Braxton Bragg - Postbellum Life

Postbellum Life

Bragg and Elise had lost their home in late 1862 when the plantation in Thibodaux was confiscated by the Federal Army. It briefly served as a shelter, the Bragg Home Colony, for freed slaves under the control of the Freedmen's Bureau. The couple moved in with his brother, a plantation owner in Lowndesboro, Alabama, but they found the life of seclusion there to be intolerable. In 1867 Bragg became the superintendent of the New Orleans waterworks, but he was soon replaced by an African-American as the Reconstructionists came to power. In late 1869 Jefferson Davis offered him a job as an agent for the Carolina Life Insurance Company. He worked there for four months before becoming dissatisfied with the profession and its low pay. He considered but rejected a position in the Egyptian Army. In August 1871 he was employed by the city of Mobile, Alabama, to improve the river, harbor, and bay, leaving after quarreling with a "combination of capitalists." Moving to Texas, he was appointed the chief engineer of the Gulf, Colorado, and Santa Fe Railroad in July 1874, but within a year disagreements with the board of directors over his compensation caused him to resign. He remained in Texas as inspector of railroads.

At the age of 59, Bragg was walking down a street with a friend in Galveston, Texas, when he suddenly fell over unconscious. Dragged into a drugstore, he was dead within 10 to 15 minutes. A physician familiar with his history believe that he "died by the brain" (or of "paralysis of the brain"), suffering from the degeneration of cerebral blood vessels. An inquest ruled that his death was due to "fatal syncope," possibly induced by organic disease of the heart. He is buried in Magnolia Cemetery, Mobile, Alabama.