Two Presidents Keep the Spirit

Christmas 1864 -Two Presidents Keep the Spirit

During the Civil War, as Christmas 1864 approached, the mood in the Washington DC White House, and of its primary occupant Abraham Lincoln, was on the upswing. However, less than a hundred miles South, in Richmond, Virginia, the mood was much more subdued in that Executive Mansion, as the inhabitants, including Jefferson Davis, President of the embattled and dwindling Confederacy, reflected the solemnity of the times they faced.

One aspect that the two leaders had in common was that each would get to celebrate Christmas with his wife and younger children, certainly a comfort to both men. Mary Lincoln had been visiting in Philadelphia for several days before Christmas (likely shopping) and planned to return on the evening of December 21st, however, her husband telegraphed her; “Do not come on the night train. It is too cold. Come in the morning.” Varina Davis was at home in Richmond, but without the luxury of safe travel as that city was surrounded by Union troops. The Washington White House was well stocked for the holidays, with plenty of food for dinners and receptions, while the Southern Executive Mansion, although not bare, had to carefully manage supplies.

In Washington DC, on December 22, Abraham Lincoln received word from General William T. Sherman that Savannah, Georgia, had surrendered, completing a Union march across that state, dividing the South, and securing the coastal ports in that area. The telegram to President Lincoln read “I beg to present you, as a Christmas gift, the city of Savannah.” On the other hand, in Richmond, Jefferson Davis was also receiving news from his Generals; but the news he received was not heartening as they spoke of retreats and minimal supplies, not of victories.  

On Christmas Day, Tad Lincoln, the President’s young son, without first asking permission, invited a group of boys he had met on the street to join him and his family at the White House for Christmas dinner. Although the unexpected guests were likely not appreciated by Mrs. Lincoln, the President welcomed them and allowed them to stay. While there was no Christmas tree in the Lincoln White House, there were other festive decorations and several formal receptions were scheduled over the holidays with ample food and drink available for the attendees.

However, in Richmond, Virginia, because most of the Southern ports were controlled by Union forces by December 1864, the flow of goods was limited. Even agricultural supplies from the Shenandoah Valley, the so-called bread-basket of the South, were restricted and the citizens of Richmond were dealing with severe shortages.  But there was a Christmas tree in the Southern Executive Mansion and Varina Davis, wife of Jefferson Davis, tried her best to keep the spirit of Christmas alive, especially for children.

She wrote, “For as Christmas season was ushered in under the darkest clouds, everyone felt the cataclysm….but the rosy, expectant faces of our little children were a constant reminder that self-sacrifice must be the personal offering of each member of the family. How to satisfy the children when nothing better could be done than the little makeshift attainable in the Confederacy was the problem of the older members of each household.”

Mrs. Davis frequently devoted time to a local orphanage which housed children of soldiers killed in the war. These children were often deprived of even the basic necessities and she was determined to give them at least one happy day. She gathered as many presents as the local ladies could muster, certainly some gave up gifts for their own children, and placed the gifts around the Christmas tree.

Mrs. Davis wrote, “The orphans sat mute with astonishment until the opening hymn and prayer and the last amen had been said, and then they at a signal warily and slowly gathered around the tree to receive…. their allotted present. The different gradations from joy to ecstasy which illuminated their faces was worth two years of peaceful life to see. The President (Jefferson Davis) became so enthusiastic that he undertook to help in the distribution, but worked such wild confusion giving everything asked for into their outstretched hands, that we called a halt, so he contented himself with unwinding one or two tots from a network of strung popcorn in which they had become entangled and taking off all apples he could when unobserved, and presenting them to the smaller children.

But Mrs. Davis wanted to lift the spirits of some adults too. She invited many of the local young ladies, and as many young officers as could be excused from duty, to a dance on Christmas evening. Because there would not be an elaborate food array at this dance, she referred to it as a Starvation Party to make light of the circumstances. Most of the officers wore formal uniforms and, as Mrs. Davis wrote, they entered in “full toggery” with bright-eyed young belles who were, “fragile as fairies, but worked like peasants for their home and country… So, in the interchange of the courtesies and charities of life, to which we could not add its comforts and pleasures, passed Christmas in the Confederate mansion.”

As history unfolded, 1864 would be the last Christmas in the White House for the Lincolns and the last in the Richmond Executive Mansion for the Davis family.  Abraham Lincoln, although re-elected a year earlier and expected to serve four more years as President, was killed by an assassin in April 1865; and his wife, Mary, had begun a long slow slide into mental illness. As for the Davis family, Varina Davis had to visit her husband in a federal prison that next Christmas of 1865, where he had been taken the previous May.  He would remain a prisoner for two years, never certain when, or even if, he would ever be free. (Eventually, President Johnson decided against a trial and Davis was freed, but never pardoned.)

But, if we think about the Christmas these two families spent in 1864, in the midst of a devastating Civil War, they both tried to celebrate the holiday and bring a level of enjoyment to others; despite the unimaginable chaotic circumstances and distractions with which they had to deal.

For most of us, with our circumstances not nearly as perilous as what these two men and their families faced, we should also be able to embrace the Christmas spirit.

So, as both Abraham Lincoln and Jefferson Davis might have said one hundred and fifty-seven years ago, “Merry Christmas!”