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Vicissitudes of the South Carolina Railroad, 1865-1878: A Case Study in Reconstruction and Regional Traffic Development
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 July 2012
Extract
The Best Friend of Charleston was a famous locomotive engine, but the real best friend of Charleston was the engine's owner, the South Carolina Railroad. Together the city and the railroad faced and endured the rigors of Reconstruction; both held fast to an ante-bellum dream of regional dominance. The railroad made bold moves to acquire the trunk lines and feeder systems that would make Charleston a Gateway to the West. But frustrating forces were at work. Developing traffic patterns did not favor Charleston, and profligate multiplication of competing lines cut into existing business. Rate agreements and pooling arrangements gave the company only mild relief at best. By 1878 Charleston had resigned itself to its role as a local trading center, and the SCRR was in bankruptcy, the victim of circumstances too powerful for even the most competent of managements to combat.
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- Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 1956
References
1 This article is a product of research conducted by the author with the financial aid of the Research Committee of the University of Alabama. For other kinds of assistance the author is indebted especially to the South Caroliniana Library, the Charleston Library Society, the Library of the Bureau of Railway Economics of the Association of American Railroads, the Southern Freight Association, the Southern Railway Company, and the Central of Georgia Railway Company. An abridged version of this account was read at a joint meeting of the Lexington Group and the American Historical Association in Washington, D. C., on Dec. 28, 1955.
2 The company building the Charleston-Augusta line (which terminated for many years after 1833 at Hamburg, on the South Carolina side of the Savannah River, opposite Augusta) was the South Carolina Canal and Rail Road Company. The branch to Columbia was built by an affiliate, the Louisville, Cincinnati, and Charleston Rail Road Company. The two were merged in 1844 to form the South Carolina Rail Road Company, which, with its antecedents and its property, is here for convenience referred to as the “South Carolina Railroad.” For a comprehensive history see Derrick, Samuel Melanchthon, Centennial History of South Carolina Railroad (Columbia, S. C., 1930)Google Scholar. This book contains interesting photographs. Useful also on the company's early history is Phillips, U. B., A History of Transportation in the Eastern Cotton Belt to 1860 (New York, 1908)Google Scholar. See also Phillips, U. B., “Transportation in the Ante-Bellum South,” in Quarterly Journal of Economics, II (May, 1905), 434 ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar.
3 Annual report of the South Carolina Railroad for the year ending December 31, 1865, in “Affairs of the Southern Railroads,” House Report No. 34, 39th Congress, 2d Sess. (1866–67), p. 1036; testimony of W. J. Magrath in House Report No. 3, 40th Congress, 2d Sess., p. 33.
4 House Report No. 34, 39th Congress, 2d Sess., p. 1036.
5 Ibid., pp. 1055, 1057.
6 Ibid., pp. 1035–57, passim; at p. 1057 is an elaborate table showing the condition of each of the engines on December 31, 1865, when only seven appeared to be both serviceable and available.
7 Ibid.; Proceedings of the Stockholders of the South Carolina Railroad Company, and of the South-Western Railroad Bank, at their Annual Meeting in the City of Charleston, on the 12th and 13th February, 1867 (Charleston, 1867)Google Scholar; Annual Reports and Statements of the South Carolina Railroad Co. for the Year Ending December 31st, 1868 (Charleston, 1869)Google Scholar.
8 Proceedings of the Columbia and Augusta and Charlotte and South Carolina, and the Charlotte, Columbia and Augusta Railroad Company Held at Columbia, S. C., July 7 and 8, 1869 (Columbia, 1869)Google Scholar, passim; Proceedings of the Stockholders of the South Carolina Railroad Company, and of the Southwestern Railroad Bank, at their Annual Meeting, in the City of Charleston, 8th and 9th February, 1870, with the Annual Reports and Statements of the South Carolina Railroad Company, for the Year ending December 31st, 1869 (Charleston, 1870), p. 15.Google Scholar
9 Proceedings of the Stockholders of the Charlotte, Columbia & Augusta Railroad Company, at their Second Annual Meeting, Held at Columbia, S. C., May 3, 1871 (Columbia, 1871), p. 4Google Scholar; Annual Reports and Statements of the South Carolina Railroad Company for the Year Ending December 31, 1871 (Charleston, 1872), pp. 3, 5Google Scholar.
10 Reports of the Directors, &c. of the Georgia Rail Road & Banking Company, to the Stockholders in Convention, May 12, 1880 (Augusta, 1880), p. 6Google Scholar. The Macon and Augusta had always been operated by the Georgia Railroad.
11 Southern Railway Security Company, Organization and Charter of the Southern Railway Security Company (n.p., 1871), pp. 4, 20.
12 Ibid.
13 The Charleston News and Courier, April 14, 1872, called the purchase “a masterly stroke.”
14 Poor's Manual of the Railroads, 1874–75, p. 518. Some of this investment was regained, for the annual report for 1877 shows an involvement of only $549,530.90. Annual Reports and Statements of the South Carolina Railroad Co. for the Year Ending December 31st, 1877 (Charleston, 1878)Google Scholar.
15 Railroad Gazette, III (Dec. 16, 1871), 387Google Scholar.
16 Minutes of Directors, Central Railroad and Banking Company of Georgia, Dec. 15, 26, 1871, Feb. 27, 1872 (MS in possession of Central of Georgia Railway Company, Savannah); Proceedings of the Stockholders of the South Carolina Railroad Company and of the Southwestern Railroad Bank, at their Annual Meeting, in the City of Charleston, on the 8th and 9th of April, 1873 (Charleston, 1873), pp. iv–viiiGoogle Scholar.
17 Minutes of Directors, Central Railroad and Banking Company of Georgia, Feb. 27, 1872.
18 Railroad Gazette, IV (March 9, 1872), 107Google Scholar.
19 Report of Directors, &c. of the Georgia Rail Road & Banking Company, to the Stockholders in Convention, May 8, 1878 (Augusta, 1878), pp. 8–9Google Scholar. The Port Royal Railroad defaulted on its bond interest in Nov., 1873, and was sold in foreclosure on June 6, 1878.
20 Poor's Manual of the Railroads, 1873–74, p. 342.
21 The Savannah and Charleston entered receivership on April 28, 1874.
22 Richmond and Danville Railroad Company, Report of Special Investigating Committee Appointed under Resolution Adapted by the Stockholders at the Annual Meeting held in the City of Richmond, Dec. 8, 1875 (n. p., 1876), p. 7.
23 Proceedings of the Stockholders of the South Carolina Railroad Company, and of the South-Western Railroad Bank, at their Annual Meeting in the City of Charleston, on the 12th and 13th February, 1867 (Charleston, 1867), p. 16Google Scholar.
24 Annual Reports and Statements of the South Carolina Railroad Co. for the Year Ending December 31st, 1868 (Charleston, 1869), p. 2Google Scholar.
25 Proceedings of the Stockholders of the South Carolina Railroad Company, and of the Southwestern Railroad Bank, at their Annual Meeting, in the City of Charleston, 8th and 9th February, 1870, with the Annual Reports and Statements of the South Carolina Railroad Company, for the Year ending December 31st, 1869 (Charleston, 1870), p. 15Google Scholar. Passenger fares were reduced in Nov., 1869, from 5 to 4 cents per mile.
26 Proceedings of the Stockholders of the South Carolina Railroad Company, and of the Southwestern Railroad Bank, at the Adjourned Meeting, 3d May, 1870, and at their Annual Meeting, in the City of Charleston, on the 14th and 15th February, 1871 (Charleston, 1871), p. 18Google Scholar.
27 Annual Reports and Statements of the South Carolina Railroad Company for the Year Ending December 31, 1871 (Charleston, 1872), p. 2Google Scholar.
28 Proceedings of the Stockholders of the South Carolina Railroad Company and of the Southwestern Railroad Bank, at their Annual Meeting, in the City of Charleston, on the 8th and 9th April, 1873 (Charleston, 1873), p. 1Google Scholar.
29 Annual Reports and Statements of the South Carolina Railroad Company for the Year ending December 31st, 1874 (Charleston, 1875), p. 8Google Scholar.
30 “Proceedings of the Convention of Southern Railroads and Steamship Lines held at Atlanta, June 30, 1875,” in Circular Letters of the Southern Railway and Steamship Association, XXI (Series of 1886–1887), 1655–56Google Scholar; telegram of Joseph E. Brown, President of the Southern Railway and Steamship Association, to the presidents of member lines, July 8, 1875, ibid., p. 1665; “Proceedings of the Convention of Southern Railroads and Steamship Lines held in Atlanta, July 22, 1875,” ibid., p. 1667.
31 Annual Reports and Statements of the South Carolina Railroad Co. for the Year Ending December 31st, 1877 (Charleston, 1878), p. 4Google Scholar.
32 Annual Reports and Statements of the South Carolina Railroad Company for the Year ending December 31st, 1874 (Charleston, 1875), Table A, folded in back.Google Scholar
33 Charleston News and Courier, April 10, 1877.
34 Ibid.
35 Annual Reports and Statements of the South Carolina Railroad Co. for the Year Ending December 31, 1877 (Charleston, 1878), p. 7Google Scholar.
36 Charleston News and Courier, Sept. 9, 1878.
37 Ibid., Sept. 10, 1878.
38 Ibid., Sept. 9, 1878