In 500... (or less)

Dressing Up Jeff

The news made the Secretary giddy. Jeff Davis in a dress.

Few things elicited any emotion from Mr. Stanton, I laughed in spite of myself when he heard the news and chuckled heartily.

"I want that dress at once," he told me. "Right down to the hoop skirt and the slip."

I personally found the reports a little dubious. I knew Mr. Davis from before the war, he was not a coward. The thought of him giving the Army the slip wearing a petticoat did not match up with his character.

"It may not be as much, sir," I calmly told Mr. Stanton. "Such garb would be impractical for flight from the patrols."

"Nonsense," he snapped. "I want to display the dress as the crowning piece of my collection: Jeff Davis' final moments as the leader of the Confederacy, trying to run away wearing a girdle."

The narrative took hold in the papers, each providing more saucy details. Davis was wearing his mother's best Sunday bonnet. He was carrying a fine Oriental umbrella and fan. It bordered on the preposterous, but only seemed to improve the humor of Mr. Stanton, who waited with implacable eagerness to receive the garb.

Perhaps I might yet have seasoned his expectations, but all hopes of that were dashed when the letter arrived.

"Haha, I told you," Mr. Stanton said. "Look here! A letter from P.T. Barnum himself, offering $500 for the old traitor's dress!"

I took the letter from his outstretched hand to read it for myself. The showman had indeed offered to donate $500 to charity in return for the dress. I thought of all the good that money might do.

"It is most generous of Mr. Barnum," I said. "There are plenty of wounded soldiers who could use the help."

Stanton glared at me, he had no intention of accepting the offer.

"Congress will provide for the soldiers," he said. "And if Barnum is offering $500, he suspects he must be able to make back ten times that in his infernal museum. I shall not afford him the pleasure."

He bade me to quickly pen a reply, citing that the dress must remain in the custody of the War Department as evidence pending any legal proceedings. It was hogwash, but better than telling Barnum that he meant to keep the effects of Mr. Davis for himself.

Mr. Stanton kept after it, imploring me to telegraph the train station for an update as to how soon his precious package might arrive.

At last, the small crate arrived. Mr. Stanton himself pried off the lid, gleefully pouncing into the crate to retrieve its contents.

He emerged as the Mr. Stanton I had grown accustomed to, sullen and bitter.

"A raincoat and a hat!" he hollered. "Where is the dress?!"

Alas, there was no dress. The only piece of women's clothing was a shawl hurried thrown around Mr. Davis' neck by his wife a few minutes before he was captured. Stanton was undeterred.

"Lock it up!" he boomed. "And not a word. The public believes Jeff Davis was captured in a dress, and I'll be damned if we prove otherwise!"