USA > North Carolina > History of North Carolina: The Federal Period 1783-1860, Volume II > Part 28
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altogether, by farmers in the west, whose new rich lands enable them to produce it with less labour and expense." On the other hand, consumption of imported goods did not decline in proportion to the decline of agricultural values, so resulting in a depression of trade balances. The notes of North Carolina banks were sold at a discount in 1828 and the banks themselves were facing liquidation. "This creates a distress that impels thousands of our citizens to abandon their homes and their hopes in their native state, and seek relief abroad, where better prospects are opened to them. If, in transplanting themselves from their native soil, they bet- ter their condition, it is certain that their friends who remain behind are left in a worse condition."
The remedy suggested for the situation thus presented was an economic reform that would "enable us to buy less and sell more-that will enable us to supply within ourselves, our own wants and necessities. But how is this important revolution to be accomplished? We unhesitatingly answer, by introducing the Manufacturing System and fabricating at least to the extent of our own wants. We go further. Instead of sending off at great expense our raw material, convert it into fabrics at home, and in that state bring it into market. * But the profits arising from the process of convert- ing the raw material are not the only advantages attending the system. Another is, that it will take from agriculture some of the surplus labor, and turn it into other pursuits. It will convert producers into consumers, and thus create at home, in the bosom of the community, good markets for the products of the farmer." 1
Even before the legislative report pioneer factories had been started. As early as 1802 cotton spinning machines were reported at Fayetteville. The Schenck mill near Lincolnton had been in operation since 1813. In 1820 another factory was built at Rocky Mount, Edgecombe County, with approxi- mately 2,000 spindles, in which negro labor was used until 1851. A smaller mill was built near Lincolnton in 1822. In
1 Report on the establishment of cotton and woolen manufactures, etc., January 1, 1828.
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1825 a cotton factory was erected at Fayetteville. In 1830 the Mount Hecla Mill at Greensboro was opened, and in 1837 Holt and Carrigan started another factory at Alamance Creek. Some years before 1840 Francis Fries and the Salem Manufacturing Co. were engaged in the manufacture of cot- ton goods. The census of 1840 listed twenty-five cotton mills located as follows: eight in Cumberland County, three in Orange, two in Randolph, and one each in Chatham, Caswell, Davie, Davidson, Edgecombe, Guilford, Lincoln, Montgomery, Rockingham, Richmond, Surry, and Stokes.
OLD ALAMANCE MILL, BURLINGTON, NORTH CAROLINA, AND ITS FOUNDER, EDWIN M. HOLT
The first colored cotton fabric in the South was woven in this mill. It was built in 1837. Today North Carolina leads all the states in number of cotton mills.
This nascent industrialism was the subject of comment by the press at home and abroad. Said the editor of the Raleigh Register in 1840: "The enterprise of the citizens of this state is rapidly enabling it to become independent of the North in almost every branch of manufacture. It has now more factories than were ten years ago in the whole South." In 1843 the editor of Niles Register declared that a "complete revolution in the trade of cotton yarns has been effected in North Carolina within a few years by the establishment of a Vol. II-22
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HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
number of factories in that state. Prior to the year 1836, immense quantities of the article were imported into the state from the North. In that year a factory was established in Fayetteville; others were soon after established throughout the state; and now, instead of drawing their supplies from abroad, large quantities are now exported. In Fayetteville, there are six factories which cost about $347,000. Three of these manufacture brown sheetings; the fourth has just com- menced to weave heavy Osnaburgs, weighing a half pound to the yard; the other two make yarns only. Sheetings, shirt- ings, and bagging manufacture there have acquired a reputa- tion second to none." The manufacturing revival was not limited to cotton. Three woolen mills were established, two in Davie, and one in Stokes. Distilleries supplying the whole- sale trade were numerous, 2,802 reported in 1840 producing over 1,000,000 gallons of liquor. Tanneries and lumber mills were also productive. The following table represents the general progress of manufacturing from 1840 to 1860 :
Year
No. Establishments
Capital
Products
1840
$3,838,900*
$ 3,571,321
1850
2,663
7,456,860
9,111,050
1860
3,689
9,693,703
16,678,698
Leading Industries in 1860
Name of Industry No. Establishments Capital
Products
Cotton Goods.
39
$1,272,750
$1,046,047
Flour and Meal Mills
639
1,719,823
4,354,309
Distilled Turpentine.
461
1,113,778
4,358,878
Crude Turpentine .
.
1,065
939,448
952,542
Tobacco
97
646,730
1,117,099
Lumber, sawed
330
742,420
1,074,003
* Incomplete, for liquors not included.
Concerning management, labor, and other important prob- lems of industry, little is known. Most of the factories were owned and operated by private manufacturers, while in South Carolina and in Georgia the corporate type dominated. The average profits in 1845 were reported to be 14 per cent. Labor was cheap-about 50 cents a day-and this was one of the in-
339
HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
ducements to capitalists mentioned in the legislative report of 1828. It was also held that negro labor proved more effi- cient and less costly than white labor in New England. Mr. Donaldson, owning a cotton mill at Fayetteville, was quoted as holding that negro labor was "not only equal to whites in aptness to learn and skill to execute, but, all things considered, he actually prefers them." Mr. Donaldson further stated that he had had several superintendents from the North, and all of them, with the exception of one, decidedly preferred black help, as they called it, to white. "With the black there is no turning out for wages, and no time lost in visiting musters and other public exhibitions." In spite of these ad- vantages negro labor was rarely used. Yet the task of recruit- ing white laborers was not an easy one. The operators came mainly from the farms; they were individualists, seek- ing better economic advantages, and hoping some day to rise to the planter class. Their residence at the mills was not always permanent, and they were liable to become restless under the supervision of the mill bosses. Gradually a class of permanent workers was built up who were willing to adopt mill labor as a life occupation. In 1850 the average annual wage was $163.
Extending through the periods of domestic manufactures and the nascent factory system was the lumber and naval stores industry. The exploitation of the long leaf pine region along the coast began in the eighteenth century. Tar, pitch, and turpentine, produced by the same methods used by the ancient Greeks, were shipped to England principally through Norfolk and Wilmington. "The crude turpentine was brought down the rivers on rafts and small boats from as high as Edgecombe county to Washington, from Wayne to Newbern, and from all northern tributaries of the Cape Fear river to Wilmington, and was distilled in crude iron stills partly at the shipping points, partly in Philadelphia and New York, and much also went to England to be there dis- tilled. The spirits of turpentine usually found quick sales and good prices except when over-production took place, and was preferred in France even to the Bordeaux turpentine, which was made in the department of the Landes in Gascony,
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HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
being less odorous and more uniform in quality than that. The rosin manufactured was worth very little, getting down as low as 25 cents a barrel and then so low it would not pay to handle it. The tar and pitch manufactured at first gave general satisfaction and were made in large quantities." 2 Gradually the industry declined in the northeastern coun- ties and was concentrated in those of the southeast. By 1800 Wilmington was one of the largest shipping points in the world for turpentine and tar, the amount of crude turpentine shipped in 1804 being 77,000 barrels.
As the forests of the coastal region were exhausted, the industry moved inland. By 1844 Fayetteville had a turpen- tine distillery to which was shipped the crude turpentine pro- duced in Harnett, Cumberland, Chatham and Moore coun- ties. In spite of the extension of the industry into states further south, North Carolina in 1860 was the source of 70 per cent of all the turpentine produced in the United States.
Lumber was another product. Wilmington in the eight- eenth century made shipments to the West Indies, and from the Albemarle section staves were exported in quantity. After 1840 the business declined, due to the exhaustion of the forests of the coastal region; thereafter production was mainly for home consumption.
With the opening of the nineteenth century began the ex- ploitation of mineral resources. Gold deposits were dis- closed in three regions ; in Franklin County, to a greater de- gree in the central piedmont plateau, and also along the foot of the Blue Ridge. According to tradition the metal was first mined in the present boundaries of Gaston County prior to the Revolution, while the Cherokee Indians are said to have found gold in the mountain region long before their removal from the state. The first recorded discovery of gold was in Mecklenburg County in 1799 by Conrad Reed. From 1804 to 1827 North Carolina mines were the source of all the gold produced in the United States. Yet the area of pro- duction before 1825 was not extensive; Olmsted declared that
2 Ashe, The Forests, Forest Lands and Forest Products of Eastern North Carolina, p. 74.
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HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
the gold area was approximately 1,000 square miles, includ- ing the greater part of Montgomery, the northern part of Anson, the northeastern corner of Mecklenburg, western Cabarrus, and a corner of Rowan and Randolph counties. After 1825 a much larger area was mined, for Doctor Emmons in 1856 also enumerated mines in Davidson, Burke, Union, Stanly, Catawba, and Guilford counties. Down to 1838 the amount of North Carolina gold coined in the United States mint amounted to $2,891,792. A large amount of the metal was also used in the jeweler's trade and was even shipped to Europe. Wrote the geologist Rothe in 1826: "It is well known that but a small portion of the gold found at these mines goes to the mint: The silversmiths of every portion of the country, north and south, purchase it up to be wrought into jewelry and plate of all descriptions. It is preferred by them on many accounts to gold coin and consequently they give a better price than the mint." 3 But the drain of labor to the Southwest and the discovery of gold in California caused a decline in the industry in North Carolina. Over- capitalization, speculation, and wasteful methods of mining also characterized gold industry; yet the first use of the hy- draulic process in the South, probably in the nation, was at the mines of W. H. Vandyke in Burke County, about 1850. The conversion of bullion into coin was a difficulty on account of the long distance to Philadelphia. Hence in 1831 Christian Bechtler, a German jeweller living near Rutherfordton, began to coin gold into one, two and one-half, and five dollar pieces. In the nine years from 1831 to 1840 he coined $2,241,840.50. As this was a violation of federal authority the United States Government made an investigation, but finding that the Bechtler coins were heavier than those made by the federal mint, and realizing the need of specie in the piedmont section, there was no prosecution and the Bechtler mint remained in operation until 1857. In 1835 Congress authorized the estab- lishment of a Government Mint at Charlotte, which began operation in 1837.
Iron was also discovered and mined. Deposits were found
3 American Journal of Science, 1828.
134 0
JOH AO
1
250
DIE USED BY BECHTLER, ALSO $2.50 GOLD PIECE COINED BY BECHTLER
343
HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
in the bog lands of the east and also in three belts, one in Chatham County, a second extending through Montgomery and Guilford to the Virginia line, and the third in Lincoln and Gaston counties. As early as 1729 small shipments were sent to England from the bog ore deposits. As immigration moved into the piedmont region, production increased; forges were erected along the Cape Fear, the Deep, and the Yadkin rivers. The Revolution stimulated production and during the conflict forges were built in Guilford (Franklin Furnace), Cleveland (near King's Mountain), Lincoln (Union Forge), and Stokes (Snow Creek). After 1800 the iron industry increased and in 1859 there were in operation forty-nine bloomeries and six charcoal furnaces. However, production was for the home market, and when railway transportation developed com- petition with larger fields elsewhere caused a decline rather than an expansion of the industry.
Coal, the handmaid of iron, was also disclosed in two local- ities; along Deep River, principally in Moore and Chatham counties, and along the Dan River region in Rockingham and Stokes counties. Mines were opened as early as the Revolu- tion but there was practically no attempt at exploitation of the coal deposits until the decade prior to 1860. Then an investigation of Doctor Emmons, state geologist, and reports by Colonel T. T. S. Laidley and Captain Charles Wilkes on be- half of the United States Government attracted wide atten- tion. The coal of the Egypt mines in Chatham County was de- clared equal to the best New Castle coal, excellent for the manufacture of gas, and less expensively mined than the coal of Pennsylvania. Considerable capital was invested. A railroad was projected from Fayetteville to the coal fields of Chatham, others from the coal region to Raleigh and to the South Carolina linc, and from the Dan River region to the Raleigh and Gaston and to Greensboro.
Other minerals were also disclosed. About 1830 silver ore was mined, principally in Davidson County. There the Washington Mine or King's Mine, later the Silver Hill, Con- rad Hill, Peters Mine, Cross Mine, and the Emmons Mine, also Ward's Mine in Davie and McMackin's in Cabarrus, were all widely known and attracted considerable capital,
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HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
especially in the decade from 1850 to 1860. But the lack of ยท improved machinery and the presence of other minerals kept silver mining from becoming profitable. Lead was also found, especially in the neighborhood of silver ore, notably in David- son County ; likewise zinc. Soapstone was mined in Chatham, copper in Guilford and Randolph. Experiments with graph- ite were made in Wake and Lincoln counties. Corundum was noted as early as 1846. A few diamonds were discovered before 1860 but no systematic search for gems was made until after 1865.
An important phase of the prosperity between 1850 and 1860 was the improvement in transportation facilities. The first two railroads, the Wilmington and Raleigh and the Raleigh and Gaston, not only served the public, but paid. dividends after 1850. The construction of the North Carolina Railroad stimulated the popular imagination and it also en- joyed a large patronage. In fact a new wave of agitation for state aid to further improvement of transportation began about 1852. The people of the mountain counties clamored for rail communication with the piedmont and the east. Since the Raleigh and Gaston and the Wilmington and Raleigh rail- ways fed the Virginia markets and the North Carolina Rail- road, through its terminus at Charlotte, fed the markets of South Carolina, the old argument for a great home-market city was revived. Such a market, it was argued, should be built up at Beaufort, which was reported to have the best harbor between Norfolk and Charleston. There imports from Europe would be received, so cutting off the profits of Nor- folk and the Northern merchants, and also the products of the state would be exported to Europe direct. Fayetteville and Wilmington also demanded consideration; the former a connection with the coal and iron counties, the latter aid in meeting the competition of the markets of upper South Car- olina. Likewise the people of the tobacco belt along the Vir- ginia line, the planters of the Albemarle region, and the large cotton producing counties of the middle east demanded better transportation. Neither political party dared obstruct the movement, for both whigs and democrats were bidding for support over the issues of manhood suffrage and a constitu-
345
HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
tional convention. Moreover a state-wide system of internal improvements fitted in well with the rising tide of section- alism. Said Governor Reid in his inaugural address of 1854: "There never was a time when there existed a stronger neces- sity for self reliance. The North during the last twenty-five years in the way of protection and other unjust taxation, has extorted from North Carolina more money than would have been required to improve all our rivers and construct all our railroads. The farmer and other classes need cheap trans- portation and convenient markets where they can carry their property with safety. They need commercial and manufac- turing towns and cities at home, with shipping to do their own importing and exporting, without continuing longer to pay tribute to the North."
The scheme of paramount importance was for eastern and western extensions of the North Carolina Railroad, the former to connect Goldsboro with Beaufort, the latter Salis- bury with the mountain region. If this were carried through the dream of Joseph Caldwell, a generation before, for an all-state route from the mountains to the sea would be real- ized. In the legislature of 1852 bills for state aid to this and other projects were defeated: but two companies were char- tered, the Atlantic and North Carolina and the Western; the former had an authorized capital of $900,000, the latter of $3,000,000. In the campaign of 1854 both political parties endorsed state aid to these enterprises. Consequently in the succeeding legislature not only the extension plans but a variety of other schemes were introduced as worthy of state aid. The Fayetteville interests favored connection of the west with the coast by a line from Beaufort via Warsaw, on the Wilmington and Raleigh, to Fayetteville, thence through the Deep River mineral region to Greensboro, on the North Caro- lina Railroad. The Wilmington influence demanded a road from Wilmington along the South Carolina line to the moun- tain region. The tobacco counties of the Dan River section asked for a road connecting them with the Raleigh and Gaston at Henderson. The North Carolina Railroad sought increased state aid, while the eastern interests demanded river improve- ment and a canal to the Chesapeake Bay. The response of
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HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
the legislature was liberal. The North Carolina road re- ceived a new subscription of $1,000,000 for preferred stock, the state thus coming into ownership of three-fourths of the entire stock, and the charter of the corporation was so amended as to give the state eight of the twelve directors. The plea of Fayetteville for connection with Beaufort and the west was of no avail; on the other hand, the capitalization of the Atlantic and North Carolina was increased to $1,600,000, the state subscribing two-thirds, no payment to fall due until the remaining one-third had been subscribed and at least $300,000 paid in, both state and private subscriptions to be advanced simultaneously in four installments. In return the state was to select eight of the twelve directors. For the western extension of the North Carolina road a new charter was given under the name Western North Carolina Railroad. The corporation was authorized to issue stock to the amount of $6,000,000, the state to subscribe for two-thirds; the con- struction of the road was to proceed by divisions, the eastern and the western, and the eastern division was to be com- pleted before work on the western should begin. The state's subscription was to be met by the issue of bonds, for which a mortgage on the road was to be taken. The state was also to be represented by a proxy at the meetings of stock holders and was to appoint eight of the twelve directors. For the Wilmington interests, and as a stroke at the South Caro- lina market towns, the Wilmington, Charlotte, and Ruther- fordton was chartered, with a capital of $2,000,000, the state to endorse $200,000 of its bonds for each unit of twenty-five miles completed. Evidently the North Carolina Railroad and the Wilmington and Raleigh interests dominated the railroad appropriations, for state aid was extended only to lines which would feed the existing roads.
The construction of these new lines raised unexpected problems. Under the charters towns and counties were al- lowed to make stock subscriptions. This aroused local oppo- sition but the provisions were sustained by the Supreme Court. In the location of the eastern terminus of the At- lantic and North Carolina, there was division of opinion between the directors and the citizens of Beaufort; the re-
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HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
sult was that Carolina City and Sheppard's Point were chosen. Individual stockholders paid their subscriptions slowly and the Atlantic and North Carolina Company was forced to raise money by loans. In 1857 the state was ap- pealed to, and further aid was given through a loan of $400,000 in the form of bonds, for which a mortgage on the road was taken; a sinking fund was also provided for from the road's income. The bonds were sold by the company at a loss of $114,269. However the road, ninety-five miles in length, was completed in January, 1858. It proved to be serviceable and profitable; its business in 1860 amounted to $100,000, its profit of $35,000 going into the sinking fund.
Greater difficulties and complications arose in the con- struction of the Western North Carolina. The first divi- sion, it was provided by the company, should extend from Salisbury to Burke County. But it was soon discovered that if the road passed through the town of Newton, as planned, the funds would be exhausted before Morganton was reached. Therefore Burke County subscribers refused to make good their subscriptions and the Newton subscribers protested against any discrimination against their town. By a com- promise the legislature directed that the terminus of the east- ern division be Morganton, that a branch line be constructed to Newton, and that extra subscription of stock be allowed by individuals and the state to meet the cost. By 1860 the road was completed and in operation to Morganton. In the meantime the question of a terminus for the western division had to be decided. One plan, also the cheapest, was to locate this at Paint Rock where connection would be made with the East Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia Railroad; the other was to build via Waynesville to Ducktown, so opening up a large section of mountain country and connecting at the latter point with the Georgia and Blue Ridge Railroad. Although the estimated cost from Asheville to Ducktown was $35,000,- 000, the latter plan was adopted, so providing for a through line of track from the Tennessee line to Beaufort. The ques- tion of the Paint Rock connection was left to the Greenville and French Broad Company, which planned a road from
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HISTORY OF NORTH CAROLINA
South Carolina via Asheville down the French Broad River. Plans of construction on both lines were interrupted by war.
Construction of the Wilmington, Charlotte and Ruther- fordton, to which state aid was given in 1854, was not speedy or satisfactory. The counties between Wilmington and the Pee Dee and those between Charlotte and Rutherfordton were enthusiastic; but the counties of the Pee Dee section feared that money subscribed by them would be used in the con- struction of other sections of the track. Hence the company decided to divide the construction into three sections, the first extending from Wilmington to the Pee Dee, the second from the Pee Dee to Charlotte, and the third from Charlotte to Rutherfordton. Construction was begun in 1857 and by the close of 1860 the line had been completed seventy miles west from Wilmington, and from Charlotte west to the Catawba River. But the Pee Dee counties were laggard; their sub- scriptions were not sufficient to carry on the work. The legislature was therefore appealed to and a loan of $966,000 was authorized, $660,000 to be used to finish the track east of Charlotte and $300,000 west, the security taken being bonds of the railroad. The plea of the directors of the road in ask- ing for this aid contained a double appeal. The first was based on desire for economic independence from the South Carolina market towns. "Almost the entire line," they said, "has heretofore been and still is dependent upon the tender mercies of South Carolina for their transportation and their market, and this road will release them from burdensome ex- actions and unwilling vassalage. At Charlotte, at one single depot our citizens pay annually for transportation over $100,- 000 and this to Columbia alone, and $130,000 more will not cover the tax they pay to South Carolina roads to reach Charleston. Other contributions are levied on us at Cheraw, at Camden, Yorkville, Spartanburg, and Greenville. Why should our state thus contribute to enrich our southern neighbors? Why contribute to employ the laborers on their roads, to purchase their timber, and their fuel-pay their conductors, engineers, agents and employees-their draymen, their wharfmen, their commission merchants and add to her commerce on the ocean? Why should this dependence
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