Confederate president Jefferson Davis's capture by Union cavalry on May 10, 1865, while allegedly fleeing in women's clothing, inspired a rash of prints exploiting the tale's comic possibilities. According to Davis's autobiography, at the time of his capture he was wearing his wife's raglan overcoat, which he had mistakenly put on in his haste to leave, and a shawl, which his wife had thrown over his head and shoulders. The Northern press made the most of his "last shift," transforming the shawl to a bonnet, and sometimes even portraying Davis wearing a hoopskirt and full female dress. Since Davis had apparently tried to escape casually with a black servant carrying water, he was often pictured carrying a water bucket. Another detail added by the cartoonists was a Bowie knife. Here the artist shows a camp in the woods where Davis, wearing a dress, shawl, and bonnet, and carrying a water bucket labeled "Mom Davis" and a Bowie knife, is accosted by Union soldiers. One Union soldier (center) lifts Davis's skirt with his saber mocking, "Well, "old mother," boots and whiskers hardly belong to a high-toned Southern lady." Davis implores, "I only wish to be let alone." At right another soldier, speaking in a Germanic accent, says, "Mein Gott, ter "olt mutter" vears ter pig gavalrie poots! . . . " He may be intended to represent the Norwegian-born tanner who first spotted Davis. The soldier at left exclaims, "Jerusalem! her "old Mother," hey! Its ld "Leach'" in petticoats--That's so." Behind Davis a woman warns, "Do not provoke tĚ_Ąhe President,' he might hurt some one." A black youth, presumably Davis's servant, looks on, exclaiming, "Golly Marse Yank, de old Missus is "done gone" shu-ah! . . ." At far right a waiting Confederate carriage containing barrels of "Whiskey" and "Stolen Gold" is visible. This impression was deposited for copyright on June 5, 1865, less than a month after Davis's capture. |Entered . . . 1865 by Oscar H. Harpel, (Opera House, Cincinnati) Ohio.|Signed: Design by Burgoo Zac|Title appears as it is written on the item.|"The Confederate Image," p. 85.|Weitenkampf, p. 150.|Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1865-11.

A deceptive broadside, ostensibly a pro-McClellan campaign piece but actually a piercing attack on the Democratic platform. In the center is a portrait of Democratic presidential candidate George B. McClellan standing aboard a ship, watching the Battle of Malvern Hill--the culminating defeat of his disastrous Peninsular Campaign. (See "The Gunboat Candidate," no. 1864-17.) Beneath the print's title "The Chicago Platform" is a subheading "Union Failures" above a cannon flanked by tattered American flags. Each Democratic platform resolution is illustrated with a vignette which supports its reverse. The top left scene shows a black man chased by bloodhounds, above the tenet "Resolved, that in the future, as in the past, we will adhere with unswerving fidelity to the Union under the Constitution as the only solid foundation of our strength." At the upper right is a polling scene, above which appears the Democratic resolution condemning the "interference of the military authority of the United States in the recent elections held in Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, and Delaware." In the scene balloting proceeds under the protection of federal soldiers. Citizens loyal to the Union vote, while an obviously unruly Irishman is barred. Other scenes are (middle register, left to right): "The Constitution Itself Has Been Disregarded." Abraham Lincoln displays his Emancipation Proclamation to a group of black men and women. (Continuing from left): ". . . In Every part, and Public Liberty and Private Right." A picture shows the New York draft riots of 1863, where one man clubs another while a young boy dances. A simian Irishman holds a black child upside down by his foot and is about to strike him with a club. Fires rage in the background. "Resolved That the Aim And Object of the Democratic Party is to Preserve the Federal Union and the Rights of the States Unimpaired . . . . " One scene shows a black woman sold at a slave auction, and another scene portrays two white men flogging a black man, as an overseer watches approvingly. The bottom register shows scenes of the war, Southern soldiers bowing to President of the Confederacy Jefferson Davis, a Union graveyard, "Rebels in the North" or spies being arrested, and so on. The lengthy text below includes excerpts from McClellan's letter accepting the Democratic nomination, and from his running mate George Hunt Pendleton's speech in Congress calling for a reconciliation with the South or the peaceful acceptance of its secession.|Signed: Th Nast.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1864-22.

Two scenes contrast Democratic presidential candidate of 1832 Andrew Jackson and 1864 George B. McClellan. McClellan is portrayed as weak and conciliatory toward the South, whereas his earlier counterpart's staunch preservation of the Union is applauded. In the left panel Jackson berates John C. Calhoun, leader of the Southern nullification effort of 1832. Jackson vows, "By the Eternal! this Union must and shall be preserved: A Traitor's doom to him who acts against it." Calhoun bows deeply in response, pleading, "Pardon! Pardon!" Three men in the background also bow. The South Carolinean Calhoun was a longtime exponent of Southern autonomy. On the right McClellan and running mate Pendleton kneel on the "Chicago Platform" before a standing Jefferson Davis. Davis addresses them, "Gentlemen, I am well pleased with what you ask for, you are men of sense, and to commence with I wish you to call back those fellows, Sherman, Grant and Sheridan also that old Seadog Farragut after that we will see further." The men mentioned are Union generals William T. Sherman, Ulysses S. Grant, and Philip H. Sheridan and Union admiral David G. Farragut. McClellan, who ran on a "peace at any price" plank, offers an olive branch to Davis, begging, "We should like to have Union and Peace dear Mr. Davis but if such is not your pleasure then please state your terms for a friendly separation." Pendleton, behind him, says, "Amen." At the far left a Confederate soldier comments, "Those Northern dogs how they whine!" Beside him another soldier gnaws a corn cob.|Entered . . . 1864 by L. Prang & Co. . . . Mass.|Published by Louis Prang & Co. 159 Washington St. Boston.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Murrell, p. 225.|Weitenkampf, p. 143.|Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1864-24.

The Confederate leaders are portrayed as a band of competing opportunists led by South Carolina governor and secessionist Francis Pickens (far left). The artist criticizes the January 1861 secession of five states from the lower South, following the lead of South Carolina, which had formally declared its independence a month before. Armed with a whip and a pistol, Pickens sits on the back of a young slave, pronouncing, "South Carolina claims to be file leader and general whipper in of the new Confederacy, a special edict! Obey and tremble!" The other leaders are also armed. Pickens's tyranny is met by expressions of self-interest from the other confederates. The nature of these individual interests are conveyed pictorially and in the text. Leaders from Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia sit on bales of cotton, while Florida and Louisiana sit on a wrecked ship's hull and a barrel of sugar respectively. Florida (represented by a bearded man, possibly Stephen R. Mallory, senator and later secretary of the Confederate navy ): "We want it distinctly understood that all the lights on the Coast will be put out, in order to facilitate wrecking business." Alabama (William L. Yancey): "Alabama proclaims that CĚ_Ąotton is King,' and the rest of the Confederacy "must obey" that Sovereign. Mississippi (Jefferson Davis): "We came in, with the understanding that we shall issue bonds to an unlimited extent, with our ancient right of repudiation when they became due." Georgia (Governor Joseph E. Brown): "Georgia must have half the honors, and all the profits, or back she goes to old Pluribus Unum.'" Louisiana (a mustachioed man): "A heavy duty must be levied on foreign sweetening in order to make up for what we have sacrificed in leaving the Union, otherwise we shall be like a PĚ_Ąelican in the wilderness!'" Although Texas, which seceded on February 1, is not represented here, the print probably appeared at the time of the Montgomery convention in early February when the Confederate States of America was formed, but before Jefferson Davis assumed its presidency. Texas did not attend that convention.|Published by Currier & Ives, 152 Nassau St. N.Y.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Gale, no. 1730.|Weitenkampf, p. 128.|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1861-6.

Union soldier, followed by African American in broken chains, hurls Jefferson Davis (dressed as a woman) who drops a bag of "stolen gold" over the edge of a cliff; Satan waits below the cliff with a pitchfork.|Copyright by Oscar H. Harpel.|Lithograph designed by Burgoo Zac.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)

A satire on South Carolina's role as instigator of secessionism in the South. The artist may be lampooning the convention of seceded states which assembled at Montgomery, Alabama, on February 4, 1861. The prominent leaders of the Confederate states are portrayed as foxes. The chief fox (the one "without a tail") is South Carolina governor Francis Pickens. South Carolina was the most radical of the Southern states and the first to leave the Union. Here he tries to entice the others into giving up their tails as well. As the text below puts it, "A cunning fox, having lost his tail in a trap, to save himself from ridicule called a convention of the other foxes and stated to them that having found his tail a great incumbrance he had cut it off, and advised them all to do the same, . . ." Standing on a pedestal supported on the back of a crouching black man, Pickens (center) holds aloft a document "Secession" and says, "All in favor of losing their tails will please say aye contrary no, carried the member from Mississippi will commence operations." The member from Missippi is Jefferson Davis, who stands at right holding a large ax. Before him, with its tail on a block, is a fox "Florida." Davis says (although he doesn't move), "Make ready, take aim, fire! bang!! there she goes slick as a whistle, now then Toombs, your tail if you please, no noise." Georgia secessionist Robert Toombs holds a bowl in front of him, and announces, "After the member from Florida I claim the honor of being the "next Customer." An unidentified man at the far right proclaims, "Until a better substitute is offered, I shal hold on to my tail, that's certain." To the left of Pickens is an ornate table carved with symbols of tyranny and treachery, including a pistol, dagger, crown, whip, and die. On the table rests an inkwell with a statuette of two men fighting with daggers. Behind, two foxes representing Louisiana and Alabama are partly concealed by a large document. On the far left is "Texas," a fox with a foolscap pulled down over its face and holding a musket with bayonet and a liquor bottle. He sings, "Yankee doodle be hanged (hic) Star spangled banner 'hanged, (hic) come lets lick 'er." Another man asks, "In case we cut off our tails and should afterwards repent, is there any description of glue in the market with which we can fasten them on again, and will it stick." In the foreground Buchanan's secretary of the interior Jacob Thompson of Mississippi runs from an emptied safe with a sack of $870,000, saying, "To the victors belong the spoils that good Democractic doctrine." Thompson had resigned the cabinet in 1861. The stolen goods may refer to an episode during his term of office when he was accused of stealing a large sum of money from the Indian funds of the Department of Interior. He was eventually judged innocent of this charge. In the background a fox standing atop a ladder puts a torch to the American flag and eagle.|Drawn by John L. Magee.|Published by John L. Magee, 22 South Fifth St. Phila.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Weitenkampf, p. 126.|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1861-8.

A vindictive Northern fantasy on the aftermath of the Civil War. Confederate president Jefferson Davis, dressed in a hoopskirt or crinoline, hangs from a "Sour Apple Tree" at left, a Bowie knife in one hand and a torn flag in the other. (For Davis's costume, see "The Chas-ed "Old Lady" of the C.S.A.," no. 1865-11; for the "sour apple tree," see "John Brown Exhibiting His Hangman," no. 1865-16.) Beneath Davis is an open grave from which peers the devil. At right nooses are suspended over the heads of several "Confederate Mourners" (left to right): Gen. Robert E. Lee, Secretary of War John C. Breckinridge, Secretary of State and War Judah P. Benjamin, one of the Southern "Fire-eaters" and member of the Confederate Senate William Lowndes Yancey, Georgian Robert A. Toombs, and Louis T. Wigfall. Lincoln's assassin John Wilkes Booth (far right) rushes to join the group. On the ground lie copperheads (symbols of Peace Democrats), skulls, and broken artillery. The infamous Confederate prisons, Libby and Andersonville, can be seen in the distance. In the upper register the blindfolded figure of Justice, holding a sword and scales, is enthroned on a bank of clouds. At left Liberty sits beside an urn partially covered by the Union flag. An eagle is beside her. A grieving soldier and sailor attend the urn, while a slave man, his wife, and child look toward the far right, where the recently assassinated Abraham Lincoln is escorted heavenward by angels. |Designed by Burgoo Zac.|Entered . . . 1865 by Charles Porah . . . Ohio, Cincinnati.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Weitenkampf, p. 148.|Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1865-13.

An extended and bitter indictment of Jefferson Davis and the Southern slave system. The work consists of a series of twelve vignettes with accompanying verse, following the scheme of the nursery rhyme "The House That Jack Built." The same nursery rhyme was adapted for some of the bank war satires during the Jacksonian era. The vignettes are as follows: 1. the "House," showing the door to a slave pen; 2. bales of cotton, "By rebels call'd king;" 3. slaves at work picking cotton, "field-chattels that made cotton king;" 4. slave families despondently awaiting auction; 5. slave auctioneer, "the thing by some call'd a man;" 6. slave shackles; 7. slave merchants; 8. a slave breeder negotiating in an interior with a slave merchant; on the wall appear portraits of Jefferson Davis and Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard; 9. a cat-o-nine-tails; 10. a slave driver flogging a bound female slave; 11. Jefferson Davis, "the arch-rebel Jeff whose infamous course / Has bro't rest to the plow, and made active the hearse." 12. symbols of slavery, an auctioneer's gavel, whip, auctionnotices, and shackles lying torn and broken with a notice of Jeff Davis's execution because " . . . Jeffs infamous house is doom'd to come down." |Drawn and published by David Claypool Johnston, Boston.|Entered . . . 1863 by D.C. Johnston . . . Massachusetts.|The Library's impression of the work was deposited for copyright on July 3, 1863. The Boston Athenaeum owns Johnston's preliminary pencil drawings for the individual scenes in this work.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Citizens in Conflict, no. 40-43.|Johnson, no. 75.|Weitenkampf, p. 138.|Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1863-9.

Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1865 by Gibson & Co. in the Clerks Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of Ohio.|Inscribed in ink below title: Filed June 19 1865.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)

Another state of no. 1861-23, with the addition of a skull and crossbones drawn on Davis's chest.|Probably published by Currier & Ives, New York.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Weitenkampf, p. 129.|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1861-24.

A caricature of Jefferson Davis, probably issued not long after the bombardment of Fort Sumter, but certainly postdating his February 1861 election as president of the Confederacy. Davis is shown standing on a gallows, draped in the Confederate flag and wearing on his head a misshapen Phrygian cap. Under him is a "Secession Trap" door. He anticipates his drop saying, "O dear! O dear! I don't really want to secede this way--I want to be let alone.'" To the gallows crossbar is nailed a "Letter of Marque." (See "The Southern Confederacy a Fact!!!," no. 1861-22.) Below stand several observers, including many prominent secessionists who await their own execution with nooses around their necks. They are (left to right) Secretary of State Robert Toombs, Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard, Vice President Alexander Stephens, and South Carolina governor Francis W. Pickens. Each of them speaks. Toombs: "I begin to feel weak in the knees!" Beauregard: "Oh Jeff! Jeff! is that the elevated position that you promised me?" Stephens: "Alas! Alas! I prophesied in November that secession would be the death of us." Pickens is still defiant, saying: "Can it be possible that they will dare to hang a gĚ_Ąentleman from South Carolina?'" Another state of the print, with skull and crossbones drawn on Davis's chest, was also issued (evidently by Currier & Ives) under the title, "Jeff Davis, on His Own Platform" (no. 1861-24). |Probably published by Currier & Ives, New York, in 1861 or 1862.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Weitenkampf, p. 129.|Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1861-23.

An illustrated sheet music cover for an anti-Confederate comic song. Confederate president Jefferson Davis stands on a bale of cotton and asks John C. Breckinridge, former U.S. Vice President and fellow secessionist, to "Black Me." Breckinridge, in military uniform, complies and begins to paint Davis's face with blacking. Around Breckinridge's feet coils a "Copperhead," symbol of the Peace Democrats. Another snake winds around the broken, inverted staff of a Union flag. At right a grinning black man sits on boxes of "Butler's Blacking" and holds a tin of blacking in his hand. The name "Butler" probably refers to Gen. Benjamin F. Butler, a figure despised in the South. Among other things, Butler had forced the Confederacy to recognize the military status of U.S. Negro troops. At left under the heading "Memminger's Funeral Pile," bare-chested Confederate secretary of the treasury Christopher G. Memminger is partially submerged in a pile of C.S.A. bonds. Under his management, the Confederate Congress issued so many bonds that the people doubted its ability to redeem them, and prices skyrocketed. "Repudiation" appears in large letters on one of the bonds.|Alexander McLean lith.|Entered . . . 1864 by Mrs. Eunice Bussett . . . Missouri.|Published for the Author by Endres & Compton, no. 52, 4th St., St. Louis.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1864-43.

Davis, Jefferson. "First Inaugural Address." Transcript of speechdelivered at the Alabama Capitol, Montgomery, Alabama, February 18, 1861.https://jeffersondavis.rice.edu/archives/documents/jefferson-davis-first-inaugural-addressDescription: The Confederate President addresses his countrymen

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1865, by J. Hoey, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York. J. Hoey, designer and engraver on wood, Room 11, 160 Fulton St., New York.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)

Another comic version of Confederate President Jefferson Davis's ignominious capture by Union troops in May 1865. (See also "The Chas-ed "Old Lady" of the C.S.A.," no. 1865-11.) Here Davis, clad as a woman and holding a wooden pail, is discovered by a lone trooper, Benjamin Dudley Pritchard of the Fourth Michigan Cavalry. The soldier lifts the skirts of the fugitive to reveal a pair of black boots. Davis's wife (at right) protests, saying, "Only my mother."|Entered . . . 1865 by Lee & Walker . . . Pa.|Philadelphia, Lee & Walker, 722 Chestnut St.|Published for the benefit of the Western Sanitary Fairs of Chicago, Ill. and Milwaukee, Wis.|The Library's impression of the sheet music cover was filed for copyright on June 28, 1865.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1865-19.

Signed in stone: F. Welcker.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Forms part of: American cartoon print filing series (Library of Congress)

Another version of Jefferson Davis's capture by Union cavalry. (See "The Chas-ed "Old Lady" of the Confederacy," no. 1865-11.) The image appears on the cover of a musical piece dedicated to Davis's captor, "Lieut. Col. D. B. [sic] Pritchard, 5th Mich. Cavalry," Davis, in a dress and bonnet and clutching a Bowie knife, flees through the woods with Union troops in close pursuit. One federal soldier has fallen down in his attempt to catch Davis.|Entered . . . 1865 by G.D. Russell & Company. |Franklin N. Carter Lith. Boston.|Published by G.D. Russell & Company 126 Tremont, opp Park St.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1865-14.

Northern rejoicing at the end of the Civil War often took the form of vengeful if imaginary portrayals of the execution of Confederate president Jefferson Davis. Here abolitionist martyr John Brown rises from the grave to confront Davis, although in actuality the latter had nothing to do with Brown's 1859 execution. Brown points an accusing finger at Davis, who sits imprisoned in a birdcage hanging from a gallows. Davis wears a dress and bonnet, and holds a sour apple. Below, black men and women, resembling comic minstrel figures, frolic about. (For Davis's female attire, see "The Chas-ed "Old Lady" of the C.S.A.," no. 1865-11.) Since the beginning of the war Union soldiers had sung about "hanging Jeff Davis from a sour apple tree." Davis's actual punishment was imprisonment at Fortress Monroe after his capture on May 10, 1865.|Entered . . . 1865 by G. Querner . . . D.C.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|"Image of America," p. 81.|"The Confederate Image," p. 89.|Weitenkampf, p. 148.|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1865-16.

"Metamorphosis" prints usually consist of folding flaps, each printed with part of a design and which, when opened sequentially, show several consecutive scenes. This example is an imaginary view of the hanging of Confederate president Jefferson Davis. (Davis was actually only imprisoned.) For another of the many popular portrayals of Davis's hanging, see "John Brown Exhibiting His Hangman" (no. 1865-16). In the first scene, Davis holds one hand to his chest and his other hand out, asking pardon. Next, Davis sits weeping on his coffin, a noose around his neck. In the final scene he hangs, his face hooded, from the gallows as crows (or vultures) fly overhead. |Title appears as it is written on the item.|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1865-18.

Confident Union propaganda from the summer of 1861, claiming dominance over Confederate troops led by generals P. G. T. Beauregard and Gideon Pillow. Union commander Winfield Scott sits on a mound in the center, holding a noose and awaiting the emergence of president of the Confederacy Jefferson Davis from his "Richmond" burrow. With his feet Scott pins the tails of two foxes, Beauregard (on the left), near Mannassas Junction, and Pillow, near Memphis. The print was probably issued before the Battle of Bull Run, while Beauregard's troops were stationed at Manassas Junction, protecting the Confederate capitol at Richmond. Memphis was not won by the Union, however, until June 1862.|Published by Currier & Ives, New York.|Title appears as it is written on the item.|Gale, no. 4947.|Weitenkampf, p. 131.|Published in: American political prints, 1766-1876 / Bernard F. Reilly. Boston : G.K. Hall, 1991, entry 1861-36.