Winnie Davis: Daughter of the Lost Cause
*Winner of the Colonial Dames of America Book Award*

Varina Anne “Winnie” Davis was born into a war-torn South in June of 1864, the youngest daughter of Confederate president Jefferson Davis and his second wife, Varina Howell Davis. Occurring only a month after the death of beloved Confederate hero general J.E.B. Stuart during a string of Confederate victories, Winnie’s birth was hailed as an omen of victory by war-weary Southerners. But after the Confederacy’s ultimate defeat, Winnie would spend her early life as a genteel refugee and expatriate abroad.

After returning to the South from German boarding school, Winnie was christened the “Daughter of the Confederacy” in 1886. For Confederate veterans and the United Daughters of the Confederacy, Winnie became an icon of the Lost Cause, eclipsing even her father. Winnie Davis: Daughter of the Lost Cause is the first published biography of this little-known woman who unwittingly became the female symbol of the defeated South.

Winnie’s controversial engagement in 1890 to a Northerner lawyer whose grandfather was a famous abolitionist and her later move to work as a writer in New York City shocked her friends, family, and the Southern groups who worshiped her. Faced with the pressures of a community that violently rejected the match, Winnie desperately attempted to reconcile her prominent Old South history with her personal desire for tolerance. 
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Winnie Davis: Daughter of the Lost Cause
*Winner of the Colonial Dames of America Book Award*

Varina Anne “Winnie” Davis was born into a war-torn South in June of 1864, the youngest daughter of Confederate president Jefferson Davis and his second wife, Varina Howell Davis. Occurring only a month after the death of beloved Confederate hero general J.E.B. Stuart during a string of Confederate victories, Winnie’s birth was hailed as an omen of victory by war-weary Southerners. But after the Confederacy’s ultimate defeat, Winnie would spend her early life as a genteel refugee and expatriate abroad.

After returning to the South from German boarding school, Winnie was christened the “Daughter of the Confederacy” in 1886. For Confederate veterans and the United Daughters of the Confederacy, Winnie became an icon of the Lost Cause, eclipsing even her father. Winnie Davis: Daughter of the Lost Cause is the first published biography of this little-known woman who unwittingly became the female symbol of the defeated South.

Winnie’s controversial engagement in 1890 to a Northerner lawyer whose grandfather was a famous abolitionist and her later move to work as a writer in New York City shocked her friends, family, and the Southern groups who worshiped her. Faced with the pressures of a community that violently rejected the match, Winnie desperately attempted to reconcile her prominent Old South history with her personal desire for tolerance. 
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Winnie Davis: Daughter of the Lost Cause

Winnie Davis: Daughter of the Lost Cause

by Heath Hardage Lee
Winnie Davis: Daughter of the Lost Cause

Winnie Davis: Daughter of the Lost Cause

by Heath Hardage Lee

Overview

*Winner of the Colonial Dames of America Book Award*

Varina Anne “Winnie” Davis was born into a war-torn South in June of 1864, the youngest daughter of Confederate president Jefferson Davis and his second wife, Varina Howell Davis. Occurring only a month after the death of beloved Confederate hero general J.E.B. Stuart during a string of Confederate victories, Winnie’s birth was hailed as an omen of victory by war-weary Southerners. But after the Confederacy’s ultimate defeat, Winnie would spend her early life as a genteel refugee and expatriate abroad.

After returning to the South from German boarding school, Winnie was christened the “Daughter of the Confederacy” in 1886. For Confederate veterans and the United Daughters of the Confederacy, Winnie became an icon of the Lost Cause, eclipsing even her father. Winnie Davis: Daughter of the Lost Cause is the first published biography of this little-known woman who unwittingly became the female symbol of the defeated South.

Winnie’s controversial engagement in 1890 to a Northerner lawyer whose grandfather was a famous abolitionist and her later move to work as a writer in New York City shocked her friends, family, and the Southern groups who worshiped her. Faced with the pressures of a community that violently rejected the match, Winnie desperately attempted to reconcile her prominent Old South history with her personal desire for tolerance. 

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781612346373
Publisher: Potomac Books
Publication date: 04/15/2014
Pages: 248
Product dimensions: 6.40(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Heath Hardage Lee is an independent historian, biographer, and curator. She is the author of The League of Wives: The Untold Story of the Women Who Took on the U.S. Government to Bring Their Husbands Home.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations vii

Foreword J.E.B. Stuart W ix

Preface xi

Introduction 1

1 A Tragic Fall 7

2 My Name Is a Heritage of Woe 12

3 Escape, Capture, and Fort Monroe 20

4 A Fatal Romance 28

5 Scandal and Sickness 35

6 Boarding School Blues and the Dorsey Dilemma 43

7 Yellow Fever 56

8 Portrait of a Lady 66

9 Daughter of the Confederacy 72

10 Life in a Fishbowl 81

11 I Will Never Consent! 90

12 Engagement Issues 101

13 Italian Idyll 106

14 Dear Diary 113

15 A World on Fire 119

16 Queen of a Mystic Court 129

17 New York, New Woman 141

18 The Last Casualty of the Lost Cause 152

19 Death and Maiden 158

Epilogue: The Great-Great-Grandson of the Confederacy and the Daughter of New York Coauthored Bertram Hayes-Davis 167

Acknowledgments 173

Notes 177

Bibliography 199

Index 207

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