George Davis (politician)
For other people with this name, see George Davis.George Davis (
March 1 1820—
February 23 1896) was a
Confederate States of America political figure and the last Confederate
Attorney General, serving from 1864 to 1865.
Born near
Wilmington, North Carolina, Davis attended the
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he was valedictorian of the class of 1838. He subsequently studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1840. In 1848 he became general counsel of the Wilmington & Weldon Railroad. He held this position the rest of his life.
Davis was a delegate from North Carolina to the unsuccessful Washington Peace Conference of
February 4 to
February 27,
1861. After succession, he was a delegate to the
Provisional Confederate Congress in 1861-1862, and was then elected to the Senate, where he served from 1862 to 1864. In December 1863, President
Jefferson Davis appointed him attorney general. He served in this position from
January 2,
1864 until
April 24,
1865, in the last days of the Confederacy.
After the war, he was captured by U.S. forces at
Key West, Florida on
October 18,
1865, and was imprisoned at Fort Hamilton in Brooklyn, N.Y. He spent several months at Fort Hamilton before being pardoned in 1866. He then returned to law practice in Wilmington.
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Short biography
