''A Short History of the Confederate States of America'' is a

memoir A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based in the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autobi ...

written by

Jefferson Davis Jefferson F. Davis (June 3, 1808December 6, 1889) was an American politician who served as the president of the Confederate States from 1861 to 1865. He represented Mississippi in the United States Senate and the House of Representatives as a ...

, completed shortly before his death in 1889. Davis wrote most of this book while staying at Beauvoir along the

Mississippi Gulf Coast The Mississippi Gulf Coast, also known as Mississippi Coast, Mississippi Gulf Coast region, Coastal Mississippi, and The Coast, is the area of Mississippi along the Mississippi Sound at the northern extreme of the Gulf of Mexico. Geography At th ...

near

Biloxi, Mississippi Biloxi ( ; ) is a city in and one of two county seats of Harrison County, Mississippi, United States (the other being the adjacent city of Gulfport). The 2010 United States Census recorded the population as 44,054 and in 2019 the estimated popu ...

. The book is much less a Davis memoir than an articulation of the

secession Secession is the withdrawal of a group from a larger entity, especially a political entity, but also from any organization, union or military alliance. Some of the most famous and significant secessions have been: the former Soviet republics le ...

argument. In Davis' earlier work, ''

The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government ''The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government'' (1881) is a book written by Jefferson Davis, who served as President of the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. Davis wrote the book as a straightforward history of t ...

'', he had written what is probably the most thorough exegesis of the

compact theory In United States constitutional theory, compact theory is an interpretation of the Constitution which holds that the United States was formed through a compact agreed upon by all the states, and that the federal government is thus a creation of t ...

of the

United States Constitution The Constitution of the United States is the Supremacy Clause, supreme law of the United States, United States of America. It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution, in 1789. Originally comprising seven ar ...

in existence, devoting the first fifteen chapters of the book to that topic. Fearful that his readers might not understand, or might forget, he repeated the explanation every second or third chapter after that. Still concerned that people might not understand the compact theory of the Constitution, he wrote ''A Short History of the Confederate States of America'' shortly before his death. The book was first published in 1890 by Belford Co. in New York.Title page: “Published 1890 by Belford Company Publishers 18-22 east 18th St. New York Publishers of Belford's Magazine”.

References

External links

''A Short History of the Confederate States of America''
at the

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...

Jefferson Davis Bibliography
Retrieved 2005-03-02.

at

'. Retrieved 2005-03-02. 1890 non-fiction books American Civil War memoirs History of the Confederate States of America Jefferson Davis {{mil-memoir-stub

See also

References

External links