In early May 1865 the Confederate States of America was greatly disorganized, largely because of the frenetic events of the previous month. General Robert E. Lee had surrendered the Confederate armies at the Appomattox Courthouse in Virginia, and most Americans believed the Civil War (1861-65) was over. The assassination of U.S. president Abraham Lincoln in Washington, D.C., by John Wilkes Booth and other sympathizers with the Southern cause, cast suspicion over many in the Confederate government. Though still intact, the government was largely ineffective.
Confederate president Jefferson Davis still retained hopes for the future of the Confederacy. Privately, he harbored a desire to reinforce the armies and move the fighting to the western part of the Confederacy. Publicly, he was forced to flee the Confederate capital in Richmond, Virginia, with a cadre of trusted advisors, which in effect became a government in exile. Upon departing Richmond, Davis and his retinue established a temporary center of government at Danville, Virginia. They soon moved farther south, however, because Virginia was heavily saturated with Union troops.
