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Travel on Southern Antebellum Railroads 1828-1860 by Eugene Alvarez
Travel on Southern Antebellum Railroads 1828-1860 by Eugene Alvarez
Soft Cover
221 pages
Copyright 1974
CONTENTS
Prefaceviii
1 The Introduction of the Railroad1
2 The Railroad Mania Continues to Grow14
3 Engines of Smoke, Fire, and Cinders26
4 The Railroad Passenger Car47
5 The Hazardous Roadway68
6 The Perils of the Road81
7 The Railroad Station107
8 Society in the Cars126
9 Traveling Through the South150
Epilogue164
Appendix168
Notes176
Bibliography 203
Index215
PREFACE
The antebellum railroad in the South, as well as in all of America, was a phenomenon which provided a moving, restless population with the mixed blessings of much-needed speed and dirty discomfort. To many people it was retrograde, a step backward rather than forward. Citizens frequently complained that the wood-burning engines frightened their horses, set fire to their silos, and produced an awesome death rate unmatched anywhere in the world. However, despite the hazards, most Americans welcomed the "iron horse" as a means to prosperity for rural and urban communities alike. Steel rails, they reckoned, would connect isolated plantations with ports of trade, bringing affluence to all concerned. In fact, the first significant railroads were built from coastal cities to the hinterland in order to capture the inland trade; that is, to deliver cotton and other agricultural commodities to a world market which meant dollars in Southern pocketbooks.
Although passenger travel was of secondary importance in antebellum railroading, many travelers, particularly those from abroad, were drawn to the South for several reasons: slavery, a highly controversial topic; the reputation of Southerners as genteel, aristocratic hosts, particularly open-hearted to Western Europeans; and of course the natural beauty and salubrious climate of the region. However, because of the emotional impact of these factors, and a not infrequent personal prejudice on the part of travelers, both domestic and foreign, their accounts are not always to be accepted without reservations.
The American of the first half of the last century took great pride in his railroads. Fiercely nationalistic, he viewed the spreading network of rails throughout his new and growing country as concrete evidence of power, of prestige, of economic prowess in world economy. Even more important perhaps, at least socially, was the ever-surging spirit of democracy rampant on the railroads. There, no class structure, no social caste applied-only pure, raw, down-to-earth democracy was evident. The rail car was one of America's greatest economic and social levellers. Foreigners were always amazed at the absence of class distinctions in the new nation and frequently marvelled at the crudeness, coarseness, even vulgarity, expressed by Americans in their manners and particularly in their habits of travel. As one shocked English traveler put it, these "sons of the New World" were a sight to behold. But behind all their bravado and boastfulness and lack of refinement, astute foreigners saw the seeds of greatness in the democracy of American life.
Although numerous books and articles have been published about early railroads in the United States, they chiefly concern the history of research, construction, and development-the routes, the costs, the mechanics of machines, the use of
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