Beauvoir Renovated

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beauvoir

B EAUTIFUL A GAIN Hattiesburg architect Larry Albert oversees restoration of historic Beauvoir

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TEXT BY VALERIE WELLS PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY ALBERT & ASSOCIATES One of the signs of the Gulf Coast’s rejuvenation is a white, raised cottage Greek Revival home built in 1848 on a prominent corner in an old city. Beauvoir, the small mansion in Biloxi where Jefferson Davis spent his retirement, survived 21 hurricanes before 2005. The president of the Confederacy moved to this beachfront property in 1877 and lived here until he died in 1889. After Hurricane Katrina ripped the porch off the old house and left behind a skeleton of wood, many assumed Beauvoir was hopelessly destroyed. Now restored, Beauvoir - French for beautiful to look at - hides an invisible strength inside its graceful walls. “We have made the building 90 percent stronger than before Katrina,” said Larry Albert, the Hattiesburg architect who oversaw the detailed historic renovation.

The ceiling of the formal reception hall is the star attaction.

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Reinforced steel is the hidden skeleton of the house now that buckles Beauvoir tightly to the ground. Surrounded by wood and steel, visitors would not be able to see the steel. Instead, they would see a scene from the late 19th century. “It looks the same now,” Albert said. Other treasures to look for are the wall and ceiling paintings. Visitors who saw Beauvoir before Katrina will see richer colors in the restoration, including a faux painted oak door. Albert began the massive undertaking in May 2006. The work took just a little more than one year. On Jefferson Davis’s 200th birthday on June 3, 2007, Beauvoir reopened to the public. “It’s worth a trip to see it replicated,” Albert said. About 100 to 150 visitors come to the grounds every day, said Rick Forte, acting director and chairman of the board of Mississippi Division of the Sons of

Confederate Veterans, the organization that owns and operates the site. He’d like to see closer to 250 visitors daily to help offset the costs of rebuilding and maintaining the property. “If Jefferson Davis hadn’t lived in Beauvoir, a casino would be there now,” Forte said. Just like the hidden steel that keeps the house buckled to the ground, Jefferson Davis the man has more layers than what most of us remember - that he was the political head of the South during the Civil War. Forte wants visitors to know Davis was also a U.S. senator, a hero of the Mexican War, secretary of war under President Pierce and a founder of the Smithsonian Institution. If not for the Civil War (or the War Between the States if you prefer) , Davis would have been president of the United States, Forte contends. After Davis died, the 51 acres with cottages became a home for Confederate veterans and their widows. As late as the 1950s, some of the last Confederate widows were still living on the grounds. Forte’s mission today is to “educate the world about Jefferson Davis and the Confederate soldier.” A cemetery on the property includes the graves of hundreds of Confederate soldiers. Besides the Greek Revival home and its furnishings, other buildings on site include replicas of the cottages that were destroyed by Katrina. A new presidential library and museum will be built just 30 yards away from where the old one was, a move dictated in order to get federal money to fund the rebuild. Other outbuildings that were lost to Katrina will be replicated in accurate historic detail. Plans to recreate Varina Davis’s flower and vegetable garden will be historically correct also, only using plants Miss Varina would have used. Beauvoir is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. every day except Thanksgiving and Christmas. It’s easy to find, too. The address, 2244 Beach Blvd., is at the corner of U.S. 90 and Beauvoir Road, right next to the Mississippi Gulf Coast Coliseum. Guided tours are available to adults for $9 and children for $5. For information, call (228) 388-4400 or go to www.beauvoir.org.

Above, the parlor leading to the library and beams removed from Beauvoir during the restoration process.

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