Au Revoir, Beauvoir; or, The Odd Experience of Visiting Jefferson Davis' Mississippi Mansion

Beauvoir, the former home of Confederate President Jefferson Davis, sits on a 52-acre plot along the Gulf of Mexico in Biloxi, Mississippi

Did you ever end up somewhere without any real intention of ever setting foot there? That was the case for me when I happened to pass through Biloxi, Mississippi in early April 2025 and found myself curious about one of the city’s main historical attractions: the former home of the first and only president of the Confederate States of America, Jefferson Davis. Called Beauvoir, which is derived from the Old French “beu”, meaning “fair” or “lovely”, and “voir”, meaning “to see”, the modest mansion housed one of America’s most consequential historical figures in the later years of his life, more than a decade after the U.S. Civil War ended with the Confederacy’s defeat.

While I do not in any way, shape, or form agree with the Confederate cause (because, you know, let’s just make that crystal clear), this was still a chance to see history in person, and I would be loathe to turn such an opportunity down. So, with a few hours to kill, I headed over to Beauvoir, where Davis lived from 1876 until his death in December 1889, to get a glimpse of the way in which the South commemorates the man whom many would consider one of America's greatest villains.

At the time Davis lived there, Beauvoir contained a whopping 608 acres, including an orange grove behind the main house (which prompted the man who built the place, James Brown, to originally name the estate “Orange Grove” back in 1852). Today, the property is only 52 acres strong, sporting the main house, two cottages on either side, the Jefferson Davis Presidential Library and Museum, a botanical garden, and a Confederate cemetery, where you will find the Tomb of the Unknown Confederate Soldier.

The version of history presented here at Beauvoir is one very much in line with the “Lost Cause” way of thinking, which is an interpretation of the Civil War that presents the conflict as the struggle to preserve Southern culture, oftentimes neglecting to mention that slavery had anything to do with it at all.

A prime example of this is one exhibit area on the upper level of the museum that tells the story of Jefferson Davis’ life through a series of vignettes, from spending his childhood in southern Mississippi to the death of his first wife, Sarah Knox Taylor — daughter of future president Zachary Taylor — and onto his forays into politics and the military before ultimately being chosen by his fellow Southerners to lead the Confederacy in February 1861. Not once throughout the exhibit is the word “slavery” mentioned, and certainly not the fact that Davis owned over 100 slaves at one time while heading up a cotton plantation in Davis Bend, Mississippi, in the 1830s and ‘40s.

It was at Beauvoir that Davis penned his two-volume memoir, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government (1881), which undoubtedly gave credence to the Lost Cause. In the book, he lays out the constitutional and moral justifications for forming the Confederacy and engaging in war to protect a way of life. He also, however, wrote about the history of slavery and defended the institution, claiming slavery enlightened Black people in the “arts of peace, order and civilization”, and pronouncing slaves were assuredly “contented” in their role.

In an interview with The New York Times in 2011, Yale University history professor David Blight called Davis’ memoir “perhaps the longest, most turgid and most self-righteous defense of a failed political movement ever written by an American.”

“The book is hundreds of pages of vindication for the Confederacy, for the slaveholders’ republic he led, and for the right of secession,” Blight continued. “The book also stands as one of the most open and aggressive defenses of slavery written by a former Confederate. Although Davis went to great length to argue that slavery ‘was in no wise the cause of the conflict, but only an incident,’ he nevertheless provided a thorough version of the alleged mental and historical inferiority of black people.”

So that’s, um, not great…

But what will you find if you end up in these parts and allow curiosity to kill the cat? The main attraction at Beauvoir is, of course, the Jefferson Davis Presidential Library and Museum, which contains curated exhibits with some of Davis’ personal belongings and plenty of Confederate artifacts. Just a short walk from the museum, the house itself contains original furnishings from the 19th century and plenty of other artifacts — though not as many as it used to. That’s because, in August 2005, Hurricane Katrina rolled through, causing severe damage to the property, including the loss of about 40 percent of the historical items contained therein. Reconstructing the place took a couple years and millions of dollars; Beauvoir wouldn’t reopen to the public until June 2008.

Near the house there are also two cottages, one to the east and one to the west. The east cottage, known as the Library Cottage, is where Davis stayed for a period of two years, working on his writings, before outright buying Beauvoir in 1879. The west cottage, called the Hayes Cottage, was used as a guest house during the years Davis owned the property. Both are replicas of the original structures, which were also destroyed by Katrina.

In the back of the property stands the Confederate Memorial Cemetery, which I must confess I did not lay eyes on during my visit (insert *shrug* emoji). The cemetery is the final resting place for nearly 800 Confederate soldiers, wives, widows, and civilians, as well as Jefferson Davis’ father, Samuel Emory Davis. Back here is also where you’ll find the Tomb of the Unknown Confederate Soldier, along with the United Daughters of the Confederacy Memorial Archway.

Beauvoir, taken as a whole, is an interesting historical attraction, even if that history is presented in somewhat jaded fashion. It is hardly a must-see — and maybe a place better avoided altogether — but there it is nonetheless. I suppose I’ll just say: venture at your own risk.

-LTH