Memoir 1, Page 99, 'It Will Be a Bloodless Revolution'

"When the South says she will secede and become a distinct nationality, the North will be glad to let us go and that peaceably."

This quote that Woods attributes to Davis can only be found in a book called The Pictorial Book of Anecdotes of the War of the Rebellion, published in 1866. This book was published multiple times, with extra words being added to its massive subheading throughout the years. While the first edition claimed that it contained “the most brilliant and remarkable anecdotal events of the Great Conflict in the United States: Heroic, Patriotic, Political, Romantic, Humorous, and Tragical,” by the time it was published in 1891, the same subheading instead stated that it contained “the funny and pathetic side of the war.” Regardless of the title change, both contain the quote from Jefferson Davis that is recorded here, in which Davis is said to have boasted in 1854 that the North would never fight the South’s separation and Washington, DC would belong to the slave-holding half. Complete copies of both editions can be found on Google Books, with this quote found on pages 642-643.