Museum of the Confederacy

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See also: First White House of the Confederacy

Museum of the Confederacy

Museum of the Confederacy (left) and the White House of the

Confederacy (right)

Location

Former name

Confederate Museum

Established

May 3, 1866

Location

Richmond, Virginia
Appomattox, Virginia

Type

History museum

Key holdings

uniform and sword of Robert E. Lee

Collections

Confederate documents, battle flags

Visitors

51,000

Director

Eric App

President

S. Waite Rawls III, Christy Coleman

Curator

Cathy Wright

Nearest parking

VCU Medical Center

Website

http://www.moc.org/

The Museum of the Confederacy encompasses museums in Richmond and Appomattox, Virginia as
well as the historic home which served as the White House of the Confederacy adjacent to the
Richmond museum. It maintains a comprehensive collection of artifacts, manuscripts, Confederate
imprints (books and pamphlets), and photographs from the Confederate States of America and
the American Civil War (18611865).
In November 2013, the museum's governance was merged with the American Civil War Center at
Historic Tredegar.[1]In January 2014, it was announced that the new combined institution would be
called the American Civil War Museum.[2]
Contents
[hide]

1 Richmond museum
o

1.1 History

2 White House of the Confederacy

3 Appomattox Court House museum

4 Future expansion

5 Connections to scholars

6 See also

7 References

8 Further reading

9 External links

Richmond museum[edit]
The museum was founded 25 years after Lee's surrender in Appomattox in the historic home that
served as the White House of the Confederacy when the Ladies Hollywood Memorial Association saved
the home from destruction two blocks north of the Virginia State Capitol. Opened as the Confederate
Museum on February 22, 1896. The historic home was named a National Historic Landmark in 1963
and Virginia Historic Landmark 1966. The growing collection was moved to a new building in October

1976 adjacent next door and a 12 year restoration of the historic home began. Today the museum's
location in Richmond maintains a collection of flags, weapons, documents and personal effects over 3
floors and operates tours of the home restored to its wartime appearance. The museum and home are
surrounded by the VCU Medical Center and shares parking with the hospital. In 2006, museum officials
announced that neither the museum nor the home would be moved.[3][4]
The museum houses more than 15,000 documents and artifacts along with 500 original, wartime, battle
flags from the failed Confederate States of America. Among the thousands of other important pieces
found there are items owned byJefferson Davis, Robert Edward Lee, Joseph E. Johnston, John Bell
Hood, Thomas Jonathan Jackson, Simon Bolivar Buckner, J.E.B. Stuart, Joseph Wheeler, Wade
Hampton, Lewis Armistead, and Raphael Semmes. The provisional Confederate Constitution and the
Great Seal of the Confederacy are also housed there.

Anchor of the CSS Virginia

A newer building to better preserve and exhibit the museum's collections was built and opened in 1976
immediately adjacent to the White House, on its remaining 3/4 acre (3,000 m) property. The anchor of
the first ironclad warship, CSS Virginiawhich fought the USS Monitor in the Battle of Hampton Roads on
March 9, 1862, is prominently displayed in front of the Museum.
The White House was closed in 1976, to be fully restored to its wartime appearance. The restoration
project was completed in 1988, gaining high marks from the preservation community for its accuracy
and richness of detail. Reopened for public tours in June of that year, the White House featured
extensive reproduction wall coverings and draperies, as well as significant numbers of original White
House furnishings from the Civil War period.
Notable past and present exhibitions include: The Confederate Years: Battles, Leaders, and Soldiers,
18611865; Women in Mourning; Before Freedom Came: African-American Life in the Antebellum
South; Embattled Emblem: The Army of Northern Virginia Battle Flag, 1861 Present; A Womans War:
Southern Women, Civil War, and the Confederate Legacy; R. E. Lee: The Exhibition; The Confederate
Navy; and Virginia and the Confederacy: A Quadricentennial Perspective.

History[edit]
The Museum of the Confederacy was founded by Richmond's society ladies, starting with Isabel
Maury who was later joined by Ann Crenshaw Grant, and Isobel Stewart Bryan. Isabel Maury was the
founder of the Museum of the Confederacy but she also was the first Regent of theConfederate
Memorial Literary Society (CMLS). The Isabel Maury Planned Giving Society continues the work of Mrs.
Isabel Maury, daughter of Robert Henry Maury, who, with the Relics Committee, was instrumental in
securing much of the Museum's current collection.
Mrs. Isabel Maury was a cousin to Matthew Fontaine Maury, the naval officer and scientist credited as
the father of modern oceanography. Matthew Fontaine Maury lived in Robert Henry Maury's house in
the early part of the American Civil War and would walk the two blocks to the White House of the

Confederacy on a daily basis. It was in this house that Matthew Fontaine Maury first worked with
burning underwater fuses for torpedoes in a tub of water. Today there are old and new plaques on the
building that testify to this. Mrs. Grant was the sister of Lewis Crenshaw, who owned the house just
prior to the war, and was married to James Grant[disambiguation needed], a wealthy tobacconist who also lived
within the neighborhood. Mrs. Bryan was the wife of Joseph Bryan, a wealthy businessman and
publisher, whose family is still associated with the Richmond Times-Dispatch.
By the centennial anniversary of the Civil War, the museum's governing board determined that it wanted
to see the museum evolve from a shrine to a more modern museum. In 1963, the CMLS hired its first
museum professional as the executive director, and in 1970, changed the name of the institution to
"The Museum of the Confederacy." Visitors peaked at 91,000 per year in the early 1990s but was down
to around 51,000 in the early 2000s [3]

White House of the Confederacy[edit]

Main article: White House of the Confederacy

White House of the Confederacy, 1865, Library of Congress

The White House of the Confederacy is a gray stuccoed neoclassical mansion built in 1818 by John
Brockenbrough, who was president of the Bank of Virginia. Designed by Robert Mills, Brockenbroughs
private residence was built in early nineteenth century on East Clay Street in Richmond's
affluent Shockoe Hill neighborhood (later known as the Court EndDistrict), and was two blocks north of
the Virginia State Capitol.
President of the Confederate States of America Jefferson Davis, his wife Varina, and their children
moved into the house in August 1861, and lived there for the remainder of the war. President Davis
maintained an at-home office on the second floor of the White House due to poor health.
The house was abandoned during the evacuation of Richmond on April 2, 1865. Within twelve hours,
soldiers from Major General Godfrey Weitzels XVIII Corps seized the former Confederate White House,
intact. During his tour of Richmond, President Abraham Lincoln, visited Davis' former residence, and it
was where Union officers held a number of meetings with local officials in the aftermath.
During Reconstruction, the White House of the Confederacy served as the headquarters for Military
District Number One (Virginia), and was occasionally used as the residence of the commanding officer
of the Department of Virginia.
When the city announced its plans to demolish the building to make way for a more modern school
building in 1890, the Confederate Memorial Literary Society was formed with the sole purpose of saving
the White House from destruction.

Appomattox Court House museum[edit]

Death mask of Robert E. Lee, on display at the Appomattox museum

An annex to the museum opened on March 31, 2012, in Appomattox Court House, Virginia adjacent to
the Appomattox Court House National Historical Park, The museum houses Robert E. Lee's sword, his
uniform that he wore to the surrender, a pen used in the signing the surrender, his death mask, and
various other artifacts belonging to both famous and common soldiers.[5][6]

Future expansion[edit]

This section does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this section by
citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.(January 2
The museum announced plans in September 2007 to build a system of new museum sites around the
state of Virginia. Citing diminishing returns on visitation to the original site, the concept for the "Museum
of the Confederacy System" is to exhibit its vast collections in strategically located, high-traffic, tourist
destinations that are also significant Civil War sites. The plans are to build museums in Spotsylvania
County, Virginia, near the Chancellorsville Battlefield and in Hampton, Virginia, inside the moat at Fort
Monroe. The White House of the Confederacy will remain in the care of the museum, and will be
interpreted at its current site. The museum plans to maintain a corporate headquarters and its research
and preservation facility in Richmond, perhaps at the current site of the museum. While museum
officials recognize that the plan for implementing this new initiative is aggressive, they plan to complete
the bulk of it during the sesquicentennial (150th) anniversary of the Civil War, between 2011 and 2015.

Connections to scholars[edit]
Several prominent Civil War historians have had connections to the museum. Douglas Southall
Freeman, the biographer of George Washington and Robert E. Lee, started his career at the
museum. William C. "Jack" Davis, Emory M. Thomas, and Harvard University President Drew Gilpin
Faust have all done research there.James I. Robertson, Jr., of Virginia Tech, Edwin C. Bearss, Historian
Emeritus of the National Park Service, and William J. Cooper of LSU, have each served as members of
the museums governing board.

See also[edit]

White House of the Confederacy

Appomattox Court House National Historical Park

St. Paul's Episcopal Church (Richmond, Virginia) where Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, and
other Confederate leaders worshipped

References[edit]
1.

Jump up^ Calos, Katherine (November 17, 2013). "Civil War center, Confederacy museum join
forces". Richmond Times-Dispatch. Retrieved 14 March 2014.

2.

Jump up^ Boyd, Scott C. (FebruaryMarch 2014). "American Civil War Museum Is The Name
For Richmond Civil War Entity". Civil War News. Retrieved 14 March 2014.

3.

^ Jump up to:a b Tucker. "Swept Away By History". Washington Post.

4.

Jump up^ "The Extended History - Museum of the Confederacy".

5.

Jump up^ "Museum of the Confederacy".

6.

Jump up^ Goodwin, Bill (2012). Frommer's Virginia (11th ed. ed.). Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley.
p. 125. ISBN 1118118057.

Further reading[edit]

Confederate Memorial Literary Society. Confederate Museum (1905), Catalogue of the

Confederate Museum ... Richmond, Virginia, Richmond: Ware & Duke, Print.