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The Last Ditch of the Chivalry, or a President
in Petticoats
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Confederate President Jefferson Davis was captured
by Union troops near Irwinville, Georgia, on May
10, 1865. In the gray of early morning, Davis had,
in the midst of a futile, last-ditch effort to elude
capture, mistakenly donned his wife’s raincoat,
and she had hastily draped her shawl around his
head and shoulders against the morning cold. Predictably,
the press exploited this turn of events, which grew
more exaggerated with the telling. The story in
the North was that Davis had tried to evade capture
by intentionally donning a female disguise. Inevitably
the print market began producing images showing
Davis at the point of capture ignominiously dressed
in bonnet and skirts. In this cartoon, while Davis
utters protests indicating that he is but a poor
defenseless woman, a pursuing Union soldier shouts
“It’s no use trying that shift, Jeff,
we see your Boots!” |
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Currier and Ives lithography company (active 1857–1907)
Lithograph, 1865
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
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