HIS SICKNESS AND DEATH. HE health of Mr. Davis had been poor for a number of years, but by the careful nursing of his wife, the skill of physicians, and his own prudence he had rallied from repeated illness, had lived to see his 81st birthday, and when we saw him about that time and again in July he seemed better and stronger than for some years. But a short time before his fatal illness it became necessary for him to go to Brierfield on important business, and he was feeling so well that he insisted that it was not necessary for Mrs. Davis to accompany him. While there he was taken sick, came back to New Orleans through very unfavorable weather. Mrs. Davis met him on the way and returned with him, and went at once to the house of Judge Charles E. Fenner, where also lived his life-long friend, Mr. J. U. Payne, and there received every attention that loving care could suggest until the sad end came. The Picayune gave the following account: "Jefferson Davis closed his eyes in death at fifteen minutes before 1 o'clock this morning, surrounded by all of his friends and relatives who were within call. "The handsome and characteristically southern residence of Judge Charles E. Fenner, at the corner of First and Camp streets, is at present an object of interest to every friend of Mr. Jefferson Davis, because it is in the pleasant guest-chamber of this elegant home that the beloved old Confederate chieftain passed away. "The Fenner residence, built by Judge Fenner's brother-in-law, J. U. Payne, is one of the most comfortable and interiorly artistic in all the city. It is of brown stone stucco, two stories high with broad verandas and set in lovely grounds, where cainelia bushes are spiked with bloom and oranges hang in clusters on the trees. "The house has a wide hall running through the centre with drawingrooms on one side, a library on the other and on the rear corner of the house in a lovely and cheery apartment, into which the southern sun streams nearly all day, lay the patient and distinguished invalid. |