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Legislating the Danville Connection, 1847-1862: Railroads and Regionalism Versus Nationalism in the Confederate States of America

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Legislating the Danville Connection, 1847-1862: Railroads and Regionalism Versus Nationalism in the Confederate States of America Virginia Commonwealth University VCU Scholars Compass Theses and Dissertations Graduate School 2014 Legislating the Danville Connection, 1847-1862: Railroads and Regionalism versus Nationalism in the Confederate States of America Philip Stanley Virginia Commonwealth University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd Part of the United States History Commons © The Author Downloaded from https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/etd/3510 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate School at VCU Scholars Compass. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of VCU Scholars Compass. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ©Philip W. Stanley 2014 All Rights Reserved Legislating the Danville Connection, 1847-1862: Railroads and Regionalism versus Nationalism in the Confederate States of America A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts at Virginia Commonwealth University. by Philip William Stanley Bachelor of Arts, Virginia Commonwealth University, 2011 Director: Dr. Kathryn Meier Associate Professor, Virginia Commonwealth University Department of History Virginia Commonwealth University Richmond, Virginia August 2014 ii Acknowledgments No major work is completed without the help of others. I would like to thank the following people for their assistance, support, and friendship during the past year while I completed this project. To David L. Bright, creator of csa-railroads.com, for responding to my emails in a timely fashion, for his suggestions, and his help tracking down the elusive Fifteenth Annual Report of the Richmond and Danville Railroad Company. To Sally S. Dickinson at the Watkinson Library at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, for her assistance and willingness to scan all one hundred pages of the Fifteenth Annual Report. To the librarians at the Rare Books Collection at the Earl Gregg Swem Library, College of William and Mary; the Southern Historical Collection, Louis Round Wilson Special Collections Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; the State Library of North Carolina, Raleigh; and the Library of Virginia, Richmond. To my fellow graduate students for their friendship and support. To Dr. Gregory Smithers for his help while I worked to find a topic and write the research prospectus. To Dr. John Kneebone and Dr. John Deal for agreeing to take time out of their busy schedules and serve on the defense committee. Thank you for your questions, suggestions, comments, and support. To Dr. Kathryn Meier, thesis advisor extraordinaire, for agreeing to be my advisor during a busy year at VCU. Words cannot express the help you have given and the thanks you deserve. Thank you for everything. To my family, the Neelys, Benefiels, and Stanleys, for their support and love. To my parents for their unending support and love during my entire college career. It’s been a long time, but I did it. To my wife, Leslie, for her willingness to listen to me drone on and on about railroads and the Civil War; her editorial abilities, making sure my punctuation and sentence structure actually made sense; and for her love and support while in school. I literally could not have done this without her. iii Table of Contents List of Figures…………………………………………………………………………………….iv Abstract……………………………………………………………………………………………v Introduction………………………………………………………………………………………..1 Chapter One: North Carolina and the Danville Connection, 1847-1861………………………...14 Chapter Two: Virginia and the Danville Connection, 1847-1861……………………………….46 Chapter Three: The Confederate Congress, North Carolina, Virginia and the Danville Connection, 1861-1862………………………………………………………………..77 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………...107 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………………111 iv List of Figures 1. Principal Railroads in Virginia and North Carolina, 1861………………...………………….13 2. Principal Rivers and East/West Regional Division……………...……………………………15 3. Greensboro and Vicinity……………………………………...……………………………….26 4. Virginia Railroads, 1861……...……………………………………………………………….47 5. Danville and Vicinity……………………...…………………………………………………..51 Abstract LEGISLATING THE DANVILLE CONNECTION, 1847-1862: RAILROADS AND REGIONALISM VERSUS NATIONALISM IN THE CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA By Philip W. Stanley, M.A. A Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts at Virginia Commonwealth University. Virginia Commonwealth University, 2014. Major Director: Dr. Kathryn Meier Associate Professor, Virginia Commonwealth University Department of History This thesis examines the effect regionalism had upon North Carolina and Virginia during the 1847-1862 legislative battles over the Danville, Virginia, to Greensboro, North Carolina, railroad connection. The first chapter examines the rivalry between eastern and western North Carolina for internal improvement legislation, namely westerners’ wish to connect with Virginia and easterners’ desire to remain economically relevant. The second chapter investigates the Tidewater region of Virginia and its battle against the Southside to create a rail connection with North Carolina. The third chapter examines the legislation for the Danville Connection during the American Civil War in the Virginia, North Carolina, and Confederate legislatures. Through an examination of voting patterns and public opinion, this thesis finds that, despite Confederate President Jefferson Davis’s designation of the Danville connection as a military necessity, regionalism overcame Confederate nationalism during this instance. Introduction Travelers zipping along the highway connecting Danville, Virginia, to Greensboro, North Carolina, may hardly notice the railroad tracks that follow closely alongside Route 29. Though only forty miles long, the line between Danville and Greensboro was a hotly contested piece of legislation in its day. The Piedmont Railroad (PRR), now owned by Norfolk Southern Railroad Company, was established in 1862 after numerous legislative battles in Virginia and North Carolina spanning fifteen years, between 1847 and 1862. In order to prevent the isolation of Richmond from the rest of the Confederacy, the Danville Connection, as the PRR was locally known, was proposed as another route to guarantee the city’s accessibility. Richmond, with four railroads terminating within the city limits, was not necessarily isolated. The city’s capture was one of the early primary objectives for a Northern victory; this required the consideration by Confederate authorities of every available option for the city’s survival. Though there was already one railroad running south into North Carolina, the construction of another connection was paramount for the city’s survival. It would seem that legislation for a rail connection of such vital importance to the war would quickly pass, and that North Carolina and Virginia would come together to forge this connection to improve the chances of a Southern victory. In examining the voting patterns of the antebellum legislatures of North Carolina and Virginia, however, and comparing those patterns to the Civil War legislatures of the two states, as well as the Confederate Congressional delegates, it becomes clear that voting patterns remained largely unchanged, despite Confederate President Jefferson 1 Davis’s call for the connection as a “military necessity.” Despite war the populations of Virginia and North Carolina remained steadfast in protecting their economic interests. Confederate nationalism was not strong enough to overcome regional jealousies within and between Virginia and North Carolina. Rather, the PRR bill only passed the North Carolina General Assembly because of the impending invasion of the state by Union General Ambrose Burnside. Revealed during an examination of the legislative battles over the PRR, nationalism’s failure to trump regionalism is evident. On the national level Confederate politicians spoke of sustaining the Southern way of life, protecting slavery and states’ rights, and possibly dying for the cause. Regionally, local politicians and the populace concerned themselves over more personal matters, anxieties that were ingrained in the regional population’s consciousness. Confederate nationalism sought to unite the Southern population in its fight against a common foe. Regionalism, so long a part of the local culture, was a deterrent to the success of nationalism. More tangent and immediate concerns trumped the required sacrifices needed for the survival of the ephemeral idea of the Confederate nation. The story of the PRR is tied closely to the two states it would connect: North Carolina and Virginia. Both states harbored geographic and financial rivalries that influenced railroad construction. The steam-powered railroad was introduced in the United States during the mid- 1820s. By the end of the 1830s, the United States boasted over 5,000 miles of line, with roughly 1,200 miles located south of the Mason-Dixon Line. North Carolina, while bitten by the railroad bug, did not construct as many railroads as did other states of the Union. Although the North Carolina legislature chartered a number of railroads by 1835, only two received funds to begin construction. This dearth of railroads, along with the generally poor state of North Carolina’s 2 commerce, manufacturing, and agriculture, was the reason the state was dubbed the “Rip Van Winkle State” by the rest of the country. Between 1840
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