 1980s

caused the proprietors to consider converting much of the

building to office space and destroying the Art Deco reading

room, this fortunately did not occur (Löffler, 2006).

Anne B. McCain (1998) conducted a study investigating the

history of Beauvoir and the establishment of the JDPL and

compared the library to other presidential facilities. She traced

the history of Beauvoir as a home and then discussed the impetus

behind the founding of the JDPL, including the decision to model

the library on other presidential libraries. Though there had

been several other studies about Beauvoir, McCain decided to

compare Beauvoir to existing presidential libraries and museums

in order to determine how closely the JDPL followed the plan

(McCain, 1998, p. iii).

McCain also traced the history of the presidential library

system. Although Congress authorized the creation of presidential

repositories in 1955, it was not until after the Watergate

scandal that Congress declared all documents created during a

president’s term to be public property. This facilitated the

further development of the presidential library system because it

granted ownership of the material to the library rather than the

president and his heirs. The Abraham Lincoln Library and the

Rutherford B. Hayes Library are similar to the JDPL because they

are not federally funded through the presidential library system

(McCain, 1998 p. 21-2, 24).

The current work continues the study of McCain, as her work

was conducted prior to the opening of the original building.

There has not been any scholarship conducted on the JDPL post

Hurricane Katrina, which greatly affected the house and library,

to the point of requiring a new library to be built. This work

fills that dearth in the scholarly literature.

Methodology

This study is partially a historical narrative, documenting

the history of the JDPL from its founding. This study was

triangulated through a variety of sources. Research was conducted

using historical sources, including previous studies on Jefferson

Davis, Beauvoir, and the JDPL. The Beauvoir Web site was

included, though the library itself does not have its own site.

The current inventory of the storage units was consulted for

information on the strengths of the collection. Much of the

information regarding the current state of the collection and the

JDPL stemmed from several visits to the storage units housing the

collection and the grounds of Beauvoir. The current author is the

incoming librarian/archivist for the JDPL and as such has been

able to visit the relevant sites. Information in the results

which is not otherwise cited is the result of these visits.

Results

R1- Why was the Jefferson Davis Presidential Library founded?

There have been several libraries at Beauvoir over the

years, beginning with Sarah Dorsey’s and the Davis family’s book

collections. Both Sarah Dorsey’s and Varina Davis’s book

collections remain part of the JDPL’s collection. There was also

a library at the home for the veterans and their wives. In 1969

Dr. James B. Butler, a member of the Board of Directors of the

Mississippi Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans,

established the Jefferson Davis Memorial Library. Within a decade

it became clear that a larger facility would be needed, but

circumstances prevented these plans from coming to fruition. In

1991 Louis Gorr, Executive Director of the Museum of the

Confederacy in Richmond, Virginia, proposed building a library

that would be comparable to other presidential libraries (McCain,

1998, p. 18-9).

The State of Mississippi awarded Beauvoir $1.5 million in

bond funds, followed by an additional $3 million in 1995,

allowing plans for the library to proceed. Because it is

considered part of Beauvoir, funding is due to donations, income

earned from gift shop and ticket sales, and some government

funding. The Combined Boards broke ground on August 17, 1996, and

opened the library in 1998. The library was “expected to be the

leading institution in the United States for research dealing

with Jefferson Davis” (McCain, 1998, p. 19-20). Keith Hardison,

director when the library first opened, planned to open access of

the catalog online and connect it to other Davis repositories

(McCain, 1998, p. 20). Unfortunately the catalog of the records

is likely lost due to Hurricane Katrina. The incoming librarian

plans to re-catalog the books and archival materials and make the

catalog available online.

Fig. 3. Original Jefferson Davis Presidential Library Dedicated in 1998. (Bluff City Postcards. n.d.)

R2- What are some of the major assets in the collection of the

Jefferson Davis Presidential Library?

The library material is currently housed in two storage

units. The focus of the collection is on the Civil War, making

the JDPL a significant contribution to the study of Civil War

history. The new incoming director is also redirecting the

collection to begin retaining local history as well, and it is

possible there will be a collaboration with local civil or

historical institutions. There is also a significant collection

of rare books, which are currently packed awaiting conservation

and preservation by the incoming archivist. Titles include

Jefferson Davis’s The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Varina

Davis’s Jefferson Davis: a Memoir, The Personal Memoirs of P. H. [Phillip]

Sheridan, and several reports and manuals from the war (Beauvoir

Rare Book Inventory, c.2009).

The archival material is mainly contained in one of the

storage units. It can be divided into two main categories:

accessioned and un-accessioned. There are three collections which

have not yet been accessioned, and there is not currently an

inventory of the contents of these collections. The two smaller

collections were donated by the Perkinston campus of Mississippi

Gulf Coast Community College and the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art

in Laurel, Mississippi. The third collection is large and is

currently housed in its own storage unit due to both the size and

as a means to retain provenance. It is being donated by Charles

Sullivan upon his death, though it will be housed at the JDPL

from its opening. The collection varies and until processing it

will be difficult to determine the exact contents, though it is

likely more local history than Civil War history.

The accessioned material varies greatly. Highlights of the

archival collection include programs, handouts, newspaper

articles and other documents detailing the history of Beauvoir

since its opening as a house museum, including Confederate

Memorial Day activities, Fall Musters, and Beauvoir ‘A Walk

Through History’ programs. A few boxes contain information on the

history of the library, though they were not accessible for this

study. Historic documents also include letters and reports from

the time that Beauvoir was a Confederate Soldiers Home. There are

also several boxes of nineteenth-century newspapers and

periodicals, particularly Harpers Weekly (Beauvoir Inventory

Report, n.d.).

There is a focus on material related to the Davis family.

This includes Varina Davis’s recipes and book collection and

their daughter Winnie’s diary. Illustrations of Jefferson Davis’s

inauguration and significant events from his career, as well as

several pictures of the family, are also included. Several

letters sent or received by the Davis family are available in the

archival material. The collection also features material from the

time when Beauvoir was owned by Sarah Dorsey. Several boxes

contain her book collection, and there is also a copy of her

will, in which she left the house to Jefferson Davis (Beauvoir

Inventory Report, n.d.).

R3- How did Hurricane Katrina affect the Jefferson Davis

Presidential Library?

Along with the rest of the Gulf Coast of Mississippi,

Louisiana, and Alabama, Biloxi suffered tremendous and

unprecedented damage when Hurricane Katrina struck on August 29,

2005. The casino barges which dotted the beach line variably rose

with the surge and broke their moorings, tearing through

buildings. The grounds of Beauvoir and the JDPL were

substantially damaged by the winds and waters of Katrina, in

addition to the heavy planks which tore loose from the boardwalk

directly in front of the property. The Hayes cottage (in which

the Davis’s oldest daughter and her family stayed) and the

Library cottage (the building in which Jefferson Davis wrote The

Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government) were destroyed, as were the

cistern at the back of the house and the replica barracks of the

Confederate Soldiers’ Home (Sullivan, 2009, p. 147).

The front of the property was also heavily damaged when the

President Casino boat tore loose from its moorings and was pushed

across the property. It hit the historic marker for Beauvoir and

smashed through the original white marble Memorial Gateway

donated by the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC) in 1917,

completely destroying it. (A replica has since been rebuilt and

placed in the cemetery.) The front of Beauvoir House was severely

damaged: the front porch was destroyed and most of the roof. Half

of the brick piers on which the house sat fell. One foot of water

flooded the House during the peak of the storm, pushing furniture

across the floor and out the back door. Artifacts in the

Confederate Soldiers’ Home were lost when the building was

destroyed, along with the inventory of the building’s contents,

rendering it impossible to determine the full extent of the loss.

Several of the swords contained in the building were rolled into

coils from the force of the water’s weight. The cemetery located

on the rear of the property was swathed with debris pushed from

the neighborhood surrounding Beauvoir, covering many of the

tombstones (Sullivan, 2009, p. 148-9).

Fig. 4-5. Beauvoir House before Katrina. Beauvoir House after Katrina.

The JDPL suffered greatly from the effects of Hurricane

Katrina; the entire first floor of the library was destroyed,

though the building remained standing and the second floor

remained largely undamaged. The only remainders from the first

floor were a large bronze statue of Jefferson Davis and the steel

framework holding up the second floor. The catafalque which

carried Davis’s body at his funeral in 1889 was shattered, and

the pieces “scattered across an acre” (Sullivan, 2009, p. 148).

The incredible damage which Katrina enacted on the library

required the building to be demolished. Following clean-up of the

area, plans were drafted to rebuild the library at the same

location on the grounds, though it was necessary for the new

building to be moved to the west to remove it from the flood

plain. Staff continue to find artifacts and other debris from the

wreckage on the grounds, particularly in the area surrounding the

construction of the new building.

The current state of the JDPL collection post-Katrina is

complicated. Following the hurricane, the library and archival

collections, as well as the furniture from the building, and the

artifacts salvaged from the house and museums, were moved into

sixteen storage units in Biloxi. Most of these units are

furniture, artifacts, and other debris that were salvaged from

the grounds following the hurricane, however there are two units

which are filled with the library’s books and one unit which

houses the archival materials.

The books of the library were placed on the shelves inside

the storage units so as to reuse the boxes for transport. Though

they remain somewhat organized and in Library of Congress order,

there are several books which are out of place. The present

author even found one book which was upside down on the shelf,

six years after the hurricane; the second volume of the series

this book was in is believed to be in the other unit, but the

author was unable to confirm this. The archival materials have

also not been cared for in the aftermath of the hurricane; the

boxes were originally scattered in the units, though they have

been centralized in the last few years. They have not been

processed completely so the state of the collection is impossible

to determine at this point. Following installation into the new

building, the librarian/archivist will open the archival boxes

and begin the task of sorting the collections into their

permanent locations.

Plans for a new library building continue to move forward,

however it has been postponed for over two years. The Combined

Boards officially broke ground on the new Jefferson Davis

Presidential Library and Museum on December 6, 2009. Though the

library was originally intended to be opened in the summer of

2010, problems with the construction company have hindered this.

Current estimates for moving into the new JDPL are August 2012.

The new library building is two floors with the gift shop,

main offices, and a multi-purpose room downstairs, while the

library and museum sections, as well as the board room, are on

the second floor. There are three exhibit areas on the second

floor—a rotating exhibit area with interchangeable walls, a room

for the history of the Confederate soldier, and one on Jefferson

Davis himself. The library and archive rooms are a vast

improvement over the previous building’s. The library will have

an area for the stacks and researchers, with a view looking out

over the house. There is a separate work area from the office,

and the archival materials will be housed in a reinforced vault.

The building itself also has backup generators. When the next

hurricane hits the Mississippi Gulf Coast, the contents of the

JDPL will be much better protected.

Conclusion

The Jefferson Davis Presidential Library was founded in 1998

on the grounds of Beauvoir House, Jefferson Davis’s last home.

Because of its long association with the Davis family, the Sons

of the Confederate Veterans funded the construction of a library

to honor Jefferson Davis and house a collection of Civil War

history. Beauvoir is still owned by the SCV and remains privately

funded. Seven years after its founding, the original building was

damaged by Hurricane Katrina, prompting the demolition of the

building. A new building has been under construction for over two

years, and though it is behind schedule, it will be an asset to

the Beauvoir grounds and an excellent home for the library and

archival material as well as the artifacts which will be housed

in the museum sections.

Works Cited

Beauvoir Inventory Report. (n.d.)

Beauvoir Rare Book Inventory. (c.2009).

Bluff City Postcards. (n.d.). Jefferson Davis Presidential Library.

Flowers, R.R. & Sullivan, C.L. (2008). History of Beauvoir. In Down South with the Dixie Press. Perkinston, MS: Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College Foundation, 98-99).

Löffler, E. (2006). One hundred and fifty years of the ‘Bibliotheek Sociëteit de Witte:’ the history of the libraryof a gentlemen’s club.

McCain, A.B. (1998). The history of Beauvoir, the establishment of the Jefferson Davis Presidential Library, and a comparison with other presidential facilities. Masters Project. University of Southern Mississippi.

Sullivan, C. L. (2009). Hurricanes of the Mississippi Gulf Coast: three centuries of destruction. Perkinston, MS: Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College Foundation.

Thomas, N. (2006, January 18). $403,000 Mellon grant supports Gulf Coast art conservation. Retrieved from UDaily.

U.S. Census Bureau. (2010a). Median income in the past 12 months. Retrieved from American FactFinder: http://factfinder2.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml?pid=ACS_10_3YR_S1903&prodType=table

U.S. Census Bureau. (2010b). Profile of general population and housing characteristics: 2010 . Retrieved from American FactFinder: http://factfinder2.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml?pid=DEC_10_DP_DPDP1&prodType=table

Appendix A: The Boards of BeauvoirBoard of Directors

Richard V. FortePaul B. Johnson IIIEd FunchessBert Hayes-DavisDon BarrettDr. Dan Edney, EmeritusLamar Roberts, Emeritus

Board of TrusteesWallace MasonLarry McCluneyCharles SullivanReverend Cecil

FayardGlen TaylorJohn Echols,

EmeritusMrs. Francis

WoodruffPresident Mississippi Division

U.D.C.

Alan Palmer Commander of the Mississippi Division S.C.V.

Combined Board OfficersRichard V. Forte Sr. ChairmanEd Funchess Vice ChairmanCharles Sullivan SecretaryPaul B. Johnson III Treasurer