TRANSPORTATION and BRANDYWINE INDUSTRIES Ralph

TRANSPORTATION AND BRANDYWINE INDUSTRIES 1800-1840 Ralph D. Gray Hagley Museum June, 1957 PREFACE There is no lack of monographs upon the subject of transportation. It is a topic so wide in its compass, and so varied in its application, that countless approaches to the subject are possible* Many of these have been general and romantic, and deal primarily with the various types of transportation and their evolution, A few studies undertake an examination of the administration, cost, and swiftness of the movement of men and goods. The purpose of this paper is to study a small but industrially important area in order to examine its trans portation story in the light of national developments. Particular attention will be given to the arteries of transportation, the commercial and industrial use of these arteries, and how they changed and developed. Less time will be devoted to a study of the transportation vehicles themselves. This study represents the preliminary research on an important aspect of industrial history done for the Eleutherian Mills-Hagley Foundation, to which the author is deeply indebted. Much of the primary material has been gleaned from the archival and manuscript collections of the Foundation, Other valuable repositories for primary material are the Eistorical Society of Delaware, Wilmington, and the Delaware State Archives, Dover, The staffs at both institutions have ii been most helpful and courteous. I would also like to acknowledge the assistance, in the form of notes, suggestions, and criticisms, given me by Mr. Arlan K. Gilbert and Mr. Carroll W. Pursell, Eleutherian Mills- Hagley Foundation Fellows. Finally, Mr. Peter C. Welsh, Fellowship Coordinator of the Foundation, under whose direction this paper has been written, deserves and is heartily offered my sincere appreciation for his invaluable counsel and encouragement. iii SUMMARY The eighteenth century story of transportation in Delaware is largely one of water transportation. Roads were poor and remained so, probably neglected because the Delaware river and the numerous tide water streams which indent the eastern coast of Delaware provided adequate facilities. The obvious importance of transportation to trade, travel, and manufacturing led to a drive for improved arteries of communications in the early nineteenth century. The Brandywine valley actively participated in this national phenomenon, embodying in miniature most of the transportation improve ments made throughout the young nation. Canals were projected and steamboats operating in the area before 1800. Turnpikes, with their focal point at Wilmington, crisscrossed the valley early in the century; a railroad was constructed when the idea was still new in America. European wars and our own War of 1812 delayed some ten years the so-called era of internal improvements. Most of the improvements ef fected in Delaware saw completion after 1815. Nine turnpike companies were incorporated within seven years, 1808-1815, although none was completed prior to the latter date. Two canals, the Brandywine and the Chesapeake and Delaware, were planned in the eighteenth century, although final action concerning them came during the 1820!s: the former was abandoned in 1826 as inexpedient; the latter was at last completed in 1829. Regular, reliable steamboat service, which gradually improved with more and better vessels, first came to the lower Delaware river in vi 1812. That year the Vesta commenced scheduled runs between Wilmington and Philadelphia. Delaware's pioneer railroad, horse-operated at first, was constructed between New Castle and Frenchtown, Maryland, in 1831. The Philadelphia, Wilmington, and Baltimore railroad began oper ations in 1838. There is little evidence that the numerous Brandywine industries , I utilized the steamboat or the railroad as industrial carriers prior to * 18!|0. Using these faster but more expensive transportation facilities primarily for passenger service, the merchant and manufacturer continued to rely on sailing packets, such as those operated by Bush or Warner, to move bulk goods. The du Pont gunpowder manufactory in particular had to use the older transportation methods somewhat longer. Storage dif ficulties, prejudices or fears by shipper and passenger, and expense prevented the shipment of powder by steamboat or railway at first. Canals, however, frequently carried kegs of the explosive to distant cities. The transportation improvements effected in the Brandywine valley, of themselves, did nothing but enhance the value of the area as a manufacturing site. These same improvements elsewhere, however, per mitted areas less fortunate in natural advantages to lose that limitation of prohibitive transportation costs and to begin competition with the older manufacturing localities. Steam power made the Brandywine1 s unfailing water power less important. The railroad com pleted the steps freeing industrial growth from many of the natural limitations. vii CHAPTER I TRANSPORTATION AMD INDUSTRY Mien the Indian trail gets widened, graded, and bridged to a good road, there is a benefactor, there is a missionary, a pacificator, a wealth bringer, a maker of markets, a vent for industry,1 Ralph Waldo Emerson There are at least four primary considerations that an aspiring industrialist must make in determining the type, feasibility, and location of his establishment. He must have access to the necessary raw materials, a ready source of power, and a nearby market. In addition, of equal if not greater importance, he must have efficient, adequate, and economic transportation facilities. This is necessary in order to obtain the raw materials at the lowest possible costs, and in order to be able to pay the transport charges on the goods to market and still sell at a price which is competitive with other similar' goods. Only a relatively few articles could stand long overland trans port charges in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Most American processed or manufactured materials without access to in land or coastal waterways were excluded from the local markets by the prohibitive overland transportation charges. Goods could be shipped 3000 miles from England at less expense than similar goods could be 2 wagoned fifty miles over the roads of America in loOO, The importance of transportation to industry, agriculture, and commerce caused the problem to be vigorously attacked in the early -2- nineteenth century. The great distances of America had exercised a profound influence over its industrial advance, American colonists were isolated locally and internationally, American markets were so scattered that "they were commercially about as remote from the centers of colonial industry as from the ports of Great Britain,"-^ In the early decades of the nineteenth century, when transportation facilities were limited to rivers, the sea, turnpikes, and an occasional canal, the factory was limited in markets and in the area from which to get its raw aerials.11 Access to navigable waters still determined the location of mills and factories. Manufactories distant from navigable waters were purely local in nature, using local raw materials and selling in local markets. Overland communications, until the advent of the railroad, had little positive effect upon the growth and organization of manufactures. The turnpikes established by private companies failed to constitute a lengthy system of communications. The main highways paralleled water routes; none permitted economical freighting over long distances. Besides industrial ramifications, transportation or the lack of it manifested itself in administrative lines: Of all the t'/iings that stood in the way of a realization of the dreams of those who had made the Constitution none was more formidable than the difficulties of transportation which then beset the conveyor of men^ goods, information, or adminis trative orders,- In 1789 four million people were scattered along 1,200 miles of coast line and 1,000 miles inland, A thousand miles from north to south or -3- from east to west are formidable even today; in 1789 they were almost insuperable to the carrying on of any effective, centralized federal control.^ The romantic aspects of nineteenth century transportation must not divert attention from the more substantial achievements of the period: "The improvement of transportation within the nation and the development 7 of internal commerce." These changes were fundamental to the growth and unity of the United States as a governmental entity as well as to the development of industry. Kirkland believes that by 1800 the United States was well on its way towards being divided into two contrasting areas—the Atlantic seaboard and the inland regions—and that only a revolution in transportation could prevent this. Had not improved roads and canals, the steamboat, the railroad, and the telegraph come when they did, it is debatable whether the Union would have long continued. It is well to ponder upon this before "condemning Patrick Henry or Samuel Adams for their opposition to the establishment of a national government, or Washington for his dismal forebodings as to o his ability to carry on the work."'' Where the task was too great for local entities, governmental undertakings or assistance was enlisted. The resulting transportation revolution was the one example par excellence of public enterprise, 10 according to Kirkland. The early importance of water and water transportation to the American colonists can hardly be overestimated. Besides providing the highway to the new world, waterways continued to be the main artery of transportation for the colonists. Their first homes were built along the water. As could be expected, shipbuilding was an early colonial industry. Small watercraft were constructed as early as l6ll but no crafts that could be described as ships were made that early. It was in 1631 that the Blessing of the Bay was launched in New England. This first ship, a thirty-ton sloop built for Governor John Winthrop, was the masterpiece of a group of six shipwrights who came to Salem in 1629. Other ships followed in rapid succession. By 1700, over 1000 ships had been built in the New England colonies alone.

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