The museum contains a huge collection of Confederate artifacts presented fairly chronologically. If you didn’t really appreciate the scope and breadth of the Civil War before you entered, you will have a good grasp when you leave. There are displays of equipment belonging to such Confederate luminaries as Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee, paintings, uniforms, models and documents. It also covers life on the home-front and the black experience in the south. It is an excellent exhibit in a complex built especially to house it… good lighting, good traffic flow and spaciousness. Your house tour will be timed… you can explore the museum until it is called and return afterwards.

The house is not like the northern White House other than it is white and it has columns. Rather than spacious lawns, it finds itself crammed into its setting, surrounded by other buildings. It may be lucky to exist at all, as after the war it served a number of functions including use as a school. It gradually became dilapidated and was to be torn down but it was saved by the Confederate Memorial Literary Society in 1890. It was the first site of the museum. It had begun as a Richmond physician’s residence and was purchased by the Confederate government at the beginning of the war. As such, it served as the home of the president, Jefferson Davis.

The house has been extensively restored and many of its original possessions, some of which had disappeared with the Union army that used it as a headquarters, have been returned to it. It exhibits now as a fine Victorian home with eleven rooms open to the public. Among others, you will see the State Dining Room, once used for Councils of War as well a dinner parties for the Confederate elite. As with all the ground-floor rooms, it is high-ceilinged, wallpapered and newly carpeted with an interesting chandelier and massive table. The house has two parlours separated by pocket doors; beautiful, matching rooms for receptions, one of which was normally used as a ladies’ drawing room. Upstairs the visitor will see the master bedroom with its high-backed bed and dark furniture. Nearby there is a wonderful Victorian nursery, with its child-sized furniture and children’s toys. It is on this floor too, that visitors can see Davis’s office, a simple room for conducting the business of government.

You’re going to want to set aside at least two hours for these buildings… there is much to see. I can’t recommend this site for children; unless they are extremely precocious, they might find it a bit of a bore.