On May 4, 1865, Jefferson Davis arrived in Washington, Georgia, where he carried out what proved to be his last duties as President of the Confederate States of America. Soon afterward, accompanied by a small staff and escort, he left en route to the trans-Mississippi Department, hoping from there to negotiate a just peace. His party reached Sandersville about noon on May 6, where the last official business of the Confederate States Treasury was conducted. That evening they camped near Ball’s Ferry, but after learning of a threat to his family, traveling on a converging route some hours ahead, Davis chose to continue through the night over unfamiliar roads. He found them near the home of E. J. Blackshear, north of Dublin, on the road leading south from this point. After a hard journey by way of Dublin and Abbeville, they camped north of Irwinville in what is now Jefferson Davis Memorial State Park. At dawn on May 10, men of the 1st Wisconsin and 4th Michigan cavalry regiments of the U.S. surrounded his camp and took him prisoner, ending his hopes for a new nation in which each state would exercise its cherished Constitutional rights without interference.