From the first, his task was a difficult one, and it grew increasingly
so as the war went on. That he performed it well, there can be no
question. He was the government, was practically dictator, for he
dominated the Confederate Congress absolutely, and its principal
business was to pass the laws which he prepared. Only toward the close
of the war did it, in a measure, free itself from this control, and,
finally, in 1865, it passed a resolution attributing Confederate
disaster to Davis's incompetency as commander-in-chief, a position which
he had insisted on occupying; removing him from that position and
conferring it upon General Lee, giving the latter, at the same time,
unlimited powers in disposing of the army.
But it was too late. Even Lee himself could not ward off the inevitable.
On the morning of Sunday, April 2, 1865, Jefferson Davis sat in his pew
at church in the city of Richmond, when an officer handed him a
telegram. It was from Lee, and read, "Richmond must be evacuated this
evening," Lee had fought and lost the battle of Petersburg, and was in
full retreat. Davis left the church quietly, called his cabinet
together, packed up the government archives, and boarded a train for the
South. For over a month, he moved from place to place endeavoring to
escape capture, his party melting away until it comprised only his
family and a few servants; and finally, on May 9th, he was surprised and
taken by a company of Union cavalry near Irwinsville, in southern
Georgia.
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