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United States Engineers
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7
ON THE SURVEY
62 S
J 1st Congress, ) HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES. C Ml
£d Session. $ nyniAu of railway £?o:v.. . ( No. 110.
~ ' • ' ■ *£rzZrz*: «- —
, < JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
LETTEB
fr031
, THE SECRETARY OF WAR,
in answer to
A resolution of the House, of February 3, relative to the survey of the
James River and Kanawha Canal.
February 11,1871.—Referred to the Committee on Commerce and ordered to be printed.
WAR DEPARTMENT, February 9, 1871.
The Secretary of War, in compliance with the resolution of the
House of Representatives of February 3, 1871, has the honor to submit
the accompanying report of the Engineer Department upon the survey
of the James River and Kanawha Canal.
WM. W. BELKNAP,
Secretary of War.
OFFICE OF THE CHIEF OF ENGINEERS,
Washington, 1). C\, February 8, 1870.
Sir : In answer to the resolution of the House of Representatives of
the 3d instant, I have the honor herewith to transmit a copy of the re¬
port of Major W. P. Craighill, Corps of Engineers, upon the examina¬
tion of the James River and Kanawha Canal, made under authority of
the second section of the act of July 11, 1870, making appropriations
for rivers and harbors. The object of this examination was to obtain
additional information upon the questions of practicability and cost of
opening a continuous water communication between Richmond, Virginia,
and the Ohio River.
In 1868, the engineer of the James River and Kanawha Canal Com¬
pany advised the adoption of a new summit level, in the event of a con¬
tinuation of the work, which, by the use of a tunnel nine miles in
length, would reduce the elevation of the summit and the length of the
canal.
The operations of Major Craighill during the past season were con¬
fined to a survey of this tunnel line and its, approaches, and to such ex¬
amination of the routes westward from that point as the time and money
at command would permit. In his report he designates the best position
and extent of the summit for passing the mountains; the facilities and
difficulties to be expected in its execution ; recommends the enlarge¬
ment of the canal to 70 feet width and 7 feet depth, with locks 120 feet
tVoU
2 JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
by 20 feet, and submits an approximate estimate of the money and time
required to complete the tunnel and its connections between the mouth
of Fork Run (the end of the company's definite location) and the mouth
of the Kanawha River, as well as for the enlargement of the canal from
Richmond to Fork Run. He deems the question of practicability as
definitely settled by the data furnished from these examinations, and
that the cost of this great undertaking would be, in round numbers,
$50,000,000.
Additional surveys will be necessary for the definitive determination
of the location in detail, for which a sum of not less than $25,000
would be required.
Very respectfully, your obedient servant.
A. A. HUMPHREYS,
Brigadier General and Chief of Engineers.
Hon. W. W. BELKNAP, Secretary of War.
UNITED STATES ENGINEER OFFICE,
Baltimore, Maryland, January 27, 1871.
General: The law of July 11, 1870, authorised the survey of the
James River and Kanawha Canal. On the 25th of July notice was re¬
ceived that the charge of that survey, with others, as well as of several
works of river and harbor improvement, had been committed to me.
The object of the survey was to throw additional light upon the ques¬
tions, first, of the practicability, and second, of the cost, if practicable,
of opening a continuous line of navigable water between Richmond,
Virginia, and the Ohio River, which would admit of almost unlimited
extension by the James and Ohio Rivers and their connecting waters.
The season for field work was already far advanced at the date of the
•/
passage of the law. Some time was necessarily consumed in securing
the services of suitable persons to whom might be given the charge of
the survey, from participation in which I was excluded by other duties.
The work naturally divided itself into two parts, and two parties were
speedily organized. Mr. Walter Gwynn Turpin was placed in charge
of the examination of the line of the canal from Richmond to Buch¬
anan, with a view to a determination of the cost of its enlargement to
a size which would adapt it to the extended use it would receive when it
became a link in the great central water-line between the Atlantic slope
and the valley of the Mississippi. To Mr. William R. Hutton was as¬
signed the duty of ascertaining the best manner, if any existed, of con¬
tinuing the communication by water from the end of the old canal to
the waters of the Ohio River. These gentlemen have devoted all their
energies to the work, keeping the field until the last moment, and col¬
lecting a large mass of most valuable information. They, of course,
made free use of the reports and surveys of their able predecessors in
the investigation of the subject before them. It has been considered
desirable to sum up at once the results of the survey of 1870.
The reports of Messrs. Hutton and Turpin are accordingly transmit¬
ted herewith. I refer for details to them.
The "central water-line," as it is commonly called, is a project con¬
templating the completion of a continuous line of water communication
from the waters of the Ohio River, at the mouth of the Kanawha, to
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. HtPJi
the waters of the Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic, at the mouth of
James River, in Virginia. The necessity for some such line as this, as
a means of cheap and certain commercial intercourse between the great
producing regions of the West and the Atlantic coast, has long been
advocated and urged upon public attention by various persons and par¬
ties of ability and influence. That there now exists no direct line of
water communication between the Mississippi Basin and the seaboard,
is an undeniable fact; and it is equally true, that of the two circuitous
and indirect routes now in use, the northern is subject to interruption
by ice, and the southern to a degroe of heat highly prejudicial to the
preservation of the staple articles of transportation.
The general position of the route for this desired communication
seems to have been approximately located by common consent since the
first inception of the idea, constantly modified, however, in detail, both
as to location and mode of transportation, as the wealth and require¬
ments of the two sections increased. The original idea contemplated
simply a navigation in bateaux of the rivers on the east and west of the
Alleghanies, and the passage of the mountains by a turnpike road.
The requirements of to-day demand a canal of large size and a navi¬
gation for vessels of several hundred tons burden.
The location referred to for this line, commencing at Richmond, (the
head of open navigation on James River,)' follows the valley of that
stream and its head tributaries, to the base of the Alleghany mountains;
thence, passing through or over thcin, it descends the headwaters of the
Greenbrier, New and Kanawha Rivers, and down the latter to the Ohio.
The first surveys for this route wTere made in 1817-'19, contemplat¬
ing a slack-water navigation fur bateaux of two or three feet draught,
and a portage over the mountains. The next were made in 1826—'28
by Captain McNeil, United States Topographical Engineers, for a canal
and slack-water navigation, passing the mountains by a tunnel 2T\miles
long, at an elevation of 1,916 feet above tide. Subsequent surveys and
examinations were made at various times by engineers of ability and re¬
putation, but the general plans and locations of McNeil remained un¬
changed.
As early as 1785, a company was organized for the improvement of
the James River, and some efiorts were made toward effecting a better¬
ment of the navigation of that stream. In 1832 the James River and \
Kanawha Company was incorporated, and the rights and duties of the
old company were transferred to the new. In 1836 they commenced the
construction of a canal, having in view the connection of the waters of
the James and the Ohio Rivers. Their line, as located and partially con¬
structed, commences at Richmond, with a large dock and tide-water
connections; extending thence up the valley of the James River,
through Lynchburg to Buchanan, a distance of 196| miles, including
159| miles of canal and 36J miles of slack-water navigation, which is
now completed and in working order. Thence it follows up the valleys
of James and Jackson Rivers, to Covington, on the latter stream, a dis¬
tance of 47 miles, of which 41 miles is canal and 6 miles is slack-water
navigation. This portion has been located and its execution was con¬
tracted for, but it is not as yet entirely completed.
JAMES RIVER AND CANAWHA CANAL.
From Covington the line, as projected to the Greenbrier River, (33J
miles distant, on the western slope of the mountains,) crossed Jackson
River as a canal, and ascending Dunlap's Creek at the base of the Alle-
ghanies, followed Fork Run to the summit level, where it pierced the
mountains by a tunnel 2.6 miles long, at an elevation of 1,916 feet above
tide. It descended thence the valleys of Tuckahoe and Howard's Creeks
by canal to the Greenbrier and New Rivers, down which, as well as
down the Kanawha, slack-water navigation was projected to the Ohio, a
distance of 200 miles, making a total distance from Richmond of 486.13
miles.
The large number of locks required to attain this summit level, and
the consequent consumption of lime in transit by this route, induced
examinations to be made with a view to finding a better. In 1868, Mr.
E. Lorraine, the Engineer of the James River and Kanawha Company,
advised the adoption of a new location, which, by the use of a tunnel 9
miles in length, reduced the elevation of the summit level 216 feet,
thus making it but 1,700 feet above tide. This change saved 3J miles
in actual length of canal, and 40J miles of equaled length, considering
the saving of time in lockages, and cost of working and repairs.
The operations during the last season were confined to a survey of
this tunnel line and its approaches, and to such examinations of the
routes westward from that point as the time and money at command
would permit. The results have been to determine definitely the po¬
sition and extent of the tunnel for passing the mountains ; the facilities
and difficulties to be expected in its execution ; and to enable an approx¬
imate estimate to be made of the money and time required to complete
the tunnel and its connections between the mouth of Fork Run (the end
k of the company's definite location) and the mouth of the Kanawha Ri¬
ver.
The canal, as already constructed, has a width at water line of 51)
feet, and a depth, originally, of 5 feet. As these dimensions would
prove too limited for the new and extended line, surveys were also made
last season, with a view to its enlargement to the dimensions proposed
for its extension westward from mouth of Fork Run, viz: 70 feet width
at water line, with a depth of 7 feet, the enlarged locks to be 120 feet
between the gates and with 20 feet width of chamber.
The line which I have now to recommend commeeces at the mouth of
Fork Run, ascends that stream by a canal of the dimensions just given,
with six locks of 12 feet lift each, to the summit level at 1,700 feet
above tide It then pierces the main range, passing under Tuckahoe and
Katis Mountains by a tunnel 7.8 miles long, with a section of 52 by
34^ feet, being 46 feet wide at water line and 7 feet deep. It emerges
into the valley of Howard's Creek, which it descends to the Greenbrier,
by three locks of 10 feet lift each.
From this point the canal ceases, (except in two cases, where short
sections occur,) and a continuous slack-water navigation is projected
down the Greenbrier to New River, and down New River to Lyken's
Shoals, on the Kanawha, 85 miles above its mouth. To effect this, will
require fifty-five dams, varying in height from 12 to 40 feet, and in
length from 200 to 600 feet. These are proposed to be built of masonry
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
(§3
and provided with locks, &c., of suitable size and dimensions to pass
vessels from one pool to another. From Lvken's Shoals to the mouth *
of the Kanawha, open navigation is proposed, the fall throughout the
length being equalized by low dams at regular intervals, having sluices
to permit the passage of vessels.
The estimates for this work (given below) contemplate the construc¬
tion of the whole in a substantial manner, proportionate to its import¬
ance and the gravity of the results which would attend any stoppage of
its use, caused by failures in its mechanical structures.
From mouth of Fork Run to Greenbrier, at mouth of Howard's Creek, ex¬
clusive of tunnel $2,383,474
Tunnel, 13,253,310
Down Greenbrier and New Rivers 13,243,541
Down Kanawha River, (85 miles) 973,900
Ten per cent, contingencies 2,986,420
32,840,645
From Richmond to Fork Run 14,781.644
f ■
Total 47,622,299
The idea of connecting the waters of the Atlantic slope and the Mis- ,
sissippi Valley, by joining the head-waters of the James and Ohio Rivers,
has long been entertained by distinguished men. It is certainly a very
attractive project, from its simplicity and from the grandeur of its re¬
sults, both in a physical and commercial point of view. It is far older
than railroads, and so the use of the canal, as the means of connection,
wa3 proposed. When the railroad was introduced, public attention was
turned in that direction, to the exclusion of the canal, although still, in
this case, the intention was simply to have the railroad a short link be¬
tween the head-waters of the James and the Kanawha. This railroad
is building and extending beyond the limits of its first design, so as to
become soon one of the great competing lines of communication of this
kind between the East and the West.
Notwithstanding the immense increase of facilities for transportation
which have been created in the past twenty or thirty years, the great
West and Northwest have overrun them in their exuberant productive
capacity, and after testing all other routes by rail and existing canals
and lakes and rivers across the continent, and by river and gulf to the
Atlantic, are calling loudly fur the construction of a great, cheap, short,
national highway, to carry to market their surplus products. This
voice must be heard and heeded. The national character of this work
is demonstrated by the statement just made.
If a river existed along the whole extent of the proposed route of the
water line, it would, unquestionably, receive from the General Govern¬
ment such improvement as it needed. This connection belongs to the
same class of works as the Louisville and Portland Canal on the Ohio
River, and the improvements of the Des Moines and Rock Island Rapid3
on the Mississippi.
As our great and growing country expands, in accordance with its
magnificent and manifest destiny, toward the North and toward the
South, and its extremities become more remote from each other, it will
be well to have some great national work in the geographical center,
tj6b ^ JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
attracting thither public attention and interest and capital, and conse-
- quent strength and power, and binding to it and to each other, by these
strong cords, the distant extremes.
The question of practicability is settled by the data furnished by the
reports hereto attached. They determine also that the cost will be, in
round numbers, $50,01)0,01)0. A most interesting feature of the work
is the great tunnel. A few years ago men would have been appalled at
that undertaking alone.
The recent completion of the Mount Cenis Tunnel in Europe, and the
rapid progress now made with the execution of the Hoosae Tunnel in
this country, with the experience gained in these works, and the im¬
proved facilities daily coming into use for carrying on such operations,
induce us to approach such an undertaking as the making of the Lor¬
raine Tunnel, notonly without apprehension of failure, but with a feeling
of assured certainty of success. It is no longer an extraordinary, but au
ordinary undertaking. The Lorraine Tunnel, by the last location, de¬
rived from the survey of 1870, will be 7.8 miles in length. The length
of the Mount Cenis Tunnel is 74 miles; that of the Hoosac being 4|
miles. The Lorraine Tunnel, from the circumstances of its position,
will take a shorter time for its execution than the Mount Cenis and
Hoosac Tunnels, although longer than either of them. See especially
the remarks of Mr. Hutton on this subject, as well as of Mr. Lorraine,
and of Mr. Latrobe.
It is needless for me to refer to the engineering details of the whole
work, which are sufficiently discussed for present purposes in the reports
of Mr. Hutton and Mr. Turpin and in the able paper of Mr. Lorraine,
Neither is it necessary, perhaps it would not be proper, for me to repeat
in detail the arguments which have been so elaborately advanced bj
many able minds as to the commercial advantages of the proposed work.
See several of the attached papers.
It has been supposed by some that the day of canals is past. Facts
do not sustain this view. There is no doubt that for ordinary passenger
travel and many kinds of freight the railroad will be properly preferred
as the means of transportation, arid the business thus naturally falling
to the railroads is enough to pay handsomely on their money value.
But there is no question that when the circumstances are such that
slowness of movement is permissible and the quantities to be moved
large, the cheapness of the canal becomes obvious to every one who
chooses to consider the statistics of the case. This has been true even
when the canals have been used simply as a part of the machinery oi
political parties. If managed with honesty and for the ends for which
they were intended, their ability to carry freight more cheaply than
railroads is beyond dispute. It is unquestionable that the Erie Canal
has been, is now, and will continue to be a most valuable piece of prop¬
erty to the State of New York, notwithstanding the immense develop¬
ment of competing railroad lines. Its contemplated re-enlargement is
the best proof that can be given of that statement.
The Pennsylvania Canal is so valuable to the great railroad controll¬
ing and working it that it is currently reported to be on the eve ol
enlargement.
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL,.
The Canadian governments are moving seriously in the direction of
a great enlargement of their canal system.
The Chesapeake and Ohio Ccnal, notwithstanding its limited capacity
and consequent want of adaptation to economical working, and that it
connects with nothing, is a formidable rival, as far as its legitimate
business is concerned, of the powerful, rich, and ably managed organi¬
zation known as the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, whose preponderating
influence is so widely felt and so generally recognized.
A great means of intercommunication, like the central water line,
which will, by cheapening the cost of their delivery, cheapen the cost to
consumers of the important articles of food and fuel, which are neces¬
saries of life for all, both rich and poor, while not diminishing, but in¬
creasing the receipts of producers, becomes an object of the greatest
interest to the nation.
By cheapening the cost of delivery of many of the chief articles of
export at the great commercial cities of the Atlantic, it facilitates our
competition in foreign markets, and assists in giving us the balance of
trade, and becomes in this view also a most interesting object from a
national standpoint, and well worthy of the attention and assistance of
the National Government.
Some interesting extracts are introduced below, taken from a speech,
of the Hon. W. Lawrence, of Ohio, delivered in the House of Repre¬
sentatives May 23,1870. The object of the speech w7as to demonstrate
the necessity for the provision of additional means of transportation for
the products of the Northwest, and to show the greater cheapness of
transportation by water over that of rail. The ultimate object of the
speech was to induce congressional action in the direction of gaining
free access to the ocean for Western products by the "way of the Cana¬
dian canals and the St. Lawrence River. His arguments as to the ne¬
cessity for additional means of exit to the ocean, and as to the greater
cheapness of a water route over the rail-road, apply equally to the cen¬
tral water line and to the line whose adoption he was advocating ; but
the central water line has the groat advantages of shortness, compara¬
tive non-interruption by ice, and freedom from the dangers of the navi¬
gation of the lakes and St. Lawrence River, and of being in the heart
of our own country.
Extracts from speech of Eon. W. Lawrence, of Ohio, in the House of Representatives,
May 23, 1870.
******
But in regulating trade on this continent, as well as with the nations of Europe and
Asia, we should not overlook the great interests of the producing and laboring portion
of our citizens.
******
GRAIN-PRODUCING STATES.
The great grain-producing States of the Central West, are Ohio, Indiana, Illinois,
Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa, with a population of probably eleven mil¬
lions.
******
The grain product of the United States, including wheat, corn, rye, oats, &c., in the
year 1865, was 1,343,027,868 bushels, valued at SI,118,904,376. Of this the product of
wheat was 151,999,906, and of corn 867,946,295 bushels.
8
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
The Wheat product of 1868 was 224,000,000 bushels, of which 32,000,000 were used
for seed, 164,000,000 consumed in the United States, and 28,000,000 exported. The pop¬
ulation, product, amount consumed, and surplus, were, in the States bordering on the
lakes, as follows:
States.
Estimated
population,
1868.
Wheat raised,
1868.
Consumed.
Surplus.
Ohio
Indiana
Michigan
Illinois
Wisconsin
Minnesota
Iowa
Kansas
Total
2,955,673
1,804,985
1,128,513
2,519,268
1,011,082
382,465
1,021,260
256,650
Bushels.
17,050,000
17,366,000
16,012,000
28,560,000
22,660,000
14,500,000
20,300,000
1,537,00
Buf-hels.
14,117,000
9,933,000
7,132,000
13,630,000
7,434,000
3,349,000
6,875,000
1,279,000
Bushels.
2,933,000
7,433,000
8,880,000
14,930,000
15,226,000
11,151,000
13,425,000
258,000
11,079,896
137,985,000
63,749,000
74,236,000
******
PRICES—HOW DETERMINED.
The amount which a Western farmer realizes for a bushel of wheat depends on two
circumstances, the price in the controlling market and the cost of transporting it there.
Though England buys but a small part of our wheat product, yet she consumes the
largest part of our wheat export, and the Liverpool wheat market controls the price in
New York, Toledo, and Chicago, very much as the price of our national bonds at Am¬
sterdam and Threadneedle street determine the price in the United States, or as Wall
street determines the prices of gold at Cincinnati. The gentleman from Missouri (Mr.
Asper] has shown this in his speech of March 30, by quotations from the New York
Journal of Commerce of March 22.
The price of wheat, then, in Liverpool has an effect upon the whole wheat product of
our country far beyond the export demand. With this, then, as the initial point in fix¬
ing prices, it requires no argument to prove that the cost of carrying wheat from the
place where it is produced to Liverpool will be deducted from the Liverpool price, and
the producing farmer will receive only the residue.
Dr. William Elder, until recently in the Treasury Department, recognising this fact,
in a pamphlet just issued in favor of a protective tariff, says :
44 Putting a bushel of red winter wheat at 81 30, (nine shillings per hundred pounds,)
its price in Liverpool on Christmas eve, 1869, we find its value in gold to the Western
farmer by the following deduction:
Cents.
44 Carriage from Chicago to New York '. 30
44 Marine freight 16
44 Marine Insurance
44 Commission 3
44 Handling 2
44 Charges from Chicago to Liverpool 53\
44 To this must be added the expense of placing it in Chicago, (from place where pro¬
duced:)
Currency.
44 Storage and commission * 5
44 Insurance and loss *
44 Carriage to Chicago 10
44 Handling * * 3
Igj
44 Equal in gold to 15^ cents.
44 Total deduction from price in Liverpool, 69 cents, leaving to the farmer 61 cents in
gold—73 cents currency—per bushel."
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
FREIGHT AND DEALERS' PROFITS—MODE OF TRANSPORTATION.
The secretary of the Chicago Board of Trade has furnished to the Bureau of Statistics
a table showing that during the winter months, in the absence of canal and lake compe¬
tition, rail-road freight from Chicago to New-York reaches nearly thirty cents a bushel
for wheat. *********
The great cost of constructing and operating railroads is such that they cannot com¬
pete with canal, lake, river, or ocean transportation for heavy freight. In a report made
by Hon. Israel T. Hatch to the Secretary of the Treasury in January, 1867, he says, in
House Executive Document No. 78, second session, Thirty-Ninth Congress, p. 4 :
" An elaborate investigation shows the following results as exemplified by a fair com¬
parison of the relative cost of transportation by rail and the other means of conveyance
best known in the United States :
" By rail costs 733.3 per cent, greater than ocean transportation ; by rail costs 525 per
cent, greater than over great lakes ; by rail costs 215 per cent, greater than Erie canal,
(enlarged ;) by rail costs 400 per cent, greater than over Hudson River."
But the Western producer is liable to suffer, not merely by reason of the necessarily
great cost of rail-road transportation, but by extortionate charges rendered practicable
by the monopoly of the recent immense railroad combinations, and by the want of ade¬
quate rival and competing routes and modes of transportation.
With rail-road freight costing about thirty cents to transport a bushel of wheat from
Chicago to New-York, beside other charges, by far too large a share of the product is
taken from the farmer, and he needs cheaper transportation.
Will it be said the lakes, the Erie canal, and the Hudson to New York do or will fur¬
nish all that is necessary ? ********
The annual tax now imposed upon the people of the West—these enormous charges
for tolls and freight, profits of dealers, all deducted from the final market price of pro¬
ducts, reducing the amount the producers receive—ought not to be longer endured if it
be practicable to avoid it.
* * *** *****
Freights can be reduced, and thus, even without any increase in the price of wheat
at its ultimate market, give to the producer more of that price than he now receives.
**********
The gentleman from New York [Mr. Bennett] has told us that—
"In 1836 the surplus breadstuff's exported by the lake and the Erie Canal were, alto¬
gether, 1,239,351 bushels, including flour estimated as wheat. In 1860 the movement
eastward by every avenue—by canal, by railroad, and by the St. Lawrence River—had
attained the magnitude of 76,652,486 bushels, and in 1862 its enormous aggregate was
137,667,870."
And referring to Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa and Minnesota, he
says :
" In 1840 the cereal products of these States amounted to 267,265,877 bushels. In
1850 they had increased to 434,862,661 bushels ; in 1860 to 679,031,559 bushels ; and in
1870 we shall probably find them aggregating about a thousand million bushels."
A considerable portion of all this increasing product must find an Eastern market,
and to all this must be added lumber, wool and other products of Western soil, mines,
forests, workshops and factories.
The export of Indian corn to foreign countries in 1868 was 11,147,490 bushels, valued
at $13,094,036, and 336,508 barrels of Indian meal, of the value of $2,068,430.
With the rapid growth of Western products for export, more and greater routes of
transportation must speedily be opened up. Already we have a memorial asking the
aid of Congress for a ship-canal between the lakes and the Mississippi by way of Wis¬
consin and Fox Rivers, and the country is discussing the project of a "central water
line from the Ohio River to the Virginia capes, connecting with the Kanawha and James
Rivers;" one of the publications in advocacy of which says :
" Cheap transportation is the great necessity of the West. Its products exceed in
amount the means at command of cheap outlet to the seaboard, and millions of Western
producers are placed under the power of carriers.
**********
Mr. Bennett estimates that the reduction on freight by the enlargement of the locks
of the Erie canal—
"Would equal a saving of $15,000,000 per annum on the present movement of grain
eastward by the water routes."
On the eastward movement of other articles it would be a very large sum. On the
westward movement of articles, the cost of which would be reduced to Western con¬
sumers, the saving would be a vast sum also.
**********
In illustration of these views, I present some statistical tables alike interesting a»d
valuable :
2
(j O b JAMES RRHIR AND KANAWHA CANAL.
[From Report of the Chicago Board of Trade.]
LAKE (STEAM) AND RAIL FREIGHTS.
Weekly rates of freight by propeller to Buffalo, and thence by rail to New York, for the
season of lake navigation in 1869.
Week ending—
April 24
May 1
May 8
May 15
May 22
May 29
June 5
June 12
June 19
June 26
July 3
July 10
July 17......
July 24
July 31
August 7
August 14....
August 21...
August 28...
September 4.
September 11
September 18
September 25
October 2....
October 9....
October 16...
October 23...
October 30...
November 6..
November 13.
November 20.
November 27.
TO NEW YORK.
Flour per
barrel.
$1
$0
80 to
80 to
75 to
75 to
65 to
55 to
50 to
50 to
50 to
50 to
50 to
50 to
50 to
50 to
75 to
85 to
95 tol
1
10 to 1
1
1
85
85
85
85
85
80
85
85
85
85
75
80
75
75
75
65
65
75
75
75
75
75
75
75
75
85
95
10
10
15
15
15
Provisions
and 4th
class per
100 lbs.
40
37
$0 421
m
42£
414
404
40|
to 421
424
424
to 424
37|
374 to 40
374 to 40
374
324 to 374
32|
274 to 324
25 to 374
37?
374
374
374
374
374
374
374 to 424
424 CO 474
55
55
554 to 574
574
574
Grain per
100 lbs.
$0 424
424
424 to 45
45
374 to 45
37|to 39
37|to 39
40 to 424
42 to 424
374 to 42
374
374 to 404
374
374
to 37 4
35
to 35
to 374
to 374
35
to 374
374 to 40
374 to 40
374
to 404
to 50"
50
to 55
to 60
60
to 624
624
35
30
30
35
35
37
42
50
55
60
*
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
Statement of all rail freights from Chicago eastward during the year 1869.
* 41
639
To what place shipped and date.
To New York:
J anuary 1 to January 25......
January 25 to February 1 ....
February 1 to February 9
February 9 to February 17 ...
February 17 to March 2
» March 2 to March 11
March 11 to April 12
April 12 to June 12
June 12 to September 21
September 21 to October 11 ...
October 11 to October 18
October 18 to October 27
October 27 to November 23...
November 23 to December 31.
To Boston :
January 1 to January 25
January 25 to February 1
February 1 to February 9 .....
February 9 to February 17
February^ to March 2
March 2 to March 11
March 11 to April 12
April 12 to June 12
June 12 to September 21
September 21 to October 11.....
October 11 to October 18
October 18 to October 27
October 27 to November 23 .
November 23 to December 31...
To Portland;
January 1 to January 25
January 25 to February 1
February 1 to February 9 .
February 9 to February 17 ........
February 17 to March 2
March 2 to March 11
March 11 to April 12
April 12 to June 12
June 12 to September 21
September 21 to October 11
October 11 to October 18
October 18 to October 27
October 27 to November 23
November 23 to December 31 ....
To Buffalo and Suspension Bridge :
January 1 to January 25
January 25 to February 1
February 1 to February 9
February. 9 to February 17
February 17 to March 2
March 2 to March 11
March 11 to April 12
April 12 to June 12
June 12 to September 21
September 21 to October 11
October 11 to October 18
October 18 to October 27
October 27 to November 23
November 23 to December 31
To Philadelphia and Baltimore :
January 1 to January 25
January25 to February 1..........
February 1 to February 9
February 9 to February 17
February 17 to March 2
March 2 io March 11
March 11 to April 12
April 12 to June 12
June 12 to September 21
September 21 to October 11
October 11 to October IS."
October 18 to October 27
October 27 to November 23
November 23 to December 31
Flour.!
Per barrel.
$1 50
1 40
1 20
1 10
1 00
90
90
1 00
90
90
10
20
30
30
60
57
30
20
10
10
10
10
10
10
20
30
40
40
60
50
30
10
10
00
00
00
00
00
20
50
50
40
80
70
65
65
65
65
65
65
65
65
70
70
70
70
40
30
30
10
10
10
90
90
90
90
00
10
20
20
Grain.
Per 100 lbs.
$0 80
75
65
60
50
"*50
50
50
45
45
55
65
70
70
85
85
70
65
55
55
55
60
55
60
65
70
75
75
85
85
70
60
60
60
60
50
50
50
65
80
80
75
40
40
37%
32 %
32%
32%
32%
32%
32%
32%
35
35
35
35
70
65
65
55
55
55
45
45
45
45
50
55
60
65
Fourth class
freight.
Per 100 lbs.
$0 75
70
60
55
50
45
45
50
45
45
55
60
65
65
80
75
65
60
65
55
55
55
55
55
60
65
70
70
80
75
65
55
55
50
50
50
50
50
60
75
75
70
40
35
32%
32%
32%
32%
32%
32%
32%
32%
35
37%
35
35
70
65
65
65
'55
55
45
45
45
45
50
55
55
60
Bulk meat.
Per 100 lbs.
SO 90
85
75
70
65
60
60
65
60
60
70
70
75
75
95
90
SO
75
70
70
70
70
70
70
75
80
80
80
90
85
75
70
70
70
70
65
65
65
70
80
80
80
50
42%
40
40
40
40
40
40
40
40
80
80
80
70
70
70
60
60
60
65
60
65
65
50
Dressed
hogs.
Per 100 lbs.
$1 10
1 10
1 10
1 10
80
80
80
1 10
1 10
1 10
20
20
20
20
90
90
90
1 20
1 20
1 20
20
20
20
90
90
90
90
1 20
1 20
1 20
60
60
60
60
60
60
60
60
60
60
00
00
00
00
00
00
70
00
00
Information furnished by the Secretary of Board of Trade, Chicago, Illinois.
EDWARD
_ YOUNG,
In chargejof Bureau of Statistics.
IjBiU
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
Should ifc be decided by the national authorities to proceed with this
work, additional surveys will be necessary for the definitive determina¬
tion of the location in detail. These surveys should be immediately
undertaken, and a sum not less than $25,000 should be appropriated for
them.
The following papers accompany this report:
1. Report of Mr. W. G. Turpin, dated December 28, 1870.
2. Report of Mr. Wm. R. Hutton, dated January 21, 1871.
3. Printed pamphlet on " Central Water Line," 1869, in duplicate,
containing the interesting and instructive paper of Mr. E. Lorraine, the
Chief Engineer of the James River and Kanawha Company. This pa¬
per contains an important letter from Mr. B. H. Latrobe, whose known
ability and experience entitle his opinions about the long tunnel to the
greatest weight. Mr. Lorraine's paper is prefaced by a very forcible
argument to show the necessity of a central line of navigation directly
eastward from the Ohio River by Chesapeake Bay.
4. Memorial (printed in duplicate, 1870) of the General Assembly of
Virginia, to the Congress of the United States.
5. Printed report of the Committee of National Board of Trade, on
the Continuous Water Line, in duplicate, 1869.
6. Printed remarks of T. M. Monroe, of Dubuque, before the Na¬
tional Board of Trade, in December, 1868.
Printed memorial of delegates to the National Board of Trade, 1870,
Cincinnati—in duplicate.
8. Printed report on Physical Survey of Virginia, by M. F. Maury,
1869.
9. Letter (printed) of Mr. Joseph Segar, on the "Great Thorough¬
fares and their National Aspects."—October 1, 1868.
10. Extract from letter of Mr. E. Lorraine, dated November 28, 1870.
Very respectfully, your obedient servant,
W. P. CRAIGHILL,
Major of Engineers.
Brigadier-General A. A. Humphreys,
Chief of Engineers U. S. Army, Washington} D. C.
Buchanan, Virginia, December 28, 1870.
Colonel : This survey of the eastern division of the James River and Kanawha Canal,
which is made under an appropriation by Congress, and by you committed to my charge,
with instructions to "embrace that portion of the canal definitely located and in use,"
begins at the mouth of Fork Run, in Alleghany County. It includes a portion of the
located route known as the fourth division, which extends to the town of Covington, in
Alleghany county, and is 17.37 miles in length. This portion of the fourth division is
common to either line that may be selected for the passage of the Alleghany Mountains.
The third division extends from the town of Covington to Buchanan, in Botetourt county,
and is 47.27 miles in length. Tins portion of the fourth division above alluded to, and
the third division comprise a part of the canal that has been "definitely located," and is
64.64 miles in length.
The second division extends from the town of Buchanan to the city of Lynchburg,
and is 50 miles in length. The first division extends from Lynchburg to and including the
basin in the city of Richmond, and is 146 1-2 miles long; and, with the connection
through the city of Richmond, one mile in length, known as the tide-water connection,
comprises all that portion of the eastern division "in use," and is 197 1-2 miles long,
making the aggregate length from tide-water, at the city of Richmond, to the mouth
of the Fork Run, at the eastern base of the Alleghany Mountains, 262.14 miles. Before
proceeding with the details of the cost of the respective subdivisions, I will give the
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
dimensions which have been assumed as the basis of the calculations of the cost of the
work, viz: x
A canal of 70 feet water surface, and a depth of 7 feet; towing-path 12 feet wide,
and a berm-bank 8 feet wide ; the interior slopes to be 2 base to I perpendicular, and ex¬
terior slopes 1^ base to 1 perpendicular. The locks to be 120 feet long between the gates,
and with a width of 20 feet in the chamber. The locks to be of cut stone throughout,
and in all respects of first-class masonry. The estimate contemplates first-class work
of all descriptions.
The fourth division is located in the valley of Dunlap's Creek, and consists of 4.19
miles of slack-water navigation and 13.16 miles of canal. On this subdivision the
works of art are thirty-five lift-locks and guard-locks, having an aggregate lift of 376
feet; eight dams, seven to be built of timber and one of stone, varying from 104 to 390
feet in length, and ranging from 10 to 35 feet in height; thirty-four road, farm, and
towing-path bridges ; one culvert, two waste-weirs, and one waste ; one aqueduct across
Dunlap's Creek, of two spans of 65 feet each, and one across Jackson River of two spans
of 100 feet each, the last one connecting it with the third division. The cost of this
portion of the fourth division is $ 2,206,795 45, or $ 127,046 60 per mile.
The third division extends from Covington to Buchanan, distant 47 miles, of which
41 miles are canal, and 6 miles slack-water navigation. On this division the principal
mechanical structures are thirty-six lift-locks, two guard-locks, and one guard and lift
lock combined, with a total lockage of 436£ feet; five aqueducts across James River,
each about 320 feet long; aqueducts across Long's Entry, and Linking Creeks, and
Pounding Run, of 50 feet span each ; fifty-three farm, road, and towing-path bridges;
one towing-path and road .bridge across James River, 393 feet long; eleven culverts
from 4 to 10 feet span; thirty-three square drains, 2 and 3 feet span; three dams across
James River from 250 to 365 feet long, one to be constructed of timber and two of stone ;
and two tunnels—the Marshall, 1,900 feet long, and the Mason tunnel, 198 feet long—
by which 5-| miles in distance are saved. The first 15 miles of this work above Bu¬
chanan were put under contract in 1853, but for want of funds operations were sus¬
pended in 1856. Of this work there are completed ten lift-locks, the abutments and
piers of three of the aqueducts across James River, and the abutments and piers for
the bridge across James River. The foundation of two of the dams up to the surface
of low water have been put in ; about 800 feet of the Marshall tunnel has been exca¬
vated, and work as follows has been completed, viz.: the Mason tunnel, two cul¬
verts, abutments for three towing-path bridges, and several miles of towing-path on
the slack-water navigation made by the Catawba and Gwynn dams. Much of this
work is available for the enlarged dimensions proposed. "Where the dimensions of the
structures completed and begun are not suited to the enlarged dimensions, the estimate
covers the cost of taking down and rebuilding on the enlarged plan. The cost of this
division will be $4,036,577 11, or $ 86,097 38 per mile.
The third division, and the portion of the fourth division for which estimates of
cost are submitted, were located with great care by Mr. Lorraine, chief engineer of
the canal, after repeated examinations had been made on every route through the
valley of Dunlap's Creek and Jackson and James Rivers, which offered any advan¬
tages for the location of a canal. These various surveys were made by and under the
direction of Judge Benjamin Wright, Messrs. Charles Ellet, E. H. Gill, Walter Gwynn,
and other engineers of experience and skill in the location and construction of canals.
The location, as finally adopted, is believed to occupy the route offering the greatest
facilities for judicious and economical construction and maintenance of a canal.
My operations in the field began on the 21st of September last, and were expected
to include also a survey of the first and second divisions, with a view to their enlarge¬
ment to the dimensions mentioned in the beginning of this report. The dimensions
of these divisions are generally a width of 50 feet at the water surface, and intended
depth of 5 feet of water; locks 100 feet long between the gates, with a width of 15
feet in the chamber. The survey of the second division was completed, and is 50 miles
in length, comprising 22 miles of canal and 28 miles of slack-water navigation.
The principal mechanical structures on this division are 37 lift and guard locks,
having a total lift of 299 feet; four stone dams and seven timber dams across James
River, varying from 354 to 850 feet in length, and from 14 to 36 feet in height; one
aqueduct of 50 feet span; forty-eight square drains, 2 and 3 feet span; seventeen
towing-path and farm bridges; one towing-path and road bridge across North River,
253 feet long; seven wastes and one waste-weir. The estimate covers the enlargement
of the trunk of the canal, raising the towing-path and berm banks, increasing the
height of the locks in use 2 feet, giving the same increase of height to the dams,
lengthening the culverts, the construction of new locks of enlarged dimensions and
of the same lift alongside the locks now in use, and, in all the details, to make the im¬
provement first-class.
I made changes in the location at lock No. 25, the outlet lock into the pond, created
by the Indian Rock dam, the entrance being very objectionable. With the location
14 JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
*>
now proposed, the entrance at both ends of the locks will be very good. At Indian
Rock, the estimate embraces an amount sufficient to change and improve the entrance
to the guard-lock at that point.
The estimate contemplates the erection of a towing-path and road bridge across the
James River at the Blue Ridge ferry, a few hundred yards above the Cushaw dam,
high winds and water frequently making the crossing dangerous and at times impracti¬
cable. The erection of this bridge obviates these delays. If the work was to be put
under contract, I would advise that the pond be entered about half a mile farther
from the dam than at present, and that the crossing be made the same distance from
the dam. The canal here passes from the north to the south side of the river. At
lock No. 6, the outlet into the pond, created by the Coleman Falls dam, another change
is proposed, viz.: to cross Read Creek by an aqueduct of 50 feet span, and to enter the
pond some distance below the mouth of the creek. The object of this change is to
avoid the deposit of sand made at the entrance to the lock by the creek, the site
selected for the new lock being more favorable than one alongside the present lock.
At present frequent delays are caused to navigation and much expense incurred in
removing these deposits by dredging.
Admonished by the freshet of September last, the highest which has occurred within
a century, and from an inspection of the injuries received at several of the dams, I am
convinced that they resulted from the water-way being too much contracted. The
abutments of the dams are connected with the head walls of the guard-locks by
walls of rubble masonry, generally 25 feet high above canal bottom, and varying from 40
to 360 feet in length. At Big Island, Coleman Falls, and Judith Creek dams, they
were respectively 256, 354, 256% feet long, and the freshet swept them down to the
level of the dams. I have estimated for lengthening the Big Island dam 150 feet,
making the entire length 577 feet; for Coleman Falls dam, an increase of 168 feet is
proposed, making the entire length 522 feet; for Judith Creek dam, an increase of 150
feet, making the entire length 575 feet. These additions, and other safeguards esti¬
mated for, will render those dams safe against such freshets as that which induced
these alterations. "With the exception of Quarry Falls dam, the water-way of the
dams above the.mouthof North River is sufficient, and no danger is to be apprehended.
I have provided for lengthening the Quarry Falls dam 100 feet.
By the second division the passage of the Blue Ridge Mountains is made. The length
of canal through the mountains is 7£ miles.
From the mouth of North River, in Rockbridge County, where the gap in the moun¬
tains begins, the work is heavy and of an expensive character, as is also generally the
case from this point to Lynchburg. The valley is narrow, and the river hills leave but
little space between their bases and the river. The estimated cost of this division is
$2,092,008 51, or $41,840 17 per mile.
The first division, extending from the city of Lynchburg to and including the basin
in the city of Richmond, is 146£ miles long, comprising 137f miles of canal and 8|
miles slack-water navigation. The dimensions of the first division are generally the
same as those of the second division, the locks being of the same size.
The lockage from the basin in Richmond to the city of Lynchburg is 429 feet. \
The principal mechanical structures are fifty-two lift-locks, four guard-locks, four
principal dams, viz: Waterworks dam, Lynchburg, Joshua Creek, Tye River, and
Maiden's Adventure dams; nine other dams cross James River, or to islands in the
river, which serve as feeders to the canal or for connections with the south side
of the river; eleven aqueducts, three of which have wooden trunks, the remain¬
der being of cut stone, with spans varying from 20 to 65 feet; one hundred and
ninety-one culverts, with spans from 2 to 30 feet; one hundred and thirty-three farm
and road bridges; three towing-path bridges; nine waste-weirs. Of the locks, twenty-
two are built of cut stone, the remainder of rubble masonry faced with timber, and of
the class known as composite locks. The survey of this division was principally con¬
fined to the enlargement of the trunk of the canal, construction of new locks, raising
the dams, and altering such other mechanical structures as may be made available.
The estimate embraces the construction of a towing-path bridge across James River
at the head of Joshua Creek pond, 550 feet long. It provides also for the continuation
of the thirty-third level, (entered by combined locks of 17 feet 10 inches lift) from
pond created by Tye River dam, around this pond, crossing Tye River by an aqueduct
of three spans of 100 feet each, and locking into the thirty-second level about 1,000
feet below the present guard-lock. Instead of having combined locks, I divide the lift
and substitute two locks, having lifts respectively of 9 feet 10 inches and 8 feet, with
a level between them of near 1,000 feet in length. The inducements to make this
change are to avoid the danger and detentions to navigation caused by frequent rises
in Tye River, which enters James River a few hundred yards above the guard-lock and
dam. The deposit of sand made by this stream is immense, causes frequent detentions
to navigation, and entails a large and yearly increasing expense for dredging. The
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
dam is needed as a feeder, and will still serve the local trade from the south side of the
river.
The time at my command for field-work being insufficient for the completion of the
survey of this division, field operations were suspended at the sixty-ninth mile west of
Richmond ; hence this estimate is an approximation. The cost of the enlarged locks is
accurately given, and the quantity of other mechanical work is known, and can be
closely estimated. Average sections are taken and their cost applied to similar sec¬
tions. This and all other preliminary estimates can but approximate the actual cost
of construction, yet I feel confident that this will be found as nearly correct as such
estimates can be made. The cost of this division is taken to be $4,811,326, or $32,841 81
per mile.
An estimate has been made for a new connection between the first division and tide¬
water, one mile in length, amounting to $334,937. The lockage between the basin and
dock is 69 feet.
Tide-water is reached by a ship-lock 180 feet long between the gates, 35 wide in the
chamber, having a lift of 15 feet and 16 feet water on the miter sills. The dock is
4,900 feet long, and varies in width from 100 to 200 feet. From the ship-lock to Seven¬
teenth street, 4,100 feet, the depth of water is from 11 to 15 feet. Above Seventeenth
street the depth is from 5 to 8 feet. It is proposed to enlarge this dock, and construct
a new ship-lock of such dimensions as will admit the largest steamers and sail vessels
into the dock that can navigate the James River, which is now being improved under
liberal appropriations made by Congress and the city of Richmond. The estimate for
the enlargement of the dock and new ship-lock is $1,300,000.
Estimates in detail will be made and submitted, as soon as they can be prepared, giv¬
ing by sections the quantities and classification of excavations and embankments,
quantities of masonry and prices applied, andT generally a minute description of the
whole line. Such plans and maps as will elucidate them will be submitted with the
detailed estimates. It being desirable that at least a partial report of the surveys
committed to my charge should be in your hands by the 1st of January, I have been
induced to devote the time spent in estimates to the most prominent and expensive
points and class of works, and to make as close approximations as time allowed to the
cost of less important and less expensive portions.
The notes taken in the field were so extended as to enable me to prepare estimates
for a canal with a water surface of 85 and 100 feet in width, if you should desire such
estimates. It will require about one month to complete the field-work on the first
division and make the surveys for the new tide-water connection.
The total cost of the portion of the line considered in my estimates, 262.14 miles in
length, with a total lockage of l,624f feet, is as follows :
Fourth division $2,206,795 45
Third division 4,036,577 11
Second division 2,092,008 51
First division 4,811,326 00
Tide-water connection 334,937 00
Dock and ship-lock 1,300,000 00
14,781,644 07
Exclusive of the tide-water connection and enlargement of dock and new ship-lock,
the cost is $13,146,707 07, or an average of $50,4.08 45 per mile. Including these, the
total estimate is $14,781,644 07, or an average of $56,418 10 per mile.
No physical difficulties will be encountered in the construction and enlargement of
the portion of the line herein reported on that have not been overcome in the con¬
struction of the first and second divisions of the canal including the old Blue Ridge ca¬
nal and its enlargement to the dimensions of the canal now in use. Far greater diffi¬
culties have been repeatedly met and surmounted in this country and in Europe. In¬
creasing the water surface to 70 feet and building locks 120 feet by 20 feet, involves
simply so many cubic yards of rock and earth excavation, and so many cubic yards of
masonry.
Many miles of canal in this country have cost as much per mile, with dimensions
less than here proposed; some have cost more, and in Europe the cost has largely ex¬
ceeded the amount estimated in this , report for the extension and the contemplated en¬
largement of first and second divisions.
The capacity of a canal of the dimensions assumed in this report is well known, and
has been clearly stated in tables, which show the relative capacity and length of this
and other lines between the East and West, as well as the cost of transportation by each.
This information will be found in a report on " the central water-line from the Ohio
River to the Virginia capes," prepared by the officers of the James River and Kanawha
Company, and other gentlemen interested in the proposed improvement.
The question of tonnage that would seek this route to tide-water is speculative, and
\J x X
16 JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
\
its consideration docs not fall within the range of my present duties. The practica¬
bility of the construction along this route of an enlarged canal within reasonable
bounds as to cost having been shown and its utility too clearly established to require
discussion at this late date, there can be no doubt as to the importance of its speedy
execution.
Respectfully submitted,
W. G. TURPIN,
Civil Engineer.
Colonel Wm. P. Craighill,
United States Engineer Corps, in charge of survey in Virginia, &c.
Baltimore, Maryland, January 21, 1871.
Sir : I have the honor to submit the following preliminary report, on the results of
the examinations and surveys for the extension of the James River and Kanawha Ca¬
nal, from the eastern base of the Alleghanies, together with an approximate estimate
of the cost of the improvement.
The necessity imposed upon me by you to make report early in the present year, to
enable Congress to take action upon the matter, has not allowed time for much careful
preparation or detailed study; but no point of importance has been overlooked, and
the estimate is believed to be sufficient to cover the cost. The work was placed by
you in my hands, about the middle of August last, with instructions to determine
" the best route for the canal itself, and the means of its ultimate connection with the
Ohio River, so as to open a great central line of water communication for the West and
Northwest with the East." The organization of a corps of assistants was immediately
commenced, and by the 24th of August they were in the field. The length of line cov¬
ered by these instructions was two hundred and twenty-two miles. The amount appro¬
priated to it being hardly sufficient to organize one party, it was evident that but a
small portion of it could be actually surveyed. The late period of the season, as well as
the smallness of the appropriation, rendered it necessary to make use of all available
information from reliable sources, and to limit our own operations in the field to such
points as had not been satisfactorily determined before.
With a view, therefore, first to decide as to the best crossing of the main Alleghany
Mountains, the survey was commenced at the mouth of Fork Run on Dunlap's Creek, at
the termination of the definitive location heretofore made for its works by the James
River and Kanawha Company, and a line was thence traced to the Greenbrier River,
near the mouth of Howard's Creek.
These mountain 'surveys occupied more than a month, and it was not until the 6th of
October that we were able to begin the examination and survey of the Greenbrier. This
stream presented no difficulties of a formidable nature, while those at "New River had
been represented as "appalling" and " insurmountable."
Leaving, therefore, my assistants to continue the survey of the former stream, I made
a personal reconnoisance of New River, as far as Bowyer's Ferry, resulting in
the abandonment of the Greenbrier survey, and the transfer of the party to New
River.
A fresh line was commenced just below Stretcher's Neck, (the level heights being
kindly furnished by the engineers of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad,) and prose¬
cuted until the 20th of November, when the low state of the funds rendered it neces¬
sary to disband the party at a point some three miles below Bowyer's Ferry. The re¬
mainder of the line was gone over by myself, as far as the mouth of the Kanawha
River.
object of the extension.
The enlargement and extension of the James River and Kanawha Canal, which is
known to our commercial conventions, and others, by the title of the Virginia water
line, is designed to connect the Ohio with the Atlantic through the valleys of the Ka¬
nawha and the James, and their tributaries, and to form an interior water line for the
transportation, at low rates, of heavy freights from all parts of the West to the Atlantic,
combining river, canal, and slack-water navigation. The project looks to the enlarge¬
ment of the present James River Canal, already completed to Buchanan, 191 miles
from Richmond, its continuation to and across the Alleghany summit to the Greenbrier
River, and by the improvement of that and New River to the Ohio.
From Hampton Roads to Richmond, a distance of 100 miles, the James River is navi¬
gable for vessels of one thousand tons. Thence to the Greenbrier River, the length of
the proposed canal is 274.1 miles. The total length of Greenbrier and New Rivers, to
the foot of Lyken's Shoals, on the Kanawha, 124.2, and thence to the Ohio, 85.1 miles.
Making the total distance from Hampton Roads to Point Pleasant, on the Ohio River,
609.7 miles.
SCALE# ,
The scale of the enlargement was not specified by the law making the appropriation,
or in the formal instructions communicated to me. The James River Company, by its
JAMBS RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
chief engineer, Mr. Lorraine, recommends a prism nearly as large as the Erie Canal,
of New York, with locks of somewhat greater capacity. These dimensions have .been
adopted or assumed by the States of Iowa, Virginia, and West Virginia, in their memo¬
rials to Congress on the subject, and by the National Board of Trade of 1869, in its reso¬
lutions and the reports of its committees. The commercial convention assembled in
Cincinnati, in October, 1870, recommended the construction of the work on a scale suf¬
ficient to pass boats of five hundred tons burden. The following estimates have been
based on dimensions nearly as proposed by Mr. Lorraine, to wit, width of prism at
water surface 70 feet, at bottom 56 feet, and 7 feet depth, with slope walls on both sides.
The locks to be 120 feet long between the gates, and 20 feet wide at the lower water
line. These proportions are taken, chiefly, because they are the basis of all that has
been written upon the subject, and particularly of the estimate for enlargement from
Richmond to Fork Run.
Cheapness of transportation is the great object to be attained by the work under con¬
sideration, and this varies very nearly with the capacity of the boats used. A smaller
canal could be built for less money, but the cost of transportation on it, and of manage¬
ment, would, per ton, be higher. I consider the dimensions adopted as the least that
will properly carry out the object in view.
On the other hand, any considerable enlargement of scale will increase the cost in a
rapidly ascending ratio, the water supply would become more uncertain or expensive,
and in view of the capability for enlargement of the locks proposed, any material change
seems to me undesirable. Were the question entirely new, however, I would advise a
somewhat wider lock on the canal as tending to cheapen transportation and offering bet¬
ter facilities for future enlargement.
PREVIOUS SURVEYS.
' In 1817-19, surveys were made of Greenbrier and New Rivers by Messrs. Moore and
Briggs with a view to their improvement by sluices for batteaux drawing from 1£ to 2
feet of water only. Their report is valuable for the accurate description of the rivers,
their fall, &c.
From Bunlap's Creek to the Greenbrier River full examinations and surveys for a
canal were made in 1826-'28 by Captain McNeil, United States Army, every route being
examined which gave any promise, resulting in a location by way of Fork Run and How¬
ard's Creek, which was adopted by the James River and Kanawha Company. Subse¬
quent surveys by the engineers of the company have confirmed the superiority of this
location.
In 1838 Ed. H. Gill made a minute and careful survey and report on the improve¬
ment of the Kanawha River, under the direction of Charles Ellet, jr., then the chief
engineer, recommending a system of locks from pool to pool combined with wing dams,
for the purpose of obtaining a depth of feet at low water stages.
Mr. Gill made in 1841 an examination of the Greenbrier and New Rivers, and recom¬
mended a plan for their improvement. He proposed for the former stream a mixed
system of canal and slack-water; and for New River, of locks and dams suitable for
steamboat navigation. His plans are marked by good judgment and skill, although
in some cases their boldness is rather to be admired than imitated. His report is ap¬
proved in general terms by Benjamin Wright and Charles Ellet, and with some reserva¬
tions by Charles B. Fisk, all eminent civil engineers.
Another survey and estimate for improving the Kanawha were made under the di
rection of Mr. Fisk, in 1855, by John A. Byers, on the plan of sluice dams at short
intervals on the ripples with a view to obtain five feet depth of water.
A third project was submitted to the directors of the Kanawha improvement in 1860,
by Charles Ellet, jr., their engineer at that time, who proposed, after clearing out the
sluices and confining the water to the channels, to supply from reservoirs the quantity
needed for purposes of navigation beyond the natural flow of the stream.
LOCATION ACROSS THE ALLEGHANY SUMMIT.
The first point in my instructions was to determine the best route for the canal from
the termination of the definitive location already made. As before stated, the line
selected by Captain McNeil, in 1828, had been adopted as the best that could be found.
Other routes have been brought forward by local advocates; none more prominently
than that by way of Craig's Creek, connecting it with Sinking or Poverty Creeks,
(more southern branches of New River.) This line was examined by Captain McNeil,
and more recently by other engineers, all of whom have declared it to possess no claims
to attention. Under the circumstances, and in view of the little time at my disposal,
1 have made no further investigation into the merits of this route.
While the line adopted by Captain McNeil has not been improved as to its general loca¬
tion, an important modification of it has been recommeuded and urged by Mr. Edward
Lorraine, chief engineer of the James River Company. McNeil's line ascended the valley
of Fork Run to an elevation of 1,916 feet above tide, and there pierced the ridge with
3
Gil}
9 JAMES EJVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
a tunnel of 2? miles in length, whence it descended the valley of Howard's Creek to the
Greenbrier. Mr. Lorraine proposes *' to establish the summit at a level of 1,700 feet
above tide, or twenty feet above the level of Greenbrier River, at the mouth of How¬
ard's Creek, and pass through the Alleghany Mountains by a tunnel about nine miles
long." This, then, was the real question as to the route across the Alleghany summit.
The line now recommended for the canal, from the mouth of Fork Run, ascends the
valley of that stream to an elevation of 1,700 feet above tide, then passes through the
Alleghany Mountain by a tunnel 7.8 miles in length, crossing also under the summits
of Tuckahoe and Kates Mountain, and, emerging in the valley of Howard's Creek,
follows it to the Greenbrier River. The whole distance is 12.6 miles. The ascent on
the eastern slope is 72 feet, overcome by six locks of 12 feet lift, and the descent west¬
erly from the summit level, which is 10.55 miles in length, is by three locks of 10 feet
lift, to the river.
The supply of water will bo taken from the Greenbrier River, but as this does not at
all times furnish a sufficient quantity, recourse must be had to reservoirs to meet the
deficiency. These may be constructed on the river itself, but the very complete sur¬
veys made by Mr. Lorraine for a reservoir on Anthony's Creek, one of its tributaries,
show that site to be a desirable one, both as to cost and sufficiency.
The alternate route for the passage of the main divide continues up Fork Run to an
elevation 216 feet above the first described line; the tunnel is 2f miles long, and the
whole number of locks, ascending and descending, is forty-six. The tunnel on this
route can be worked with any desired number of shafts, and lying principally in the
slate and shaly sandstones, the estimate has been made to cover the cost of arching the
whole tunnel.
The supply of water will, in this case also, be obtained from a reservoir to be con¬
structed on Anthony's Creek, a tributary of the Greenbrier, whence it will pass through
a tunnel 2£ miles long, and a feeder canal of 6£ miles to the summit level.
The distinguishing feature of the low level is the long tunnel, longer even than that
of Mount Cenis, just now reaching completion; differing from that work, however, in
one important particular, that while the Mount Cenis tunnel was excavated exclusively
from the two ends, the one now in consideration can be worked from six shafts as well
as from the ends, forming fourteen faces upon which simultaneous progress can be
made.
The section recommended and adopted for the estimate is 52 feet wide and 34£ feet
high, the water-way being 7 by 46 feet, with a tow-path of 6 feet, and semi-circular
roof. I have no doubt that stream, in some form, will be used as the motive power in
this tunnel, but have thought it necessary to provide a narrow tow-path, rather as
an assistance in case of accident, than as an auxiliary to navigation. This narrow
tow-path is extended through the rock cuttings of the approaches to the tunnel, in
which also the width at wafer surface is somewhat reduced, while retaining an equal
section.
The extreme length of tunnel is 40,380 feet, and, for the purpose of diminishing the
depth of shafts, has been located upon a curve of nearly 30 miles radius, although in
construction the tunnel would be made straight, from shaft to shaft.
The shafts vary in depth from 333 to 693 feet, and the greatest distance between any
two of them is 7,500 feet.
The cost of the tunnel varies with its -width. Being of great length, it must afford
room for the passage of loaded boats moving in opposite directions, and for the same
reason the resistance to traction, which are directly dependent on the width of water¬
way, must not be too largely increased.
The dimensions given allow 6 feet for guard-timbers and for space between passing
boats, and the resistances will be about 25 per cent, greater than on the 70-foot canal.
The rock through which the excavation will be made is slate and sandstone of vari¬
able quality, from a sandstone shale to the most solid character of rocks. Lying be¬
low the summits, crossed at a depth of 1,000 to 1,300 feet, it is reasonable to suppose
that a large portion of the rock will be sufficiently firm and solid to stand without a
lining arch. I have, however, included in the estimate the cost of arching one-half of
the whole length of the tunnel. The cost, as estimated, of this line, from the mouth of
Fork Run to the Greenbrier, is $15,636,757
And by the high-level route 7,959,564
Difference against the low level 7,677,193
Before comparing these two routes as to the relative cost of transportation over them,
we must determine as the elements of computation the probable tonnage, and the cost
of transportation per ton per mile.
On the Erie Canal 198 boats have actually been passed through a single lock in one
day; we may then safely assume a capacity for 180 boats. The tonnage of the boats
id i
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAfe. 19 ^
which will be used will be about 280 tons, but as the freight going West will not be
more than one-fourth of that from the West, we will average them at 180 tons, which
Will show a trade of 9,720,000 tons per annum or for a season of 300 days.
The actual excess in length of the high level route is about miles; the whole
amount of lockage is 432 feet. This being equated by the rule deduced from observa¬
tions on the Erie, is equal to 37 miles of level canal, making the equivalent difference
in length equal to 40J miles of level canal.
The cost of transportation on canals of these dimensions is stated by McAlpine, in his
report of 1854, to be four mills per ton per mile. The officers of the Erie have found it
to vary from 2.16 to 2.25 mills per ton per mile up to 1866, and in 1868 to have reached
4.6 mills. I make the cost on the present work, reduced to a level, 2.3 mills.
Appyling then this price, we have 9,720,000 tons by 40^ miles by 2.3
mills 8905,418
Which, at 7 per cent., is the interest on 812,934,542
We have seen the excess of cost of the low level over the higher route
to bs 7,677,193
But this result shows that the actual saving in cost of transportation
by the lower line represents a capital of 5,257,349
On the flat ground adjacent to the river it is proposed to construct a basin, in which
cargoes can be transferred from the large barges navigating the rivers to those proper
for use in the canal.
WATEK SUPPLY.
We have assumed a trade of 180 boats per day, but it will be prudent to provide a
supply of water for 200. Allowing them one and one-half locks full of water to each
boat passing the summit level, we will require 300 locks full of water per day for
a maximum trade. The greatest lift between Greenbrier and Covington, the portion
of the line to be supplied from the summit level, is 14 feet, and the locks being 120 feet
by 20, we have 300 locks by 120 by 20 by 14, equal to cubic feet per day- 10,080,000
Evaporation on 21.9 miles (the tunnel being excluded,) j inch per mile
per day, cubic feet 225,264
Filtration, cubic feet 5,240,400
Waste at structures, cubic feet 43,200
Leakage at lock gates 1,728,000
Total, cubic feet 17,316,864
The minimum flow of the Greenbrier, as gauged by Captain McNeil,
was 97 feet per second, or per day 8,380,800
Leaving to be supplied from other sources 8,936,064
Suppose the flow of the Greenbrier to continue at its minimum for an
average period of 120 days, the total quantity to be furnished would
be, cubic feet 1,072,327,680
The reservoir surveyed by Mr. Lorraine will contain 4,806,000,000 cubic
feet, and the observed discharge of the stream, (where it has been
gauged,) for a year of much less than the average rain-fall, is 5,484,229,000
Diminish this by the evaporation of one-fourth of an inch per day for
one year, from the surface of the reservoir 899,405,100
And we have available for the canal 4,584,823,900
Or a surplus of 3,512,496,220
As fears have been expressed by some persons not familiar with the subject, that a
reservoir supplied chiefly from rain-fall might fail to furnish the anticipated supply, it
is well to observe that the valley of the Greenbrier River is extremely favorable for the
construction of. reservoirs, with which it might be filled throughout its length of 60
miles, in which any desired amount of water from the spring and winter floods might
be stored up for use in times of drought.
At the mouth of Howard's Creek the canal, having passed the Alleghany summit, is
terminated. The means of its ultimate connection with the Ohio is next to be con¬
sidered. The valley of the Greenbrier River is narrow, limited on one or both sides by
steep bluffs or cliff's. The flat land is small in quantity, and in no place continuous
for any considerable distance. The improvement recommended by Mr. Gill, partly
canal and partly slack-water, would be the more economical for a work of the dimen¬
sions proposed by him, but the larger canal now under consideration would not find
room in many places along the river bluffs, without too serious a reduction of the
water-way of the river itself. I therefore recommend a continuous slack-water, (broken
b
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
at two points only by short sections of canal,) which would be extended to the mouth
of the river by nineteen dams, of heights varying from 10 to 35 feet. At Anderson's,
and again a short distance below the Falls of Greenbrier, short canals of large dimen¬
sions are introduced to avoid very expensive locations for dams, which would other¬
wise be required. The length of the river is 49.086 miles, and the total fall 316 feet.
New River is, particularly in its lower portions, of a different character, the banks
being composed almost entirely of boulders, among or over which the construction of
a canal presents formidable difficulties. These, however, are not in the way of a slack-
water improvement, as is now recommended. The river and its valley are remarkably
favorable for a work of this character, except in one single particular, and that is the
difficulty (on a hurried reconnoissance) of determining rock sites for dams. The river is
in many places filled with boulders of every size, sometimes immensely large, and it is
not possible generally to estimate their depth. At such points the cost of foundations
cannot be determined in advance. I have, therefore, deemed it necessary to locate
dams at those places only where the ledge rock can be discovered. In consequence,
some of them are higher than I could have wished, and the estimate proportionately
greater. It is probable that better sites will be found by a more detailed survey, and
that the cost will thereby be reduced. Indeed, I expect a thorough survey greatly to
diminish the estimate. It was not possible in the time and with the force at my dis¬
posal to undertake an examination in detail of the pools and shoals, with a view to
make a final location. A height was therefore taken for each dam sufficient to raise
the water seven feet at the foot of the one next above, without regard to its present
depth.
The length of New River, from the mouth of Greenbrier, is 67.433 miles ; the fall in
this distance, 756 feet.
The upper portion of the Kanawha, from the mouth of Gauley River to the foot of
Lyken's Shoals, requires the same kind of improvement as the Greenbrier and New
Rivers; the fall being too great for any open navigation, its cost is included with those
rivers.
The whole number of dams required is fifty-five, varying from 12 to 41 feet in height,
and in length from 200 to 600 feet. They are to be constructed of heavy rubble masonry
laid in hydraulic cement, and covered on top with timber and plank.
DIMENSIONS AND PLAN OF SLACK-WATER.
The locks are designed to be 200 feet in length between the gates, and 40 feet in width
at the lower water-line, with 7 feet depth of water. These dimensions will admit a
barge of 700 tons, or two canal boats for the enlarged canal. The locks as well as the
dams are to be constructed of heavy masonry, with guard walls from 10 to 20 feet above
the coping of the dams; the head walls and upper gates of the locks being carried up
to the same height as a protection during floods.
On the Greenbrier the maximum freshet rise is about 20 feet. It varies on different
portions of New River, rarely exceeding 8 feet at Richman's falls ; 30 to 35 feet from
Stretcher's Neck to Bowyer's, or perhaps to Miller's ferry ; and for a few miles below
the latter point from 40 to 50 feet. At the " Blue Hole," where the river, having fallen
62 feet among precipitous cliffs in the preceding two miles, turns at a right angle, and
meets a lighter grade, the engineers of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad have found
unmistakable signs of high water 69 feet above the ordinary surface. At these points
the locks will be, of course, submerged, but their construction will be such as to pre¬
serve them from injury.
The lock gates will be made of iron frames, and covered with plank and furnished
with suitable gearing for manoeuvering them. By reason of the necessary height of
the upper gates, they will rest on breast walls, and the influx valves will be placed in
culverts communicating directly with the pool. The efflux valves will be placed in the
lower gates.
The large locks on the slack-water will transmit the daily tonnage
estimated for the canal in 120 lockages, requiring for a maximum lift
of 15.5 feet, (on the Greenbrier,) with 25 per cent, added for waste,
120 by 200 by 40 by 15.5 by 1.25
Which being supposed necessary for 120 days, the required supply
will be
But Anthony's Creek reservoir will furnish beyond the quantity needed
for the canal
Showing a surplus to meet contingencies of
During the last summer and early fall the Greenbrier was very low; said to be lower,
indeed, than ever before observed by persons living at Greenbrier Bridge, but was
swollen by rains before an opportunity offered to gauge it. I rely, therefore, for the
Cubic feat.
18,600,000
2,232,000,000
3,512,496,220
1,280,496,220
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
6 m
low-water flow at the bridge upon Captain McNeil, who found it, as stated above,
97 feet per second at the mouth of Howard's Creek, just below Greenbrier Bridge. A
gauge made by myself, some 16 miles lower down, gave 1,000 feet per second. The
river had been much higher, but had fallen to within 8 to 10 inches of its lowest period
at the point where the gauge was made, and was very slowly falling. Any calculation
of the relative discharge at its lowest stage, based only upon the relative section, and
perimeter, must, in my judgment, be speculative when applied to a river formed like
the Greenbrier, of alternate pools and rapids. The application of the formula gives, as
the low-water discharge at the point, 603 feet per second, which must be far in excess
of the truth. Not many streams empty into the river between Howard's Creek and
this point, but I am of opinion that considerable quantities of water are furnished from
the limestone beds, which are here underlaid at a slight depth by the sandstone.
The discharge of New River, when said to be at a low stage, though not its lowest,
was found to be 2,000 feet per second. Besides the Gauley, several streams of consider¬
able importance empty into the New River below the place where the gauge was made,
yet the ordinary low water of the Kanawha, which unites the discharge of New River
with that of Gauley, is but 1,300 feet per second, and has been as low as 1,100 feet at
Buffalo Shoals, 35 miles below Charleston. If, therefore, the water of New River sinks,
as has been supposed, it does not come out at the Salines or any other point of the upper
Kanawha, but the fact is, as before stated, that the minimum flow of a stream of these
varying characteristics cannot be correctly deduced from observations made at any
other stage.
From Lyken's Shoals to the Ohio, at Point Pleasant, the distance is 85.1 miles, and the
average fall about .873 foot per mile, and as with this fall an open navigation is practica¬
ble, it is also highly desirable.
Among the plans proposed, that of sluice dams, by Mr. Fisk, is the most simple of
application and certain in its results. His theory is to grade the river by means of
dams at the shoals, to be spaced about one-quarter of a mile, containing sluices of uni¬
form dimensions, (I would fix tliera at 100 by 7 feet,) and with but 6 inches fall at each
dam, thus lengthening the steep grade of the shoal, and lightening it by extending the
fall over more distance. The resistance to a tow of loaded boats passing these sluices
up stream will be greater than has been supposed, (for the tow will completely fill the
sluice,) and will require some modifications of the present method of towing. The
water flow of the Kanawha being 1,100 to 1,300 feet per second, is not sufficient- to
fill such a sluice, but will require from 800 to 1,000 feet more. To obtain this we must
have recourse to a reservoir, and I therefore include in the estimate the cost of one sur¬
veyed by Mr. Ellet for this purpose, described by him as " Meadow Reservoir." His
estimate, as revised, amounts to $529,080, but, as one with a tenth of its capacity will
be sufficient, I have placed it at $250,000. To this is added the estimate for dams, &cM
by Mr. Byers, increased by 8(1 per cent, to allow of more permanent constructions thau
those proposed by him, as well as a greater depth of water, $723,900, making a total of
$973,900.
The mean velocity of current in the sluices will be 3 feet per second, or about 2 miles
per hour, which will be encountered for a short "distance only, and the wide pools be¬
tween the dams will otter every facility for the passage of boats moving in opposite di¬
rections. In case the system of towing cannot be changed to occupy less width than is
now usual, (I see no reason why it should not be,) then recourse must be had to locks
and dams, for which the conditions are peculiarly favorable, if any obstructed navigation
can be tolerated. An approximate estimate shows the cost of such an improvement to
be about $1,000,000.
TIME OP COMPLETION.
A material question is the time which will be required for the completion of this
work. Provided funds are supplied to keep pace with their economical expenditure,
the opening of the line will be governed by the time necessary to complete the long or
"Lorraine " tunnel. If we suppose a progress of 30 feet per month to be made in each
shaft, and 100 feet per month in each heading, (and double this has been made in the
Mount Cenis tunnel,) then the longest time will be consumed in the west heading of shaft
No. 4 and the east heading of shaft No. 5, which will require five years and two months
from the date of commencement. Ten months may be consumed in preparation and in
trimming up after the opening in made through. We may therefore safely say that the#
work can be completed in six years from the time it is put into the hands of a competent
contractor.
As these shafts will be the deepest on the line of tunnel, (the portion between them
lies under the summits of Kate Mountain,) I will not venture to predict what character
of rock will be encountered. If it should be slate or shaly sandstone, much more rapid
progress can be made ; if compact sandstone or limestone, even then the rate of 100
feet per month ought to be attained.
Much water will probably be met with, and will require the use of the most improved
pumping machinery.
JAMES RIVES AND KANAWHA CANAL.
The great quantity of material to be removed—about one ton in every four minutes—
will be facilitated by the large area of tunnel, but will require skilful management and
the best mechanical helps.
CHESAPEAKE AND OHIO RAILROAD.
From the mouth of Howard's Creek to the mouth of Scary, about 16 miles below
Charleston, the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad follows the valleys of the Greenbrier,
New, and Kanawha Rivers.
. The location made for the Covington and Ohio Railroad, of which this is the successor,
took into view the construction of the water line, and was placed at an elevation above
the reach of floods as increased by the dams to be erected, and high enough to permit
the passage of boats beneath its bridges. The location by the present company, how¬
ever, is but a few feet above the maximum freshet height of the river in its unimproved
condition, and will be flooded in high water if this project is carried out. But little
work, however, has yet been done on it which would not be available for a location
high enough to be out of the way of the water line ; but it is understood that the entire
road will be placed under contract in the spring, and it becomes therefore of great im¬
portance that the question of the construction of the water line be determined at an
early day, and an engagement entered into with the railroad company for the necessary
changes in its location. Negotiations have been opened and propositions made by
the James River and Kanawha Company, with a view to arrange the terms upon
which the alterations would be made by the railroad, but so far as I am advised, without
definite results.
MODE OF TRANSPORTATION.
Through freights will be transported by barges towed by steam from the mouth of the
Kanawha to Greenbrier Bridge, and thence by canal-boats to Richmond, moved, I would
say, by horse-power, were I not satisfied that steam will be introduced as the motor on
large canals, before this work can be constructed.
For some classes of freights it may be more economical to use barges small enough to
go through on the canal, two of which can pass the river locks at once, and thus avoid
the necessity of breaking bulk. But I apprehend that for grain, which will probably
form the greater part of the freight, the larger barges will be used and the cargoes
transferred at Greenbrier Bridge. With proper elevators the cost of transfer need not
exceed one cent per bushel.
In the present uncertain and embarrassed condition of the Ohio and Kanawha naviga¬
tion, heavy freights are carried for about 1.8 miil per ton per mile. It is then too much
to assume that by a systematic organization and the use of larger boats the cost may be
reduced to 1£ mill. We will, however, put it at 2 mills.
I estimate the cost on the Greenbrier and New Rivers at 3 mills per ton per mile, and
on the canal at 3.6 mills, making an average of about 3.16 mills per ton per mile, or
§1 52£ for the whole distance from the Ohio to Richmond.
The entire cost of the improvement will he about $48,000,000
Six per cent, on which is $2,880,000
Annual cost for maintenance 387,200
3,267.200
With a trade of 5,000,000 tons per annum, a charge of 65.3 cents per ton on the
through route will pay these expenses at the rate of 1.34 mill per ton per mile, making
total cost, with tolls, but without profits to carriers, 4.5 miils per ton per mile.
Per toa.
The average charges for ten years from Chicago to New York have been by the
water lines
And by Central Railroad 14 31
From St. Louis flour has been carried to New York by rail for 13 00
And by way of New Orleans for.. * H 50
The actual cost of transportation per ton per mile by the Virginia water line would be
as follows:
From St. Louis to mouth of Kanawha, 903 miles, at .3 cent $2 71
*%Iouth of Kanawha to Richmond, 480 miles, at .316 cent . 1 52
Richmond to Hampton Roads, 100 miles, at .25 cent 25
Two transshipments 40
Cost from St. Louis to New York, without tolls on canal or profit to carriers..# 4 88
From Dubuque, Iowa, one of the cities on the Mississippi nearest to Chicago, to
New York by rail is 1.145 miles; one ton of freight moved over this distance,
at .12 cent per mile, would cost $L3 74
JAMES RIVER. AND KANAWHA CANAL.
65
From Dubuqe to New Tork, by rail to Chicago, and thence by the northern water
lines, cost as follows :
Dubuque to Chicago, by rail, 188 miles, at .12 cent S2 2d
Chicago to Btiffalo, by the lakes, 1,042 miles, at .2 cent 2 08
Buffalo to West Troy, by Erie Canal, 350 miles, at .4 cent 1 40
West Troy to New York, by Hudson River, 151 miles, at .25 cent 38
Three transshipments
6 62
From Dubuque to Hampton Roads, by Virginia water line, will cost:
Dubuque to mouth of Kanawha, by river, 1,367 miles, at .3 cent 84 10
Mouth of Kanawha to Richmond, 480 miles, at .316 cent 1 52
Richmond to Hampton Roads, 100 miles, at .25 cent 25
Two transshipments 40
Total 6 27
Showing a difference from Dubuque of 29 cents per ton by the Virginia water lines
over that by the lakes, although the difference of distance against it is 241 miles. Of
all points on the Mississippi, Dubuque is one of the most favorable to the Northern
lakes, in this comparison. The Virginia route is open several months, during which the
Northern lines are closed by ice, and is free from the dangers which affect that naviga¬
tion during the busiest months of the grain movement.
In addition to through freights from the West to the seaboard, the trade of the Vir¬
ginia line will be increased by local developments. The coal deposits of the Kanawha
have been worked with marked success, though to a comparatively limited extent. Bi¬
tuminous, canal, and splint coals are found in abundance, and are mined with very little
cost. The iron ores of East Virginia, lying near the line of the canal, cover large tracts
of country. They are of excellent quality, and will be extensively developed by cheap
coal from the Kanawha. Three-fourths of the salt-works, formerly so productive, are
now, I am informed, "dead rented"* to proprietors of other works on the Ohio, to pre¬
vent their competition. They are capable of any required development. The general
argument for the construction of this work is to be found in the necessity for more lines
of transportation, and for cheaper rates from the Northwest to the Atlantic, as set forth
in the memorials to Congress of the States of Virginia and Iowa. Time has not permit¬
ted me to present from original sources such statistics of Western production and trans¬
portation as would have been desirable.
The surplus products of the Northwest exceed twenty-five million tons, of which from
five to six million come to the Atlantic States over our four trunk lines of railway and
the Erie Canal. The total wheat and corn crop of 1868 was nearly 1,000,000,000 bush¬
els, of which there were received at the lake ports 84,000,000 bushels ; shipped to Now
York, by water, 53,000,000; by rail, 14,000,000, and exported, 30,000,000 bushels. In
1869 the receipts at lake ports were 113,000,000 bushels; at New York 62,000,000 bush¬
els, and the exports for the year ending June 30, 1869, 35,000,000 bushels.
Under the stimulus of high prices for farm products since the war, large quantities of
grain have been sent forward at rates for transportation which they cannot hereafter
pay. Daring the season of 1870, the reduction of tolls and freights on the Erie Canal
made up to some extent for the fall in prices, and considerable quantities were sent by
way of the St. Lavrrence through Canada.
" The growth of the West constantly keeps ahead of the progress of the railroads,
and the result is, the transportation companies absolutely control the rate of freight.
The present railroad lines having as much freight as they can carry, there is no motive
for competition between them, but rather for collusion to secure the highest possible
rates.
" So heavy are the transportation taxes now laid on this trade, (that of the Ohio and
the Northwest,) that at the present time, (April, 1870,) breadstulfs and produce to the
value of hundreds of millions is perishing in the West, for the reason that it would cost
more to move it to the seaboard than it would bring when it reached there. This fact,
and the consequent discouragement of production, is a cause of serious alarm, when we
consider that it is on a Western produce that we must, in a great measure, depend, to
make up the balance of our foreign trade.
" Without cheaper transportation, however, we cannot compete with Russia and other
grain-producing countries in foreign markets; but with free navigation from the Mis¬
sissippi, via the Wisconsin and Fox Rivers, the lakes and the Erie Canal, to the sea¬
board at this point, the agricultural resources of the country would be more fully
* Paid to remain idle.
jtames riyer and kanawha canal.
and properly developed, the volume of our export trade largely increased, and the
prosperity of our State permanently assured." (Hunt's Merchant's Magazine, April,
1870.) '
But I apprehend that this portion of the argument will be admitted by all:
1. That the depression of business is greatly affected by the high cost of food.
2. That cheaper transportation will give cheaper food at the East.
3. That Western agriculture will be stimulated to increased transportation.
4. That the quantity and value of our exports will also bo increased.
To those who have investigated the subject, the great economy of water transporta¬
tion is well known, and it is generally conceded by the mercantile community.
We have but one canal connecting the Western waters with the Atlantic, the Erie.
Of its importance, notwithstanding the rapid growth of the railroad system of the State,
as a source of wealth and an element of commercial prosperity, we can best judgo from
the tonnage statistics of the State engineer's report, which show that during the seven
months of navigation, in 1869, the canals moved more freight than was carried by all
the railroads of the State during the year.
The Erie Canal proper has cost in construction, improvement, repairs, and manage¬
ment, with interest on all expenditures, 8140,430,953 ; and has paid in tolls, with inte¬
rest on all sums received, $181,828,603; or a net profit over principal and interest of
$41,397,650.
Notwithstanding the high rate of tolls which produced this enormous profit, the
charges for transportation by canal have generally been about half as much as by rail.
Although at times the railroad rates have been reduced to the same as the canal, they
have then been less than cost, and required the imposition of excessive charges on local
trade to make up the loss.
For the year 1867, canal charges on the round trip from Buffalo to Albany were ave¬
raged at 1 cent per ton per mile, 44 per cent, of which was toll.
The average receipts per ton per mile during the years 1865, 1866, and 1867, were, on
New York State canals, 1 cent; New York Central Railroad, 292 cents; Erie Railroad,
242 cents.
The poiicy of low tolls on her canals has been inaugurated by the State of New York,
with the view to retain and increase the immense trade brought by them to her empo¬
rium. The profits of transporting, handling, selling, and shipping will advance her pros¬
perity far more than the receipts for tolls. Another enlargement of the Erie Canal is
urged, at a cost of $10,000,000, for the purpose of reducing cost of transportation from
2.16 to 1.7 mills per ton per mile.
The Pennsylvania canals, so long a burden and expense to that State, though of small
dimensions and unfitted for the most economical transportation, having passed into the
hands of the Pennsylvania Central Railroad Company, under the skilful management
which has accomplished such great results for the railway, are being brought into condi
tion to facilitate and cheapen transportation on their lines.
Hon. William I. McAlpine, one of our most eminent engineers, in an address delivered
by him in 1868, states the case with so much force and with such authority that I intro¬
duce here his remarks:
"The Erie Canal now conveys one-fourth of the whole of the exports of that vast
interior region which I have already described, and as much of it during its six months
of uninterrupted navigation as all of the trunk railways together during the same
time.
"Every canal-boat which comes to this city with an average cargo is more than the
average of the New York Central Railroad trains. In the busy canal season, more than
one hundred and fifty such boats come daily to tide-water, and the New York Central
Rail-Road traffic never reaches thirty trains a day.
" Such a canal traffic would make more than twenty miles of railroad cars, and there
is neither room nor convenience for discharging one-fourth of that number. The slow,
plodding canal-boat attracts no attention, while the bustle, noise, and whirl of a freight
train creates a sensation in every village through which it passes. The locks on the ca¬
nals act as regulators of the boats, which are separated just the distance which they
would move during one lockage ; and hence the canal business proceeds methodically,
and gives no idea of its great volume. Nor is this appreciated until some stoppage oc¬
curs, and then a delay of twenty-four hours will accumulate hundreds of boats, enough
to fill the Central track half-way from here to Utica.
"One of the commissioners told me to-day that a break at Schenectady, which re¬
quired six days to repair, filied the canal to Utica on one side and to the Hudson on the
other.
" Mr. Dullard told me last fall that the freight which has frozen upon the canal would
(with their other business) occupy all the power of the Central six months to transport
it to the Hudson. Six days more of canal navigation would have brought every pound
of this freight to tide-water.
" Imagine, if you can, what would be the effect of a catastrophe that should stop the
navigation of the canals for one season. All of the New York roads could not trans-
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. ^ ^5
port one-tenth and all of the roads to the seaboard put together not one-fifth of it. Half
the merchants of New York, connected directly or indirectly with this canal traffic,
would be bankrupted, and their rivals in Portland, Boston, Philadelphia and Baltimore
would be correspondingly profited.
" It is evident that all the channels of trade in operation between the Atlantic and
the West, as now managed, are inadequate to accommodate or perform it at a cost
which, in time of low prices, will allow the agricultural products of the West to be
transported.
" In a broad view of the subject, there is no antagonism between the interests of the
canals and railways of this State. They have each their appropriate functions to per¬
form, and, while accomplishing these, each of them is adding to the business of the
other.
" A prominent cause of the transfer of much of the legitimate business of the canals
to the railways of our State arises from the fact that the former is under individual man¬
agement, and the latter is controlled by politicians. As the manager of several Western
railways, where the direction and route of a large transport was controlled, I can
safely say that I was never for a week without the presence of a solicitor of Freights
from one or more of the New York railways, and in ten years of such active manage¬
ment I never once had an applicant to direct our freights over the Erie Canal. All
that took that direction (and it was of no inconsiderable amount) was from the sheer
force of influence of its own merit."
The reports of the railroad companies do not furnish the means of determining the
cost to them of transportation. The most favorable statements represent it to be 1.2
cent per ton. Coal in large quantities can be carried at less cost.
It has been urged as against the project of a new water line that railroads of easy
grades and curves and running at low rates of speed could carry freights at almost
nominal rates. Undoubtedly by such means, with a track exclusively for slow freights,
and perhaps by adopting to some extent the lessons of the narrow-guage railway, rail¬
road transportation may be very much cheapened. Good authorities maintain, how¬
ever, that a reduction of speed below 8 to 10 miles per hour is not economical, and the
third track adds materially to the expense. But the first argument is .the fact that
none of our through lines have thought it worth while to inaugurate such a system,
while they have plenty of freights at higher and better-paying rates. Freights of cer¬
tain classes belong legitimately to the railroads; they are of greater value, and can
afford to pay higher rates, and for such articles the great saving in time, by which a
larger business can be done on the same capital, will always give it the preference.
To these the water line can lay no claim. Its specialty will be the transportation of
such as would scarcely be borne by the railway in any case, such as are now " perish¬
ing in the "West because it would cost more to move them to the seaboard than they
would bring when they reached there."
Over the water line by the lakes this one has the advantage of being but little
obstructed by ice, and it is free from the heat and dampness of the New Orleans route,
which, for more than half the year, cannot, without risk, be used for grain and other
articles.
But the tendencies of the great railway companies are toward consolidation. Among
them there can be no real competition, attempts at which always end in combination.
" It is on the water way * * * rather than on new lines of railroad that we must
chiefly rely for the accomplishment of the much-needed reforms. Lakes, rivers and
canals are the only sure protection against railroad monopoly."
If it should be determined to prosecute this work, although it is of the greatest
importance to the interests involved that its completion should not be delayed, at least
one season will be required for the proper examination of the line, its relocation, sur¬
vey, preparation of plans, and getting it ready for contract.
Some time might be saved by commencing work on the deep shafts of the Lorraine
tunnel, as soon as a careful location could be made.
These necessary surveys and preparations will cost about $80,000. Work on the tun¬
nel shafts, to the amount of $10,000 or $15,000, could be done before the spring of 1872.
The above estimate is not intended to provide further information to enable Congress
to decide the question, but supposes the project adopted, and the work to be prepared
for contract.
The estimated cost being nearly $48,000,000, and the time required six years, an
average expenditure of $8,000,000 per annum will be necessary.
Considering that this water line will be closed at its junction with the Ohio for
about three months in each year, by low water in that stream, I was at first disposed
to recommend the improvement of the rivers to a less depth than that adopted for
them; but there is no reason why the capacity of the line should not be kept up
during such periods as furnish sufficient water, more particularly as at such times trans¬
portation may be cheapened by the use of boats made to pass through the canal
without breaking bulk from the point of shipment on Western waters to Richmond or
4
265
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
Hampton Roads. At the risk, however, of touching questions not committed to me, I
would call attention to the fact that the water line involves the improvement of the Ohio
River from the mouth of Kanawha down. It is difficult to explain why a river of such
capacities should have been left in its present condition. With a low-water discharge of
3,500 cubic feet per second, sufficient at such times to fill a channel 200 feet wide and 7
feet deep, it affords, on its shoals, a depth only one-fourth as much spread over a width
of about one thousand feet.
The following is the estimated cost in detail .of the improvement, as recommended,
from mouth of Fork Run to mouth of Kanawha River :
Estimate from Fork River to Greenbrier River :
Grubbing and cleaning 67 miles, at $200 . $1,340
141,700 yards of embankment, in addition to price for excavation, at 10
cents 14,170
313,149 yards earth excavation, at 30 cents 93,945
1,203,865 yards rock excavation, at $1 25 1,504,831
13,000 yards of slope wall, at $1 50 19,500
6,500 yards of lining, at 40 cents..... » 2,600
8 locks at $27,000 216,000
1 lock, at $50,000 50,000
3 culverts 5,000
2 waste weirs, 3,000
7 overfall wastes 5,600
1 aqueduct, wooden trunk, to carry Fork Run over cut 5,600
2 bridges, $4,950 and 5,625 10,525
Tunnel, 40,580 feet long, 2,333,350 yards at $5, including exca¬
vation for arch $11,666,750
Shafts 2,700 lineal feet, 14,400 yards, at $20 288,000
Masonry of arch and tow-path, 162,320 yards at $8 1,298,560
1,931,511
13,253,310
15,184,821
155,000
Feeder, 16,000 feet long 121,000
Ham, with abutment and guard gate 41,000
Embankment, 8,000 yards : 2,000
Anthony's Creek reservoir (Mr. Lorraine's estimate :)
456,000 yards embankment, at 30 cents 136,800
977 yards masonry arch, at $12 11,724
2,989 yards masonry abutments, at $8 23,912
14,000 bushels cement 10,500
950,000 pounds iron pipes, at 8 cents 76,000
258,936
Land damage, 200 acres, at $40 ; 3,000 acres, at $10,.......... 38,000
15,636,757
Greenbrier and New Rivers :
989,130 cubic yards of masonry, at $10 $9,891,300
22,852 cubic yards of concrete, at $5 114,260
400,000 cubic yards of riprap, at $1 50 600,000
6,882,000 feet, board measure, of timber and plank, at 5 cents 344,100
1,401,622 cubic yards of earth excavation, at 40 cents 560,648
168,600 cubic yards of rock excavation, at $1 50 (partly under water) 252,900
1,470,000 cubic yards embankment, at 20 cents 294,000
77,333, cubic yards of puddling, at 25 cents 19,333
Timber and Iron in coping of dams 99,000
550,000 cubic yards of graveling, at 40 cents 220,000
Lock Gates, $8,000 per lock, valves, &c., $1,200 per lock 552,000
55 lock houses, at $1,000 55,000
For dam and lock at Lyken's Shoals 130,000
Land damages, 150 acres, at $100 $15,000
Land damages, 9,600 acres, at $10 96,000 ^
111 jUUv
13.243,541
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. [j
recapitulation.
From mouth of Fork River to Greenbrier River $15,636,757
Greenbrier and New Rivers 13,243,541
Kanawha River. • • 973,900
Add 10 per cent, for contingencies •. 2,986,420
Total from Fork Run 32,840,618
Respectfully submitted.
¥M. R. HUTTON,
Chief Engineer.
Major Wm. P. Craighill,
United States Engineers.
NECESSITY OF A CENTRAL LINE OF NAVIGATION DIRECTLY EASTWARD
FROM THE OHIO RIVER TO THE CHESAPEAKE BAY.
Cheap transportation is the great necessity of the West. Its products exceed in
amount the means at command of cheap outlet to the seaboard. They press constantly
upon the avenues of transportation, and millions of Western producers are thus placed
under the power of carriers. A system of transportation is needed which shall be free
from interruption, and sufficient to carry all the freights promptly and at low charges.
The railroads do not furnish this system. Their charges are high, and are put up when
the business is most pressing. They are not common highways, but close corporations.
Though their rates may be borne for short distances, yet but few of the agricultural
and mineral products of the West can bear even their minimum charges over the long
distances which intervene between very extensive portions of the far interior and the
seaboard. Beyond certain distances from the Eastern markets, the great bulk of agri¬
cultural and mineral products must rely exclusively upon water transportation.
There are now but two routes of continuous navigation by which they can obtain
outlet—that by the Northern lakes and that by the Mexican Gulf* But these, besides
being liable to the casualties of climate, (one of them to five months of interruption by
ice,) are so circuitous, that they require the products of our very extended country to
pass beyond its boundaries in seeking their way to its own markets. This tedious
circuit, while it is at all times objectionable on the score of time and cost, is most
especially so whenever the nation becomes, or is in danger of becoming, involved in
hostilities with a maritime power. During the recent war with a domestic power, whose
ports were rigidly blockaded, this evil was most sensibly felt, even with reference to
the route by the lakes. What might not the evil be in the event of a war with Great
Britain ?
The great length of these two circuitous lines of water transit, and the non-exist¬
ence, up to the present time, of any continuous line of navigation directly across the
country from the centers of the interior to the center of the seaboard, have compelled
a resort to the policy of substituting railroad transportation over the direct routes. But
although the cost of carriage has been much cheapened on these works, they cannot
be thrown open to general use and free competition. Meantime water transportation
has itself undergone very great improvements, which have had the effect of reducing
freights far below any possible minimum at which railroads can afford them. It is now
practicable, on lines of unbroken navigation, for the heaviest classes of agricultural
and mineral products to be borne, from distances exceeding five thousand miles in the
interior, to the seaboard, at charges by no means prohibitory.
Even at present the great bulk of Western trade avoids the direct transit across the
country afforded by the railroads, and seeks the circuitous and more or less hazardous
routes of the lakes and of the Gulf, on account of cheapness; thus proving, that as
water will seek its lowest outlet, however great the circuit it may have to pursue, so
trade will seek its cheapest outlet, however long may be the passage. It is true that
during the recent war vast quantities of produce went to market over the railroads;
but then the Gulf route was closed and the lake route much obstructed. There was
also a stronger reason even than this, which found its cause in the high prices result¬
ing from the condition of the currency and the existence of war. The direction which
phenomena gave to the movement of products is thus accounted for by the Superin¬
tendent of the Census in his report under the Department of Agriculture :
" Had it not been for the high premium on gold, the price of wheat in this country,
and especially at the West, would have been less than the cost of production ; as it is,
the advance in gold has served to increase prices in the West much more in propor¬
tion than in the Eastern or Middle States. For instance, if a bushel of American wheat
sells at $ 1 25 in London, and the cost of sending it from Iowa is $ 1, the Iowa farmer,
with gold at par, receives only 25 cents a bushel for the wheat. Should gold continue
6 5$
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL,
at $2 56, (the price at the present Writing, 18(54,) though the wheat still brings only
25 per bushel in London, and the cost of sending it there should be $1 per bushel,
as before, the Iowa farmer would receive §2 12 per bushel for his wheat instead of 25
cents, as would be the case if gold was at par. The wheat is sold for gold, and $1 25
in gold sells for $3 12 in legal money. Deduct $1 as the expense of sending it to Lon¬
don, and we have $2 12 as the price which wheat should bring in Iowa. In other words,
the premium on gold increases the price of wheat in Iowa eight-fold."
This statement of the Superintendent of the Census, though not accurate in its
details, even as of the date when it was written, yet serves to suggest the manner in
which war prices, in conjunction with a depreciated currency, may operate temporarily
to enable the owners of western produce to pay the high expenses of railroad trans¬
portation. With the fall of prices to normal rates, and with the gradual decline of
the premium on gold, western producers find themselves obliged to desist from the use
of railroads for heavy products for long distances, and again to recur to the circuitous
navigation of the lakes and of the Gulf. No interior water-line of continuous east and
west navigation yet exists within the United States.
But if a line of cheap water transportation were opened directly eastward from the
centers of western production to the centre of the Atlantic seaboard line, it would
offer all the advantages of directness, shortness, expedition, and freedom from inter¬
ruption, which are presented by the central lines of railroad; combined with the in-,
dispensable desideratum of cheapness, now only presented by the circuitous routes of
Gulf and lake navigation. Such a line would be afforded by completing the unfinished
portion of the Virginia Canal, over the 80 miles of distance between the present termi¬
nus at Buchanan, Botetourt County, Virginia, and the Greenbrier River, in Greenbrier
County, West Virginia. This work would connect steamboat navigation at Richmond
with steamboat navigation on the Kanawha, by a canal 277 miles long; whereas the
Erie Canal in New York connects steamboat navigation at either end of it by a canal
navigation 363 miles in length. .
American genius and enterprise have accomplished many grand achievements for
the West; first, the application of steamboat navigation to the Mississippi River and
its great tributaries; then the opening of the Erie Canal; then the construction of
great lines of railroad over the most difficult passes of the Alleghanies at immense
cost. One great achievement remains to be performed. It is the opening of a line of
water transportation directly eastward across the shortest passage of the Alleghanies,
from the Ohio to the base of the Chesapeake. Railroad transportation is for manufac¬
turers, merchants, speculators, and capitalists; water transportation is for the people.
A line of navigation, open to general use, accessible to all 'classes, is needed on the
shortest route from the interior to the seaboard. That route is presented by the inter-
lapping valleys of the Kanawha and James Rivers in Virginia, connecting the channel
of the Ohio and the channel of the James.
Impressed with the great superiority in cheapness, general utility, and popular con¬
venience of water navigation over railroad transportation, for their increasing pro¬
ducts, and naturally desiring a shorter, more central, and more expeditious line of
water transit than the present circuitous and extraneous ones by way of the Northern
Lakes and Southern Gulf, the people of the West are beginning to look to Congress for
the provision of such a route. With this object in view, the general assembly of
Iowa, at its last session, unanimously voted an able and earnest memorial on the sub¬
ject to the national legislature, following it by a resolution " instructing their Senators
and requiring their Representatives in Congress to use their best efforts to obtain such
aid from the General Government as will secure the early completion" of the Virginia
water line.
The memorial concludes as follows :
"This is a work of great national importance. Its benefits will be shared directly
by more than half the people of this country; and indirectly by all. It is a necessary
addition to the improvement of the navigation of the western rivers, without which
the benefits of that measure will be but half realized. It is a work to be done by the
whole country for the benefit of the whole country. It belongs to the Government of
the United States.
"Nothing need to be given. An advance upon good security for the return of prin¬
cipal and interest is all that will be necessary. Not only will this advance be returned
in kind with the interest, but the benefits of each year will return the outlay more
than five-fold. Instead of increasing our national burden of taxation it will so increase
the means of payment as to greatly lessen it.
" To the end, then, of obtaining Government aid, there should be a co-operative
movement of cities, towns, and States. It should be connected with the western river
improvement as a part of the same enterprise, and the influence of the great interest
to be promoted by it should be concentrated through a convention, and brought to
bear upon Congress, to insure a speedy completion; keeping it always in mind that
every year's delay is a loss of more than five times the amount required for that object.
JAMES Rim AND KANAWHA CANAL, 6
u Resolved, By the general assembly of the State of Iowa, that the great rivers on our
eastern and western borders are the natural highways for the trade and commerce of
our State, and any measures that will add to their efficiency and importance as channels
of communication will increase the Value of all our productions, add to the price of all
real property, and contribute to the prosperity of all our people.
"2. That the line of water communication between the valley of the Mississippi and
the Atlantic Ocean, by way of the Kanawha and James Rivers, through the States of
Virginia and West Virginia, is a work of national importance, and one deeply affecting
the interest of the grain-producing States of the Northwest.
"3. That our Senators in Congress be instructed, and our Representatives requested
to use their best efforts to obtain such aid from the General Government as will secure
the early completion of said line of water communication.
"4. That a copy of these joint resolutions and the accompanying memorial be for¬
warded by the secretary of the State to the President of the United States, the presi¬
dent of the Senate, and to each of our Senators and Representatives in Congress."
RESULTS EFFECTED BY THE ERIE CANAL—OTHERS EQUALLY GREAT WOULD ATTEND THE OPEN¬
ING OF THE VIRGINIA CANAL.
Although steamboat navigation on the western waters dates from 1817, the develop¬
ment of the West did not fairly begin until 1825. In October of that year the great
Erie Canal was completed. The effect was virtually to give another mouth to the Mis¬
sissippi River. It opened to market a vast region which otherwise could have presented
but limited attractions to emigration. The fact that the lake country, where the rigors
of winter are more severe, and the climatic disadvantages imposed upon agriculture
greater than in any part of the Union, has undergone a more rapid development than
any other, is due in chief part, to the Erie Canal. This work brought that great region
within readier and cheaper reach of market than any other portion of the West. The
long and tortuous channel of the Mississippi, the circuitous navigation of the Gulf, and
the heating, sweating, and moulding effect of the semi-tropical and moist southern cli¬
mate upon many products of agriculture, presented objections to the Gulf transit which
rendered the lake route preferable to it, even for the trade of localities where the ad¬
vantage of distance was less considerable. The falls of the Niagara and rapids of the
St. Lawrence River were turned by the canal, which completed a line of unbroken nav¬
igation from the furthest of the great lakes to tide-water at Albany. On the completion
of the Erie, several canals in the Northwest were immediately projected, and were soon
completed, connecting the lakes with the Ohio River on the south, and the Mississippi
River on the west. These, in later years, were followed by railroads laid down in the
same directions, forming portages between the navigation of the great rivers and that of
the lakes. But all these canals and railroads pointed to the Erie Canal as the common
debouche. These works were all in the first instance constructed as feeders to the Erie
Canal, which was the parent work and grand trunk line of the whole system. After the
system of works, of which the Erie Canal was the base, had stimulated an unprecedented
development of population and production in the West, it was found incapable of dis¬
charging the vast trade which it had created ; and then it became necessary to enlarge
its capacity, and to construct as many auxiliary works as possible, parallel with it.
Hence* the Welland and St. Lawrence Canals, and hence the Grand Trunk Railroad in
Canada, and the New York Central, the New York and Erie, the Pennsylvania Central,
and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroads, within the United States. But it may be said
with perfect truth that if there had been no Erie Canal the stupendous agricultural de¬
velopment which has been witnessed in the West would not have taken place, and that
these great auxiliary works would not have become necessary until after a much greater
lapse of time. . .
The following table shows the effect of the canal upon the growth of imports, exports,
and population in the city of New York, in contrast with the same growth in Philadel¬
phia, where the influence of the trade of the canal was only partial and indirect:
Year.
Amount of
tolls col¬
lected.
Tons, total
movement
east and
west.^
Value of imports at the
ports of
Value of exports from
the ports of
Population of—
New York.
Philadel¬
phia.
New York.
Philadel¬
phia.
New York.
Philadel¬
phia.
i920..
18.10..
1840..
I860..
$5,244
1,056,922
1,775,747
3,273,899
#••••••
1,417,046
3,076,617
$38,5.56,064
$0,064,942
116,667,553
$9*525,893
8,464,882
12,065,834
$11,769,511
17,666,624
>32,408,689
• 47,580,357
$5,743,549
4,291,793
6,820,145
4,501,606
123,706
203,007
312,712
515,394
137,097
188,961
258,832
409,353
^0 JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
The power of a direct canal running west and east to attract trade to itself is exhib¬
ited in the operations of the Erie Canal. " There are now seven great railway lines
competing with this work, besides the canals of the St. Lawrence. They are the Balti¬
more and Ohio, the Pennsylvania Central, the Atlantic and Great Western, the Phila¬
delphia and Erie, the Erie, and the New York Central Railroads, in the United States,
and the Grand Trunk Railroad in Canada. Yet these great railways do not (computing
with theirs all the trade which goes to Montreal, Ogdensburg, and Cape Vincent by lake)
secure more than fifty per cent, of the total eastward movement of all classes of freight
from the West to the seaboard markets.'' (Annual statement of trade and commerce
of Buffalo for 1865.)
It is a peculiarity of railroads that they stimulate a greater production in the country
within their reach than they can transport. Their capacity for transportation falls
behind the demands upon it, resulting from the stimulus which they impart to produc¬
tion. This is particularly the case where the roads are of great length, and penetrate
into fertile regions of country. The construction of railroads does not relieve the pres¬
sure of produce upon the means of transit, but, on the contrary, aggravates the pres¬
sure.
The opening of another and shorter canal eastward to the seaboard, over a line ex¬
empt from the long suspensions enforced further north by winter ice, would produce a
similar development of trade on the more southern line ; and some future statistician
will be able to w.rite of the Virginia Canal as the Superintendent of the Census has
written of the Erie: ( .
" The opening of this work was the announcement of a new era in the internal grain
trade of the United States. To the pioneer, the agriculturist, and the merchant, the
grand avenue developed a new world. From that period do we date the rise and pro¬
gress of the Northwest, as well as the development of the internal grain trade."
INADEQUACY OP ALL EXISTING OUTLETS FOR TRANSPORTING THE INCREASING TRADE OP THE
WEST.
Remarking upon the subject of transportation for western trade, the Superintendent
of the Census says :
" It is feared by many in New York that the construction of a ship canal to the St.
Lawrence River- would damage the canal interests of the State by diverting a large por¬
tion of the grain trade of the lakes from the Erie Canal; but when it is considered that
the production of grain in the Northwestern States increased from 218,463,583 bushels
in 1840 to 642,120,366 bushels in 1860; and that of the eight food-producing States west
of the lakes, embracing an area of 262,549,000 acres, only about 52,000,000 acres were
under cultivation in 1860, and that 26,000,000 acres of that have been broken since 1850,
no fears need be entertained that any of the outlets to the ocean will be unoccupied to
the extent of their capacity. The only fear is, th&t we will not keep pace with the in¬
creased production by the provision of increased facilities of transportation."
Sir Morton Peto, in his interesting and very clever work on the Resources and Pros¬
pects of America, makes the following truthful observations:
" How far is the amount of tonnage employed in inland intercourse in America ade¬
quate to the wants of the country ? In considering this point we have to regard the
very great length over which traffic has to be carried; and looking at those distances
no reasonable doubt can be entertained that the inland navigation of America is very
inadequate to the wants of the people. It has not, in fact, kept pace with the population
and progress of the country; and if it were not for the railroads, the great producing dis¬
tricts of the United States would be at a stand-still for want of means of transport for
their produce. There is a period of the year when the canals are frozen up. The whole
task of conveyance then falls upon the railways, and the consequence is, not only an
immediate rise in their rates, but absolute inability to conduct the traffic. The results
are often most disastrous. In one case 40,000 barrels of flour were detained at Toledo
(nearly half-way between Chicago and New York) for several months, in consequence
of want of carriage. A vast mass of produce is yearly destroyed from the inability of
the carriers to forward it. The owners are ruined, and parties in the Eastern States,
who advance money on this produce, charge excessive rates to cover the risks of delay.
The grain producers of the Western States are quite unable to find sufficient means of con¬
veyance for their products, because the railroads from west to east are choked with traffic.
The existing railroad requirements of the West are, in fact, insufficient. At present, be¬
cause they cannot carry the produce, the whole traffic of the country is subject to two
gigantic evils, arising, first, from uncertainty of conveyance ; and second, from uncer¬
tainty of charge. The present railways are quite insufficient for the growing traffic.
The lines of communication from the West by canal, &c., which existed previously to
railways, have not been affected by their construction. The produce of the Western States
has, in fact, increased faster than the means of transport, and additional facilities for the
conveyance of goods are urgently required. It is of the utmost importance to the devel-
JAMBS RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
6$ 7
opment of the West that no time should be lost in making this additional provision. An
inadequate railroad provision and a corresponding uncertainty as to conveyance and de¬
livery of freights must have the effect of checking production in the West, and, conse¬
quently, of checking capital of the East from seeking employment in the West. Railway
facilities are now the measure of the prosperity of the country.
"Now, what is the effect of this inadequacy of transportation? The producer, the
merchant, the railway company, and the consumer are all ".directly injured ; but the in¬
direct injury extends far beyond those interests. The whole produce of the West, and
consequently the entire cultivation of America, is affected, If the produce cannot be
carried, it can only find local markets. If it only finds local markets, prices must abate.
If prices abate the stimulus to the cultivation of land is lost. If the land is not required
for cultivation, in the same proportion it necessarily diminishes in value. The pros¬
perity of the West, the value of its produce, the value of its land, and the extent of
land cultivated, all depend, therefore, upon increased facilities for the conveyance of
produce, and those facilities canals and railroads must afford. The American public
ought never to be satisfied until they are able to calculate on fixed moderate prices for
freight, and fixed periods for its delivery. The future of the West depends upon ample
means of communication with the East; and the success of its means of communication
with the East is expressed in a few words, ' Prompt and economical delivery, in a fixed
time and at a fixed price.' "
Nothing could be more true than these remarks. The talk of competition between
railroads and canals, between one water line and another, or one railroad line and
another, is wholly out of place. When there is more than enough trade for all, it is use¬
less to consider the subject of competing interests.
A direct unbroken line of water transportation is urgently needed for the teeming
products of the West. The necessity for it is becoming more and more imperious every
year. How vast is the country producing tonnage, how wonderfully prolific is its pro¬
duction, how marvelously rapid its increase !
VAST EXTENT OP COUNTRY TO BE DRAINED.
The portion of the Mississippi Valley and lake country interested in the opening of a
direct line of transportation extending the navigation of the Ohio and the Mississippi to
the base of Chesapeake Bay, is composed of the following States and Territories, whose
area and population, taken chiefly from the census of 1860, are attached:
West Virginia..
Kentucky
Tennessee]
Arkansas
Ohio
Indiana
Illinois
Michigan.. .....
Wisconsin
Minnesota
Iowa
Missouri
Kansas ......
Nebraska ......
Dakota, (1865).
Montana, (1865)
Colorado
Total....
Sq. miles.
24,000
37,680
45,000
52,198
39,964
33,809
55,409
56,243
53,924
83,531
55,000
65,039
83,000
70,000
220,000
150,000
104,000
1,228,795
Population.
376,688
1.155,684
826,782
435,450
2,339,511
1,350,428
1,711,951
769,113
775,881
172,023
674,913
1,182,012
107,206
28,841
4,837
20,000
34,277
11,945,597
In the same geographical relations to trade and its markets, though not belonging to
the same political jurisdiction, is another extensive region lying above our natural
boundary line. The Red River of the North, and the Sascatchawan, in Northwest
British America, traverse a territory in the heart of the continent, five hundred thou¬
sand square miles in extent, and capable of sustaining a population of thirty millions.
"In the valleys of the Sascatchawan and Assiniboine," Professor Hand estimates that
" there are eleven millions of acres of arable land of the first quality." Of this region
about one-half is prairie and one-half is woodland; it is the only extensive prairie
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
country open to the Canadas east of the Rocky Mountains; it is destined to be the
Illinois or Iowa of British America. This is no inhospitable desert, repugnant to the
increase of the human race. Here is "a vast wedge-shaped tract of country, extend¬
ing from 47 degrees to 60 degrees of northern latitude, 10 degrees of longitude, deep at
the base, containing 500,000 square miles of habitable land, subject to few and incon¬
siderable variations in climate. The summer at Buffalo is about ninety-five days, and
it is ninety days at Cumberland House on the Sascatchawan, on 54 degrees north. The
annual mean temperature is only 8 degrees lower than Toronto, with 17 inches more of
rain and 33 inches less of snow, than at Toronto. Herds of Buffalo winter on the
woodland as far north as 60 degrees parallel. Corn grows on both sides of the Sas¬
catchawan; wheat" sown in the Red River Valley in May is gathered in by the end of
August.
The lake and river systems of this region are almost as wonderful as our own; Lake
Winnepeg having an area equal to that of Lake Ontario, and Lake Manitohah'nearly half
that of Winnepeg. The distance from a given point on the westerly end of Lake Supe¬
rior to the navigable waters of Frazer's River in British Columbia,will not exceed 2,000
miles, about twice the distance between Boston and Chicago. The westerly end of Lake
Superior is on the parallel of about 46 degrees, which passes from the heart of Germany
through the British Channel, across the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Lake Superior, Vancou¬
ver's Island, and the rich and populous archipelago of Japan.
The climate of Edmonton is milder in winter than at St. Paul. The Sascatchawan is
clear of ice in the spring as soon as the Mississippi is, between St. Anthony and Ga¬
lena. Steamboat navigation, now established on the Red River of the North to Fort
Gerry, by Americans, can readily be extended through Lake Winnepeg, and up the
Sascatchawan, to Fort Edmonton, the supposed eastern limit to the new gold district.
This territory has now a population of about ten thousand. The valley of the Red River .
of the North will make one of the finest of wheat-growing countries, the yield being
forty to sixty bushels to the acre. One hundred miles east of the Rocky Mountains,
on the Sascatchawan, is an immense coal field, stretching away towards the Arctic
Ocean.
The trade of all this region, equal in area to ten States of the size of New York, will,
from necessity, seek an outlet by the Mississippi, or Lake Superior, or the Virginia water-
line. The discovery of gold will ensure its early settlement.
" ITS PROBABLE POPULATION.
Here is a great region within and bordering upon the United States, embracing
1,750,000 square miles of territory, becoming rapidly populated, whose trade is to'be
brought to the seaboard. The population of the portion of it which lies within the United
States has greatly increased since the census of 1860, and will continue to increase until
this expanded region, one of the most fertile in the world, shall contain inhabitants ap¬
proximating in numbers, per square mile, the populations of other districts of the earth
no more fertile. As indicating the actual density of population in other quarters of the
globe, the following table is given:
Number of inhabitants to the square mile.
Belgium
Saxony
England and Wales,
Netherlands.......
Sardinia
Wurtemburg
Ireland
German States
France
397
353
307
250
225
210
205
199
176
Prussia 7.
Bavaria
Austria
Hanover
Denmark
Scotland
Sweeden
Norway .,
159
156
142
123
114
92
21
13
Few^if any, of these European States are more fertile than the valleys of the Missis¬
sippi and the lakes ; many of them are far less fertile. It is, therefore, quite reason¬
able to assume that within another century the population of this region will average one
hundred persons to the square mile, and will reach the imposing aggregate of one
hundred and seventy-five millions of inhabitants.
The State of Illinois gained between 1850 and 1860, one hundred per cent, of popu¬
lation. To show how much room is open for an increase of population, one of the
densest portions of the population of the West, that embracing the States of Indiana,
Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, and Minnesota, 'numbered, in 1860, only sixteen
persons to the square mile. The increase of population in the entire Union during each
of the last decades was 35£ per cent. At a rate of increase for the West equal to only
6 5 9
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. 1 S3
33 per cent, (it will be more than 50,) the population of the seventeen States and Ter¬
ritories of the West that have been named will be one hundred and twenty millions
by 1940. But the increase will be much more rapid. There are persons now born who
will live to see it reach more than that number.
But confining our attention to the affairs of the present time, it is important to know
what amount of tonnage is now produced in the States and Territories under consid¬
eration ; what portion of this production is necessary for consumption, and what part
might be spared for market; whether all that might be spared does or does not actually
go to market, and if it does not go, whether the faliure is due or not to inadequate
facilities of transport^and too great a cost of carriage.
ITS PRODUCTION IN TONS.
In 1860 the production of that portion of the West embraced in the seventeen States
and Territories entering into the question under discussion, was as follows:
Articles.
Wheat, bushels
Corn, bushels
Rye, bushels
Oats, bushels
Barley, bushels
Buckwheat, bushels
Beans and peas, bushels.
Irish potatoes, bushels..
Sweet potatoes, bushels.
Clover seed, bushels....
Grass seed, bushels
Flax seed bushels
Butter, pounds
Cheese, pounds
Wool, pounds
Flax, pounds
Tobacco, pounds
Hops, pounds
Maple sugar, pounds
Honey, pounds
Beeswax, pounds
Hay,
Hemp
Coal
Pig iron
Copper
Orchard produce, value
Market-garden produce, value.
Home manufactures, value...
Slaughtered animals, value
Lead, value
Salt, value
Fisheries, value
Lumber, value
Wine, gallons
Maple molasses, gallons
Sorgum molasses, gallons
Grand total.
Quantities or
values.
111,119,374
527,893,527
5,568,461
71,962,329
5,210,770
4,286,566
1,648,538
39,015,910
4,981,759
403,423
546,170
337,818
183,634,188
28,575,219
28,267,123
2,130,823
222,329,886
272,892
12,164,546
10,857,944
476,939
$7,431,517
$3,695,696
$9,774,577
$99,837,933
$915,481
$3,620,418
$351,479
$35,429,729
975,254
1,108,772
5,620,675
Equal to—
Tons.
3,367,700
15,996,775
167,529
1,151,397
226,127
1,285,810
91,317
14,287
14,133
1,065
111,165
136
6,082,
5,428
236
7,405,376
68,902
1,928,466
163,266
7,422
713,128
4,577
250,000
5,859
5,250
32,991,433
Here is a grand aggregate of thirty-three millions of tonnage. It is difficult to de¬
termine what amount of this total could be spared from consumption and sent to mar¬
ket. Some statisticians contend that a community occupying so fertile a country, and
so situated, as that of the great West, can easily spare for 'market an amount of ton¬
nage equal to three-fifths of the total production; which, in the case of the West, and
its production in 1860, would be twenty millions of tons. This estimate does not seem
5
66034
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL,
excessive when we find from the foregoing statement that if we deduct for home con-
, sumption a tonnage equivalent to that of all the oats, all the hay, (besides every other
sort of fodder,) all the butter and cheese, and orchard and garden produce, all home
manufactures, all the wine, molasses, fish, clover and grass seeds, hops, maple sugar,
honey and beeswax, all the wool, flax and hemp, all the coal and pig iron, three-fourths
of all slaughtered animals, and of the Irish and sweet potatoes, peas and beans, five
pounds of tobacco for each inhabitant, and six bushels of wheat to every man, woman,
and child of the population, there would still be eighteen millions of tons left to be sent
to market, besides what live stock might go off on the hoof, by rail, or by boat. Such
was the amount of tonnage which the West would seem to have been competent to send
to the seaboard in 1860, if the facilities at hand for carrying it to market had been ade¬
quate in capacity to the herculean task, and if the rates of charge had been low enough
to leave a profit to the producer.
WHY DID NOT THIS TONNAGE COME TO MARKET ?
But these facilities were not adequate in capacity, nor were the charges of transit
sufficiently low to permit so vast an eastward movement of tonnage. In a comparative
sense, the actual movement of tonnage as late as 1862, while the stimulus of war prices
was active in bringing it forward, was very meager.
" In 1862," says the report of the Board of Trade and Commerce of Buffalo, 1865,
"the surplus products of the West sent eastward (through trade) to the tide-water mar¬
kets, including products of wood, agriculture, animals, manufactures, and miscellaneous
commodities, was 5,176,499 tons. This includes the eastward movement of through
freight over the four great roads of the United States, and the Grand Trunk and north¬
ern railways, and the total exports from Buffalo and Oswego by canal. If the way
freights received at the western terminal points of all these railways, and delivered in
the interior, be added to the through freight, it is estimated that the total number of
tons moved out of the West during that year exceeded 5,500,000. Of the eastward
movement in 1862, 2,086,656 were sent from Buffalo, and 638,419 tons from Oswego,
making nearly 50 per cent, of the total movement by the New York canals, and the re¬
maining portion by the five through lines of railroad."
Thus, it seems that the great public works of the country already in operation did not
attract from their places of production, nor transport, one-third of the products which
the West could actually have spared. If the whole exportable production had offered
itself for transit, it could not have been carried; and it did not offer itself, because the
cost of carriage on a vast proportion of the exportable products was not low enough to
tempt them forward.
PROBABLE INCREASE OP THIS TONNAGE.
Now, while the number and capacity of these works have been very slightly aug¬
mented, production in the West has grown apace. That this production grows at about
an equal rate with the population, is shown by the following table for the country em¬
bracing Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan:
■ , Population.
1840 3,340,542 165,698,832
1850 5,403,595 310,050,295
1860 8,855,932 556,801,897
The decennial increase in these States, both of population and cereal production,
exceeded 65 per cent. The actual exportation of the West in 1862 slightly exceeded
five millions of tons. Distinguishing actual from possible exportation, the actual
movement from the West, if it shall increase at equal pace with the population, will,
by 1880, become fifteen millions. How will this certain amount of exportable tonnage
find exit ? Unless the bulk of it go down the Mississippi, it will be unable to reach
the sea-board, without a great increase in the number and capacity of our public works.
Even on the basis of actual exportations, a direct canal across the shortest passage of
the Alleghanies to the sea-board is evidently necessary.
But, by 1880, the exportations will be far more than fifteen millions of tons, pro
vided means are provided for carrying away the produce. In 1860, when the popu¬
lation was twelve millions, the West could have exported eighteen millions of tons.
In the absence of facilities for cheap transportation, it actually did export less than
five millions of tons. There was a difference of 250 per cent, between the actual and
possible exportation. At present the western population has reached eighteen millions,
and it is capable of exporting fully twenty-five millions of tons of produce, if avenues of
transportation were accessible, and if freights were cheap. To bring out this trade a
short line of cheap navigation is necessary. Another canal on the most direct central
route, with the attendant railroads that would spring up near its margin, is indispensable
to the accommodation and development of western trade.
JAMBS RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL, 35
6
comparative value and capacity op canals and railroads.
Much has been said of the comparative merits of canals and railroads. When the
discussion loses sight of distance and circumstances, it leads to no sound conclusion.
The chief exports of the West are the bulky products of the farm, forest, and mine;
and it is generally true, that beyond certain distances, these commodities cannot afford
the cost of railroad transportation. For instance, if a cent and a half a ton per mile
(which is much below the average charge) be assumed as the lowest price at which
railroads can profitably transport tonnage ; and if the specie price of wheat in market
be $1 50 per bushel, or $49 50 per ton of thirty-three bushels ; and if the cost of grow¬
ing wheat be 60 cents per bushel, or $19 80 per ton, so that the margin between cost
and market value is 90 cents per bushel, or $29 70 per ton; then, making no allow¬
ance for expenses of handling, storage, commissions and the like, it is clear that wheat
cannot go farther than 1,980 miles by railway without the cost of carriage trenching
upon the cost of producing.
Price per ton in market $49 50
Cost per ton of growing the crop 19 80
Margin for expenses of carriage 29 70
Equal, at 1% cent per ton per mile, to $19 80.
But, as the cost of production varies in different localities, and even on different
farms, and as the price in market varies almost weekly, it would not be proper to con¬
clude either that railroads can invariably carry wheat as far as 1,980 miles, or that
this is the distance beyond which wheat can never be transported, in any season,
under any state of the markets, between any points. It is generally true, that in a
region so remote from the sea-board as vast portions of the West, water transportation
is essential to the purposes of farmers, lumbermen, and miners of bulky minerals;
while railroads suit best the uses of manufacturers, merchants, and speculators. Both
methods of transportation are necessary, each for its appropriate sort of trade, and so
far from being antagonistic, they are mutually assistant and beneficial. Cheap navi¬
gation develops production in the first instance ; and then commerce and art demand
the assistance of railroads for their more rapid operations.
The respective distances for which canals, railroads, and ordinary highways com¬
mand trade is approximately exhibited by the following table. It takes no account of
charges other than for freight; and is made out for wheat at $1 50 per bushel, or
$49 50 per ton, and corn at 75 cents per bushel, or $24 75 per ton of 33 bushels. It
assumes the cost of carriage at 5 mills per ton per mile on canals, 15 mills on railroads,
and 15 cents on ordinary highways :
Statement showing the value of a ton of wheat and one of corn at given distances from
market, as affected by cost of transportation respectively by canal, by railroad, and
over the ordinary highway:
Canal carriage.
Railway carriage.
Common road
carriage.
Wheat.
Corn.
Wheat.
Corn.
Wheat.
Corn.
Value at market
$49 50
$24 75
$49 50
$24 75
$49 50
$24 75
Value 10 miles from market
49 45
24 70
49 35
24 60
48 00
23 25
Value 20 miles from market
49 40
24 65
49 20
24 45
46 50
21 76
Value SO miles from market
49 35
24 60
49 05
24 30
45 00
20 25
Value 40 miles from market
49 30
24 55
48 90
24 15
43 50
18 75
Value 50 miles from market
49 25
24 50
48 75
24 00
42 00
17 25
Value 60 miles from market
49 20
24 45
48 60
23 85
40 50
15 75
Value 70 miles from market
49 15
24 40
48 45
23 70
39 00
14 75
Value 80 miles from market
49 10
24 35
48 30
23 55
37 50
14 25
Value 90 miles from market
4S 05
24 30
48 15
23 40
36 00
11 25
Value 100 miles from market
48 00
24 25
48 00
23 25
34 50
9 75
Value 110 miles from market
47 95
24 20
47 85
23 10
33 00
* ' 8 25
Value 120 miles irom market
47 90
24 15
47 70
22 95
31 50
6 75
Value 130 miles from market
47 85
24 10
47 55
22 80
30 00
£6 25
Value 140 miles from market
47 80
24 05
47 40
22 65
28 50
[3 75
Value 150 miles from market.
47 75
24 00
47 25
22 50
27 00
2 25
Value 160 miles from market
47 70
23 95
47 10
22 35
25 50
75
Value 170 miles from market
47 65
23 90
46 95
22 20
24 00
Value 320 miles from market
46 90
23 20
44 70
19 95
1 50
•••a* •»••
Value 330 miles from market
46 85
23 15
44 55
19 80
Value 340 miles from market.
40 80
46 75
44 50
41 25
39 60
33 00
24 75
19 80
23 10
23 05
19 75
16 50
14 85
8 26
44 40
44 25
34 50
24 75
19 80
19 65
19 50
9 75
Value 350 miles from market.........
Value 1,000 miles from market
Value 1,650 miles from taarket. .....
Value 1,980 miles from market
Value 3,300 miles from market.......
Value 4,960 miles from market
Value 5,940 miles from market......
Value 9,900 miles from market
m
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
The table is merely theoretical. Of course the charges on produce, other than for
carriage proper, would materially curtail the distances indicated by it. The exhibit is
valuable, however, as showing, by contrast, for how much greater distances navigation
commands trade than overland methods of transit. At 330 miles the cost of carriage
on common roads consumes the whole value of wheat, leaving nothing at all for the
farmer. At 1,980 miles the freight on railroads leaves but 60 cents per bushel ($19 80
per ton) for the grower ; and at 3,300 miles sweeps off the total value. But on canals,
the cost of carriage does not trench upon the cost for production (of 60 cents per
bushel) until the wheat has been carried 6,940 miles; nor is the value wholly exhausted
within a distance of 9,900 miles.
Thus, the question involved in this comparison is very far from being one of mere
percentage. The railroad charges become prohibitory within actual practical distances
from the seaboard ; and it then becomes a question with the interior producer between
water transportation and no transportation at all. If no cheap navigation is available,
the crops of the far interior must rot in the fields and the minerals must remain indefi¬
nitely emboweled in the earth.
It is very far from being the fact, therefore, that, in a country cf such vast extent as
ours, railroads have superseded or can supersede canals. In a small islandlike Great
Britain they may do so; but not on this spacious continent. Here, canals have not
ceased, and they cannot cease, to be of essential importance to the great producing
classes of the far interior.
growth of the western grain trade.—its effect upon our foreign exports of
breadstuffs.—natural preference of this trade among lines of outlet to the
seaboard.
Forty years ago the surplus products of Ohio had accumulated beyond the means of
transport, and wheat sold in the interior at 37 cents per bushel, and Indian corn at 10
cents. Then the Erie Canal was opened, and soon after the Ohio canals, and prices
were raised more than 50 per cent. Now that the means of transport have been
increased, the price of flour at Cincinnati is nearly double the price in 1826, the price
of Indian corn is four times, and the price of pork three times as great. On the other
hand, the prices of grain and meat on the seaboard have not been reduced in the least.
It is therefore evident that the bulk of the gain obtained by the increased facility of
transport has gone to the producer.
Not only has the transport of produce been cheapened, but also the cost of the trans¬
port of every article of manufacture required by the producer. Machinery and articles
of foreign growth have been supplied him at almost seaboard prices. Sugar and coffee
were no dearer at Cincinnati in 1860 than in 1835, although the population of the
Western States in that interval had increased in enormous proportions.
Prior to the opening of the Erie Canal, the only outlet to the ocean from the north¬
western territory was by the river Mississippi. During the progress of the Erie Canal
it was predicted that "it would never pay," for that the trade would follow the
rivers, and was not likely to be diverted across the continent. It has turned out, how¬
ever, that the artificial channels of trade, the canals and railroads, have completely
diverted the course of the traffic as to a very large section of the West. There are
various causes for this. The principal, no doubt, is the increase of the grain-consuming
population in the States of the Atlantic. Other causes are to be found in the uncer¬
tainty of river navigation during the summer months, the greater speed and security
of transport by railway, the superior advantages of New York to New Orleans as a
place of trade, and the greater risk of damage to grain and flour by "heating" in the
southern latitudes of the Gulf of Mexico. Thus it results that New Orleans has not
become a leading shipping port for grain, although her trade in cotton, sugar, and
tobacco, has largely increased.
Much has also been due to the energy of the North ; and the graphically expressed
complaint of Professor De Bow was well grounded when he declared, that "the bold,
vigorous, and sustained effort of the North has succeeded in reversing the ven' law of
nature's God, rolled back the tide of the Mississippi and its ten thousand tributary
streams, until their mouths, practically and commercially, are more at New York than
at New Orleans."
The first shipments of grain on the lakes, of which there is any record, were made in
the year 1836, when the brig John H. McKenzie shipped at Grand Haven, Michigan,
3,000 bushels of wheat for the port of Buffalo.
The first shipment of grain from Chicago, consisting of 78 bushels of wheat in 39
sacks, was made in 1838. The first shipments from the State of Wisconsin were made
three years later, in 1841. These shipments consisted of about 4,000 bushels of wheat
purchased at Milwaukee on Canadian account.
In 1848 the Illinois and Michigan Canal was completed, opening up another great
field of cultivation in the State of Illinois. In 1849 the era of railroad communication
was inaugurated by the opening of the Chicago and Galena Union Railroad, traversing
JAMES ItlVEH AND KANAWHA CANAL.
a widely-cultivated district. This line of railroad led to a great and rapid development
of the country which it traversed. In 1863 nearly eleven and a half million bushels of
grain were carried over this line. These large shipments of grain to the seaboard soon
began to excite an export movement.
The growth of the grain trade of the lakes is illustrated by the following table of
Shipments eastward from Michigan ports .♦
Year.
Bushels.
Year.
Bushels.
1858
27,879,293
25,829,753
43,211,448
1861
69,489,113
78,214,675
74,710,664
1859
1862
I860
1863
Such a record of progress is probably unparalleled. The production of grain in the
Northwestern States is estimated to have increased from 218,463,583 bushels in 1840 to
642,120,366 bushels in 1860.
Thus the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825, which placed the Hudson River in com
munication with Lake Erie, inaugurated a new era in the trade of the United States.
The shores of the great lakes were brought by this line of communication into connec¬
tion with the Atlantic by a navigable water-course through the entire State of New
York. This grand avenue did, indeed, "develope a new world to the pioneer, the agri¬
culturist, and the merchant."
The following official table shows the ratio of increase in the value of the grain ex¬
ported from the United States, for a period of 40 years :
1823 to 1833
3833 to 1843
1843 to 1853
1853 to 1863
Years.
Aggregate value of
exports of grain.
$67,482,211
73,303,440
198,594,871
512,380,514
Percentage of
increase.
8.0
170.8
158.0
EUROPE BEGINS TO RELY CHIEFLY ON AMERICA FOR GRAIN.
The repeal of the corn laws of Great Britain in 1846 gave the greatest encouragement
to the exportation of American grain. During the years 1862 and 1863 the total exports
of grain, flour, and meal from the United States were of greater value, in either year,
than the aggregate value of the whole grain trade of the Union for the ten years from
1833 to 1843 :
Year.
Bushels.
Value.
1862
76,309,425
77,396,782
$83,692,812
88,597,064
1863
The years during which this very great supply of food was exported were, it should
be remembered, years of civil war. Of the total amount of the exports, nearly two-
thirds were shipped to Great Britain and Ireland. The proportion sent there is repre¬
sented as follows:
1862
1863
Year.
Bushels.
Value.
34,102,735
47,082,026
$47,916,266
56,059,360
38
" "4
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL,
ie supply of wheat from the United States to England and Ireland during the years
1861, 1862, and 1863, was estimated to amount to 37£ per cent, of their whole import. Of
the imports of flour into Great Britain, 58.3 per cent, were from the United States.
It has been estimated by the Mark Lane Express, a paper of authority on agricultural
matters, that the average consumption of wheat in Great Britain is six bushels per head
per annum; and as the population amounts, in round numbers, to thirty millions, this
gives a total annual consumption of 180,000,000 bushels, and indicates the importance of
Great Britain as a customer of our Western States. The exportations of wheat from
Eastern Europe to its western populations having reached their maximum magnitude,
and being henceforth destined to decline, while the western European populations are
steadily increasing, the dependence of the latter upon American grain is becoming more
and more absolute, and the Mississippi Valley is becoming more and more emphatically
" the granary of Europe." The rapid growth of our foreign exportations of grain will
require, more and more imperatively, the opening of a direct water-line of navigation,
from the central west to the seaboard, over the shortest possible line.
Western exportations are even at present much restricted on account of insufficient
facilities of cheap transportation, and this restriction directly affects the foreign pro¬
duce exportations of the Union. Since the great loss which the export trade of the
United States has sustained from the decline of Southern production, it has become
doubly important to the national prosperity that its exports of western produce should
be increased by every possible means. The nation must look chiefly to the free labor
of the West for compensation for the sacrifices it has incurred by emancipation. That
is the only source from which compensation can come in the form of exportations.
These can be indefinitely enhanced by multiplying the channels of cheap transportation
from the interior to the seaboard ; and, of all such channels which can be possibly de¬
vised, none offers so many advantages as the Virginia water-line.
CHEAP TRANSPORTATION MAKES WESTERN TRADE PREFER THE WATER OUTLETS.
Notwithstanding the strong tendency of western produce to seek markets by direct
eastward routes, it is still diverted to the circuitous northern or southern water lines
by the cheapness of water transportation and dearness of railroad carriage. This strong
tendency of trade to pursue the shortest route eastward to market has for forty years
given the lake and Erie route a great advantage over that by way of New Orleans.
These two routes are subject to equivalent disadvantages ; that by way of New Orleans
to the damaging effect of excessive heat during the summer months upon produce,
and that by way of the lake to obstruction by ice in the winter. These disadvan¬
tages being nearly equivalent, the northern route secures more trade by reason of
its being much shorter. If the direct railroads were liable to five months of obstruc¬
tion in their operations they would fail to secure any considerable proportion of through
trade, and would be unable to carry through produce at prices which it could afford to
pay.
WESTERN TRADE PREFERS THE SHORTER NORTHERN WATER OUTLET TO THE LONGER SOUTH¬
ERN ONE.
The advantage which its comparative shortness gives to the lake route over that o*
the Gulf is exhibited by the statistics of the eastward movement of produce from the
"West, some of which are now given.
Andrew's report on " Colonial and Lake Trade " gives the eastward movement of
tonnage in 1851 as follows:
Value.
By New York canals...
By New York railroads
By St. Lawrence River
By Mississippi River...
1,977,151
228,107
329,631
1,292,670
$53,727,508
11,405,350
9,153,589
108,051,708
It seems that more tons went by the canals, but more value by the Mississippi, owing
to the difference in price between farm produce and cotton.
The same authority gives a table of the value of property received At the seaboard
by way of the Hudson and by way of the Mississippi for the ten years ending with 1851.
The totals for the ten years were as follows :
By way of the Hudson $484,924,474
By way of the Mississippi 857,658,164
- JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. 39
Here, too, although the value of the movement by the Mississippi was 85 per cent,
greater, the avoirdupois tonnage was but half that which went out by the canals.
The following were the shipments (not receipts) of flour, wheat, and corn from Chi¬
cago eastward in the years designated:
Shipments from Chicago.
1856
1857
1858
1859
1860
Years.
Wheat and
flour.
Bushels.
9,419,365
10,783,292
10,909,243
10,759,359
15,892,857
.
•
Corn.
Bushels.
11,129,668
6,814,615
7,493,212
4,217,654
13,700,113
The shipments from Milwaukee and other lake ports eastward were proportionally
large. Contrast with the shipments from Chicago alone, as above stated, the following
table of shipments from New Orleans during the same period.
Shipments from New Orleans. •
Years.
Flour.
Wheat.
1856
Barrels.
251,501
428,436
474,906
133,193
80,541
Bushels.
1,096,733
1,353,480
596,442
107,031
2,189
1857
1858
1859
I860
Corn.
Bushels.
2,941,711
1,034,402
1,134,147
111,522
224,382
The foregoing table shows not only how small a proportion of Western grain and
flour sought a market by way of the channel of the Lower Mississippi and New Or¬
leans, but that this proportion was yearly and rapidly diminishing before the war.
The natural tendency of these products is eastward, across the continent, on routes as
near as possible to the same parallels of latitude as those on which they are grown.
This tendency of trade is pointedly shown by the following tables, for four years of—
Shipments from Cincinnati.
Articles.
1857 and 1858.
1858 and 1859.
Shipped north.
Shipped south.
Shipped north.
Shipped south.
Flour. barrels..
Wheat bushels..
Corn sacks..
445,650
601,214
17,225
162,565
30,446
1,927
544,570
270,531
24,796
17,569
1,182
3,707
1859 and 1860.
1860 and 1861.
Flofar barrels..
Wheat bushels..
• 385,389
310,154
92,919
11,341
268,033
477,264
158,592
47,801
The bulk of this trade took the line of the lakes. Thus strongly does the trade
of the West itself apeal for a direct water-line along the shortest route to the seaboard.
40
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
VH> OBJECTIONS TO THE RIVER AND GULP ROUTE.
Any reflecting mind would have concluded in 1820, when the success of steamboat
navigation had been fully demonstrated on Western waters, that the course of Western
trade was thereby determined ; that it would never seek artificial lines of transportation
where steam navigation could be applied, but would assuredly prefer the course of the
Mississippi River to New Orleans and a market. But no sooner was the Erie Canal
opened in 1825 than produce from the region of the Mississippi began to seek that route
to the seaboard. From the country in the region of the Lakes the new route had the
advantage of being much shorter and more direct. From the country bordering upon
the Ohio River other considerations gave trade a northeastward direction toward the
canal.
It is a well-known fact that almost every article of up-country produce is liable to un¬
dergo a sweating, souring, and heating process from the warmth and humidity of the
climate of the Gulf. The loss in value from this deteriorating cause is sometimes very
serious, and always greater or less, being variously estimated at from 5 to 25 per cent,
on the value of produce, except when the transit is made in the winter months. Assuming,
however, that the average deterioration amounts only to 5 per cent, on bacon, lard,
butter, tobacco, and 10 per cent, on wheat and flour, we have an average loss of $7 50
per ton on the former class of articles, and of $5 per ton on the latter; a sum which is
sufficient to give the control of this trade for most of the year to northern routes. The
addition of these items to the comparative estimates of cost of transportation by various
routes, given in the report of Mr. Lorraine and the memorial of the Iowa Legislature,
would make a still greater difference in favor of the Virginia route over that by way of
the Gulf.
Besides the objection of climate there are dangers in the navigation of the Missis¬
sippi, from snags and other casualties. During the last twenty-five years much has
been done to relieve this evil, but the high rates of river-steamboat insurance still at¬
test the magnitude of the dangers attending the navigation of the river. Mr. Barrow,
in a report to the Senate of the United States in 1843, stated the amount of the losses
on the Mississippi and its tributaries, from snags alone, at a million of dollars per
annum.
The navigation of the Gulf of Mexico is subject to the sudden storms and hurricanes
incident to the West India climate. In his speech at the Memphis convention, in 1845,
Mr. Calhoun said on this subject: "With all the advantages possessed by the coasting
trade between the Gulf and Atlantic, be it ever so well secured against interruption,
there is one great objection to which it is liable. The peninsula of Florida projects far
south, which makes the voyage from New Orleans and the other ports of the Gulf to the
Southern Atlantic cities not only long and tedious, but liable to frequent and great acci¬
dents in its navigation. A voyage from this place, (Memphis,) for instance, to Charles¬
ton would be a distance of certainly not less than two thousand five hundred miles, and
is subject to as great losses as any voyage of equal extent in any part of the world. It
was estimated some dozen years since that the actual loss between Cuba, the Bahama
Islands and Florida was not less than half a million of dollars a year, and it may now,
with the great increase of our commerce, be put at not less than a million." These
dangers, coupled with those incident to the navigation of the boisterous coast of the
Carolinas, and combined with the great length of the voyage from St. Louis to New
York of four thousand miles, make up a most imposing and formidable array of objec¬
tions to the river, Gulf and seaboard route.
The far-seeing mind of Chief Justice Marshall perceived the effect of these objections
as early as 1812. In his report in advocacy of the Virginia canal line, that eminent
man said : "The whole of that extensive and fertile country, [the valley of the Missis¬
sippi, ] a country increasing in wealth and population with a rapidity which baffles cal¬
culation, must make its importations up the Mississippi alone, or through the Atlantic
States. When we take into view the certain growth of the country, we can scarcely sup¬
pose it possible that any commercial city on the banks of that river, [near its mouth*]
can keep pace with that growth and furnish a supply equal to the demand. The un¬
friendliness of the climate to human life will render this disparity between the commer¬
cial and agricultural capital still more sensible. It will tend still more to retard a popu¬
lation of that sound commercial character which would render some great city on that
majestic river a safe emporium for the western world."
In answer to inquiries addressed by Mr. Cabell, former president of the Virginia ca¬
nal, to eminent merchants largely engaged in trade, both in Richmond and New Orleans,
he received the following replies. Several persons united in saying that if the Virginia
line should bring trade from the west to tide-water at two cents per ton per mile,
(which is quadruple the charge at which it will be brought,) it was their opinion
" that the following articles would pay all the expenses of transportation and net the
* The context shows that he referred to an importing city near the seaboard.
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL
grower more in Richmond than if taken to New Orleans free of charge ; say tobacco,
flour, pork, bacon, lard, butter, cheese, &c., for the following reasons :
" Independent of the freight down the river to New Orleans, these articles are all
materially injured, by passing through a warm and humid climate ; at New Orleans they
have to pay exorbitant rates of drayage, storage, fire insurance, and commission, and
when shipped from thence toother markets, are subject to a rate of freight at times 50
per cent, higher than from the James River." General Steenbergen, an eminent man
of business in the Ohio Valley, wrote, that " every avenue from the Ohio to the eastern
cities at all practicable, and at prices of transportation that can possibly be borne by the
shipper, is used in preference to the New Orleans route. It will always bo the case.
The climate and dangers of the one, against the certainty and even high prices of the
other, will make the inland passage a favorite one."
Of late years the costruction at St. Louis and other points of great stationary steam
elevators for transferring grain from boat to boat, and the employment of floating steam
machinery for performing the same office from boat to boat while in motion, and the sub¬
stitution of barges towed in fleets by steam tow-boats, for the old plan of carrying the
freight on the steamboat, has restored to water transportation an undisputed superiority
over railroad carriage, and greatly diminished the objections which formerly existed to
the route by the Lower Mississippi and the Gulf. But the injurious effects of the semi-
tropical climate upon the agricultural produce, the great length of the circuitous Gulf
route, and the dangers of the Gulf and coast navigation, still constitute enduring objec¬
tions to that route.
DFFECTS OF THE ST. LAWRENCE ROUTE.
The outlet of the St. Lawrence into the ocean is not less than 1,000 miles northeast
from Lake Ontario, about 700 miles of the line consisting of the river itself, and 300
miles of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, into which it falls. As to its natural features, this
line of navigation, in both of its divisions, was accurately described in 1838 by an emi¬
nent English engineer and traveler, Mr. Stevenson, who had made a professional tour of
observation in the United States and British America. Mr. Stevenson says of this river :
" Receiving the whole surplus waters of the North American Lakes, and the drainage
of a great tract of country traversed by the numerous streams which join it in its course
to the ocean, the St. Lawrence, as regards the quantity of its discharge, presents
abundant advantages for safe and easy navigation. The stream of the upper part of
this river, however, is much distorted by numerous expansions and contractions of its
banks, and also by declivities or falls in its bed, and clusters of small islands, which
render its navigation exceedingly dangerous, and in some places wholly impracticable
for all sorts of vessels excepting the Canadian batteaux, which are stong, flat-bot-.
tomed boats, built expressly for its navigation. In several parts of its course the river
expands into extensive lakes; and in its waters, which are thus distributed over a
great surface, numerous shoals occur, among which the ship-channel is generally tor-,
tuous aud narrow, and only navigable in daylight. In some places again the St. Law¬
rence forces its way between high banks which encroach on its bed, and leave a com¬
paratively narrow gullet for its passage ; and in others it flows over a steep, rugged
bottom. These sudden contractions and declivities interrupt the peaceful flow of the
stream, and produce " chutes," as they are called, or rapids, some of which are wholly
impassable for vessels of large size, and others can only be navigated in certain states
of the tide. The islands, which occur chiefly on the upper part of the river between
Montreal and Lake Ontario, also disturb the channel, and give rise to rapids which are
no less detrimental in a commercial point of view."—Stevenson's Civil Engineering in
America.
The navigation of the river is further embarrassed by the general and strong current.
of the river, against which ascending vessels can make their way only by the aid of steam
tow-boats of the most powerful description to be found in any of the American waters.
Since Mr. Stevenson wrote, the rapids and shallows of the river have been flanked by
canals, and the falls of the Niagara River have been lapped by the Wetland Canal—all
on the British side. The dimensions of these Canadian canals are as follows:
Lachine
Beaubarnais..,,..
Cornwall
Farrand's Point
Rapid Plat
Point Iroquois
Gallop's . ...
Welland
Total
6 ~
Length.
Miles.
8%
11%
11%
eH
28
69
Depth.
Size of locks.
Lift.
Feet.
Feet.
Feet.
10
200 by 45
44 %
10
200 by 45 •
82%
10
200 by 45
4S
f 10
200 by 45
4
1 10
200 by 45
11%
1 10
200 by 45
6
I 10
200 by 45
8
10
150 by 26%
830
534*4
No. of
lochs.
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
The St. Lawrence canals can pass vessels of 800 tons. The Welland canal can pass
vessels of 400 tons. These canals connect the lower river and Gulf of St. Lawrence with
the chain of the great Lakes.
Of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Mr. Stevenson gives the following description:
" The navigation of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, through which the river discharges
itself into the Atlantic, is very hazardous. In addition to the dangers arising from the
masses of ice which are constantly to be met with for nearly one-half of the year, it is
subject to dense and impenetrable fogs, and its rocky shores and desolate islands, afford
neither comfort nor shelter to the shipwrecked mariner. One of the most desolate and
dangerous of the islands in the Gulf is Anticosti, which lies exactly opposite the mouth
of the St. Lawrence, and is surrounded by reefs of rocks, and shoal water. Two light¬
houses have been erected on it, and also four houses of shelter, coutaining large stores
of provisions, for the use of those who have the misfortune to be shipwrecked on its in¬
hospitable shores."
In a memorial of citizens of New York, written by De Witt Clinton in 1816, addressed
to the Legislature of that State, in advocacy of the Erie Canal, it is stated that "the St.
Lawrence is generally locked by ice seven months in the year, during which time prod¬
uce lies a dead weight on the hands of the owner." But Mr. Stevenson seems to imply
a shorter duration of the period of frost by remarking that it continues " for the space
of at least five months in the yeargoing on further to say : " The rigor of a Canadian
winter, covering the face of the country with snow, and congealing every river, lake and
harbor, produces a stagnation in trade which cannot fail to have a bad effect on the coun¬
try and the habits of the people, who are compelled to complete their whole business
transactions during the summer and autumn months, and remain in a state of compara¬
tive indolence during the remainder of the year."
BRITISH PROJECTS IN CANADA.
These difficulties attending the navigation of the St. Lawrence River and Gulf, make
that route a feeble competitor for the trade of the great West. Yet British enterprise
and capital seem determined to overcome the disadvantages imposed by nature. Not to
speak of stupendous railroads constructed from the Upper Lakes to points on the St.
Lawrence, from which they are continued to Portland, Maine, and Boston, Massachu¬
setts, the following plans of water navigation have been projected and are partially in
progress:
The principal enterprise is that of a canal on the American side around the falls of
Niagara, eight miles in length. It is proposed to make the locks 275 feet long, 46 feet
wide, and 13 feet deep on the sills, giving capacity for the passage of vessels of twelve
hundred tons.
There are many canals on the Canadian side projected, in progress, or completed. The
proposed Ottawa ship canal will pass from the easterly side of Lake Huron up the French
River to Lake Nippisisngue ; from thence by canal across the elevation of Trout Lake, at
the head of Mattawaco River, and down it to its junction with the Ottawa; following the
latter to Montreal. The length of the canal proper is 37| miles, and the whole improve¬
ment will cost $24,000,000. A recent location makes a line of canal proper 29.32 miles
long, and a route of canal and improved river and lake navigation 401 £ miles in length
from Montreal to Lake Huron. It will effect a saving of distance between Monti eal and
Chicago, of 8424 miles over the circuitous route of the great lakes. The locks on this
route will be 50 feet wide, 250 feet long, and 10 feet on the sills, which will pass vessels
of 1,000 tons. Lift 6654 feet.
The Georgian Bay and Toronto Canal will connect Toronto with Lake Huron by a
route only 100 miles long, and 470 feet lift of locks. The locks will be 265 feet long, 55
wide, and 12 feet on the sills, costing $22,000,000. By this route the distance between
Chicago and Montreal, compared with that by Lakes Erie and Ontario, or by the Wel¬
land Canal, will be 428 miles less.
OBJECTIONS TO THE ROUTE OP THE GREAT LAKES.
The determined enterprise of the British capitalists and colonists who are undertaking
the expensive works in Canada, which have just been described, proves two important
facts. It proves how much water transportation is still valued and relied on even in lat¬
itudes of frost where canals can be used only about 200 days in the year; and it proves
that there is some insuperable objection to navigation on the great lakes, especiallyathose
of Erie and Ontario, which it is of great importance to avoid, by shorter lines across the
northern peninsula.
The nature of that objection can be learned from the following facts :
After various unsuccessful experiments, it is perfectly ascertained that ordinary canal
boats, such as are in use upon the Ohio and Erie Canals, cannot be safely towed upon the
stormy surface of the great lakes. The modern barge system cannot, therefore, be ap¬
plied on the lakes.
0
JAMBS RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. 43
The board of the New York State canals, in their report for 1835, set forth the fol¬
lowing state of facts:
" The method of towing barges by means of steamboats has been very successfully
practiced on the Hudson River; but on the lakes, though a great many steamboats
have been in use for several years, the plan has not been adopted, because steamboats
cannot manage barges in a storm. * * * * An intelligent gentleman of several
years' experience in navigating steamboats on Lake Ontario informs us that he con¬
sidered it impracticable as a regular business for steamboats, to tow vessels with safety
on the lakes, unless the vessels were fitted with masts and rigging, and sufficiently
manned so as to be conducted by sails in a storm; that storms often rise very suddenly
on these lakes, and with such violence as would compel a steamboat to cut loose vessels
in tow in order to sustain herself."
Those who have not witnessed them can form no adequate idea of the violence of
lake storms. The annual damage sustained by the massive masonry of the piers by
which the harbors are protected, in which stones weighing upward of half a ton are
sometimes raised from their beds and completely upturned, the range of lofty trees
rooted up and thrown upon the bordering shores, and the numerous vessels driven
ashore and totally lost or seriously damaged, furnish striking evidences of the power of
an agency which nothing can resist. They are even more powerful than the " ground
swells " of the ocean near the shore. In all land-locked bodies of water the waves are
short and sudden in their movements, proving very destructive to whatever obstacle is
opposed to their fury; but there is a characteristic slowness in the long movement
of the ocean's swell which, it is generally acknowledged, renders it less destructive to
marine works exposed to its action than the waves produced in land-locked lakes or
seas.
From Mr. Woodbridge's report to the Senate of the United States in February, 1843,
upon the subject of the trade of the lakes it appears "that from 1834 to 1841, inclu¬
sive, the number of wrecks upon Lake Michigan amounted to eighty-nine vessels;
that those wrecks were accompanied by a destruction of property to the value
of $1,052,450; and that one hundred and fifteen lives were sacrificed." The same report
makes the disclosure that during the year 1842 alone, "two steamboats, one ship, and
seventeen schooners, were totally lost in the storms on the upper lakes ; and that three
other steamboats, two brigs, and ten schooners, were driven ashore, accompanied by
the probable loss of nearly one-half million of value in property, and more than a hun¬
dred lives."
From the shallowness of the water upon Lake Erie, compared with that upon the other
lakes, it is more easily and more permanently affected by frost, its navigation being
generally obstructed by ice for some weeks every spring, after that of all the others is
open and unimpeded. From the same cause this lake is likewise contradistinguished
from all the others by a siight current constantly setting from the west to east, which,
together with the prevailing southwesterly winds, causes the floating ice in spring to drift
down to accumulate to a vast extent about the head of the St. Lawrence River, thereby
retarding the opening of the navigation at the entrance of the Erie and Welland canals
some three weeks beyond the period at which it opens at the port of Erie upon the
southern side of the lake.
There is a significant fact disclosed by the last report of the New York canals. For
the months of October and December, of 1867, the receipts from tolls were about two
millions, being a little more than half the receipts for the fiscal year, and more than
half the estimated receipts for the next fiscal year. These figures show that the navi¬
gation closes just when the demand for transportation is greatest, and the comparative
smallness of receipts for the other five months of open navigation shows that the freight
which cannot use this canal gets to market over other and much more expensive avenues
of transportation.
It is probably owing to this serious disadvantage of the lake route that so little
success has attended the various efforts which have been made to institute direct ex¬
ports from the lakes to Europe. Notwithstanding all these efforts, the following list
will show the whole number of vessels that have passed from the lakes to the ocean,
from 1846 to 1865 (excepting 1864, 1851, 1852, 1853, and 1849, for which the statistics
are not available:)
1846
1859 ..
1847
1860 ..
1848
1861..
1850
1862..
1854
1863 ..
1855
1865..
1856
1857
Total mm mi
1858
"When the magnitude of the western lake trade, and when the costliness and perfec¬
tion of the canals which have been constructed for the passage of ocean shipping are
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
considered, this must bo confessed to be a meager exhibit, and it affords conclusiva
proof that trade avoids the outlet furnished by the St. Lawrence rather than seek it.
For the trade of the vast country lying in the States west and .southwest of the
lakes, tliis route does not seem to furnish a cheap outlet. In an able paper on the duty
of the Federal Government in connection with the navigation of the Mississippi River
and its tributaries, Prof. Sylvester Waterhouse, of St. Louis, remarks : t( Under all the
existing difficulties (of this navigation) the freight of cereals from the Upper Missis-
sippi to New York is far cheaper by way of New Orleans than it is by the lakes and the
New York canal. The comparative rates of transportation from Dubuque, Iowa, to
New York, are:
Via of the lakes.
Via New Orleans
Difference in favor of southern route 30
The present cost of shipping grain from Chicago to Cairo by rail, and thence via New
Orleans to New York by water, is no greater than the freight to the same point by way
of the lakes. The existing water tariff on wheat in bulk from Chicago to New York, is:
_ ' Cents.
By the lakes 44.
From Chicago to Cairo by rail 20
From Cairo to New Orleans by water 12
From New Orleans to New York by water 1 12
- So extreme is the cheapness of river carriage that the rates of the southern route,
increased by 300 miles of costly railroad transit, do not exceed those of the northern
line. If we take a point on the Mississippi, south of the latitude of Chicago, such as
Dubuque, the saving is 30 cents a bushel, by the New Orleans route. This gives 38
cents as the cost; and it is believed that after the improvement of the rapids of the
Mississippi, and the erection of elevators for the transfer of grain in bulk, the freight
of cereals from the Upper Mississippi to New York by way of New Orleans will be
reduced to twenty-five cents per bushel.
Such a reduction, and even the present low rates, will powerfully affect the movement
of western grain ; for even as early as in 1865, out of 48,000,000 bushels of grain shipped
to Chicago, 15,000,000 were brought from points on the Mississippi; and it is officially
stated that three-fifths of all the wheat received in 1865 at Milwaukee and Chicago came
from the towns on the banks of the Mississippi.
TUE VIRGINIA WATER-LINE TIIE BEST SUBSTITUTE.
The serious disadvantages which have been here detailed attending the navigation
of the lakes and the St. Lawrence River and Gulf, coupled with the other consideration,
that in the event of a war with Great Britain this important channel of transportation
of the produce of the west to the cast would be obstructed, have combined to impress
upon the public mind of the east the great importance of auxiliary lines of railroad lying
wholly within the national jurisdiction.
This well-grounded appreciation of railroads which grew gradually into a railroad
mania, operated for several years to turn public attention away for a period from all
artificial water-line routes of transportation. But now it is discovered, after the fullest
experiment, that railroads are inadequate to the performance of the immense transpor¬
tation required, and that they are liable to the popular objection of being in charge of
close corporations, and are not, like canals, open to indiscriminate public use at moderate
rates of charge.
The Virginia canal, owing to the costliness of the work, did not reach completion
before the railroad fever had taken possession of the public ; and it has had to wait for
its consummation to that returning appreciation, which is now again felt, of cheap, wa¬
ter transportation. It offers now a channel of navigation from west to east shorter than
any other, cheaper than any other, more expeditious, and more free from all obstruc¬
tions arising from a climate or a public enemy, than all the rest. Its only rivals in
capacity, for western trade, are the Mississippi and Gulf route on one hand, and the
great lake, Erie Canal, and St. Lawrence River routes on the other. Both of these bound¬
ary routes are circuitous, while this central one is direct. Both of the others take
American produce out of the Union, in transporting it from one part of the Union to
the other, subjecting it to the dangers of war; and while one of them subjects our na¬
tional products to the damaging effects of a semi-tropical climate, and the hazards
of Gulf and coast navigation, the other renders it liable to be seized for months and held
by the ice, or wrecked and lost by the lake storms.^
Emphatically, in the case of the Virginia line it is true, in medio tuttissimus ibis. It
Cents per bushel.
68
38
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
&71
offers the safest, the shortest, the most central, the cheapest, the most constantly open,
and the most available of all the channels of outlet by water for western trade.
The rapid expansion and extension of inland navigation in the central basin of the
continent is producing an increase in the quantity of trade demanding outlet to the
seaboard far exceeding the capacity of all existing avenues of outlet to discharge, and
imperatively requiring the opening of a new line of direct water navigation to the sea¬
board equal in capacity to the Erie Canal. The extent of this inland navigation will
now be displayed in a few paragraphs.
VAST EXTENT OF OUR INLAND NAVIGATION.
The construction of a ship canal less than one mile in length between Lakes Travor
and Big Stone, in Minnesota, will unite the waters of the river St. Peter's with those of
the great Red River of Northwest British America. The Red River of the North is
navigable for steamboats for seven hundred miles to Lake Winnepeg; and from Lake
Winnepeg this navigation is extended by the Saskatchewan, seven hundred miles to the
base of the Rocky Mountains, within a short distance of Frazier's gold diggings. Thus
navigation will soon be opened west of the Mississippi from St. Paul, on the Mississippi
River, to Frazier's diggings in British Columbia, via the St. Peter's and the Red River
of the North. East of the river, the union of the head-waters of the Wisconsin and
Fox Rivers, in Wisconsin, will make a navigable water route from the Mississippi to
Green Bay, on Lake Michigan. Further south, one hundred miles of ship canal, from
Chicago west to Peoria, with some improvements in the Illinois River, will make another
navigable water route for large vessels fjjpm the Mississippi to Lake Michigan. A canal
in Ohio connects Portsmouth on the Ohio River with Cleveland on Lake Erie. Cincin¬
nati on the Ohio River, and Toledo on Lake Erie, are connected by the Miami Canal. A
canal from Toledo to Logansport, Indiana, with the Wabash River, unites the waters of
the Ohio River with those of Lake Erie at Toledo. Should the wants of commerce
require it, these latter canals can be enlarged through Ohio and Indiana, to a capacity
for passing steamboats of six hundred tons burden.
The proposed dimensions of the canal above described, as projected for uniting Prairie
du Chien, on the Mississippi, with Green Bay, on Lake Michigan, across the State of
Wisconsin, are as follows: The entire improvement will be 295 miles in length, of which
175 miles, chiefly of lake and river navigation, are in use. The locks will be 160 feet
long by 35 feet wide. The Upper Fox is not yet fully improved, but now passes barges
of greater capacity than those of the Erie Canal. The dimensions of the water-line
through Illinois will be, when the canal is enlarged, length 100 miles, with locks 350
feet long by 70 feet wide : cost $10,000,000. These two latter works are not antagon¬
istic, and will make a navigable water communication between the great chain of lakes
and upwards of 20,000 miles of navigable rivers, including the Mississippi and its nu¬
merous tributaries, and the Red River of the North and Saskatchawan of British
America. These improvements, in connection with the short ship canal, less than a
mile long, between lakes Bigstone and Traver, will open steamboat navigation from
Chicago or New Orleans to Lake Winnepeg, which is 700 miles distant from St. Paul.
This great sheet of water is as large as Lake Ontario, and receives the Saskatchawan
River from the west, which itself is navigable 700 miles to the Rocky Mountains, within
a distance of 50 miles from the Frazier's River gold mines. By means of these improve¬
ments, and the various ship canals proposed or completed between Lake Michigan and
the east, steamers from Quebec, New York, or New Orleans, could be passed to the
head-waters of the Missouri, the Yellowstone, and the Saskatchawan, a distance of
5,000 miles of inland water navigation. This vast extension of navigation must exert a
prodigious influence in stimulating western production, and produce an accumulation of
trade requiring the opening of every possible channel of outlet to the seaboard.
The great lakes have a shore line of 3,620 miles on the American side, and 2,629 miles
on the side of Canada. Lakes Huron and Superior are navigably connected by a ship
canal around the rapids of the St. Mary's River, with locks 350 feet long and 50 feet
wide, having 12 feet lift.
The present extent of steamboat navigation, in the valley of the Mississippi River, is
shown by the following table, prepared by Colonel Long, of the United States Army :
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
EXTENT OF WESTERN STEAM NAVIGATION.
Mississippi and branches.
Miles.
Mississippi proper 2,000
St. Croix 80
St. Peters 120
Chippewa 70
Elack 60
Wisconsin 180
Rock 250
Iowa 110
Cedar 60
Des Moines 250
Illinois 245
Maramec 60
Kaskaskia 150
Big Muddy 5
Obion 60
Forked Deer * 195
Big Hatchie 75
St. Francis . 300
White 500
Big Black 60
Spring 50
Arkansas 603
Canadian 60
Neosho 60
Yazoo 300
Tallahatchie 300
Yallabusha 100
Big Sunflower 80
Little Sunflower 70
Big Black 150
Cumberland 400
Tennessee 720
Red River and branches.
Red River proper 1,500
Washita 375
Saline 100
Little Missouri 50
Bayou d'Arbour 60
Bayou Bartholomew 150
Bayou Boeuf 150
Bayou Macon 175
Bayou de Glaze 90
Miles.
Bayou Carre 140
Bayou Lafourche 60
Bayou Rouze 40
Bayou Plaquemine 12
Bayou Teche 92
Grand River.... 12
Bayou Sorrel 12
Bayou Chene 5
Missouri and branches.
Missouri proper 1,500
Yellowstone 300
Platte River 40
Kansas 150
Osage 275
Grand 90
Ohio and branches.
Ohio proper 1,000
Alleghany 200
Monongahela 60
Muskingum 70
Kanawha 65
Big Sandy 50
Scioto 50
Kentucky 62
Salt River 35
Green 150
Barren 30
W abash 400
Bayou Louis 30
Tensas 150
Lacke Bistenaw 60
Lake Caddo 75
Sulphur Fork 100
Little River 65
Kiamitia 40
Boggy 40
Bayou Pierre 150
Atchafalaya 360
Total 16,674
Here are nearly seventeen thousand miles of steamboat navigation. It would be a
moderate estimate to reckon the slack-water navigation of these rivers, for boats other
than steamboats, at the same number of miles in addition. And, if we accept the as¬
sertion of an eminent European engineer that any stream having a volume of water 19
feet wide and 18 inches deep may be made navigable, and is considered a commercial
stream in Europe, then there are still as many miles in addition of navigable water in
the great basin; making a total navigation of 50,000 miles for purposes of commerce.
THE BARGE SYSTEM ON THE WESTERN RIVERS—ITS TENDENCY TO DIVERT TRADE FROM THE
LAKES TO THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER, AND TO THE OHIO AND VIRGINIA CANAL.
The inadequacy of the present means of outlet for western produce to the seaboard,
other than the channel of the Mississippi, is universally acknowledged.* For the sake
of cheapness, vast quantities of produce must take the river and Gulf route, or not go
to market at all. Notwithstanding the objections which exist, and are universally en-
* In 1865 Minnesota alone produced 10,000,000 bushels of wheat. Three-fourths of this harvest could
have been exported if facilities of cheap transportation had offered sufficient inducement. In 1S66,
higher prices—which produce the same effect as cheaper freight—led to the exportation of 8,000,000 of
bushels. It is such a state of freight charges or of market prices as will leave a profit to the producer
which brings out pre ducts to market.
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
tertained, to that route, its trade is rapidly increasing from the very necessity of the
case. Within the last three years it has received so great an impetus, that improve¬
ments in the facilities for transferring produce from vessel to vessel, and for towing it
upon the water, have become indispensable. The barge system has accordingly been
substituted for the old one of placing the produce on large steamboats. Steam-tugs of
immense strength are employed. They carry no freight. They are simply the motive-
power. They save delay by taking fuel for the round trip. Landing only at the large
cities, they stop barely long enough to attach a loaded barge. By this economy of time
and steady movement, they equal the speed of steamboats. The Mohawk made its
first trip from St. Louis to New Orleans in six days, with ten barges in tow. The
management of the barges is precisely like that of freight cars. The barges are loaded
in the absence of the steam-tug. The tug arrives, leaves a train of barges, takes another
and proceeds. The tug itself is always at work. It does not lie at the levees while the
barges are unloading. Its largest stoppage is made for fuel. The power of these boats
is enormous. The tugs plying on the Minnesota River sometimes tow 30,00C bushels
of wheat apiece. The freight of a single trip would fill 85 railroad cars. Steamboats are
obliged to remain in port two or three days for the shipment of freight. The heavy
expense which this delay and the necessity of large crews involves, is a grave objection
to the old system of transportation. The service of the steam-tugs requires but few
men, and the cost of running is relatively low. The advantages .which are claimed for
the barge system are exhibited by the following table :
Stoppage at intermediate points
Stoppage at terminal points....
Crew
Tonnage
Daily expenses
Original cost
Tugs and barges.
Steamboats.
2 hours
6 hours.
24 hours
48 hours.
15 men
50 men.
25,000 tons
1,500 tons.
$200
$1,000.
$75,000
$100,000.
In addition to the ordinary precautions against fire, the barges have this unmistaka¬
ble advantage over steamboats, they can be cut adrift from each other, and the fire
restricted to the narrowest limits. The barges are very strongly built, and have
water-tight compartments for the movement of grain in bulk. The transportation of
grain from Minnesota to New Orleans by water costs no more than the freightage from
the same point by railroad to Chicago. After the erection of a floating elevator at New
Orleans, a boat load of grain from St. Paul will not be handled again till it reaches the
Crescent City.
The dimensions of the vessels employed on the river between St. Louis and New
Orleans are as follows :
TOW-BOATS.
Light draught. Depth of hold. Breadth. Length. Tonnage.
3J feet. 5£ feet. 30 feet. 180 feet. 6,500 bushels coal.
BARGES.
feet. 6 feet. 30 feet. 175 feet. 600 tons.
H feet. 8 feet. 34 feet. 190 feet. 1,000 tons.
The tow-boats have two engines each ; the cylinders are 22 inches in diameter, with
20-inch stroke. One tow-boat will draw eight thousand tons of freight. The time from.
St. Louis to New Orleans is 6 days down, 10 days back ; round trip, on the average, 18
days.
The Mississippi Valley Transportation Company has 5 tow-boats and 37 barges.
They are crowded with business. They handle as much as 11,000 tons of freight in a
week. The business is rapidly and largely developing. The barge system will soon
supersede all other methods of transportation on western waters. An indispensable
adjunct of it is the steam elevator for transferring grain from vessel to vessel in bulk.
The St. Louis elevator cost $450,000, and has a capacity of 1,250,000 bushels. It is able
to handle 100,000 bushels a day. It began to receive grain in October, 1865. Before
the first of January, 1866, its receipts amounted to 600,000 bushels, 200,000 of which
were brought directly from Chicago. The local receipts at the elevator in 1866 were
1,376,700 bushels. Grain can now be shipped by way of St. Louis and New Orleans to
New York and Europe twenty cents a bushel cheaper than it can be carried to the At¬
lantic by the other existing routes. The effect produced by the barge system are thus
described by a New Orleans correspondent of the New York Times :
(•4$, JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
I Jt
"New Orleans, Sunday, April 5, 1868.
" cnicago and new orleans.
" Every one observes how this most enterprising people is prospecting for commercial
expansion. Chicago owns about one-third of the whole tonnage of the Union. She
controls the lakes, and is forcing her way by the St. Lawrence to the ocean. She is
penetrating the upper country of the Northwest and intercepting from St. Louis the
productions of Iowa and Montana. Recently she has discovered that the Mississippi
is the cheapest open way to the markets of the world, so she has sent her commercial
explorers to mark her pathway to the ocean by way of New Orleans. The great Illi¬
nois Central Railroad has taken hold of the West India trade, and offered such induce¬
ments to western importers that Havana sends her products by this route instead of by
New York. The Texas cattle dealers have adopted this route. Large capital has been
put in grain elevators, and western men who are here to conduct the business claim
confidently this important commerce. These explorers from the Northwest seem de¬
lighted with the climate and local attractions of New Orleans, and with a rapid rail
time between the snows of the North and the sunny trotloirs of New Orleans, we have
crowds of business men with their families constantly among us. This has given an
impulse to our western trade, and has occasioned considerable investments in city and
country real estate. .
"the northwest on politics.
" The giant Northwest is in fact beginning to perceive and employ its physical ability
in the commercial politics of the country. With the conviction that the Mississippi
outlet was of indispensable importance, it has decreed that all obstacles to the navi¬
gation of that river shall be removed, from its sources to its mouth. So the Des Moines
Canal is under contract. It is to be seven miles long, three hundred feet wide, and
six feet in depth. The smaller obstructions of the upper river, including the bridge
at Rock Island, are to be removed or so modified as no longer to impede navigation.
Then the Government has ordered a dredge-boat, costing nearly $400,000, to go to work
on the Belize Passes. Besides this, St. Louis is declared a port of entry, and hereafter
goods will be imported direct to that city. This xvill no doubt make a great change in
the values imported by way of this custom house. There are other evidences that this
great internal power will make itself felt in the legislation and foreign policy of the
Government. It is a leviathan, which has only made itself known so far by spouting
and an occasional lash of its tail. When its power shall be fully awakened it will
snap the ropes and splinter the life-boats of the politicians who are after it for its
blubber alone. The character of national politics will be fixed by the millions who
inhabit the Northwest. They are mostly of European origin, believe in the divine
right of the majority, think that the minority ought to be hanged for the treason of a
difference of opinion. In a word, they have transfused the doctrine of European des¬
potism into the forms of a popular government. Whenever this numerical power shall
demonstrate itself we may anticipate a moral revolution in the political administration
of this democratic republic."
The employment of the barge system on the Ohio River will, as to all trade accessible
to that stream, neutralize the objection to the overland portage from Parkersburg to
tide-water at Baltimore, by way of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. At a recent
meeting of the Board of Trade of New York it appeared that transportation by rail to
Cincinnati from that city cost 70 cents per hundred, while from Boston and Philadel¬
phia along the Atlantic coast to the mouth of the Chesapeake, thence north to Balti¬
more, and thence by railroad to Cincinnati, the cost .is 40 cents per hundred. The
Baltimore Gazette of April 11, 1868, gives the following table of freight charges
respectively from New York and Baltimore to different points in the West on fourth-
class goods:
To Cincinnati..
To Louisville..
To St. Louis...
To Chicago....
To Indianapolis
From New
York.
Per hundred.
$0 50
66
94
55
53
From Balti¬
more,
Per hundred.
$0 30
48
55
38
35
These differences are producing a great diversion to the Baltimore route from the
more northern ones, and demonstrate the strong tendency of trade to seek the shortest
crossing from the West to tide-water.
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL*
THE QUESTION OP BACK-LOADING.—PRODUCTS OP THE KANAWHA VALLEY. •
Transportation by either of the two great routes of circuitous navigation, from the
West to the sea, which have been considered, is conducted under the very costly dis¬
advantage of a deficiency of return freights for the boats conveying the trade. The
products moved eastward from the West are gross and bulky, while the freights taken
baclc to the West consist chiefly of articles much lighter and less bulky in proportion
to their value. All the statistics of trade between East and West show that the ton¬
nage moving eastward exceeds, by several fold, that moving westward. This condition
of trade subjects the boats engaged in it to the necessity of returning westward either
wholly or partially empty. In Western New York the deficiency of back-loading thus
occasioned has produced a very great development in the salt manufacture, and swollen
that business in that locality probably to the largest salt manufacture in the world.
The reverse state of things now exists in the trade of the Ohio River. A very large
portion of the western population derives its coal from the mines on the upper waters
of the Ohio. This mineral is bulky in proportion to its value, and boats carrying it
down from the region about Pittsburg to the places of consumption, have no suflficient
return loading eastward in consequence of there being no outlet of navigation to the
seaboard from the Upper Ohio, do not return at all, and are broken up for fuel or lum¬
ber, and sold at a sacrifice.
The opening of the water-line from the Great Kanawha River, through Virginia to
the Atlantic, will correct both of these serious disadvantages incident now to western
trade. The boats or barges which shall carry the heavy and bulky farm produce of
the far interior to the mouth of Chesapeake Bay will refill in returning with the fine
bituminous coals of West Virginia, and carry them back to the very hearths of those-
western farmers from whose granaries they were loaded for the eastward voyage. The
coals of West Virginia would themselves supply all the return tonnage which the boats
moving east would require ; but in the event of any deficiency in this respect, the
salines of the Kanawha Valley, now producing two millions of bushels of salt per
annum, would multiply their production to any possible requirement.
It is well known to geological men that the veins of bituminous coal which pervade
the entire western slope of the Appalachian chain of mountains have their maximum
aggregate thickness in the Kanawha Valley.
From a late authentic work on the subject of the Kanawha coals, the following ex¬
tract is made :
"THE GREAT KANAWHA COAL FIELDS.
" The coal fields of the Great Kanawha region, in West Virginia, are superior to those
of Great Britain or Pennsylvania. They are regarded by eminent geologists as the
finest deposit of coal in the world. The quality of Kanawha cannel coal is equal to the
best English cannel; the quality of its bituminous coal is equal to the best found in
Pennsylvania ; and Kanawha splint coal, for smelting iron ore, is unsurpassed. The
veins lie horizontally, and vary from three feet to fifteen feet in thickness.; and the
aggregate thickness of the various veins in some localities amounts to forty and even
fifty feet of solid coal.
" The advantages of the Great Kanawha coal fields over those near Pittsburg may be
summed up as follows:
" 1. The Kanawha coal fields contain as good bituminous coal as the best found on the
Monongahela and Youghiogheny, and, in addition thereto, large deposits of cannel coal,
equal in quality to the best English cannel, none of which is found in the Monongahela
coal fields.
"2. The veins of coal are thicker and more numerous on the Kanawha than on the
Monongahela. Veins of splint and bituminous coal on the Kanawha are from four feet
to fifteen feet thick, and the cannel from thirty inches to five feet thick.
"3. Coal lands on the Monongahela and Youghiogheny sell for $ 300 and $400 per
acre, while better coal lands on the Kanawha can now be purchased for from $ 10 to $ 20
per acre.
" 4. The Kanawha coal fields are 230 miles nearer to Cincinnati and the southwest
cities than the Monongahela coal fields are. This gives to Kanawha coal an advantage
of at least one cent per bushel in cost of transportation to such markets over the Monon¬
gahela and Youghiogheny coal.
" 5. The navigation of the Ohio at Point Pleasant is greatly better than it is at Pitts¬
burg ; therefore, Kanawha coal can be more frequently shipped from Point Pleasant
than Monongahela coal can from Pittsburg.
"6. The navigation of the Kanawha and Lower Ohio is not interrupted by ice to the
extent that the navigation of the Monongahela and Upper Ohio is, as New River, the
chief tributary of the Kanawha, rises in North Carolina—while the Alleghany (which,
with the Monongahela, forms the Ohio) rises near Lake Erie. This gives to the Ohio
River at Point Pleasant an advantage of two weeks and mora every winter over the
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
Ohio at Pittsburg—and at a time when fuel is most needed in Cincinnati and Louis¬
ville.
" 7. The Kanawha coal fields are situated on what must be, in time, a great highway
for the trade and travel of the Mississippi Valley to the Atlantic seaboard. The vast
and rapidly increasing trade of the Great West is seeking new routes for transit to the
cities of the sea-coast; and the route through the Kanawha Valley has advantages oyer
all others in shortness of distance, grade of road, and mildness of climate
COALS FOR THE SEABOARD CITIES AND FACTORIES.
The coals of the Kanawha region are now shipped around by way of New Orleans
and the Gulf to New York, at a profit to the miner and dealer. The quality of the
cannel coals of West Virginia is fully equal to that of the coals of England and Nova
Scotia imported into New York. It has become of vital importance to the manufac¬
turing interests of the seaboard cities to obtain adequate supplies of the best qualities
of bituminous coals from shorter distances than those from which they are now derived,
and at cheaper rates. The most intelligent manufacturers and dealers in coal, of New
York and the eastern cities, recognize the necessity of a resort to the excellent cannel
and bituminous coals of the Kanawha, Coal, Guyandotte and Sandy Rivers of West
Virginia for fuel—a fact which is fully established by the shipments that are now making
of the coals of that region by the roundabout route of New Orleans to the Atlantic
seaboard.
The opening of the Virginia Canal will finally settle the question of an adequate coal
supply for the eastern cities, and forever relieve the apprehension and scarcity now felt
by eastern manufacturers on that vital subject. Valuable as this water line will be to
the West, as shown in these pages, its importance is doubled by the fact that the work
is vital to the success of the manufacturing system of the East, as a means of supplying
the best coals of the continent from the nearest mines by the most direct navigation and
at the cheapest rates.
DUTY OF CONGRESS ON THE SUBJECT OF INLAND NAVIGATION.
" The invention of Fulton has in reality, for all practical purposes, converted the Mis¬
sissippi, with all its great tributaries, into an inland sea. Regarding it as such, I am
prepared to place it on the same footing with the Gulf and Atlantic coasts, the Chesa¬
peake and Delaware Bays, and the lakes, in reference to the superintendence of the
General Government over its navigation. It is manifest that it is far beyond the power
of individual or of separate States to supervise it, as there are eighteen States, including
Texas and the Territories—more than half the Union—which lie within the Valley of
the Mississippi or border on its navigable tributaries."—J. C. Calhoun in Memphis con¬
vention of 1845.
Pertinent to this question of congressional duty, with reference to the western rivers,
there is an important provision in that great organic law of the Northwest, the ordi¬
nance of 1787. By that law, enacted by Congress for the government of the territory
of the United States northwest of the Ohio River, it is declared that " the navigable
waters leading into the Mississippi and St. Lawrence, and the carrying places between the
same, shall be common highways and forever free, as well to the inhabitants of the said
territories, as to the citizens of the United States, and those of other states that may be
admitted into the confederacy, without any tax, impost, or duty therefor." It may be
asked, How can the people of the United States at large enjoy the benefits of this com¬
mon right, unless they have avenues of access opened to them by a competent power;
and how can the people of the country bordering those streams enjoy the benefit of
their navigation, if that inland navigation be not connected with the seaboard, by direct
lines of artificial navigation, opened by competent authority ? This ordinance is in the
nature of a compact between the General Government and the people of the States,
and it reserves certain rights, and imposes certain duties, in which all citizens of the
United States are interested. It is a part of the fundamental law of the land. Reserv¬
ing the rivers as common highways for all, it divests all the States, and each particular
State, of any jurisdiction over them; and gives Congress full power to extend their
advantages to every citizen of the Union.
Having guaranteed to all the people the navigation of these rivers forever, the United
States is bound to open avenues to them from all directions, and keep them in a condi¬
tion to be freely navigated and fully enjoyed. But how can an inland navigation be
fully enjoyed, if Congress shall supply no direct and convenient outlet to the seaboard
and to the markets of the world ?
It is now conceded that Congress has power, as proprietor of the public lands, to do
what any prudent land owner may do for the enhancement of the value of his patri
mony, and can lawfully appropriate part of its lands in aid of public works which would
commensurately enhance the lands retained. If this be so, what method could be con¬
ceived of that would more certainly enhance the value of every acre of public lands in
the West, than the opening of another canal of the capacity of the Erie, on a more cen¬
tral, more southern, and shorter route ?
The attentive reader of these pages cannot fail to have arrived at the conviction,
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
that water navigation affords greater advantages to greater numbers of people, at lower
rates, and for far more numerous tons of produce, than railroad transportation. Yet
railroads have received nearly all the bounties which Congress has been willing to
bestow upon public roads.
The Commissioner of the General Land Office, in his report for 1865, (pp. 34-5,) gives
the following information:
"The immense railroad grants [of land by Congress] embrace, by estimate, the
quantity of one hundred and twenty-five millions of acres; exceeding by eight millions
of acres the aggregate area of the States of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Con¬
necticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland. These enor¬
mous grants are within about one fourth of being twice the united area of England,
Scotland, Wales, Ireland, Guernsey, Jersey, the Isle of Man, and islands of the British
seas, and less than a tenth of being equal to the French empire proper, with its eighty-
nine departments and its thirty-seven thousand five hundred and ten communes.
" Why is it that the Congress of the United States, as the national trustee, charged
under the Constitution with the disposal of the public lands, have made grants on such
a stupendous scale as this ? The answer is found not merely in the indemnifying prin¬
ciple of duplicating the reserved sections, but in the higher purpose of opening speedy
communication by the iron railway across the continent to unite the great industrial
interests of the Atlantic slope, the Valley of the Mississippi, and the declivity from the
Rocky Mountains to the Pacific."
Does not a line of direct eastward navigation, promising similar results to those
which followed the opening of the Erie Canal, present a very strong claim upon the
bounty of Congress ?
A crowning act op reconstruction.
The effect upon public opinion in the Southern States, of liberal grants of aid by
Congress in behalf of public works of national importance within their borders, would
be unspeakably happy. And no act of such assistance would be more gratefully
received, or be more beneficial in result, than a donation of lands and loan of bonds in
behalf of so important an enterprise as the completion of the Virginia water line.
Such an act, giving earnest of a broad beneficent policy, would exert as great an influ¬
ence in securing thorough and permanent reconstruction as any measure that could be
adopted by the federal power. It would completely identify Virginia with the great
West, and utterly and finally obliterate every sentiment and trace of sectional aliena¬
tion. It would give that bounding prosperity to the State which brings solace for every
grievance, and sweeps away every remnant of the poverty and privation which are the
sure nurses of disaffection and resentment. The completion of a great line of trade
across the territory of Virginia would bind that great leading Southern State to the
bosom of the Union by the strong ties of prosperous commerce, and hold her in indis¬
soluble allegiance for all time to come.
The bestowal of such a bounty at a period of so much need as the present upon a
commonwealth which, at a former era of the national history, made notable sacrifices
in behalf of the national cause, would be a requital not inappropriate, and would do
as much to restore an era of good feeling and sterling loyalty as any measure that could
be taken to that end.*
*
official history and description of the virginia canal.
In pursuance of suggestions proceeding from the West, Mr. Charles S. Carrington,
president of the James River and Kanawha Company, has requested Mr. Edward Lor¬
raine, the able chief engineer of the works of that company, to prepare a report of
leading facts relating to the important canal with which he is connected. This task
has been very ably and satisfactorily performed by that competent officer, in the fol¬
lowing interesting and instructive paper:
Office of the James River and Kanawha Company,
Richmond, June 10, 1868.
Sir : At your request, and with a view of furnishing reliable information to persons
who feel interested in the completion of the James River and Kanawha Canal, and of
supplying data by which the superiority of this route over all others as a means of
transportation of Western products to the Atlantic seaboard may be demonstrated, I
have prepared the following historical and statistical sketch of this improvement, to
which I have added some suggestions as to the best plan for its completion, with esti¬
mates of its probable cost. 1 propose simply to collect together all the interesting
statistics which now lie scattered through a vast number of reports and documents, and
combine them in one comprehensive paper, which may serve as a text book and maga¬
zine of facts for those seeking information on this subject.
* In compiling the foregoing pages, much information has been drawn from the admirable report of
Mr. Elmore H. Walker, on the trade and commerce of Buffalo, and from writings of Professor Sylvester
Waterhouse, of St. Louis, and Mr. Thos. M. Monroe, of Dubuque.
JAMBS RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL
HISTORY OF THE JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
An act for clearing and improving the navigation of James River was passed by the
legislature of Virginia, on the 5th of January, 1786. By this act the first or old James
River Company was incorporated. They were required to make the river navigable
for vessels drawing one foot of water at least, from the highest place practicable to the
great falls beginning at Westham, and from said falls to make such canal or canals with
sufficient locks, as would open navigation to tide water. This organization continued
until the 17th day of February, 1820, on which day the legislature passed an act to
amend the "Act for clearing and improving the navigation of James River, and for
uniting the eastern and western waters by the James and Kanawha Rivers." By this
act the rights and interest of the James River Company were transferred to the Com¬
monwealth, and by an act passed February 24, 1823, all the rights, power, duties, and
privileges of the president and directors were conferred on the board of public works,
whose transactious were to be still in the name of the James River Company. This
organization continued until the year 1835.
The old James River Company constructed a canal around the falls of James River,
extending from the city of Richmond to Westham, a distance of about seven miles, and
improved the bed of the river by sluices as high up as Buchanan.
The second James River Company, on State account, enlarged and reconstructed the
former canal from Richmond to Westham. and extended the same to Maiden's Adven¬
ture, in Goochland County, a distance of 27 miles; constructed a canal through the
Blue Ridge seven and a half miles long; constructed a turnpike road from Covington
to the mouth of Big Sandy River, two hundred and eighty miles long, and improved
the Kanawha River by wing dams and sluices from Charleston to its mouth, a distance
of 58 miles.
The James River and Kanawha Company was incorporated March 16, 1832, and or¬
ganized May 25, 1835. By the charter the whole interest of the Commonwealth in the
works and property of the then existing James River Company was transferred to the
James River and Kanawha Company; the State being interested in the latter to the
extent of three-fifths of its capital stock, and individuals and corporations to the extent
of the remaining two-fifths.
The works of the James River Company were valued at $1,000,000, the State receiv¬
ing a credit for that amount in part of her subscription to the capital stock of the
James River and Kanawha Company. The new company, moreover, was charged with
the payment of the annuity of $21,000 forever to the stockholders of the old James
River Company; and as this sum is equivalent to a principal of $350,000, at six per
cent, interest, it will be seen that the present company took the old works at the price
of $1,350,000.
The construction of the new canal from Richmond to Lynchburg was commenced in
1836, and the work was completed about the 1st of December, 1840.
In that time the work of construction of the second division of the canal above
Lynchburg was commenced and prosecuted up to the year 1842, when for want of funds
it was abandoned. On the 1st of March, 1847, an appropriation of $1,246,000 was made
by the legislature for the purpose of completing the unfinished work between Lynch¬
burg and North River, and the extension and completion of the canal to Buchanan.
The work was commenced in July, 1847, and completed in November, 1851. '
Fifteen miles of the third division of the canal, next above Buchanan, was put under
contract in August, 1853, but for want of funds the work was suspended in the fall of
1856. The work done on this portion of the line consisted chiefly of stone locks, aque¬
ducts, and tunneling.
The original capital of the company was $5,000,000, of which the State paid $1,000,000
- in old works, and of the private subscriptton there proved to be insolvent $73,336, leav¬
ing $3,926,664 as the actual available cash capital. All beyond the capital thus realized
has been money either borrowed directly from the State treasury or on bonds guaran¬
teed by the State, on which the company has been required to pay interest from the
day it was received, before it was expended, and of course long before it began to yield
any return.
The actual cost of construction of the James River and Kanawha Canal, including
the incomplete works above Buchanan, has been as follows:
Lock and tide-water connection $851,312
First division—Richmond to Lynchburg 5,837,628
South Side connections 162,685
Rivanna connection 115,043
Second division—Lynchburg to Buchanan 2,422,556
North River improvement 536,551
Third division, work done 511,094
Total
10,436,869
JAMBS RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
$79
The money expended in the construction of works, over and above the amount of the
cash capital, which, as stated, was borrowed directly or indirectly from the State, to¬
gether with the accrued interest, amounted in the year 1860 to about $7,200,000, which
sum was assumed as the debt due by the company to the State.
Under this heavy load of debt, with its whole property under a lien to the State, it was
impossible for the company to make any further progress with its works.
To relieve the company from its embarrassment and to enable it to complete the canal
to Covington, the Legislature, on the 23d of March, 1860, passed an " act to amend the
charter of the James River and Kanawha Company," by which the capital stock of the
company was increased to $12,400,000, in shares of $100 each, and the board of public
works was directed to subscribe, on behalf of the Commonwealth, in addition to the
shares now owned by the State in said company, for 74,000 shares of said capital stock,
which shall be declared by said company a six per cent, preferred stock, on which $6
per share shall be paid to the holders thereof before any dividend shall be paid on
other stock of said company; whereof 72,000 shares shall be taken in full satisfac¬
tion of the debt now due from the said company to the State, and for the assumption by
the State of the debt for which the State is bound as the surety for said company, and
the annuity to the old James River Company ; and for the residue of 2,000 shares, the
bonds of the State for the aggregate amount of $200,000 are to be delivered to the com¬
pany, to be applied to the extinguishment of the floating debt of the company. The
company was also authorized to borrow money at a rate of interest not exceeding seven
per cent, per annum, and not exceeding $2,500,000, for the purpose of completing the
canal to Covington. The company being thus relieved of its indebtedness to the State,
and released from the lien upon its property, was placed in a condition by which it was
hoped and believed if would be enabled to borrow money sufficient to complete the
canal to Covington.
About this time a French gentleman, representing a company of European capitalists,
and vouched for by the French consul in Richmond, proposed to enter into an engage¬
ment for completing the canal to the Ohio River on an enlarged scale. His propositions,
after protracted consideration, were acceded to by the company, and the requisite
legislation was obtained from the State. The civil war intervened to prevent the ex¬
ecution of the provisions of this engagement, which was finally abandoned in the spring
of 1867.
On the 1st of March, 1867, the Legislature of Virginia passed an act authorizing the
James River and Kanawha Company "to borrow the sum of $750,000, to be applied to
paying off the floating debt of the company, putting aud keeping its present works in re¬
pair, and to give a mortgage on the property, franchises, and net revenues of the compa¬
ny for the purpose of securing such loan."
A committee of the stockholders, at their called meeting in March, 1867, reported the
floating debt of the company to be about $622,480. For the purpose of liquidating this
debt, the board of directors have issued the six per cent, bonds of the company, payable
in twenty years from their date, and have executed a mortgage conveying the property,
franchises, and net revenues of the company in trust to secure the said bonds.
Up to this time about $410,000 of the floating debt of the company has been paid in
cash, or funded in the mortgage bonds, leaving about $240,000 still to be adjusted, and it
is hoped that in a short time the whole debt will be liquidated.
Having thus briefly related the history, affairs, and condition of the company up to the
present time, I now proceed to give
A DESCRIPTION OF THE VIRGINIA WATER LINE.
The Virginia water line extends from the capes of Virginia to the Ohio River, a dis¬
tance of 636 miles, and consists of—
I.
The James River from its mouth te the head of navigation, at the city of Richmond, a
distance of 151 miles; and—
II.
The James River and Kanawha improvement, extending from the city of Richmond to
Point Pleasant, at the mouth of the Kanawha River, a distance of 485 miles.
James River is navigable for ships of one thousand tons burden, drawing sixteen feet,
from its mouth to City Point, 36 miles below Richmond, and at an inconsiderable ex¬
pense, by dredging, the ^channel can be excavated so as to admit vessels of that draught
up to the wharves of the city.
The James River and Kanawha improvement, for the purpose of description, will be
divided into—
6$0
JAMBS RIVER, AND KANAWHA CANAL.
Miles.
1st. The Richmond dock and tide water connection 1.00
2d. The first division of the canal, extending from Richmond to Lynchburg.. 146.50
3d. The second division of the canal, extending from Lynchburg to Buchanan 50.00
4th. The third division of the canal, extending from Buchanan to Covington.. 47.00
5th. The fourth division of the canal, extending from Covington to the Green¬
brier River 33.43
6th. The Greenbrier and New Rivers to Lyken's Shoals on the Kanawha 123. 21
7th. The Kanawha River from Lyken's Shoals to the Ohio River 85.12
First. The Richmond dock and tide water connection. By means of this improvement
vessels ascend from the river into the dock, where they are met by canal-boats which
descend from the basin at the terminus of the canal, and lie alongside the vessels for the
purpose of exchanging cargoes ; or the canal-boats can descend to the river, and, with¬
out breaking bulk, be towed to City Point or to Norfolk.
Vessels enter the dock by means of a ship lock, which is founded upon solid rock, and
built of the most substantial cut granite. It is 180 feet long between the gates, 35 feet
wide, has a lift of 15 feet, and 16 feet water on the miter sill. It will pass vessels of
500 tons.
The dock is 4,100 feet long from the ship lock to Seventeenth street, and has a con
tinuous wharf, protected by a granite wall, for its whole length on the north side, and for
about 1,000 feet on the south side. The depth is from 11 to 15 feet, and the average
width 100 feet. Above Seventeenth street is a continuation called " the upper dock,"
which is also surrounded by a substantial granite wall, and is made accessible to small
class vessels by means of a pivot bridge across the line of Seventeenth street extended.
This upper portion is 800 feet long and 200 feet wide. At its upper extremity is the
depot of the Richmond and Danville Railroad.
The dock is connected with the basin by means of five locks, having an aggregate lift
of 69 feet.
These locks are built of hewn granite, and with the ship lock, in their style and finish,
will compare favorably with any similar works in this country".
The total cost of the dock and tide-water connection has been $851,312. It wag com¬
pleted in 1854.
Second. The first division of the canal, extending from the basin in Richmond to the
city of Lynchburg, comprising 137f miles of canals, and 8| miles of slack-water navi¬
gation.
The trunk of the canal is 30 feet wide at the bottom and 50 feet wide at the water line,
and was originally cut to a depth of 5 feet. The tow path is 12 feet wide and the berm
bank 8 feet.
The locks are 100 feet long between the gates and 15 feet wide in the chamber. The
total lockage, from the Basin in Richmond to Lynchburg, is 429 feet. The works of art
on the first division consist of 52 lift locks, having a total lift of 429 feet; 6 guard locks;
2 accommodation locks; 3 principal dams across James River, affording slack-water
navigation; 9 other dams across James River ; or to islands in the river, which serve as
feeders to the canal, or for connection with the south side of the river; 11 aqueducts,
three of which have wooden trunks and the remainder are of cut stone ; 191 culverts ;
133 farm and road bridges over the canal, and 3 tow-path bridges. Of the locks 22
are built of cut stone and the remainder of rubble masonry, faced with timber and
plank.
This division of the canal has cost $5,837,628, or $39,982 per mile.
On the first division are works connecting the canal with the south side of James River,
usually called the " southside connections." These works are a dam and an outlet lock
at Cartersville, and three bridges ; one at New Canton, one at Hardwicksville, and one
at Bent Creek. The wooden superstructures of the bridges were burned during the late
war. They were built upon cut stone abutments and piers, which remain uninjured.
The total cost of the southside connections has been $162,685.
There is also a connection on the north side of the river with the improvement of the
Rivanna River, an important tributary to the canal, which has cost the James River and
Kanawha Company the sum of $115,043.
Third. The second division of the canal extends from the city of Lynchburg to the
town of Buchanan, a distance of 50 miles, and consists of 22 miles of canal and 28 miles
of slack water navigation. The principal works of art on this division are :
Thirty-eight locks, having a total Jift of 299 feet, built with a few exceptions of cut
stone ; 4 stone dams and 6 timber dams across James River; one aqueduct of 50 feet
span; 8 culverts; 48 square drains ; 17 tow-path bridges, and two farm bridges. It was
completed in the year 1850, and has cost $2,422,566, or $48,451 per mile.
Connected with the second division is the North River improvement, extending from
the mouth of North River to the town of Lexington, a distance of 19| miles. Of this
improvement 10 miles are canal and 9| miles are slack-water navigation. The principal
works of art are, 22 locks, all of rubble masonry, and of the same size as those on
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
the main line of the canal, and having a total lift of 188 feet; 9 stone dams and one
timber dam across North River, and 4 aqueducts. This work was completed in the
year 1860, and cost $636,551.
Fourth. The third division of the canal follows the valley of the James and Jackson
Rivers from Buchanan to Covington, a distance of 47 miles.
This division has been definitively located, and the first 15 miles above Buchanan was
put under contract in the year 1853, but for the want of funds the work was suspended
in 1856.
Forty-one miles are canal, and six miles slack-water navigation. The total lockage
436£ feet.
The principal mechanical structures are 36 lift locks, two guard locks, one guard and
lift lock, five aqueducts across James River, each about 320 feet long, 3 aqueducts of
50 feet span, and 3 dams across James River. There are also the Marshall tunnel 1,900
feet long, and the Mason tunnel, 198 feet long, by means of which 5f miles of distance
are saved.
Of this work there are nearly completed ten lift locks, and the abutments and piers
of three of the aqueducts, across James River. The foundations of two of the dams,
up to the surface of low water, have been put in; about 800 feet of the Marshall tun¬
nel have been excavated, and the Mason tunnel is completed. The mechanical work on
this division is executed in the best style,and of the most substantial materials, all of
the structures being built of hewn limestone, laid with hydraulic cement.
Fifth. The fourth division of the canal, extending from the town of Covington to
the Greenbrier River, a distance of 33£ miles.
At Covington the canal crosses Jackson River by an aqueduct, and follows the valley
of Dunlap's Creek to Crow's Tavern, at the base of the Alleghany Mountains, a dis¬
tance of 17£ miles.
At Crow's the line of the canal leaves the valley of Dunlap's Creek, and following the
bed of Fork Run, ascends the eastern side of the Alleghany Mountain, by a series of
locks and dams, to the summit.
The distance from Covington to the eastern entrance of the Alleghany tunnel is 20.7
miles, and the total lockage is 675 feet.
The summit level is 4£ miles long, 1,921 feet above tide-water, and pierces the Alle¬
ghany Mountain by a tunnel 2 6-10 miles long.
Emerging from the western side of the mountain the canal descends by the valleys
of Tuckahoe and Howard's Creeks, 241 feet in a distance of ten miles, to the Green¬
brier River.
The summit level, and the portion of the canal on each side of it between Dunlap's
Creek and the Greenbrier River, a distance of 15£ miles, will be supplied with water
chiefly from Anthony's Creek. Upon this creek a reservoir is to be made covering 2,753
acres of land, and having an average depth of 60 feet, from which the water will be
conducted by a feeder canal, about 9 miles long, to the summit level.
Sixth. The Greenbrier and New Rivers, from the mouth of Howard's Creek to Ly-
ken's Shoals on the Kanawha, a distance of 123 miles.
From the mouth of Howard's Creek to the Ohio River, the character of the improve¬
ment will be changed. The line that we have been heretofore occupied with from
Richmond to the Greenbrier River is to consist of a canal. The line down the Green¬
brier, New, and Kanawha Rivers, will consist of a slack-water and sluice improvement
of those rivers for steamboat navigation, and the mouth of Howard's Creek, or what is
known as "Greenbrier Bridge," will be either the point of transshipment from steam¬
boats and barges to canal-boats, or the point where canal-boats, having been towed up
by steamboats, will change steam power for horse power, and vice versa.
1st. Greenbrier River from Greenbrier Bridge to New River, a distance of 49.62
miles. Lockage 316 feet.
2d. New River to Lyken's Shoals on the Kanawha, a distance of 73.59 miles. Lock¬
age 766 feet. . *
The surveys of the Greenbrier and New Rivers have not been so elaborate nor so exact
as those of other parts of the line, but they have been sufficient to obtain a correct
profile, and the general character of the beds of the streams, and to establish beyond
any doubt the practicability of their improvement. Of the practicability of their
improvement we may feel well assured by the concurrent opinions of Benjamin Wright,
Edward H. Gill, and Charles B. Fisk, three eminent practical hydraulic engineers.
Judge Wright, after acquiring practical experience and high reputation on the Erie
Canal, was selected as the first and chief engineer of the James River and Kanawha
Company. In his letter to the board of directors, published in the seventh annual
report, page 73, he says: " From the facts disclosed by the survey on the lines of the
Greenbrier and New Rivers, I am satisfied that the difficulties of improving these
rivers have heretofore been overrated, and that the plans proposed for that purpose are
both practical and expedient."
Mr. Fisk, the late eminent chief engineer of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, has
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL*
also personally examined the Greenbrier and New Rivers, and approved of the proposed
plan for their improvement*
Mr. Gill, who made the survey of these rivers, in his report of the survey, published
in the seventh annual report, page 65, says: "Nature has with a prolific hand, within
these rockbound shores, furnished all the elements for the construction of a cheap and
permanent improvement, consisting of locks and dams, sites for the erection of which,
of the most desirable description, and materials of the best quality for their construc¬
tion, are distributed along the entire route in profusion. And feeling confident that
the latter description of improvement is the most permanent and economical that can
be adopted on this stream, I recommend it."
I have estimated this section of the improvement from Mr. Gill's notes of the width
and fall of the rivers, and have provided for locks and dams built of stone, and adapted
to steamers of 350 tons.
Seventh. The Kanawha River, from Lyken's Shoals to its mouth, a distance of 85
miles, falls 76£ feet.
Various plans have been recommended for the improvement of the Kanawha; but
as the improvement by sluices has been proved to be practicable, is by far the cheapest,
the least liable to accidents from freshets, and presents the advantages of an open,
unobstructed navigation, I have adopted it as the basis of my estimate.
PRACTICABILITY OF THE ROUTE.
Before presenting my estimates of its cost, it will be proper to express some views in
regard to the practicability of the water line. The only points, I believe, about which
any doubts have been expressed as to the practicability of the route, have been the
improvement of New River and the summit level. As to New River, I have already
given the testimony and opinion of three practical hydraulic engineers, and I do not
think that I can add anything that can strengthen, nor do I think that the crude, off¬
hand, superficial views of unprofessional persons ought to weaken, the confidence that
the opinions of these eminent engineers should impart to the public. I will therefore
pass on to the summit level.
The only doubts, I believe, that have been expressed in regard to the practicability
of this part of the line have been as to the sufficiency of the supply of water ; and as
but few persons have taken the trouble to inform themselves on this subject, it will be
proper here to explain more fully the plan by which it is proposed to supply the summit
level with water, and to demonstrate its practicability and its sufficiency.
It is proposed to suppiy the summit level with water from Anthony's Creek, a tribu¬
tary to the Greenbrier. Where that stream passes through the Greenbrier Mountain
there is a narrow defile, which has been selected as a site for a dam or mound, which,
when erected, will arrest the water that flows down the creek and convert the valley
above into a reservoir or lake. This reservoir will be nine miles long, will have an
average width of half a mile, a superficial area of 2,753 acres, and a mean depth of 60
feet. The mound will be 126 feet high and 395 feet long. The reservoir will contain
178,000,000 cubic yards of water, which was ascertained by an accurate survey of its
superficial area; after which cross-sections of its depth were taken at every consider¬
able variation in the ground, with the angles of the hill-side at every station of 100
feet. The reservoir was thus divided into a number of fields, the superficial and cubic
contents of which were separately calculated. In order to utilize this immense body
of water, it will be necessary that the mountain ridge that separates the southern border
of the lake from the valley of Howard's Creek shall be pierced by a tunnel two and a
half miles long. The level of the bottom of this tunnel will be thirty feet below the
surface of the water in the lake. It passes for its entire length through a black slate-
rock of easy excavation, and as it will be necessary to be made only just large enough
to be advantageously worked, it cannot be considered an obstacle of any importance.
After passing through this tunnel, the water from the reservoir will flow down the bed
of Dry Creek, and at the narrow gorge where it enters into the valley of the North
Fork of Howard's Creek, a dam 300 feet long and 20 feet high will be constructed to
stop the water and turn it through a tunnel 200 yards long into the valley of the Middle
Fork of Howard's Creek, after which it will be conducted by a feeder canal two and
eight-tenths of a mile long to the summit level.
It will be observed that as this feeder tunnel is located on a level thirty feet below
the surface of the lake, it is proposed to use only the upper thirty feet of the water,
which will be the quantity that will be available for feeding purposes, and which has
been ascertained to be 109,189,130 cubic yards.
The annual quantity of water discharged by Anthony's Creek has been ascertained
by daily gauges of the creek for a whole year, and is stated in the following
Table of the quantity of water discharged by Anthony''s Creek in one year.
Cubic yards.
January 11,649,673
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. StS 3
Cubic Yards.
May 13,262,939
June 19,208,0(15
July . 4,586,482
August . 7,071,220
September 1,194,709
October 780,491
November •. 6,963,657
December 21,393,063
Total, per annum 210,526,955
Average discharge per diem, cubic yards .. 576,786
These gauges of the creek were taken during the last half of the year 1851, and the
first half of the year 1852, during which time the quantity of rain as ascertained by
the rain guages, which were kept in that vicinity, was 34| inches. The average down¬
fall of that year and the preceding four years was 36.4 inches, and the maximum in
1847-48 was 39.5 inches. So the quantity of rain that fell during the year the creek
was guaged was considerably below the average, and we will therefore be Within
the mark if we assume 576,786 cubic yards as the average daily supply. •
I consider this the actual available supply from the creek, and make no deduction
for evaporation or filtration from the reservoir, because the surface of ground covered
by the reservoir is greater than the surface of the reservoir, and was subject to evapo¬
ration while the gauges of the creek were being taken, and the flow of the creek was
diminished by the quantity evaporated from that surface, and there could be no leak¬
age, filtration and absorption in the reservoir, except through the mound, because after
the water has passed through and saturated the thin overlaying stratum of soil, it would
reach the impenetrable rock, and there it would have to stop ; there could be no
further absorption or filtration. The filtration through the mound, if it was properly
made and puddled, would be so slight as to be unworthy of notice. But after the water
has left the reservoir it will pass over six miles of branch and canal, from which there
would be evaporation and filtration. I will, then, allow that this six miles of feeder
will lose the whole of its prism of water once in every fifteen days, and assuming its
area of cross section at 64 square feet, estimate the quantity thus lost at 5,006 cubic
yards per diem, which deducted from 576,786 cubic yards, will leave 571,780 cubic yards
as the actual supply for feeding the canal.
As doubts had been suggested as to the adaptation of this valley for. the purposes of
a reservoir, and vague surmises expressed as to fissures and caverns in the sides of the
mountain through which the water would leak out, an eminent practical geologist
was employed to make an examinantion of the geological structure of the site of this
reservoir, who reported that " if the engineers had the choice of the rocks of this region,
it would be dfficult to show how they could make a better disposition of them;5' and
he also expressed the opinion that the building a dam across the gorge of the mountain
would reproduce the conditions that once existed, as there was abundant evidence to
prove that the valley had been once occupied by a lake, which had subsequently, by a
disruption of the mountain, escaped through the gorge.
Having now ascertained the quantity of water afforded by the creek, and the fact
that it can be made available, the next step is to determine the quantity that will be
needed for the use of the canal, and to see whether the supply will be equal to the
demand.
The whole length of the canal to be supplied entirely by this reservoir is that portion
between the point on the eastern side of the summit where Dunlap's Creek is taken in
as a feeder, and the point on the western side of the summit where Howard's Creek is
taken in as a feeder, a distance of about nine miles.
After the prism of the canal shall have been filled, the yearly supply which will be
demanded from thfe reservoir will be a quantity sufficient to supply the loss by leakage
through the locks, and filtration and evaporation from the canal, and the quantity
consumed in the passage of the boats through the locks at the summit level. In ex¬
periments made by Mr. Fisk on the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, the loss by leakage
through the locks, which were 100 feet long and 15 feet wide, amounted to 62 cubic feet
per minute, and the monthly loss on the same canal from evaporation and filtration
was about twice the quantity of water contained in it. As the locks proposed for the
summit level of our canal will be at least 120 feet long by 20 wide, the proportional
* quantity to be allowed for leakage through them would be about 100 cubic feet per
minute, and the loss by evaporation and filtration from a canal 70 feet wide and 7 feet
deep, would be 96 cubic feet per minute per mile. That portion of the canal occupied
by the tunnel, being through solid rock, will be subject to no more loss by leakage and
evaporation than will be supplied by precolation through the roof and sides of the
, tunnel, and this is therefore excluded from this calculation ; leaving the entire length
of the canal subject to filtration and evaporation six and a half miles*
58, JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
6 8 *
The total loss then by leakage, filtration, and evaporation, would be 724 cubic feet
per minute, or 1,042,560 cubic feet per diem.
* In making the estimate of the quantity of water that will be consumed in passing
the boats through the locks, let us assume that the canal will enjoy a full trade, and
that the boats will pass through the locks at the summit as fast as possible. The aver¬
age time of a boat passing a lock of 10 feet lift is about six minutes, or 240 per diem.
Assuming a full trade, w^ must also assume a fair alternation of boats passing the
summit level; if one boat succeed another, each boat will consume two lockfuls of
water; if two boats meet on the summit, each boat will consume one lockful of water.
It will therefore be fair to assume that the average expenditure of water for boats
passing the summit leVel will be 1-J prism of lift for each boat, or 360 prisms of lift
per diem, which for locks 120 feet long, 20 feet wide, and 10 feet lift, would amount to
8,640,000 cubic feet per diem ; add to this quantity 1,042,060 cubic feet, the quantity
lost by leakage, filtration, and evaporation, and we have 9,682,560 cubic feet, or 358,613
cubic yards per diem, as the quantity of water necessary to navigate the canal with a
full trade.
Cubic yards.
We have seen that Anthony's Creek will afford a net available supply per
day of — 571,780
And that the quantity required for the use of the canal will be, per day 358,616
Leaving a surplus for contingencies per day of ... .* 213,167
This surplus is amply sufficient to cover any contingencies or objection that ingenuity
may suggest, but as a further security there are three other creeks, viz : Little Creek,
Tuckahoe Creek, and Howard's Creek, whose united volumes amount to about one-third
of Anthony's Creek, which, if necessary, could be appropriated to the use of the canal.
There ought not, then, to rest a reasonable doubt in the mind of any candid, sensible
man, who will take the trouble to investigate this subject, as to the practicability of
the passage of the Alleghany by canal, or as to the sufficiency of the supply of water.
No physical difficulties exist that cannot be overcome by money, for it is not designed
to do anything that has not already been done scores of times, both in this country and
in Europe.
ESTIMATE OF THE COST OF COMPLETING THE JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL FROM
BUCHANAN TO THE OHIO RIVER.
In making up this estimate, I have provided for a canal from Buchanan to the Green¬
brier River of the same dimensions as the enlarged Erie Canal, viz: 42 feet wide at the
bottom, 70 feet at the water surface, and with a depth of water of 7 feet; the locks to
be 120 feet long between the gates, and 29 feet wide, and it is proper to state that the
estimate for this portion of the work is based upon a definitive location, and accurate
cross sections of the canal for the whole distance.
The estimate for the Greenbrier and New Rivers is for steamboat navigation, with
stone dams and locks, the locks to. be 200 feet long and forty feet wide, with 7 feet depth
of water; extending to Lyken's Shoals on the Kanawha, where sluice navigation
will begin.
ESTIMATE.
Miles.
1. From Buchanan to Covington 47.27 $4,036,577
2. From Covington to mouth of Fork Run 17.37 2,206,795
3. From mouth of Fork Run to western entrance of Alleghany
tunnel (including reservoir and feeders) 6.03 5,077,736
4. From western end of Alleghany tunnel to Greenbrier River 9.93 1,709,517
5. The Greenbrier River to New River 49.62 3,512,506
6. The New River from the mouth of Greenbrier to Lyken's
Shoals on the Kanawha 73.59 9,091,537
7. Kanawha River from Lyken's Shoals to the mouth of the
Ohio (sluice improvement) 85.12 402,167
Total length of new work 288.93
Total cost from Buchanan to the Ohio River 26,036,836
As it would be useless to construct the canal from Buchanan to the Ohio River on
an enlarged scale without making a corresponding increase in the size of the locks,
and in the depth of the canal from Richmond to Buchanan, I have made an estimate
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. t)
of the cost of building new locks 120x20 by the side of the old ones, and of increasing
the depth of the water in the canal to 7 feet, which is presented below:
Estimate of the cost of doubling the locks and deepening the canal to seven feet, from the
Itichmond dock to Buchanan.
New tide-water connection by way of Haxall's Mill $334,937
Cost of doubling locks and deepening canal from Richmond to Lynch¬
burg., 2,091,504
Cost of doubling locks and deepening canal from Lynchburg to Buchanan 1,502,900
Total cost of doubling locks and deepening canal from Richmond dock
to Buchanan - 3,929,341
Add cost of new canal from Buchanan to the Ohio River 26,036,836
—
Total cost of completing the Virginia water line 29.966,177
PROPOSED NEW PLAN FOR SUMMIT LEVEL.
The above estimate is based upon a location of the summit level, both as to elevation
and direction, which was recommended by Captain McNeil, of the United States Topo¬
graphical Engineers, in 1827, and has never since been changed. Every route between
the head-waters of the JamesVnd those of the Greenbrier and New Rivers, that gave
any promise of being practicable, has been instrumentally examined, and this has
proved to have the lowest summit, to be passable at the same elevation with the
shortest tunnel, and to afford an abundant supply of water at ^n inconsiderable ex¬
pense. There can be no doubt of the superiority of this route over all others; but
there may be some question as to the most judicious elevation for the summit level.
The choice is between a longer tunnel and less lockage, and a shorter tunnel and more
lockage. Of course, it would be desirable to reduce the lockage as much as possible,
both on account of the cost of attendance and the annual repairs of the locks, and the
time that would be consumed in passing through them. "With that view, after a mature
consideration of the subject, I have determined to recommend a change in the plan of
passing the summit level, which, although more costly, I consicfer decidedly preferable
to the present plan.
I propose to establish the summit at a level 1,700 feet above tide, or 20 feet above the
level of the Greenbrier River at the mouth of Howard's Creek, and pass the Alleghany
Mountain by a tunnel about nine miles long. We would thus dispense with 220 feet of
lockage on each side of the summit, and with 44 locks ; save 4 miles in distance, and 7£
hours in time, and by feeding directly from the Greenbrier River, be enabled to pass the
summit level without the aid of reservoirs.
Let us see whether these advantages will be purchased at too great a cost:
I estimate the cost of a tunnel nine miles long, including a feeder dam on
the Greenbrier, at $13,790,000
From which deduct the estimated cost of the alternate route by Howard's
and Tuckahoe Creeks, including the cost of Anthony's Creek reservoir
and feeder ' 6,392,266
And we find the excess of cost of the short line to be 7,397,734
To determine whether the company will be justified in expending this large sum of
money for the purpose of shortening the distance and the time consumed in lockage, it
is necessary first to ascertain the capacity and probable tonnage of the canal and the cost
of transportation.
The locks will admit boats about 108 feet long and 19 feet wide, with six feet draught
of water; such boats will carry at least 280 tons ; but I will put the average loads at
250 tons, and will suppose that one boat will pass through the locks in every 7£ minutes,
or 192 boats per day for 300 days, and obtain 14,300,000 tons as the actual capacity of
the canal with a full trade. It would be fair, then, to assume the half of this sum, or
say 7,000,000 tons, as the probable tonnage. It will be admitted that for every mile we
can shorten the canal, we may expend a capital of which the interest is equal to the an¬
nual expense of transporting the whole tonnage over that mile.
By adopting the long tunnel line we save four miles in actual distance, and the time
consumed in passing 44 locks, which, at seven and a half minutes to the lock, will
amount to 5J hours, equivalent to a saving of eleven miles more, or a total saving in dis¬
tance of 15 miles. Assuming the cost of transportation at 4 mills per ton per mile, the
passage of 7,000,000 tons over 15 miles will cost $420,000, to which add the annual cost
of attendance and repairs of 44 locks at $600 per annum for each lock, $26,400, and we
have $446,400 for the amount saved annually, which, at six per cent, interest, represents
W JAMES RIYER AND KANAWHA CANAL
a capital of $7,440,000, which is the amount that may be expended to save a distance of
15 miles. So that if the tonnage should be only one-half of the theoretical capacity of
the canal, the company would be justified in incurring the increased expense, in order to
have a shorter and better line.*
But some persons may object to so long a tunnel. For my part I cannot see any ob¬
jections to it; but, on the contrary, see everything to recommend it. About its practi¬
cability there can be no doubt. The tunnel already excavated through the same moun¬
tain for the Covington and Ohio Railroad is about one mile distant from the proposed
.5 canal tunnel, is 4,700 feet long, and passes for its entire length through solid slate and
sandstone rock. As there have been no extraordinary physical difficulties encountered
in excavating this tunnel, none need be apprehended in the canal tunnel, and, as will be
shown, hereafter, it can be completed as speedily as other portions of the work.
I have provided for a tunnel 56 feet wide and 32 feet high, with a water-way 44 feet
wide and a tow-path of solid mortared masonry on each side six feet wide, so that boats
drawn by horses can pass each other without inconvenience ; but these tow-paths may
be dispensed with, and the tunnel, excavated to its full width of 66 feet, may be navi¬
gated by steam-tugs towing the canal-boats through it.
As some intelligent persons and warm advocates of the water line with whom I have
conversed on this subject have been rather astounded, and have expressed most decided
opposition to so long a tunnel, I will here consider the principal objections that have been
urged against it.
One is the stupendous rmagnitude of the undertaking,'and the consequent length of
time that will be consumed in its execution. It certainly will be a work of great magni¬
tude, surpassing both in its size and length all others of a similar character in the world.
But is that any reason why it should not be done? Ten years ago such an objection
would have had some" force, and it would have required some temerity to have recom¬
mended such a gigantic undertaking. But within that time works of a similar character,
and approximating it in magnitude, have been undertaken both in in this country and in
Europe, and are now being prosecuted to a successful and speedy termination.
In this country the Hoosac tunnel in Massachusetts, about four and three-quarter
miles long, is, in spite of past difficulties and disasters, now progressing favorably.
In Europe the Mont Cenis tunnel under the Alps, for the purpose of connecting
France and Italy by a* continuous railway, is seven and a half miles long, and is now
nearly completed. In the interesting report of Mr. Benjamin H. Latrobe, who visited
this tunnel last October, there is a statement of the monthly progress of the work,
from which it appears that the average monthly progress for the preceding six months
from April to October, was 245 feet at one end and 238 feet at the other, or a total
of 483 feet per month, or 5,796 feet per annum, more than half a mile a year at each
end. The progress of the work on this tunnel, which is being excavated from each
end without the aid of shafts, and at a monthly increasing speed, leads to the most
satisfactory assurance that the projected Alleghany tunnel, with the favorable char¬
acter of the mountain for the location of numerous shafts, and the facilities which the
late improvements in automatic machine drilling have afforded for the rapid prosecu¬
tion of that kind of work, could be completed probably as quick as the rest of the
work, certainly as speedily as the two and a half mile tunnel. On the line of the last
mentioned tunnel, as located, there are three depressions in the mountain at which
shafts may be sunk, one 129 feet, one 264 feet, and one 215 feet deep, or three shafts in
two and a half miles, averaging 203 feet deep. We may therefore reasonably expect,
on the long tunnel line, at least eight shafts, or one for each mile of the tunnel, averag¬
ing about 425 feet deep. But if there is only one shaft for every three miles of the
tunnel, and one year is allowed for sinking them, it is evident that at the rate of half a
mile a year each way from each shaft, and from the ends, the tunnel could be excavated
^n four years from its commencement, which is about as quickly as the New River or
Greenbrier sections could be completed under the most favorable circumstances. No
reasonable objection, then, can be urged against the long tunnel on acoount of the time
that will be consumed in its execution. It is simply a question of money, and of money
only ; and I think that I have proved that the money would be economically and judi¬
ciously expended.
Another objection is urged as to its use after it is completed, a fancied difficulty and
even horror of passing for a distance of nine miles under ground and in utter dark¬
ness. It will be observed that I have provided for tow-patlis of masonry six feet wide
on each side of the tunnel, which are to be protected on their edges by a cast-iron
curb or railing. By this means there will be ample room and perfect security for
teams, and as there will be no meeting of teams nor passing of lines under or over the
*Note—The attentive readerwill observe a discrepancy in the time allowed for the passage of a
boat through the locks in the calculation of the water consumed on the summit level and in the calcu¬
lation of tbe tonnage capacity of the canal, six minutes being assumed in the first case, and seven and
a half minutes in the second. This has been done purposely, so as to assume an extravagant average
of the quantity of water consumed, and a more moderate and practical average for the assumed ca¬
pacity of the canal.
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. 6^ g
boats, there will be no delay when the boats pass each other as there is elsewhere, and
consequently the navigation through the tunnel will be conducted with less delay and
inconvenience, and with as much security as on other parts of the line.
As to the darkness, the boats, of course, will have their bow lights up, which will
give a sufficiency of light. I believe that if the boatmen had the choice of the two
routes, they would greatly prefer the nine miles through the long tunnel to the four¬
teen miles by the other route, with its 440 feet of lockage, and its two and a half miles
tunnel, and its delay of 7£ hours, 'in fact there is no objection that is urged against
the nine mile tunnel, except as to its cost, that cannot be applied to a tunnel 2J miles
long, and the summit cannot be passed by a tunnel of less length. To get up to this
level there is an ascent from the Greenbrier River of 240 feet, and a corresponding de¬
scent on the other side, occupying in all a distance of 14 miles. To feed the canal by
this route and at this level we have to resort to a reservoir on Anthony's Creek, a
feeder canal nine miles long, and a feeder tunnel 2J miles long. By the alternate route
we have a tunnel nearly four times as long, but equally as practicable in its construc¬
tion and use ; we shorten the distance actually four miles, and in effect fifteen, dispense
with 44 locks and the expense of their attendance and maintenance, and, by feeding
directly from the Greenbrier River, avoid the necessity of resorting to a reservoir and
feeder canal to supply the summit level with water.
Moreover, by avoiding the delay attending the passing of so many locks so close
together, we would actually increase the capacity and value of the canal, and would
present to the consideration of» the public an improvement Vhich, wdien completed, will
in its capacity and utility, be superior to any other on this continent.
Anticipating that there might be criticisms adverse to the proposed change of plan
at the summit level, I have not been contented to recommend such an extensive tunnel
solely upon my own judgment, but have solicited the advice of a gentleman whose
opinion upon such a subject is probably entitled to more respect and confidence than
that of any other engineer in this country. I allude to Mr. Benjamin H. Latrobe, of
Baltimore, whose long experience in tunneling, and especially as consulting engineer of
the Hoosac tunnel, and whose observation of the operations at the Mont Cenis tunnel
have afforded him rare opportunities of acquiring an enlightened judgment concern¬
ing the practicability, and the probable time that would be consumed in the prosecu¬
tion of a work of such magnitude as the proposed Alleghany Tunnel. I have the
pleasure of presenting his letter on that subject, which he has kindly permitted to be
published :
Baltimore, May 1, 1868.
Dear Sir : I am in receipt of your letter of the 30th ultimo, and of the map and
report accompanying it, and which contains the most specific information you are able
to give me as to the profile of the proposed long tunnel at the summit level of the
James River and Kanawha Canal, I would, of course, have liked to have had before
me an accurate longitudinal section of the line of the tunnel, but the heights above
tide shown upon the topographical map, and the projection of the position of the work
thereon, enable me to say what follows in the way of an opinion, which, if it will assist
you in recommending the enterprise, I shall feel glad to have given, desiring as I do the
success of every effort to improve the communications of our common country, aside
from all local interest.
I cannot hesitate to pronounce the proposed tunnel of 10 miles in length entirely prac¬
ticable, nor do I doubt that, for the reasons assigned in your letter to me, it would be
expedient to adopt it instead of the shorter one of 2.6-10 miles. The assumed summit
level of the canal being 1,700 feet above tide, and the highest surface elevation at the
top of the Alleghany Mountain over the tunnel being but 2,606 feet above tide, if one
or more shafts had to be sunk even at points as high as this, they would still be not
excessive in depth. I judge, however, from an inspection of the map, that if the line
of the tunnel be curved as you suggest, and to which I see no serious objection, (the
radii being large,) the extreme depth of shaft need not exceed 600 or 700 feet, and the
average depth about 400 feet. If, then, we assume a shaft in each mile, we can esti¬
mate the time required to execute the work with some certainty. Experience in sink¬
ing the deep central shaft of the Hoosac tunnel of 1,030 feet in depth, has shown that
in the mica slate rock of that mountain a speed of 25 feet per month can be made in
drilling by hand labor and blasting with common gunpowder. In the clay slates and
sandstones of the Alleghany Mountain, I believe that a progress of from 30 to 40 feet
per month could be effected even by hand-drilling, and considerably more by machine
drills and nitro-glycerine. If we assume then but 33£ feet per month, ten shafts of
400 feet average depth can be sunk in twelve months after being fairly started, and as
they may be simultaneously begun and finished, the work of drifting horizontally in
the body of the tunnel could be commenced at two faces in each shaft, or twenty faces
in the whole ten shafts, supposing the whole tunnel to be taken out through the shafts,
and allowing nothing for the approach cuts. There would then be half a mile to drive
each way from each shaft; and at an average rate of but 100 feet per month, the sev¬
eral workings would meet in 26.4-10 months, or a little over two years. Adding to this
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
the twelve months employed in sinking the shafts, we have 3 years and 2.4-10 months,
and with a further addition of enough time for preparation and contingencies to make
up four years, the work could be finished and in operation at the end of that period.
It may seem incredible that a ten-mile tunnel could be finished in any such time, and
if the time already spent at the Hoosac and at Mont Cenis be taken as settling the
question, it would be at once decided adversely to this estimate. But we must look at
the recent progress of those works, with the advantage of the experience earned by
them and now available to a new scheme of simitar character, and not to the average
progress, including the delays attendant upon mistakes made in the outset, and the de¬
fects of the labor-saving machinery which has since been perfected and is now realizing
such vastly improved results.
Having driven more than one tunnel in slates and sandstones, such as will be met
with in the Alleghany tunnel you have' projected, I am well acquainted with the
character of those rocks, and know that very rapid progress can be made in them. The
strike and dip of the strata at your locality are also as favorable as possible to safe and
speedy working. I assume that the most improved drilling machine will be used, and
that as suggested in my last report upon the Hoosac tunnel, which you have, the whole
section be taken out at once, without any preliminary " heading," which can be readily
done with drill carriages properly constructed for the purpose. I also suppose that
nitro-glycerine would be used as the explosive, although that would not be necessary to
insure a progress of 100 feet per month, much more than which has been effected with
gunpowder, both at Mont Cenis (where as much as 272 feet per month has been accom¬
plished) and at the Hoosac, where 131 feet has been driven in a much harder and tougher
rock than either that of Mont Cenis or the Alleghany Mountain.
As much water may be encountered in your long tunnel, the most effective means of
raising it must be provided, and for this purpose no engine can be compared with the
Cornish engine (of the "bull" form) placed at the top of the shift. The hoisting and
ventilating machinery must, of course, be of the most approved form, and in short all
the operations within and without the tunnel made to harmonize in the most perfect
manner.
In conclusion I will add that I have never felt, in giving a professional opinion, more
perfect confidence in its soundness, and the certainty with which the results predicted
can be realized.
I am, dear sir, yours respectfully and truly,
BENJ. H. LATROBE,
Civil Engineer.
E. Lorbaine, Esq.,
Engineer and Superintendent James River and Kanawha Canal, Richmond, Va.
The estimated cost of the improvement by the long line is $29,966,177
Add excess of cost of short line 7,397,734
Total cost by short line 37,363,911
the value of the improvement as an investment.
Capital invested in new works, say $40,000,000
Capital invested in old works, say 4,926,664
Preferred six per cent, stock of the State * 7,400,000
Total capital invested 52,326,664
assumed revenue.
7,000,000 tons through freight, 485 miles, at 2 mills per ton per mile $6,79C,000
100,000 tons way freight, say 50 miles, at 1 cent per ton per mile 50,000
200,000 tons to and from Lynchburg, 146 miles, at f cent per ton per mile.. 219,000
100,000 tons to and from Buchanan and Lexington, 196 miles, at £ cent per
ton per mile •••• 98,000
200,000 tons to and from Covington, 243 miles, at 4 mills per ton per mile.. 194,400
300,000 tons coal from Kanawha Valley to Lynchburg and to iron furnaces
on line of canal, 250 miles, at 2.5 mills per ton per mile 187,500
200,000 tons coal from Kanawha Valley to Richmond, 400 miles, at 2 mills
per ton per mile 160,000
500,000 tons coal from Kanawha Valley to New York and other eastern
cities, via Richmond, 400 miles, at 2 mills per ton per mile 400,000
Revenue from tonnage of Kanawha westward 400,000
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. ( ) 6 ^ 63
Revenue from Richmond dock $400,000
Revenue from water rents 30,000
Revenue from boats and passengers 100,000
9,028,900
Expenses of repairs and administration $750 per mile 363,750
Net revenue 8,665,150
Which is more than 16 per cent, on a capital of §53,000,000
The coal field penetrated by the Kanawha, Coal, Big Sandy, and Guyandotte Rivers,
in the variety, quality, and quantity of its bituminous coals, is without parallel on this
continent. The Virginia water line opens this entire field to eastern markets. The
Kanawha passes through the heart of this coal region, and the Coal River, its tributary,
is already provided with slack-water navigation. The cannel coal of this coal basin can
certainly be delivered in New York city by the Virginia water line at one-half of the
present cost in that city, by the cargo, of the English cannel coal. It is difficult to esti¬
mate the advantages of the Virginia water line to the East in connection with this coal,
but great confidence is felt that the above estimate of eastern shipments will, on the
.completion of the water line, be found to be far below the mark.
VALUE OF THE IMPROVEMENT TO THE WESTERN AND NORTHWESTERN STATES.
But it is not only as a profitable investment for capital, but chiefly in its character as
a great public highway, by which the products of agriculture, the forest, and mines may
find the shortest and cheapest means of access to the eastern markets, that this great
improvement recommends itself especially to the consideration of the people of the
Western and Northwestern States.
These States are almost exclusively agricultural, and produce an immense surplus of
grain and pork, which is increasing every year to an extent that is incalculable. The
States of Missouri, Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Minnesota are estimated to have pro¬
duced more than one-fourth of the whole value of the crops raised in the United States
in 1864, four-tenths of all the wheat, and nearly one-half of all the corn. Nearly all
the wheat exported from this country is sent from those States.
New England produces but eleven quarts of wheat to each inhabitant, and consumes
$50,000,000 more than she produces of agricultural productions. Even Pennsylvania
and New York are calling upon the teeming granaries of the West to supply their defi¬
ciency in breadstuff's ; and Ohio is barely making a surplus.* England imports 72,000,-
000 bushels of wheat annually, and her importations are increasing every year ; and in
Europe generally the deficiency of grain must be greater every year, for the produc¬
tion is nearly at a stand, while the population is steadily increasing. This rapidly-mul¬
tiplying deficiency of breadstuff's in the Old World and in the east can be supplied only
from the Western and Northwestern States, which will soon become the granary of the
world.
The great question, then, with the people of those States is, how to get their surplus
productions to market in the shortest time and at the least possible cost, for their suc¬
cess and wealth depend very much on the cost of transportation. The prices of wheat,
corn, and pork in the West are regulated by the prices of those articles in New York,
being generally the same, less the cost of transportation to that place.
The surplus products of the West are estimated at 25,000,000 tons. The chief chan¬
nels of communication with the East are by the Mississippi River to New Orleans, and
thence by Gulf and ocean to New York or Liverpool, and by a variety of railroads cross¬
ing the Northwestern States east of the Mississippi to the lake cities, and then either by
the lakes and Erie Canal or by direct railroad line to New York.
These railroads charge enormous freights, but possess a great advantage in the ele¬
ment of time. They deliver freight from the Mississippi River into New York in about
ten days, and the merchant in the western city is thus enabled to draw at ten days'
sight on his New York commission merchant, and get his draft discounted at bank, and
invest his money in new purchases. The facilities thus offered by these routes enable
them, at extortionate prices, to compete to tlieir utmost capacity with the river route,
^vith its low rates, but long time.
"The directors of the Bureau of Statistics have completed an elaborate report for one
of the Committees of Congress, which shows the tonnage and value of the freight
transported during the year ended March 31, 1867, across the State of Illinois, west¬
ward of the meridian of Chicago, from which it appears that there were transported
over eight railroads running eastward, 4,358,000 tons of freight, the value of which
amounted to §235,000,000; and westward, 1,345,000 tons, valued at $411,000,000; the
*See speech of P. Robbj.es^., before the Mississippi River improvement convention bold at Dubuaue.
Iowa, February 15, 1866.
tiyo
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
combined movement amounting to the enormous aggregate of 5,703,000 torts, valued at
$646,000,000, an amount nearly equal to two-thirds of the entire freight commerce of
the country." We thus find that these railroads only transport about one-sixth part
of the estimated surplus products of the West.
In a letter written by Mr. Thomas M. Monroe, and published in the Dubuque Times,
Jannary 28, 1868, he says: "The charges by railroad from Dubuque (188 miles west of
Chicago) and New York are now, for the lowest class freight carried eastward, $1 10
per hundred, or $22 per ton. In the summer, when canal and lake navigation was free,
it was 95 cents per hundred, or $19 per ton. The lowest rate on westward-bound freight
is now $1 30 per hundred, or $26 per ton, while the next class of heavy freight pays
$2 30 per hundred, or $46 per ton. This is nearly as favorable a point from which to
transport produce or merchandise from the Mississippi across to New York, or vice versa,
as any other point west of that stream, as it is nearly in the line of the general route of
transportation. It may, therefore, be safely stated that transportations on produce pay¬
ing the lowest charges from any point on the western bank of the Mississippi to New
York will not fall short of an average throughout the year of $20 per ton; and the
westward-bound freight is still higher."
In the Dubuque Herald of March 18, 1868, it is stated that the Mississippi Barge
Company have advertised the following rates for the coming season:
Wheat, from St. Paul to New York 36 cents per bushel.
Wheat, from Dubuque to New York 32 cents per bushel.'
Corn, from Illinois River to New York 28 cents per bushel.
These rates are on an average cheaper than shipments from Chicago to New York,
via the lakes, in the summer time.
The Des Moines (Iowa) Register, of the 15th March, 1868, says : "The first shipment
since the war, from Liverpool by New Orleans, the Mississippi River, and the Des
Moines Valley Railroad to Des Moines, was made a few days ago ; 27 crates of queens-
were came through in 95 days, at the cost of 84 cents per hundred pounds less than
via the Atlantic cities, and at a cost of only $1 17 per hundred pounds from Liverpool.
We are also of the opinion that this is cheaper than the regular carrying price from
Liverpool to Chicago."
As an illustration of the value of the Virginia water line to the people of the North¬
western States, let us now make a comparison of the cost of transporting a bushel of
wheat from Dubuque to New York via river and ocean, and the cost of transporting it
by the Virginia water line to the seaboard.
Wheat from Dubuque to New York, 1,665 miles by river and 1,850 miles by ocean,
total 3,515 miles, at 32 cents per bushel—$10 56 per ton, or 3 mills per ton per mile.—
Distributing the charges in proper proportion, would give for the ocean transportation
2 1-10 mills per ton per mile, and for the river transportation 4 mills per ton per mile.
The cost of transportation on the Erie Canal is stated at 4 mills per ton per mile, ex¬
clusive of tolls. As will be shown hereafter, transportation on the Virginia Canal will
be equally as cheap as on the Erie. I therefore put it at 4 mills, and adding 2 mills for
tolls, make the whole charges on the James River aud Kanawha Canal 6 mills per ton
per mile.
The charges, then, on wheat from Dubuque to Hampton Roads by the Virginia water
line, will be as follows :
River transportation from Dubuque to Point Pleasant, 1,367 miles, at 4 mills
per ton per mile $5 47
Point Pleasant to Richmond, 485 miles, at 6 mills 2 91
Richmond to Hampton Roads, 125 miles, at 4 mills 50
Difference in favor of Virginia line, 1.58 cents per ton, or nearly 5 cents per bushel.
It will thus be seen that the Virginia water line can compete successfully with the
Mississippi river and ocean line from the Northwestern States even at the low prices
advertised by the Mississippi Barge Company ; and when we take into consideration the
great saving in time and insurance by the Virginia Line, the liability of breadstuffs to
heat and sour by passing through a damp semi-tropical climate, who can doubt that th^,
great bulk of the surplus products of the Northwestern States will seek a market
through Virginia.
We have seen that the lowest rates charged by the comparatively short railroad routes
from Dubuque to New York in the summer, when canal and lake navigation was open,
was $19 a ton. There would be a saving then of $10 02 per ton in transportation by
the Virginia water line to the seaboard over the railroad line from Dubuque to New
York, or about $40,000,000 a year on the eastward bound freight only, enough in one
year to pay the whole estimated cost of constructing the canal on the most extensive
scale.
One transshipment
Total
10
8 98
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
I have compared the cost of transportation from Dubuque to New York with that
from the same place to Hampton Roads, because the completion of the canal will de¬
mand, and be sure to result in, the establishment of a port of entry at Hampton Roads
or the mouth of James River, which must in a short time grow to be a large city,
with regular commercial relations established between it and Europe. This future
great commercial,emporium of Virginia will, through its connection by the Virginia
water line with the Western States, and because nearer and more accessible by railroad
to at least seven-eighths of the Mississippi Valley than any Atlantic city north of it,
be the point of transshipment of their immense freights to be conveyed by ocean steam¬
ers and sailing vessels to all parts of the world. It will be connected by a continuous
water line 1,880 miles long with Kansas City, and one 3,224 miles long with Omaha, on
the Missouri River, which are the termini of the Union Pacific Railroad, now in the
course of completion to San Francisco. The immense trade that will pour into these .
cities from both directions will, of course, bring with it a corresponding travel,
and Virginia will become the great thoroughfare both for trade and travel be¬
tween Europe and California and the other Pacific States. All that Commodore Mat¬
thew F. Maury said of Norfolk may be said of this future port of Virginia: "As to
natural advantages of position and depth of water, and accessibility by land and sea,
Norfolk has no competitor among the seaport towns of the Atlantic. Midway the At¬
lantic coast line of the United States, Norfolk is the most convenient because the most
central point where the produce of the interior may be collected, and whence it may
be distributed north and south, right and left, among the markets of the seaboard.
Its climate is delightful; it is exactly of that happy middle temperature where the
frosts of the north bite not, and where the pestilence of the south -walketh not. Its
harbor is commodious, and as safe as can be. It is never blocked up with ice ; and as
to the egress and ingress between it and the sea, it possesses all the facilities that the
mariner could desire.
" Moreover, the prevailing winds in the parallel of Norfolk are westerly winds, which
are fair for coasting and for going seaward in any direction. A little to the south of*
that parallel you find the northeast trades, which are fair winds for the inward bound
Norfolk vessels.
" Then there is the Gulf Stream, that mighty river in the ocean, upon the verge of
which Norfolk stands.
" It flows up with a current which, without the help of sweeps, sails, or steam, will
carry the European-bound vessel out of Norfolk at the rate of nearly one hundred
miles a day, directly on her course. Then at the sides of this, and counter to it, are
eddies which favor the same vessel on her return to Norfolk. These hawse her along
and shorten her voyage by many a mile.
" Such are the natural advantages of Norfolk seaward. Let us look ashore and con¬
sider them landward, and compare them with the natural inland advantages of New
York. Stretch a string on the map from Norfolk to New York and make a dot half
way between them. Now seek a point on the south shore of Lake Erie that is equi¬
distant from New York and Norfolk; draw a line from the dot to this point, and you
will have a dividing line of distance between the two places, every point along which
will be just as far from the one place as the other. You will find that this line runs
through Delaware and cuts Lake Erie near Cleveland, Ohio.
" Thus you perceive that Chicago, in Illinois, and St. Louis, in Missouri, are actually
nearer to Norfolk than they are to New York, even by an air line.
"You see, moreover, that as between New York and Norfolk, the natural advantages
here are greatly in favor of the latter.
" The most direct way to the sea through either of these ports, from most of the
lake country, and from almost the entire Mississippi Valley, lies through Virginia. The
natural advantages, then, of Norfolk, in relation to the sea, or to the back country, are
superior beyond comparison to those of New York."
"Whether, then, the future seaport of Virginia be Norfolk or a new city to be built on
the north side of the mouth of James River, we have the highest authority in this
country, or any other, for pronouncing it the most capacious, safe, accessible, and con¬
venient harbor from Florida to Newfoundland.
The depth of water is sufficient to float the Great Eastern, and its capacity to accom¬
modate the shipping of the world.
It is proper, therefore, in making a comparison of distances and charges, to make
Hampton Roads, the Atlantic terminus of the Virginia water line, the point of compari¬
son with New York.
COMPARATIVE COST OF TRANSPORTATION, BY THE VIRGINIA WATER LINE AND OTHER COM¬
PETING ROUTES, FROM THE PRINCIPAL WESTERN CITIES TO THE ATLANTIC SEABOARD.
. The previous comparisons were made upon the actually existing charges for trans¬
portation between New York and Dubuque, (this city being selected because it is a
point of comparison as favorable to the northern lines of transportation as any other on
the Upper Mississippi, and about midway between St. Louis and St, Paul,) but inas-
66
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
much as the charges for transportation are fluctuating, and dependent a good deal upon
the competition produced by rival lines, it will be proper to make the comparison be¬
tween the Virginia water line and other routes upon the more certain fixed basis of the
actual cost of transportation.
The costs of transportation, as laid down by Mr. W. J. McAlpine, State engineer and
surveyor of New York canals in 1854, and which he stated had beed arrived at with
great care, were as follows:
The cost of transportation may be somewhat greater now than it was then, in conse¬
quence of the general advance in the prices of labor, provisions, and materials; but as
any changes of that kind will apply equally to all kinds of transportation, the relative
cost will still remain the same, and therefore the above figures will subserve the pur¬
pose of comparison just as well now as then, and may be relied upon as being very nearly
correct.
The locks on the enlarged Erie Canal are 110 feet long in the chamber, and 18 feet
wide. The largest boats are 98 feet long, 17.4 feet wide, and draw 6.4 feet water, their
maximum capacity being 240 tons.
As the locks on the James River and Kanawha Canal, as proposed, will be 120 feet
, long and 20 feet wide in the chamber, they will admit boats of larger dimensions and
greater capacity than those on the Erie Canal. I estimate their capacity at 280 tons.
The lockage on the James River and Kanawha Canal will be much greater than on the
Erie, but taking into consideration the greater capacty of the canal, and the fact that it
will have at its western end 85 miles of open river navigation and 123 miles of slack-
water, adapted to steamboats, we certainly will be justifiable in assuming the cost of
transportation on the Virginia water line from Point Pleasant to Richmond at 4 mills
per ton per mile.
The following tables show the comparative cost of transportation by the leading
routes from the West and Northwest to the Atlantic ports.
The inland distances are taken from Williams and Appleton's Traveler's Guide Books,
and the ocean distances have been kindly furnished from the Coast Survey Office at
Washington. '
No. 1.—From Dubuque, Iowa, to Hampton Roads, by the Virginia water line.
Dubuque to Point Pleasant 1,367 miles, at 3 mills per ton per mile.. $4 10
Point Pleasant to Richmond 485 miles, at 4 mills per ton per mile.. 1 94
Richmond to Hampton Roads 125 miles, at 3 mills per ton per mile.. 38
Ocean—Transportation, average
Lakes—Long
Short
Rivers—Hudson and of similar character
Mississippi and Ohio
Canals—Erie enlargement
Ordinary size
Railroads—Average
Mills.
1.5
2.0
3.4
2.5
3.0
4.0
6.0
15.0
1,977
One transshipment
Total ....
6 52
10
No. 2 .—From Dubuque, Iowa, to Hew York, by railroad.
Dubliqe to Chicago, by Galena and Chicago Railroad
Chicago to Dunkirk, by Lake Shore Railroad. *
Dunkirk to New York, by Erie Railroad . *
.. 188 miles.
.. 497 miles.
*. 460 miles.
Dubuque to New York
* 1,145miles,at 15mills*. $17 17
Difference in fator of Virginia route, $10 65 per ton*
Difference against Virginia in distance, 832 miles*
No. 3.—Dubuque to Hew York, via Chicago, the lakes, and Erie Canal.
Dubuque to Chicago by railroad
Chicago to Buffalo by the lakes*
188 miles, at 15 mills+ 10 cents.. $2 92
1,042 miles, at 2 mills+ 10 cents.. 2 18
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL,
67
Buffalo to "West Troy "by Erie Canal 350 miles, at 4 mills $1 40
West Troy to New Tork by Hudson River.... 151 miles, at 2.5 mills 38
1,731 6 88
Difference in favor of the Virginia line, 36 cents per ton.
Difference against Virginia in distance, 246 miles.
No. 4.—Dubuque to New York, via Toledo and the lake and Erie Canal.
Dubuque to Toledo by railroad 432 miles, at 15 mills+ 10 cents. $6 58
Toledo to Buffalo by lake 252 miles, at 3 mills+ 10 cents.. 86
Buffalo to New York, as by No. 3 501 miles 1 78
4,185 9 22
Difference in favor of Virginia line, $2 70 per ton.
Difference against Virginia line in distance, 792 miles.
No. 5.—From Dubuque to New York, via Mississippi Biver and ocean.
Dubuque to New Orleans 1,665 miles, at 3 mills.. $4 99
New Orleans to New York.... 1,850 miles, at 1£mills + 10 cents 2 87
3.515 * 7 86
Difference in favor of Virginia line, $1 34 per ton.
Difference in favor of Virginia line, 1,538 miles.
No. 6.—From St. Louis to Hampton Boads, by Virginia water line.
St. Louis to Point Pleasant 903 miles, at 4mills+ 10 cents.. $2 81
Point Pleasant to Richmond 485 miles, at 4 mills 1 94
Richmond to Hamptqn Roads 125 miles, at 3 mills 38
1,513 5 13
No. 7. From St. Louis to New York, via Illinois and Michigan Canal, lakes, and Erie Canal.
St. Louis to Grafton
Grafton to Peru, Illinois River
Peru to Chicago, by canal
Chicago to New York, via the lakes
41 miles, at 3 mills $0 12
274 miles, at 4 mills+ 10 cents.. 1 20
102 miles, at 5 mills+ 10 cents.. 61
1,543 by table No. 3 3 96
1,960 5 89
Difference in favor of Virginia line, 76 cents per ton.
Difference in favor of Virginia line, 447 miles.
No. 8.—St. Louis to New York,via Portsmouth, Ohio, and Erie Canals.
St. Louis to Portsmouth, Ohio River 811 miles, at 3 mills+ 10 cents.. $2 53
Portsmouth to Cleveland, by canal 307 miles, at 5 mills+ 10 cents.. 1 63
Cleveland to Buffalo, by lake 194 miles, at 3.4 mills 66
Buffalo to New York, by Erie Canal 501 by table No. 3 1 88
1,813 6 70
Difference in favor of Virginia, $1 57 per ton,
Difference in favor of Virginia, 300 miles.
From St. Louis and Cairo to New York by Mississippi River and ocean, the difference
in favor of the Virginia route will be the same as from Dubuque; and 223 miles below
Cairo or about Memphis, Tennessee, the cost by the two routes will be equal.
For Cairo, Louisville, Cincinnati, and all other points on the Ohio River between
Cairo and Portsmouth, via the Ohio and Erie Canals to New York, the difference in
favor of the Virginia route will be the same as for St. Louis, in table No. 8, but of course
the proportional saving will be greater, because it will be the same amount, saved on a
smaller total of costs.
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL
No. 9. Evansville to New York, by Wabash Canal, lakes, and Erie Canal.
Evansville to Toledo 467 miles, at 5 mills +10 cents.. $2 43
Toledo to New York 753 miles, by No. 4 2 64
1,220 5 07
Evansville to Hampton Roads, by Virginia water line.
Evansville to Point Pleasant 530 miles, at 3 mills +10 cents. $1 69
Point Pleasant to Hampton Road3 610 by No. 6 2 32
1,140 4 01
»
Difference in favor of Virginia water line, $1 06.
Difference in favor of Virginia in distance, 80 miles.
No. 10.—Cincinnati to New York by Miami Canal, lake, and Erie Canal.
Cincinnati to Toledo 266 miles, at 5 mills+ 10 cents.. $1 43
Toledo to New York 753 miles, by No. 4 2 64
1,019 4 07
Cincinnati to Hampton Roads, by Virginia water line.
Cincinnati to Point Pleasant 206 miles, at 3 mills+ 10 cents.. $0 72
Point Pleasant to Hampton Roads 610 miles, by No. 6 2 32
816 3 04
Difference in favor of Virginia water line, $1 03.
Difference in favor of Virginia in distance, 203 miles.
No. 11.—Wheeling to Baltimore, via Baltimore and Ohio Railroad.
Three hundred and eighty miles, at 15 mills per ton per mile • • • • $5 70
Wheeling to Hampton Roads, by Virginia water line.
"Wheeling to Point Pleasant 177 miles, at 3 mills+ 10 cents. $0 63
Point Pleasant to Hampton Roads 610 miles, by table No. 6 2 35
787 2 95
Difference in favor of Virginia line, $2 75.
Difference against Virginia line in distance, 407 miles.
No. 12.—St. Louis to Liverpool, via New Orleans.
St. Louis to New Orleans 1,201 miles, at 3 mills+ 10 cents $3 70
New Orleans to Liverpool 5,328 miles, at 1J mills 7 99
6,529 11 69
St. Louis to Liverpool, via Virginia water line.
St. Louis'to Hampton Roads 1,513 miles, by table No. 6 $5 13
Hampton'Roads to Liverpool 3,710 miles, at l£mills +10 cents 5 66
5,223 10 79
Difference in favor of the Virginia route, 90 cents.
Difference in favor of Virginia in distance, 1,306 miles.
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
69 5
69
Besides the cost of transportation in the above table being in favor of the "Virginia
route, the difference in time, in climate, in safety, in insurance, and in preservation of
the cargo, will also be so much in favor of that route that there can be but little doubt it
will be the one selected for direct exports and imports between St. Louis and Liverpool;
and as St. Louis is destined to be the great central city of the "West, to which will con¬
verge the mighty trade of the yet undeveloped far west, which will be brought in by
the several railroads that are now stretching out their arm toward the Pacific, it appears
that St. Louis, more than any other city of the West, should feel a lively and peculiar
interest in the completion of the Virginia water line.
The crates of queensware, noticed above, that were imported from Liverpool to Des
Moines, Iowa, in ninety-five days, at $1 17 per hundred, might have been imported by
the Virginia water line in forty-five days, at a cost of $ 1 per hundred.
No. 13.—Cincinnati to Liverpool, via New Orleans.
Cincinnati to New Orleans 1,548 miles, at 3 mills+ 10 cents.. $4 74
New Orleans to Liverpool 5,328 miles, at mills 7 99
6,876 12 73
Cincinnati to Point Pleasant 206 miles, at 3 mills+ 10 cents.. $0 72
Point Pleasant to Hampton Roads 610 miles, by table No. 6 2 32
Hampton Roads to Liverpool 3,710 miles, at 1£ mills + 10 cents, 5 66
4,526 t 8 70
Difference in favor of Virginia water line, $ 4 03.
Difference in favor of Virginia in distance, 2,350 miles.
As it has already been shown that the difference between Cincinnati and New York
and Cincinnati and Hampton Roads was $1 03 per ton in favor of the latter route, and
as importations could be made as cheaply from Liverpool to Hampton Roads as to New
York, it will be decidedly the interest of Cincinnati to make her European exports and
imports by the Virginia route, in preference to any other, both in view of time and ex¬
pense ; and the same may be said of Louisville, Kentucky.
Memphis, Tennessee, to Norfolk by railroad, 956 miles, at 15 mills $14 34
No. 14.—Memphis, Tennessee, to Hampton Roads, by Virginia water line.
Memphis to Point Pleasant 973 miles, at 3 mills+ 10 cents.. $3 02
Point Pleasant to Hampton Roads 610 miles, table No. 6 2 32
1,583 5 34
Difference in favor of Virginia water line, $9 per ton.
Difference against Virginia in distance, 627 miles.
70
e/3^
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL,
General summary.
Routes.
Dubuque to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line
Dubuque to New York by railroads
Dubuqne to New York by Chicago, lakes and Erie Canal
Dubuque to New York by Toledo, lakes, and Erie Canal
Dubuque to New York by Mississippi River and ocean..
St. Louis to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line
St. Louis to N. York by Illinois & Michigan and Erie Canals
St. Louis to N. York by Portsmouth, Ohio, and Erie Canals
St. Louis to New York by Mississippi River and ocean.
Louisville to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line...
Louisville to N. York by Portsmouth, Ohio, and Erie Canals
Evansville to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line....
Evansville to New York by Wabash and Erie Canals.....
Cincinnati to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line
Cincinnati to N. York by Portsmouth, OhioandErie Canals
Cincinnati to New York by Miami and Erie Canals
Cincinnati to New York by Mississippi River and ocean.
Wheeling to Baltimore by Baltimore and Ohio Railroad.
"Wheeling to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line....
St. Louis to Liverpool by New Orleans
St. Louis to Liverpool by Virginia water line
Cincinnati to Liverpool by New Orleans
Cincinnati to Liverpool by Virginia water line
Louisville to Liverpool by New Orleans
Louisville to Liverpool by Virginia water line
Memphis to Norfolk by railroad
Memphis to Norfolk by Virginia water line
®
O
d
c3
fl
O
u
©
p«
CD
O
O
1,977
$6
52
1,145
17
17
1,731
6
88
1.1S5
9
22
3,515
7
86
1,513
5
13
1,960
5
89
1,813
6
70
3,051
6
47
949
3
44
1,249
5
01
1,140
4
01
1,220
5
07
816
3
04
1,116
4
61
1,019
4
07
3,398
7
51
380
5
70
787
2
95
6,529
5,223
11
69
10
79
6,876
12
73
4.526
8
70
6,743
12
33
4,659
9
10
956
14
34
1,583
5
34
Ui
O •
> ®
cfi ^4
^ i-H
c *
•»—< q
s!
-+-» <4-1
Of O
1,53S
447
300
300
80
300
203
2,582
1,306
2,350
i • • • • •
1,863
a
<3 ©
i® a
e$ -h
r-4
<D
O <3>
g"3
-2 if
832
246
792
407
627
It appears from the above tables that the country bordering on the Ohio River, from
Wheeling to its mouth, and on the eastern side of the Mississippi, from the mouth of
the Ohio up to St. Paul, and all the country west of the Mississippi River between
these points, including a large part of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Ken¬
tucky, the whole of Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota, Kansas, Nebraska, and Dakota, will be
tributary to the Virginia water line, and may find through Virginia in most cases the
shortest, and. in all cases the cheapest, route to the Atlantic seaboard.
CLIMATIC ADVANTAGES OF THE VIRGINIA WATER LINE.
The Virginia route has another very decided advantage over the Northern water
lines, in its being located in a more temperate climate, in consequence of which it will
be open at least four months in the year when the Northern canals will be closed by ice.
By examining the reports of the James River and Kanawha Company, it will be seen
that from 1840 to 1848 there was no suspension of navigation by ice reported, except
twelve days in 1845. If there were any others, they must have been so slight as not
to have attracted attention, or to have been deemed unworthy of comment. From
1848 to the present time, all suspensions of navigation by ice have been reported by the
superintendents, and have been as follows :
Years DayS of SUS"
x pension.
1848-49 8
1849-50 None.
1850-51 None.
1851-52 32
1852-53 None.
1853-54 NoDe.
1854-55 23
1855-56 55
1856-57 56
1857-58 None.
Years. °f 8U8'
pension.
1858-59 None.
1859-60 16
1860-61 None.
1861-62 None.
1862-63 None.
1863-64 21
1864-65 None.
1865-66 8
1866-67 42
1867-68 41
We find, then, that in a period of twenty years the total number of days in which the
navigation was suspended by ice amounts to 302, an average of 15 days for each year.
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
As these reports apply to the canal as high np as Buchanan, west of the Blue Ridge, it
will be reasonable to infer that when the canal reaches its highest elevation in the Al-
leghanies it will not be closed by ice on an average more than thirty days in the year,
while the Erie canal is closed by ice about five months in the year, making a difference
of one-third of the year in favor of the Virginia water line, and that at the very season
of the year when the agricultural products of the "West are seeking an eastern market.
CANALS NOT BEHIND THE AGE.
There has been an opinion prevailing for many years in Virginia that the days of
canals are numbered, and that they must be superseded by railroads. The only reason
that I have ever heard for this condemnation of canals is, that they are "too slow" and
"behind the spirit of the age." But this is mere empty assertion without any argu¬
ment in support of it. The real question is, which can transport the products of agri¬
culture, of the forest and mines, at the least cost, railroads or canals; and as the spirit
of the age is decidedly money-making, it would seem that the improvement by which
the most money can be made or saved would be the very one that was not behind the
spirit of the age. It will not be controverted that a canal can transport more tonnage
and at a less cost than a railroad. Instances, no doubt, may be produced where rail¬
roads have carried freight at as low or even lower price than canals ; but if they have
done so, it has always been at a loss, and under peculiar circumstances produced by the
irregularities of trade, and by competition with canals.
Thus canals not only transport cheaply themselves, but they are the cause of cheap
transportation on railroads, and are thereby a double blessing to the State. Take away
from the railroads the wholesome competition of water carriage, and the community
immediately suffers from their rapacity, as may be witnessed every winter on the lake-
shore roads as soon as the navigation is closed by ice.
In proof of the assertion that canals can transport more tonnage and at a less cost
than railroads, take the following statement of the comparative business of the New
York canals and railroads for the year 1866, which is the latest report that has been
printed: '
The total number of tons carried on all the railroads of the State during the year,
from the 1st October, 1865, to 30th September, 1866, was 9,210,476, and on the canals,
during the season of navigation, which was 226 days, 5,775,220, the canals transporting
more per month than the railroads.
The following table, taken from the report of the auditor of the New York State
canals, shows the total movement of tons on the two railways connecting New York with
Lake Erie, and on the State canals, during the year 1866, the freight paid to the roads,
and the tolls and carriers' charges on the canals :
1866.
Total ton¬
nage.
Tons moved
one mile.
Freight and
toll.
Average
per ton
per mile.
New York Central Railroad..
Erie Railroad
1,602,197
3,242,792
5,775,220
331,075,547
478,485,772
1,012,448,034
$9,671,920
17,611,023
10,160,051
2.92 cents.
2.45 cents.
1.00 cents.
Canals
Totals
10,620,209
1,822,209,353
$31,442,994
1.18 cents.
The above table "shows that the cost of transportation on the canals, including the
carriers' charges, is not one-half of the cost of railroad transits. This to some extent
can be attributed to the fact that a larger proportion of low-priced and low-rated freights
is carried on the canals than on the railroad. But if the classes of freight, prices and
rates were equal in their proportions between the canal and rail, the rail transportation
would be one hundred per cent, above the canal. This the producer loses, or the con¬
sumer pays, on all rail transits, when that mode of carriage is preferred to canals."
It shows, also, that the canal, during seven and a half months of the year, transported
nearly a million tons more than two double-track railroads between the same points did
in twelve months, and did it at less than half the cost.
The Hon. William J. McAlpine, in a late address delivered at Albany on the public
works of the State, uses the following forcible language :
"Gentlemen, you do not realize the importance of the canals. The Erie Canal now
conveys one-fourth of the whole of the exports of that vast interior region which I
have already described, and as much of it during its six months of uninterrupted navi¬
gation as*all of the trunk railways together during the same time.
"Every canal boat which comes to this city with an average cargo is more than the
72 JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
s
Average of the New York Central Railroad trains. In the busy canal season more than
one hundred and fifty such boats come daily to tide-water, and the New York Central
Railroad traffic never reaches thirty trains per day.
"Such a canal traffic would make more than twenty miles of railroad cars, and there
is neither room nor convenience for discharging one-fourth of that number. The slow-
plodding canal-boat attracts no attention, while the bustle, noise, and whirl of a freight
train creates a sensation in every village through w7hich it passes."
It is simply fatuity, then, to deride and undervalue canals because they are slower
than railroads. It would take at least five railroads to do the heavy freighting business
that could be done at half price by the canal; and if the canal were constructed it
would, by its development of the mining and manufacturing interest of the country
west of Buchanan, create business enough for two or three railroads.
The canal would carry the heavy freight that could not be profitably transported on
the railroads, and the railroads would monopolize the merchandise and other freight
demanding rapid transportation, which the canal could never take from them. All
would get their own, and still there would be a demand for more channels of communi¬
cation for the illimitable and ever-increasing products of the West.
Mr. McAlpine, in his report of 1853, conceded that "the dividing line of trade be¬
tween the Virginia and the New York canals, when the former and the enlargement of
the Erie Canal are completed, will be 110 miles north of Portsmouth and Cincinnati."
That was before the contemplated enlargement of the Virginia Canal. If his calcula¬
tions had been based on a canal through Virginia of greater capacity than the Erie Canal,
he no doubt would have conceded all that is now claimed for it.
In the annual statement of the trade and commerce of Buffalo for the year 1865, re¬
ported for the Buffalo Board of Trade, by Mr. E. H. Walker, there is an interesting
review of the commerce of the lakes and Erie Canal and the competing routes, and first
among the competing water routes he places the James River and Kanawha Canal, of
which he says:
"Were this canal as large as the present Erie Canal, notwithstanding its numerous
locks and its nearly 1,900 feet of lockage lift, about the same as that of the Gennessee
Valley Canal, it would, from its being open nearly all the year, be a strong competitor
for the trade of the western States. The Ohio River is as free as the lakes, with the
distance from the Mississippi to Point Pleasant about the same as from the Mississippi
to Buffalo. The States west of the Mississippi, including Missouri and Iowa, and those
States immediately west of these States on the Missouri, as well as the southern portions
of Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio, and Kentucky, would be more immediately tributary to
the James River and Kanawha Canal than to the Erie, unless ship canals should be con¬
structed through Ohio and Indiana."
The Hon. Israel D. Andrews, in his valuable report on colonial and lake trade, says of
the James River and Kanawha Canal:
"Copld this canal be carried into the Ohio Valley with a sufficient supply of water,
there can be no doubt it would become a route of an immense commerce. It would
strike the Ohio at a very favorable point for through business. It would have this great
advantage over the more northern works of a similar kind, that it would be navigable
during the winter as well as the summer.
"The route after crossing the Alleghany Mountains is vastly rich in coal and iron, as
well as in a very productive soil. Nothing seems to be wanting to the triumphant suc¬
cess of the work but a continuous water line to the Ohio."
It is a significant fact as to the appreciation of canals at the north, that although the
State of New York has expended $55,000,000 in the construction of canals, and $32,-
000,000 in the enlargement of the Erie Canal, it is now recommended to spend $12,000,-
000 more in the further enlargement of the locks on that canal so as to pass boats of
500 tons burden, with a view of counteracting the effects of the projected ship canal
around Niagara Falls, which would divert the trade of the lakes from the Erie Canal to
the St. Lawrence River.
It is also proposed to construct a ship canal from Chicago through the State of Illi¬
nois, by enlarging the present canal 100 miles in length, and improving the Illinois
River, in order to connect Lake Michigan with the Lower Mississippi.
The proposed improvement is one of great magnitude, the locks of which are to be
350 feet long by 70 feet wide, and will involve an expenditure of $20,000,000.
A survey has been made for a ship canal from Lake Michigan to Lake Erie, and a
charter granted by the legislature of New York to a ship canal company for the con¬
struction of this work, with a capital stock of $25,000,000.
Canada is projecting a new canal from Lake Huron by way of Ottawa River to Mon¬
treal, which is estimated to cost $24,000,000. The saving in distance between Montreal
and Chicago by this direct route, almost due east from the straits of Mackinac, is 842
miles over that by the present circuitous line through the lower lakes and the St. Law¬
rence. The locks on this canal are to be 250 feet long by 50 feet wide, and 10 feet on
the sills, passing vessels of 1,000 tons burden.
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
Another proposed ship canal is from Georgia Bar, an outlet of Lake Huron, by way of
Lake Sinicoe to Toronto on Lake Ontario, a distance of 100 miles. The proposed size of
the locks is 265 feet in length by 55 feet in width, and the estimated cost of the improve¬
ment is $22,000,000.
The distance from Chicago to Liverpool by this route, as compared with that via
Buffalo, is 837 miles less, and 428 miles less than the route by the Welland Canal to
Quebec.
These proposed canals and those already constructed and in operation have all one
purpose in view, "to attract to Canadian channels the products of the Western States
destined for the eastern seaboard." [E. H. Walker's report.]
It will thus be seen that New York and Canada are proposing to spend about $100,-
000,000 in enlarging present canals and constructing new ones, and all for the single pur¬
pose of drawing to their ports the great trade of the Western States.
_ Virginia, which has the route that is shortest, best, and longest open, should lose no
time and spare no effort to secure this valuable prize.
saving to the west by the completion of the virginia canal.
But it is not Virginia alone that is interested in the completion of her water line.
To the Western and Northwestern States it is a matter of paramount importance.
These States demand both a speedy and a cheap transit for their exports and imports.
They have now the railroads with their quick transits but enormous charges, and the river
route with its lower charges, but long time and other disadvantages that have been
pointed out and are well understood. The Virginia water line offers them the double in¬
ducement of rates lower than either the railroad or river routes, and an advantage in
time and security from damage over the latter, which will insure to it the preference for
the transportation of grain and provisions.
San Francisco, St. Louis, and Richmond are nearly on the same parallel of latitude,
and a line drawn through these cities is nearly the central line of the United States,
and will be the central line of the trade of the world. All that is needed is the comple¬
tion of eighty miles of canal, and the improvement of the natural water-courses, to
have a navigable water line from Liverpool to Omaha, nearly due west, 5,900 miles
l°ng*.
This striking feature in this route, together with its having the most accessible, ca¬
pacious, safe, and deep harbor on the Atlantic coast, cannot fail to make it, if once
completed, the great highway of traffic and emigration from Europe to the Western
States.
At a moderate calculation the amount that would be saved to the West by this route
would be an average of $2 per ton on the river route, and at least $10 per ton over the
railroad lines.
It is no exaggeration to say that $40,000,000 a year could^be saved to the West by the
completion of the Virginia water line on the freight that would pass over that route, be¬
sides a yield of 10 or 15 per cent, interest on the capital invested in the improvement.
But the effect of the completion of the Virginia water line will be not only to open a
cheaper route for transportation from the West, but to reduce the charges on all the
competing lines, and thereby lessen the cost of transportation on the whole trade of the
West to the extent, probably, of one hundred million dollars per annum.
I have thus endeavored, in as brief a manner as possible, to give the history and char¬
acter of the Virginia water line, with my own views in regard to the manner in which it
should be completed, and the advantages that it will then possess over other lines of com¬
munication with the West.
This latter part of the subject I have barely touched upon. To elucidate it fully
would require more time than I could well spare from my other duties. I therefore
leave to you or to others to present the political, economical, and commercial aspects of
this question to the consideration of the people of the West, with the hope that a full
understanding of its merits will lead to a speedy completion of this great work.
Very respectfully,
E. LORRAINE,
Chief Engineer James River and Kanawha Company.
Charles S. Carrington, Esq.,
President of the James River and Kanawha Company.
Letter from General Charles P. Stone.
Dover Company, Offfice of Engineer and Superintendent,
Dover Mines, Virginia, October 12, 1868.
Dear Sir: It is a pleasure to comply with your request for a written expression of the
conclusions arrived at after a somewhat careful study of the plan recently suggested
by your company's able engineer and superintendent to change the location of the pro¬
posed extension of your canal near the summit level in Greenbrier County.
10
7 GO
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL
Comparing the engineering difficulties and advantages of the two routes proposed, I do
not hesitate in expressing the opinion that the advantages would be far greater and the
difficulties less in following the short route proposed by Mr. Lorraine.
The long route requires the following operations, which, while practicable, are yet dif¬
ficult and require good engineering and very perfect work:.
First. A tunnel through the summit mountain of 2£ miles in length, approached at each
end by a long through cut. .
Second. The construction of forty-four first-class locks, twenty-two on each side of
the mountain.
Third. A reservoir capable of retaining a body of water sufficient for yielding a daily
flow of more than two and a half millions of gallons, and this of such perfect construc¬
tion as to never fail in its duty, since failure of water would be as efficient a barrier to
barges as the untunneled mountain itself.
Fourth. A feeder tunnel miles long.
Fifth. A dam across Dry Creek 20 feet high, of such solid construction as never to be
in danger of giving way.
Sixth. A feeder canal 2| miles long.
I repeat all this is quite practicable, but the work is of great magnitude and of various
kinds.
On the short route, as proposed by your engineer, the above questions are all ren¬
dered unnecessary, and in their place are substituted the following, more practicable but
more expensive :
First. The driving of a tunnel 9 miles long, or, in effect, nine tunnels, each 1 mile
long, 56 feet wide, and 32 feet high.
Second. The construction of a strong, perfect dam across the Greenbrier River to
make it sure as a feeder.
Of the above nine tunnels Mr. Lorraine proposes to drive seven, each between two
shafts 12 feet in diameter ; two between a shaft at one end and a thorough cut at the
other.
Assuming that Mr. Lorraine is correct in his information that eight shafts can be
located at the proper points, which shall have an average depth of 425 feet, I think that
any engineer would vastly prefer undertaking the construction of the short rather than
the long route, for the two reasons: first, that there would be fewer difficulties in the
work ; and second, he would, after faithfully performing his duty upon the nine tun¬
nels and one dam, turn his work over, feeling that nothing short of a convulsion of
nature, or the intentional work of man, could interrupt navigation there for centuries ;
while he would leave the long route, with its complicated constructions, feeling that
he might at any time learn that by the mere carelessness of man, or the ordinary vicis¬
situdes of the seasons, navigation had been there suspended for a longer or shorter
period.
As regards the feasibility of the succession of tunnels, I think there can be no question.
By the sinking of eight shafts the matter is reduced to the driving of nine tunnels,
each 1 mile long ; so that it is really a question at each point of driving a mile of tunnel.
More than that has been done in Virginia and can be done again.
As to the feasibility of the dam across Greenbrier River, I suppose no one who con¬
siders it practicable to build a mound of sufficient strength to form a large lake from the
waters of Anthony's Creek, will hold the dam to be either impracticable or even a diffi¬
cult operation.
If it be conceded, then, that Mr. Lorraine's plan is feasible as an engineering opera¬
tion, it remains to consider the time and money to which he limits himself for its execu¬
tion. He has kindly furnished me with his estimates and their general basis, to which I
have given serious attention.
The first operation would necessarily be the sinking of the eight shafts and opening
the two thorough cuts. He provides for eight shafts each 12 feet in diameter and 425
feet deep, and allows for each $35,604.
Not having before me the profile of the mountain, I cannot estimate the cost of the
thorough cuts; but he has certainly overestimated the necessary cost of the shafts, and
that very considerably, and his estimate of time is perfectly safe. I speak positively
upon this matter, because speaking from experience in shaft-sinking through very much
the same kind of rock as he will probably have to contend with.
I have no personal knowledge of the nature of the rocks there, but find in the geo¬
logical profile of the State, by^Professor William B. Rogers,, (whose section passes very
near the line of the proposed tunnel,) the following description: "Organic limestone
on top, red and green sandstones belowand the strata appear to be nearly horizontal.
If the best hoisting machinery shall be provided, I am confident that experienced
sinkers, with good tools and explosives, will be able to put these shafts down at the
rate of at least 40 feet per month. Indeed, I have had a shaft 10 feet in diameter sunk
through slates and sandstones at rates varying from 10 to 14 feet per week, using only
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
W1
hand-drills and gunpowder. In this work three shifts of hands were employed, each
working eight hours in the twenty-four.
Mr. Lorraine's estimate of time, then, is safe, and his estimate of cost is sufficient
not only to sink the shafts, but also to furnish each of them with suitable machinery
for hoisting all the debris from the tunnels in the progress of their driving.
It is of great importance that the best of machinery and of fully sufficient power
should be provided, since in driving the tunnels at the rate of 100 feet per month in
two directions from each shaft, it would be neccessary to raise front each, debris at the
rate of at least one-third of a ton per minute, supposing the hoisting-engine to run
night and day for three hundred days in the year.
It is possible that Mr. Lorraine may find it advantageous to give his shafts an oval
cross section rather than a circular of some area, in order to provide an unimpeded
hoisting space of sufficient size, and yet leave room for the pumping machinery which
may be needed.
Within the year, while the sinking of the shafts shall be progressing, full preparation
and organization for rapid work upon the tunnels can be made ; and you have not only
the high engineering authority of Mr. Benjamin H. Latrobe, but the examples of work
done to prove that a monthly progress of 100 feet on each face of the tunnels can be
accomplished. Mr. Lorraine is, therefore, doubtless safe in his estimate of the time in
which the work can be performed, and, if provided with the means, he could fairly ex¬
pect to complete his constructions and open the route within four years from the day
of breaking ground. A wise economy would suggest the pressing of the work with all
possible speed.
I have gone over the calculations on the cost of the tunnels, and believe that Mr.
Lorraine has been liberal in his allowances for the cost of excavating and removing the
rock, provided full preparations shall precede the work, and energy and economy direct
it. The reserve fund in his estimate for pumping, masonry, and other contingencies,
seems to me to be sufficiently large, unless there should be a great advance in the price
of labor and material.
If, now, it be conceded that the plan is feasible, and that it can be carried out within
the time and for the amount of money estimated, the only point remaining to be dis¬
cussed is, whether the advantages to be gained by the adoption of Mr. Loraine's plan
are not sufficiently great to justify an increased cost in so large a sum as $7,500,000.
To justify such expenditure great advantages should be proved, and that such exist,
I think, is the easiest matter to be proved in all the discussion.
The object of your canal is to open water communication between the Mississippi
Yalley and the Atlantic Ocean. In other words, to give a water outlet to the world for
the products of about half a dozen empires.
If it be worth while to open this route at all it will be found, when once opened,
that its great defect, though made as perfect as possible, will be its want of sufficient
capacity ; and it will be wise either to abandon altogether the project of continuing the
canal to Kanawha the River, or else to adopt the plan which, without such cost as will
place its construction beyond the pecuniary means of a great nation, will give it the
largest possible capacity.
Let us examine the matter of increased capacity by the short route, and see what the
difference amounts to.
In considering this question I shall not pursue the same course with Mr. Lorraine,
and estimate that the canal will be employed to only one half of its capacity for, I
believe, if this great work is once faithfully carried out, you will find its full capacity
wholly insufficient to answer the demands of the great West.
The short route will offer the following as some of its advantages over the long one :
1. It will save to every barge using the canal, on each trip, the passage of forty-four
locks, almost as many as are required for lifting a barge from Richmond to Lynchburg.
2. It will save in actual distance towed to each barge each trip 4 miles.
3. It will save to all barges using its facilities the uncertainty resting upon the con¬
dition as regards the repair and working order of the forty-four locks.
4. It will save all barges the risk of stoppage arising from the possible failure of
supply in the great reservoir at the summit, required by the present plan of the im¬
provement, and from damages to the reservoir, feeder, &c.
Siipposing the canal to be working to its full capacity, 192 boats per day would pass
the summit, and leaving out of the calculation the amount of injury which these boats
would receive in passing through forty-four locks, there would be, each day, (allowing
minutes for the passage of each lock) a loss of time equal to 44 days of one barge,
or say a daily loss of transportation oh the canal by following the long route, of at least
1,000 tons of freight; that is, the carrying capacity of the canal would be reduced by
more than 300,000 tons per year by the time lost simply in the passage of the forty-four
locks. I should estimate the injury to canal barges, in passing these locks, as high as
$50,000 per annum, .
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL
The saving from the second cause, by the Lorraine route, would amount to increasing
the capacity of the canal by, say about 240,000 tons per annum.
The freight on 540,000 tons, at the moderate rate of §1 94 for the whole distance,
would be §1,047,600.
Thus the Lorraine route would oifer increased capacity equal in value to the trans¬
porters to more than $1,000,000 per annum.
This increased capacity, if taken advantage of by the carriers, would yield an in¬
crease of revenue to the canal of say $1,500,000, and I think Mr. Lorraine very moderate
when he places his estimate at $26,400 as a sum sufficient for the maintenance and re¬
pair per year of forty four locks, the reservoir, mound, and feeder tunnel.
Another means of increasing the capacity of the canal by the short route, which does
not exist by the long one, is touched upon by Mr. Lorraine, but only slightly, in his
report.
It is understood that barges will be towed by steamers from the Ohio River to the
dam on Greenbrier River.
By the long route the Greenbrier dam would necessarily be the point where steam
power would cease to be used, and towing by animals would commence. By the Lor¬
raine route the steam-tug could be and would be used for towing the barges to the
eastern side of the Alleghany Mountains, and it is easy to see in this another very large
increase in capacity.
To conclude this review I cannot better express my opinion of the value of Mr. Lor¬
raine's proposition than by using his own words : "For my part I cannot see any objec¬
tions to it, but, on the contray, see everything to recommend it."
Very respectfully, I am sir, your most obedient servant,
CHARLES P. STONE.
Charles S. Carrington, Esq.,
President James River and Kanawha Company, Richmond.
MEMORIAL OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF VIRGINIA TO THE CONGRESS
OF THE UNITED STATES RELATIVE TO WATER COMMUNICATION BE¬
TWEEN THE ATLANTIC AND MISSISSIPPI.
To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States:
Respctfully represent that there is a necessity for a shorter, cheaper, and better chan¬
nel of communication between the Western States and the Atlantic seaboard.
That such a channel can be obtained through Virginia by connecting the waters of
the James and the Greenbrier and improving the Greenbrier, New, and Kanawha
Rivers.
That the benefits to be derived from this work when completed would be enjoyed
equally by the Eastern and Western States and by a majority of the States of the Union,
and that in the case of hostile invasion it would be invaluable to the Government as an
interior means of communication by which supplies in large quantities could be cheaply
and safely transported from the West to the eastern cities, and that for these reasons it
may justly and properly be considered a national work.
That the States of Virginia and West Virginia, through which this work passes, are
unable to complete it, and feel justified, in consideration of the general benefits to the
people of the United States and the peculiar benefits to the General Government, in
soliciting its aid in the prosecution of this great enterprise.
The necessity for a shorter and cheaper channel of communication between the
Western States and the Atlantic seaboard is clearly shown by the present charges upon
the transportation of grain from the Northwestern States to New York.
The charges on wheat from the Mississippi River to New York, by railroad, when the
canals are closed, average seventy-two cents per bushel, and even by water tranporta-
tion from Chicago the charges sometimes amount to fifty-six cents per bushel,* or about
sixty-two cents per bushel from the Mississippi River; so that the farmers west of the
Mississippi River have to pay about one half of their crops to get the other half to
market. In fact, the charges on wheat from the Northwestern States are so onerous
that it is questionable whether there is any profit in its cultivation, and if some remedy
is not speedily applied its production for exportation from those States will be .greatly
diminished, if not altogether abandoned.
This state of things is produced by the inadequacy of the present means of transpor¬
tation, the pressure on the water routes being so great during the limited season between
the harvesting of the crops and the closing of navigation that exorbitant prices are
demanded for freight, and the distance by railroad is so great that transportation can
never be brought down to a price that will leave a sufficient profit to the farmer and at
the same time be remunerative to the railroads.
* See Report of National Board of Trade on a Continuous Water Line, p 33.
JAMBS RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
7m
The effect of the high prices of freight is to depress the agricultural interests of the
States and Territories west of the Mississippi and to discourage and check immigration.
That these evil influences may be removed, that the agricultural interests of the
West may be protected, and that immigration may he encouraged, it is necessary that
cheaper transportation shall be provided between the Mississippi and the seaboard.
The multiplication or the consolidation of railroads will not effect the desired end,
because, as above stated, the distance is too great for agricultural products to be carried
by rail at a profit.
A sufficiently cheap transit can be obtained by water, and by opening a communica¬
tion from the Mississippi, by way of the Ohio River and the Virginia water line, to the
Capes of Virginia.
This route will consist of the Ohio River, from its mouth to Point Pleasant, a distance
of 728 miles ; the Kanawha, New, and Greenbrier Rivers, 208 miles; the James River
and Kanawha Canal, (including 46 miles slack-water navigation,) from Greenbrier River
to Richmond, 272 miles; and James River to Hampton Roads, 125 miles. Total dis¬
tance from mouth of Ohio to Hampton Roads 1,333 miles.
To perfect this route, it is proposed to improve the Kanawha River from its mouth to
Lyken's Shoals for sluice navigation ; thence to improve that river and the New and
Greenbrier Rivers by locks and dams, for steamboat navigation, to the mouth of How¬
ard's Creek, and to cut a canal from Howard's Creek to Buchanan, 76 miles, of the
same size as the Erie Canal, with locks 120 feet long and 20 feet wide ; and to enlarge
to the same dimensions the canal already made from Buchanan to Richmond, 196 miles.
The total length of improved river and canal navigation will be 480 miles; of which
254 miles will be river and slack-water navigation, and 226 miles canal navigation.—
Constructed upon this scale the canal would be adapted to boats carrying 280 tons, and
would have a capacity of 14,000,000 tons annually.
But there is no necessity that the canal should be restricted to this size. It could be
made sufficiently large to accommodate boats of 500 tons, and would then have a ca¬
pacity of 21,600,000 tons.
When this route shall have been completed, it is believed that it will present the
shortest, cheapest, and the best line from the Mississippi to the Atlantic.
The distance from Mississippi to Hampton Roads by this route is 1,333 miles.
The distance by the Illinois and Michigan Canal, the lakes, and Erie Canal, to New
York, is 1,919 miles.
By the Fox and Wisconsin improvement and lakes to New York, it is 1,560 miles.
By the most direct railroad route to Chicago, and thence by the lakes to New York,
it is 1,731 miles.
By the Ohio River, Wabash Canal, lakes, and Erie Canal to New York, it is 1,418 miles.
By the Ohio River, Ohio Canal, lakes, and Erie Canal to New York, it is 1,638 miles.
The distance from the mouth of the Ohio by the Mississippi River and Gulf to New
York is 2,876 miles.
It will thus be seen that the distance from the Mississippi River to Hampton Roads by
the central water line is less by 83 miles than the shortest water route from the Missis¬
sippi to New York ; 586 miles less than by the longest northern water route, and 1,543
miles less than by the Gulf route.
It will also be the cheapest route for all points on the Mississippi River between Mem¬
phis and Dubuque ; for, although there may be a slight difference in the actual cost of
transportation in favor of the Fox and Wisconsin and lake route to New York, the fact
that the latter route will be so much sooner closed by ice, and the consequent great
pressure on it in in the fall months, will continue to operate unfavorably to cheapness
of transportation. The charges on wheat from Chicago to New York by the lakes and
canal during this pressure go up as high as fifty-six cents per bushel, while on the cen¬
tral water line, wheat can be carried for at least ten months in the year, and frequently
all the year round, without any hurry or pressure for fear of being frozen up, at the
rate of twenty-seven cents per bushel. There will thus be a saving, as compared with
the cheapest route, at some seasons, of twenty-nine cents per bushel; and as the rail¬
roads charge on an average from sixty to seventy cents per bushel, there will be a
saving, as to those routes, of from thirty-three to forty-three cents per bushel. It may,
therefore, be safely assumed that an average saving of thirty cents per bushel on the
transportation of grain from the Northwestern States to the Atlantic will be effected
by the opening of the Virginia water line.
Besides being the shortest and cheapest route, it will also be the best.
It will be better than the northern route by the lakes and Erie Canal, because that
route is closed for five months in the year, and at the very time when there is the great¬
est demand for transportation. It will also be better than that route on account of the
great risk and danger to which navigation is subjected by the boisterous weather and
the storms that prevail on the lakes during the fall and winter months.
It will be better than the route by New Orleans and the Gulf, on account of the
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL
greater length of that route, the loss of time thereby, and the great risk attending the
navigation by the Florida Pass.
It will be better than both of those routes, because it lies wholly within the territory
of the United States, and will open an internal navigation from the Ohio, Mississippi,
and Missouri Rivers and their branches by way of Chesapeake Bay, the Chesapeake
and Delaware Canal, the Delaware River, and the Delaware and Raritan Canal, to Bal¬
timore, Philadelphia, and New York, that will be secure from the attacks of an enemy
in time of war, thus affording a safe and cheap means of transporting supplies
from the interior to the seaboard cities which would be impracticable by the other routes.
If we should have a war with Great Britain the routes by the Gulf and the lakes
would be closed to commerce, and the railroads would be insufficient to carry the addi¬
tional freight that would be thrown upon them. There would then be no avenue by
which the products of the West could be carried to the Atlantic cities. The conse¬
quences would be a scarcity of provisions, high prices, and great suffering in the East,
and no market, no money, and general dissatisfaction and depression in the West.
A new water route is therefore indispensably necessary, and is demanded as much
for the interests of the Eastern as of the Western States, and indeed for the whole
country.
It is estimated that the exportation of cereals from the States in the valley of the
Mississippi that would use the Virginia water line, if their increased production is not
checked by want of transportation, will, in 1880, amount to 500,000,000 bushels. Of
this crop the Virginia canal, if constructed on the scale now proposed, could carry 200,-
000,000 bushels, at a saving of thirty cents per bushel on the present prices, which
would be a saving of 860,000,000 per annum on a part of the crop. But the competi¬
tion produced by the opening of this line would have the effect of cheapening trans¬
portation on all the other lines; and if the saving by the use of this line should be only ten
cents on the bushel on the whole crop, it would amount to $50,000,000 annually, which
is more than the estimated cost of the work. There cannot, therefore, be a shadow of
a doubt that this work would pay for itself in one year, by the cheapening of trans¬
portation on grain alone, because, although the Virginia Canal would be inadequate to
carry the whole surplus product of the West, still the effect of its construction would
be to cheapen transportation on other lines at least ten cents on the bushel, and, there¬
fore, would affect the whole grain crop of the West to the amount stated, and put that
much money in the pockets of the farmers.
The question of cheap food is one of vital importance to the Eastern States. Cheap
food makes cheap labor, which is the foundation of the success of manufactures. High
prices of food cause a demand for higher prices of labor, strikes among the operatives,
interruptions to business, and general distress and loss in manufacturing communities.
Cheap transportation would have the effect of reducing the price of provisions, and
would thereby benefit the manufacturers of the East as much as it would the farmers
of the West.
The people of the East are interested in this work in another way. Its construction
would develop the inexhaustible mines of coal of the Kanawha Valley, and would
throw into the markets of the East the best cannel, splint, and bituminous coals ; and
if the canal should be thrown open free of toll, these coals could be sent from the
Kanawha Valley to New York at a less price than the Cumberland and Pennsylvania
coals.
The development of this coal and of the immense beds of iron ore of East and West
Virginia, in close proximity to each other, and on the very borders of the canal, and of
the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad, would open up a new and boundless field for the en¬
terprise and mechanical skill of the whole country.
The immense trade that would be thrown on the canal and the railroad' by the de¬
velopment of this almost virgin country, and by the opening of a cheaper line of com¬
munication with the West, and which would seek a market through the capes of Vir¬
ginia, would revive and give a new impetus to commercial and shipping interests of the
eastern cities.
Thus the agricultural interests of the West, the manufacturing and commercial in¬
terests of the East, and the defensive capacity of the country, will be promoted by the
opening of this water line, and it is for these reasons that Virginia, unable to finish
this work, asks the aid of the Government in completing this great improvement,
which appears to be so necessary for the prosperity, progress, and power of the whole
country.
The estimated cost of the work is $40,000,000, and it is confidently believed that it
can be completed in four years.
It is respectfully asked that the Congress of the United States shall, in such way as
may seem to them best, either by direct appropriation or by a loan of the credit of the
Government, furnish the means of executing the work in four years.
On her part, the State of Virginia, West Virginia concurring, will relerse the inter¬
est of the two States in the work; will relinquish all of her interest in the work,
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. ^0
9
which is represented by more than $10,000,000, of which $7,400,000 is preferred stock
money actually expended in prosecuting the work to Buchannan; and will turn the
work over to the Government to be completed in such manner as Congress may direct.
If Congress shall see fit to complete the work by direct appropriation, without a
return of the principal and interest, Virginia, West Virginia concurring, will further
agree that the water line, as soon as completed, shall be thrown open to the public free
of toll, except so far as may be necessary to keep the work in repair.
This suggestion is made with the broad view that it is a work in which the whole
nation will be the stockholder, and that the money paid for its construction will be
more than returned, every year, principal and interest, in the saving in the cost of
transportation, the cheapening of provisions, and the general development and pros¬
perity of the country.
But if this view should not prevail, it is not doubted that the money advanced by
the Government could be speedily returned, both principal and interest, from the reve¬
nues derived from tolls, and when that shall have been done, then the State will consent
that the water line shall forever be a public highway free of toll, except for purposes of
repair.
The State of Virginia will agree that the work shall be prosecuted either under the
management of the company, subject to such regulations and restrictions as Congress
may impose ; or by commissioners appointed by the States of Virginia and West Vir¬
ginia, who will hold the property as a sacred trust for the benefit of the whole country,
under like regulations ; or that the prosecution of the work and the management of the
property, when it shall have been completed, shall be committed to a board of eleven
trustees, one of whom shall be appointod by the President of the United States, and
one each by the States of Iowa, Missouri, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio,
Virginia, West Virginia, and Maryland, as recommfended bv the national board of trade
at its annual session in December last, or in any other way in which its construction
and management will best promote the prosperity and welfare of the whole country.
It is proper, however, to state that there is a funded and floating debt due by the
James River and Kanawha Company, amounting to about $ 750,000, and that stock of
the company to the amount of 20,000 shares, the present market value of which is
$100,000, is held by private stockholders, and that any pledge given by the State look¬
ing to the relinquishment of the interests of the company, or the exemption from tolls,
must be subordinate to the rights of the creditors and private stockholders of the com¬
pany, which, in view of the small amount involved, could no doubt be easily adjusted.
1. Besolved by the general assembly of the State of Virginia, That our Senators in
Congress be instructed, and our Representatives requested, to use their best efforts to
obtain such aid from the General Government as will secure the early completion of
the line of water communication between the valley of the Mississippi and the Atlantic
Ocean, in the manner mentioned in the foregoing memorial, and upon such terms and
conditions as will best promote the interests of the whole country.
2. Besolved, That the governor of the State be requested to forward a copy of these
joint resolutions and accompanying memorial to the President of the United States,
the President of the Senate, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, and to each
of our Senators and Representatives in Congress.
Agreed to March 11, 1870.
J. BELL BIGGER,
C. H. D. and K. of B. of Va.
REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE OF THE NATIONAL BOARD OF TRADE ON A
CONTINUOUS WATER LINE OF TRANSPORTATION THROUGH VIRGINIA.
To the National Board of Trade of the United States of America :
During the annual session of your honorable body, which was held in December last
at Cincinnati, you had under consideration the following resolutions, presented by the
Louisville Board of Trade :
1. " Besolved, That cheap transportation for its heavy products to the markets of the
world is not only a necessity to the West, but equally demanded by the best interests
of the whole country.
2. u Besolved, That the most feasible plan to secure this end, is to provide a direct
and continuous line of water communication between the Mississippi River and the At¬
lantic Ocean, in a latitude favorable to the safe carriage of grain in bulk, and yet com¬
paratively free from obstructions by frost; that such a communication can be readily
secured, by the Ohio, Kanawha, and James Rivers, through Virginia and West Virginia,
to the Atlantic Ocean near the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay.
3.- " Besolved, That said line of water communication is a work of great national im¬
portance, and as such is entitled to receive such aid from the General Government as
will secure its completion at the earliest possible period, -
80 JAMES RIVER ANT) KANAWHA CANAL.
?06
1 5. "Resolved, That the executive council are hereby appointed a committee to me¬
morialize the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States, on behalf of
this body, and ask them to take the subject of said water line communication into
favorable consideration at an early day, and to grant such aid as may be necessary to
secure its early completion.''
While these resolutions were pending, at quite a late period of your session, when
but a short time was left for the transaction of business, the following resolutions were
submitted on behalf of the Louisville Board of Trade, and were adopted :
44 The subject of the resolutions submitted by the Board of Trade of Louisville, and
now under consideration, is one of great importance, and has been but recently brought
to the attention of the majority of this body, and should be fully examined and ma¬
turely considered before final action : Therefore,
44 Resolved, That the whole subject be referred to a committee of fifteen, with in¬
structions to fully examine the same, and report to the board at its next meeting.
44 Resolved, That the report of this committee be placed in the hands of the secretary
forty days previous to the next annual meeting, that he may transmit copies of the same
to the constituent bodies."
In pursuance of this resolution the following committee was appointed on this sub¬
ject :
Messrs. Porter, of Louisville; Stanard, of St. Louis; Burwell, of New Orleans;
Topp, of Memphis; Brown, of Portland ; Converse, of Boston ; Hincken, of New York;
Monroe, of Dubuque ; Munn, of Chicago; Taylor, of St. Paul; Gano, of Cincinnati;
Wetherill, of Philadelphia; Parr, of Baltimore; Hughes, of Norfolk; Carrington, of
Richmond.
Before leaving Cincinnati your committee held a meeting, and after taking measures
for draughting a report on the subject submitted for their consideration, adjourned to
meet at the White Sulphur Springs on the 15th of August following. Pursuant to such
adjournment your committee met at the time and place aforesaid, and having duly ex¬
amined the subject of your resolutions, beg leave to submit the following report:
THE FIRST RESOLUTION.
1. Nothing could be more true than the declaration of the first of the series of reso¬
lutions which your honorable body has submitted for our consideration—44 that cheap
transportation for its heavy products to the markets of the world is not only a necessity
to the West, but equally demanded by the best interests of the whole country."
Transportation to market the great need of the West.
The problem now most seriously engrossing the attention of commercial men at the
North, at the East, and throughout the West, is that of cheaper intercommunication
between the great interior region of our continent and the seaboard. The necessity for
its solution is becoming more and more urgent every day. The railroads are overbur¬
dened with freight, and are inadequate to its transportation, at rates which draw it forth
from remote parts of the interior.
The question of cheaper transportation is only another form of the question of ade¬
quate means of transportation ; for the moment that freight prices are so reduced as
to permit produce to go to market, from where it is grown in the fertile West, at a
profit to the producer, immediately such a volume of it is mobilized as to overtax the
capacity of the avenues of transportation. The problem of cheap carriage is therefore
no other than that of adequate means of transportation.
The productions of the interior are magnifying every year. They grow in aggregate
more rapidly than the means of transmitting them to market can be multiplied. West¬
ern production is constantly pressing unduly upon the means of transportation. The
multiplication of railroads in the interior is more rapid than that of railroads connect¬
ing the interior with the seaboard. The effect of the extended railroad and naviga¬
tion systems of the West is to stimulate production more rapidly than existing lines
of transportation can be augmented in capacity. Insufficiency in the means of outlet
produces high freight charges, and the remark of all eminent writers on political
economy is true, that impassable mountain chains interpose no greater barriers to trade
than high prices of freights.
Extent of this inland transportation system of the West.
The stimulating causes now in operation to augment the production of the West are
verv powerful in their influence :
1. The natural increase of population, augmented by the immense immigration from
foreign countries and from the Atlantic States, is peopling the interior regions of the
continent with a rapidity unexampled in the history of the human race; and the pro¬
duction of the country is increasing in the same unprecedented ratio,
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL* 81
2. The railroad system of the Mississippi and Lake Valleys has grown to an aggre¬
gate of 17,622 miles in length. This system is acting as a powerful stimulant to the
production of that prolific region in every part of it.
3. The inland navigation of the West is of immense expansion. Official reports give
the aggregate length of steamboat navigation on the Mississippi and its tributaries at
16,674 miles. The flat-boat and bateaux navigation of the head-waters and branches
of these great streams increases this navigation by more than ten thousand miles ; and
in the course of a short time slack-water and canal improvements will swell the grand
total of western inland navigation to at least 50,000 miles. It will ultimately be con¬
siderably more if the European principle should obtain in this country, that every stream
19 feet wide and 18 inches deep may be rendered navigable.
River navigation has assumed new importance of late by the inauguration of a cheap¬
er and more efficient system of water transportation. On the western rivers they have
instituted the system of steam-tugs and barges on a large scale. The effect is virtually
to convert the river channels into railroads, the steam-tugs being locomotives and the
barges being freight cars. Incorporated companies of large capital own the tugs and-
barges, and run them upon tinie schedules, just as railroad companies run their trains—
the trains picking up barges as they pass different wharves and leaving others. The
expense is but a fraction of railroad transportation, and the river channels are prized
as nature's substitute for long railroad tracks. As there are nearly 17,000 miles of
steamboat navigation on the western rivers, the effect is virtually to add 17,000 miles of
railroad track to the transportation business of the West.
Thus the total length of our main lines of transportation in the West, on which steam
is the motor, has reached 34,000 miles.
The area of country embracing this vast system of railways and of navigation is
nearly two millions of square miles; and, when population reaches an average of fifty
persons to the square mile, will contain one hundred millions of people whose leading
industry will be agriculture.
The stimulus imparted to production by the railway and navigation systems which
have been mentioned, seconded by the unexampled growth of population there going
on, is producing an immense development of export products. In 1860 there were
eighteen millions of tons of produce to spare from the West, not one-half of which
went off. It failed to go off either from the non-existencc of sufficient means of trans¬
portation, or by reason of the prohibitory cost of freightage over great distances. What
the amount of produce now is which could be spared for outside markets from the in¬
terior, cannot be stated with authentic accuracy, and the statistics of the forthcoming
census must be awaited. But it would be an under-statement to say that it has reached
twenty-five millions of'tons. On the other hand, it would be an exaggeration to esti¬
mate that twelve and a half millions of these tons now go out to market over all the
existing avenues of transit.
The existing deficiency in the facilities of transportation increases as the center of
production recedes westward. A few years ago this center was in Ohio. It has steadily
retrograded through the States of Indiana and Illinois. It has now crossed the Missis-,
sippi, and is still moving westward. The center of demand at the West for the neces¬
sary supplies from the East, including machinery, other manufactures, and merchan¬
dise, salt, iron, and coal, is receding with equal step into the far interior, to a still
greater distance from the source of supply; so that, while the demand for intercom¬
munication is constantly increasing, the continually widening distance between the
places of production and consumption is adding to the expense of communication.
Already very many of the products of the West, wanted at the East, will not bear
transportation. Even in the State of Illinois, corn, the staff of life—needed at the
East to fill hungry mouths—has been burned for fuel, on the score of economy; and in
Dubuque, on the western bank of the Mississippi, within the last five years, corn in the
cob has been burned for domestic purposes as cheaper than other fuel, the ruling price
of wood being $10 per cord, and of anthracite coal $20 per ton.
The area of country in the West which can be served by the Erie Canal is continually
decreasing; for, as the country bordering on the lakes becomes settled up. the
breadth of land under cultivation increases, and the produce from this increased cul¬
tivation, being fearer to the lakes, cuts off that from the far West by monopolizing the
canal.
To show the inadequacy of the present means of outlet for transmitting such a vol¬
ume of produce as would be spared for market, we may estimate the maximum theo¬
retic capacity of the Erie Canal for through produce at seven millions of tons; we
may estimate the utmost capacity of all the railroads now leading across the Allegha-
nies at eight millions of tons, for through freights. It would be safe to estimate the
amount of western produce which now goes out by the channels of the St. Lawrence
and the Lower Mississippi at four millions of tons. (The capacity of the lower outlets
of the Mississippi and of the St. Lawrence for discharging produce, is, of course, not
measured by the quantity actually going out, but rather by the capacity of existing
appliances for its shipment.) Thus the utmost theoretic capacity of these several-
11
ZD"
8fy Q y JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
avenues of outlet does not exceed 19,000,000 of tons. The quantity of western through
tonnage actually.moving over them is but little more than half this amount. Yet the
present tonnage which could be spared by the West and which could be forwarded to
market, if its products were mobilized by cheap carriage, and by ample avenues of
transportation, would be twenty-five millions of tons. (See article I, Hunt's Magazine
for August, 18(58.) It is not, therefore, merely a question whether we shall add new
railroads to those already engaged in the work, or whether we shall merely open new
canals, or whether we shall merely increase the appliances necessary for transmitting
produce through the Lower Mississippi and the Gulf. Resort must be had to all these
expedients, and still there will be a grievous deficiency in the means of conducting the
vast transportation.
Western production seeks market in the direction of the Atlantic.
Whether this huge volume of produce is to find outlet to the markets of the world
in the direction of the Atlantic or of the Pacific Ocean, does not admit of doubt. The
history of trade from the earliest records of time, furnishes no instance of a considera¬
ble movement of produce designed for human or animal food toward countries and pop¬
ulations adjacent to the Pacific Ocean.
The Atlantic is a long, narrow ocean, easily navigated on short voyages. The coun¬
tries on either side of it are inhabited by the powerful Christian nations of the earth ;
nearly all of them commercial, and most of them importers of grain. It is opened up
to Northern Africa and to Southern Europe by the Mediterranean Sea, and to Northern
and Central Europe by the Baltic. It is opened to all America except the narrow strip
west of the Andes, the Cordilleras, and the Rocky Mountains, by our gulfs and seas,
our bays and lakes, and by our great rivers, of which the Mississippi and the Amazon
are scarcely more important than a dozen others. Nearly all the great navigable rivers
of the world flow into the Atlantic and its tributaries.
Our western grain must find its consumers in the populations near the Atlantic, and
its markets almost exclusively in Atlantic ports. (Great Britain alone imports annually
four millions of tons of grain.) It must all seek exit in the direction of the Atlantic,
its natural tendency being to pursue the short direct route due eastward, from the lo¬
calities of production to the seaboard. There is no reason for believing that this ten¬
dency will ever be reversed or changed.
The East and West alike interested in the question of cheap transportation.
•
The problem of providing cheap transit to the seaboard for the whole production of
the West which can be spared for market, is not of first importance to producers alone.
The entire manufacturing and commercial populations of the Eastern States are inter¬
ested in obtaining food. Unless food shall be furnished at the lowest prices, manufactur •
ers must gradually decay throughout the Eastern and Middle States, and either perish
after a lingering existence, or migrate to other sections in search of cheap subsistence.
The interest of the West in cheap transportation is no more vital than is that of the
East in cheap food. Both are dependent upon the timely and liberal provision of ade¬
quate channels of transportation. Clie^p food is the best '■protection" which can be
provided our manufacturers against foreign competition. It is in its relation to this
subject that the commercial and manufacturing seaboard but reflects the prosperity of
the West. Western products furnish the basis of commercial wealth, and cheap food
is essential to the prosperity of every manufacturing community. Thus every great
work which may be projected for cheapening and increasing transportation between
the West and East is national in character, and merits the encouragement of the Na¬
tional Government.
THE SECOND RESOLUTION.
A central water line now an exigent necessity of the West.
II. The object being to provide means for transmitting the maximum quantity of
produce at a minimum cost, your committee have no hesitation in recSmmending the
opening of a canal and slack-water line of continuous navigation across the territory of
Virginia, from the Ohio to tide-water on the James River, as suggested by the second
resolution submitted by your honorable body for our consideration. Since the intro¬
duction of the steam-tug and barge system of transportation on the western waters,
since the practice has become general of transporting grain in .bulk, and since the
application of stationary and movable steam elevators for transferring grain from
one vessel to another, inland water transportation—which at one time seemed likely
to be wholly superseded by that of railway—has assumed new importance in the West,
and has been made much cheaper than it is possible for railroad transportation to be
rendered over long distances.
> JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
These improvements in the method of conducting the business of transportation on
western waters have given the canals a revived importance and awakened a widely per¬
vading interest in the proposition to open a continuous line of direct navigation from
the Mississippi River to Hampton Roads through the territory of Virginia.
Your committee are more strongly inclined to look with favor upon this enterprise
on account of the superior capacity of canals for carrying quantities of freight. To
illustrate this truth we need but consider some of the special facts of transportation.
The boats used on the Erie Canal carry 210 tons; that is to say, as many tons as a
railroad train can carry of twenty-six freight cars, each bearing eight tons. The small
capital invested in the canal-boat, the small number of men employed to man it, and
the small cost of motive power used in drawing it, are all in striking contrast with the
capital necessary to be invested in the locomotives and freight cars, in the purchase of
fuel, and in the hire of men attending the freight trains. The ratio of capital required
in the one case and the other is as twenty to one. The canal, moreover, is a public
highway, open to all. The railroad is necessarily operated by a corporation having
a large capital and all the attributes of a monopoly. In general the outlay of capital is
ten times as great in the case 6f railroads as in the case of water transportation. When,
therefore, we design to construct an additional outlet for the trade of the West, truly
national in its character, in being open and accessible to the use of the humble as well
as the great, of the poor as well as the rich, we must provide a water channel rather
than a railroad. In a lecture delivered in Ferubary last, before the American Insti¬
tute, by Professor William J. McAlpine, the following striking comparison is made of
the capacity of canals for transportation with that of railroads, and of the actual trans¬
portation of the Erie Canal with that of all the trunk railroads in the United States :
" The great canals executed in our day form an important feature in this progress.
With many persons there is an idea that the 'railway has superseded the canal, and
that the former now performs the chief part of the traffic of the country. While the
latter is true in regard to interior short lines of trade, it is a serious error in reference
to the great transport between the agricultural West and the Atlantic. The Erie
Canal, during the season of navigation, conveys more of this traffic than all of the
railroads together; more than all the trunk lines from the St Lawrence to the Poto¬
mac. The boats which come to tide-water have an average cargo exceeding that car¬
ried by the longest freight train on the Central Railway. During the busy season more
than 150 such boats arrive daily, and their tonnage would require more than 150
freight trains. The greatest number is but thirty per day on the Central Railway.
The Erie Canal, therefore, is performing more than five times as much business as the
Central Railway. Yet the slow, plodding canal-boat attracts no attention, though bur¬
dened with more tons than the bustling, noisy, whirling freight train, which creates a
sensation in every village through which it passes. The 4,000 canal-boats of an aggre¬
gate of 1,000,000 tonnage, moving 5,000,000 tons of cargo per annum, exceed the
tonnage of the vessels engaged in the foreign commerce of this city [New York]
even before the war."
Canals are used by the public—railroads only by their oicners.
Here is also exhibited one of the many reasons why canals afford more unlimited
capacity for the transportation of freights than railroads. Whoever may be able to
command a few hundred dollars of capital may engage in the business of a common
carrier on the canal; whereas that business on railroads is virtually confined to the
single corporations owning them. If we are to have additional highways for the cheap
transportation of heavy produce in great quantities, we must open at least another
canal, which should be at the service of all common carriers, great and small.
The Erie Canal, in its present dimensions, is adapted to boats carrying 210 tons. Its
capacity is now theoretically equal to the discharge of 7,000,000 of tons of produce per
annum, way and through; it actually discharges less. It practically passes as much
tonnage during the year as three of the most efficient and best appointed railroad lines
in the world. During the seven months when it is open, it discharges as much tonnage
as five such railroads. It carries bulky articles of commerce which the railroads
cannot move with profit, and it carries all produce cheaper than the railroads. The
Hon. Israel T. Hatch, of Buffalo, a high authority on these subjects, said recently, in an
address to a meeting of leading merchants in the city of New York:
" The average cost per ton from Chicago to New York via the lakes, the Erie Canal,
and the Hudson River, including canal tolls and carriers' profits, embracing a period of
ten years, is $7 66£. The cost of transportation on the Central Railway, as given in
annual reports, taking the average of six years, is one cent four mills and nine-tenths
of a mill per mile, not including carriers' profits. This average, applied to the distance
from Chicago to New York by rail, 988 miles, makes $14 31 per ton, or $6 65 more per
ton than the average cost for a period of ten years via the lakes, the Erie Canal, and
the Hudson River, including the State tolls and profits of carriers. The through freight
moved eastward by the five trunk lines and the Erie Canal is about, in round num¬
bers, 5,500,000 tons, which, if multiplied by $6 65, the difference before mentioned
<|4U JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL
would make a difference between rail and water transportation of all carried by either
method of $36,580,500, and, with the profits of the railway companies, added to the
actual cost, would augment this amount largely."
The classes of freight chiefly carried by the canals are the heavier products of agri¬
culture, and those of the forest and the mine. The New York canals carried, in 1867
,of the products of the forest, 1,232,968 tons, valued at $11,167,969, while the amount of
this class of products carried by all the. railroads of the State in the same year was only
303,236 tons, having a value of only $2,204,526. In respect, however, to articles of
higher value the case was reversed, the railroads of the State having carried 1,290,815
tons of "animal food," valued at $440,916,588, while the canals carried only 16,614 tons,
valued at $5,675,202. Thus railroads and canals supplement each other, the canals
relieving the railroads of cumbrous products paying low freights, while the railroads
carry those articles which could not await the slow transit of the canals, and which
afford high charges of freight.
Railroads do not afford cheap transportation for great distances. The canal, the river,
the lake, are the channels for the products of the farm, forest, and mine; the railroad
is for merchants and manufacturers.
It may be conceded that canals do not stimulate the production of the countries
which they penetrate as actively as railroads. But when once a network of railways
is constructed, and has produced that vast augmentation of production which in fer¬
tile regions invariably results, then canals become indispensable aids to railroads in
taking off to distant markets the increased and increasing production. In order, there¬
fore, to solve the problem of cheap transportation and adequate means of outlet for
western produce, we cannot confine ourselves to any one species of improvement. "We
must have a sufficiency of all improvements, and more especially of canals, as they
have greater capacity for the transportation of quantities of freight than railroads, and
can carry heavy produce cheaper over great distances.
Canals are not obsolete.
That canals have not become obsolete is proved by the fact that in France there are
in profitable operation 7,700 miles of canal and slack-water navigation, and that in
Great Britain and Ireland there are over 4,000 miles of similar works in use, as follows :
Miles.
Canals in England 2,600
Canals in Scotland 226
Canals in Ireland . 275
Navigations 900
Total 4,000
In France, where the system has greater extension than in any other country, the
Emperor, not content with mastering the Suez Canal, has projected a great ship channel
from the Bay of Biscay to the Mediterranean, the cost of which is estimated at between
seventeen and eighteen millions of pounds, and the time necessary for its completion
six years.
The argument against the utility of canals, and the trite assertion that they have
become obsolete, were based principally on the fact that in the United States some
canals have been unsuccessful, and some have been virtually abandoned.
The great success of canals in Great Britain created a furore for their construction
in this country, and many were made that proved to be failures, principally because
the zeal that projected and commenced them died out before their completion, and the
prosecution of the works was abandoned before they had arrived half way to their
destination.
Another cause of their want of success was, that many of them were made of such
small, dimensions that they could not be profitably navigated, and soon filled up, so
that they could not be navigated at all. But these failures prove nothing, and are
only warnings against the folly of wasting money on works that never can or never
will be completed, and against projecting great water communications upon such mean
and insufficient plans that their very littleness will insure their failure.
The partial obscuration of canals by the dazzling success of railroads has been only
temporary, and so far from public opinion being against canals, it is now setting
strongly in their favor, and their utility and superiority over railroads for the cheap
transportation of heavy tonnage is a growing opinion, and the necessity of their con¬
struction, not as rivals but as reliefs to railroads, is more and more generally conceded.
This is manifested by the earnest demand at the North for the further enlargement of
the Erie canal to the capacity of vessels of 500 tons; by the projection of new lines
JAMBS RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL
71 i
85
of water communication and the enlargement of old ones, in Canada, where $200,000,000
are proposed to be expended upon such works ; by the proposed ship canal around the
Falls of Niagara ; the enlargement of the Illinois and Michigan Canal to ship dimensions;
the proposed ship canal from Lake Michigan to Lake Erie ; another across the Isthmus
of Florida, to shorten the voyage and avoid the difficulties and dangers of the Florida
Pass; and lastly, the magnificent scheme of connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans
by means of a ship canal across the Isthmus of Darien. No less than nineteen dif¬
ferent routes have been proposed for a ship canal across the American Isthmus, and .
various surveys have been made by governments and private individuals, and the inter¬
est in this interoceanic connection is unabated. Mr. F. W. Kelly, of New York, has
estimated the saving in money to the trade of the United States that would result from
the use of the Isthmus Canal at $36,000,000 ; and the saving to the trade of the world at
about $50,000,000 annually; while the cost of the canal has been estimated as high as
$325,000,000.
In comparison with this gigantic scheme, the Virginia water line only dwindles into
insignificance so far as the cost is concerned ; but when we come to consider the benefit
to be derived from it in the saving of money to the trade of the United States, it will be
seen that at one-eighth the expenditure in money the saving will be as great.
The interest in canals is not confined to the United States. One of the leading topics
of the world at this time is the successful completion of the great Suez Canal, at a cost
of $80,000,000. The French Emperor's plan of connecting the Bay of Biscay with the
Mediterranean, in order to save the circuit of the passage of Gibraltar, excites great in¬
terest and commands favor. The canalling of the Isthmus of Corinth is also projected,
as well as the important project of connecting the Baltic and North Seas by a canal
across the Isthmus of Denmark.
What greater evidence could there be of the public estimation of the value of canals
than the projection of the above-mentioned schemes, especially those in New York and
Canada, where the period of navigation is limited to seven months in the year ? What
railroad could live and prosper if its operations had to be suspended for five months
every year ?
The principal concern that needs be felt for the success of the Virginia water line is,
that the full benefit to be derived from its unrivalled position and advantages may not
be attained from parsimony or an unwise economy in the scale of its construction. If
made at all, let it be made on a scale commensurate with the demands of the trade of
the great West, and fully up to the greatest capacity that can be obtained at the sum¬
mit level. It is the opinion of the engineer of the company that a capacity double that
already assumed in his plan of the canal, or say for boats of 500 tons, could be obtained
by the construction of reservoirs on the Greenbrier and its tributaries.
•
The existence of natural channels has never been held an argument against the construc¬
tion of artificial ones.
In the United States there would be a blockade of western trade if the Erie Canal
were closed for a year. It is idle to urge in opposition to the project of cutting a canal
straight across the country from the waters of the Ohio to those of the Chesapeake, that
the Mississippi River and the Gulf are competent to bear away all the produce which the
West can grow, and which the Erie Canal and the great railroad lines across the Alle¬
ghany summits cannot move. If they are competent to the task they do not actually
perform it, simply because the river and Gulf route is too circuitous to be pursued by the
produce of a very extensive region of the country contributing its trade, and the north¬
ern water route is closed by ice for five-twelfths of each year.
If, in 1665, an engineer of the Spanish monarch, sitting on the ramparts of Gibraltar,
had ridiculed the attempt of Louis the Great to transmit trade from Toulouse to Mar¬
seilles without having to pass under the guns of that fortress, and had asked, "What
need of a canal across France while these straits remain here, capacious enough to pass
the commerce of all the world at once ?" he would have spoken in the spirit of those
who now object to the Virginia work. But the canal du Midi, with its great reservoir
of St. Ferrol, was built, and it still exists, one of the most valuable works of France,
and one of the proudest monuments of the genius of Louis XIV, and the advanced
enterprise of the seventeenth century. One hundred years afterward, ignorant of
what had actually been done for a whole century in France, a very "practical"
public in England ridiculed the project of the Duke of Bridge water to make an arti¬
ficial navigation from Liverpool to some coal mines only forty miles distant through a
flat country. But the Duke's name now stands among the most renowned and most re¬
vered in England, and the practical British public has since attested its appreciation of
the works he inaugurated bv constructing three thousand miles of canals which are in
daily use. And yet, one hundred years since the triumph of the Duke of Bridgewater
over all ridicule and all protestation, and two centuries since Louis XIV proved that the
straits of Gibraltar were not sufficient to answer all the purposes of French navigation,
the idea is still maintained by a few that the Mississippi affords the only needful outlet
8f 1
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
for western trade. But distance has something to do with the operations of commerce,
and a very large portion of the western produce, rather than travel three thousand
miles from St. Louis to New York, by way of the Balize, the Gulf, and the long south¬
ern coast—going out of the country in order to get through it—would prefer a short
trip of only fifteen hundred miles inland to Norfolk, even if in the passage through the
Virginia Canal it would have to scale seventeen hundred feet of elevation, or about half
as many feet in lift of locks as it would go extra miles in tedious circuit by way of the
Balize, Cuba, and the Bahamas.
The cheapest transit for long distances is furnished alone by water, and yet, in order
to get to the seaboard at present by water, the western produce must needs go either by
the lakes or by the Gulf—must go beyond the boundary of the Union for want of a direct
navigation across the territory of the Union. This is a national shame, a national incon-
convenience, a national loss. Another canal is needed for the millions of tons of western
produce which is now not carried to market at all, simply because the rates of charge for
transit are not cheap enough to draw it out from the far interior. General Washington
suggested the true remedy for this now great and growing 'evil. The remedy was a
line of unbroken navigation across the territory of Virginia.
Causes which have impeded the opening of this line.
The fact that this route of navigation has not been opened long ago, especially in
view of the successful experience of New York with the Erie Canal, furnishes no argu¬
ment against the present expediency of the enterprise. The delay has been due both
to physical and financial causes. It is a fact that Virginia formed the determination to
construct a canal across the mountains in her territory at about the same time that
New York began to make a canal across the level plateau of country which stretches
out between the Hudson and Niagara Rivers. The task of New York was as easy as
that of Virginia was difficult. The surface of Lake Erie is only 564 feet above tide¬
water, and, except the elevation forming its eastern shore, is higher by 143 feet than
any of the ground between the lake and the Hudson River. Between the Seneca and
Mohawk Rivers a plateau of country extends for sixty miles, along which not a single
lock was required in constructing the canal. Nothing was needed to be done, in fact,
but to cut through the eastern shore of the lake, and lead the outflowing waters down
along a gradually descending country to the sources of the Mohawk, and with the
course of that stream to the Hudson. So favorable was the topography of the route
that the cost of making this channel, 363 miles long, was estimated at only $5,000,000,
and did not actually exceed $7,000,000, on the plan on which the canal was first com¬
pleted. No sooner did the trade begin to find an artificial outlet from Lake Erie to the
Hudson, than canals across the low divides between the waters of Lake Erie and the
Ohio, and Lake Michigan and the Upper Mississippi, were undertaken. It required
lockages of only 569 feet to reach the elevation of Lake Erie from the Hudson; between
Lake Erie and the Ohio, the elevation to be surmounted was only 950 feet; while
that between Lake Michigan and the Mississippi was only 610 feet. New York
plainly saw that, by first constructing her own canal, and then aiding the States of Ohio,
Indiana, and Illinois in constructing other canals over these easy summits, she would
obtain command of the trade of a country embracing half a million of square miles,
as fertile as the Delta or the Nile. While New York has only these three incon¬
siderable summits to surmount, in order to reach beyond the lakes to the Mississippi
and the Ohio, what were those which Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia had to
overcome in simply reaching the Ohio ? Pennsylvania had a range of mountain coun¬
try 70 miles in breadth to penetrate with her canal, and a summit of 1,899 feet to sur¬
mount with locks. Maryland had a series of mountain ranges a hundred miles broad
to traverse, and a summit level of 3,754 feet to lift her canal over. Virginia had a
like series of elevations, a hundred miles in breadth, to cross, and a summit of 1,700 feet
to overcome.
Yet, nothing daunted by barriers 'which would be appalling even to the enterprising
spirit of our own times, these States went boldly forward with their respective canals.
Pennsylvania spent $20,000,000 in making a water line, broken by inclined planes and
pierced by portages. Maryland, aided by Virginia, spent $8,000,000 on the Chesapeake
and Ohio Canal, in carrying it no farther than the foot of the Alleghanies, and then,
dismayed by the difficulties still before her, gave up the water line, and devoted her
resources to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. Virginia undertook her canal as
courageously as the rest, and after spending $10,000,000 found she had carried it only
to the western base of the Blue Ridge. The works in which these three States had
been engaged were so arduous, expensive, and tedious that before they could be com¬
pleted the growing preference for railroads, and the success of those works, produced
a division of popular sentiment on the subject of the proper improvements to be con¬
structed, and caused a suspension of the canals. Owing to the favorable route enjoyed
by New York, and the rapidity with which the Erie Canal was constructed, New York
had completed her great work before the popular preference for railroads had super-
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
vened to suspend that work. She pushed itYthrough to early completion ; secured'
also, the construction of the Ohio and Illinois Canals, and thus completed a grand
system of inland navigation, reaching more than a thousand miles into the heart of the
West, before being called on to embark in railroad enterprises.
Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia were forced to change their system of improve¬
ments after having crippled their finances 011 unfinished canals, and to engage in the
construction of railroads, without the aid of the trade which had been expected from
the canals.
Merits of the central water line.
The junction of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers is the grand converging point of the
Kansas, Nebraska, Missouri, Mississippi, Illinois, Ohio, Cumberland and Tennessee
Rivers; is the geographical center of their trade, and the converging and diverging
point of 17,000 miles of inland steamboat navigation; while Norfolk, the central and
most capacious harbor of the Atlantic coast, is connected with the center of the vast
interior (except the little space occupied by the " unfinished section" of the Virginia
Canal) by an unbroken water line, which is at once shorter, cheaper, and more reliable
than any other, and open to trade for more than eleven months of the year. It would
seem that these two great centers were made expressly for each other.
For many years the cheapness of transportation on the Erie Canal gave a permanently
northeastward tendency to the trade of ttye whole West, above the parallel of St.
Louis. But the perfection to which railroad construction has been brought, and the
increasing cheapness and rapidity of railroad transportation, have given to western trade
a strong and growing tendency to cross the country on lower latitudes and shorter
routes. Hence the vast business that has sprung up on the Pennsylvania roads, on the
Baltimore and Ohio road, and on the Norfolk and Memphis line of road.
The growing preference of western trade is for central lines; not only because they
are more exempt from the frosts of the northern climate, but because they are on the
shortest routes from the centers of western production and population to the center of
the-American seaboard. It is this tendency of trade, it is this necessity of trade, that
has so powerfully turned public attention of late to Norfolk as a great seaport city, and
given so much credit to the lines of improvement proposed for connecting the great
Virginia seaport with the leading cities in the central West.
The great harbor of Norfolk.
In respect to the advantages of Norfolk in its central location upon the seaboard, and
the superlative excellence of its harbor, the highest authority in maritime and commer¬
cial subjects, Commodore M. F. Maury, better known to science as Lieutenant Maury,
is here quoted. That eminent author says :
" Geographically considered, the harbors of Norfolk or Hampton Roads and New
York occupy the most important and commanding positions 011 the Atlantic coast of the
United States. They are more convenient to the ocean than Baltimore, Philadelphia,
and Boston are, because they are not so far from the sea.
"Depth of water that can be carried out, and distance of the sea from
Hampton Roads, distant 15 miles—depth 28 feet.
New York, " 30 " 3^ fathoms, 23 "
Boston, " 100 " 3| " 21
Philadelphia, " 100 " 3| " 23 "
Baltimore, " 160 " 2£ 16 "
" Between the three last and the sea there is a tedious bay navigation, but each of
the first two is situated upon a well-sheltered harbor that opens right upon the sea with
beautiful offings, those of Hampton Roads surpassing the others in all the requirements
of navigation, both as to facility of ingress and egress, certainty of land fall, depth of
water, and holding ground.
" The Chesapeake Bay is a 4 king's chamber' in the bosom of Virginia, which no
belligerent may enter with other than good intent. It affords the finest harbors on the
coast; and, moreover, they are those farthest to the north on the Atlantic side of the
continent, that are never obstructed by ice.
" To the south, all the seaport towns, as far as the Reefs of Florida, have their har¬
bors obstructed by bars, over which the larger vessels of commerce can never pass ; and
the extent of back country, naturally tributary to them, is, in comparison with that
which is tributary to the seaport towns of Chesapeake Bay, very small. It does not
extend beyond the drainage of these rivers.
" The harbors that lie north of the Chesapeake are liable to obstructions by ice every
winter, and their approaches are often endangered by the fogs which prevail in their
offings.
"This noble sheet of water, with its spacious harbors, is large enough to accommo¬
date shipping sufficient to afford transportation for all the products and merchandise of
the West, were they a thousand-fold more abundant than they are ; and it is the most
.|8$ JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
convenient point on the entire coast for distributing them north and south along the
Atlantic seaboard, or for sending them to markets beyond the sea.
44 As to the natural advantages of position, depth of water, and accessibility by land
and sea, Norfolk has no competitor among the seaport towns of the Atlantic. Midway
the Atlantic coast line of the United States, Norfolk is the most convenient because the
most central point where the produce of the interior may be collected; and whence it
may he-distributed, north and south, right and left, among the markets of the seaboard.
Its climate is delightful; it is exactly of that happy middle temperature where the
frosts of the North bite not, and where the pestilence of the South walketh not. Its
harbor is commodious, and as safe as can be. It is never blocked up with ice, and as to
the egress and ingress between it and the sea, it possesses all the facilities that the mari¬
ner could desire.
44 Moreover, the prevailing winds in the parallel of Norfolk are westerly winds, which
are fair for coasting and going seaward in any direction. A little to the south of that
parallel you find the northeast trades, which are fair winds for the inward-bound Norfolk
vessels.
44 Then there is the Gulf Stream, that mighty river in the ocean, upon the verge of
which Norfolk stands.
44 It flows up with a current which, without the help of sweeps, sails, or steam, will
carry the European-bound vessel out of Norfolk at the rate of nearly one hundred miles
a day, directly on her course. Then at thq sides of this, and counter to it, are eddies
which favor the same vessel on her return to Norfolk. These hawse her along and
shorten her voyage by many a mile.
44 Such are the natural advantages of Norfolk seaward. Let us look ashore and con
sider them landward, and compare them with the natural inland advantages of New
York. Stretch a string on the map from Norfolk to New York, and make a dot half¬
way between them. Now seek a point on the south shore of Lake Erie that is equidis¬
tant from New York and Norfolk ; draw a line from the dot to'this point, and you will
have a dividing line of distance between the two places, every point along which will
be just as f$r from the one place as the other. You will find that this line runs through
Delaware and cuts Lake Erie near Cleveland, Ohio.
44 Thus you perceive that Chicago, in Illinois, and St. Louis, Missouri, are actually
nearer to Norfolk than they are to New York, even by an air line.
44 You see, moreover, that as between New York and Norfolk, the natural advantages
here are greatly in favor of the latter.
44 The most direct way to the sea through either of these ports, from most of the lake
country, and from almost the entire • Mississippi Valley, lies through Virginia. The
natural advantages, then, of Norfolk in relation to the sea, or to the back country, are
superior beyond comparison to those of New York."
In his great work, entitled 44 Physical Survey of Virginia," Commodore Maury fur¬
ther says in regard to the military advantages of Norfolk :
44 Moreover, the approaches from the sea to Sandy Hook and to the Chesapeake are
greatly in favor of the latter. In war, light-houses would be extinguished, and all light-
boats, beacons and buoys removed. The channel way to Sandy Hook is narrow and
intricate, so that a vessel flying from a superior force in war, to seek protection under
the forts or shelter in the harbor, would run great risk of stranding. On the other hand,
the entrance to the Chesapeake is wide, open and clear ; ships can run in there by night
as well as by day, and in all weathers.
44 Sandy Hook is hydrographically very easy to blockade ; the Chesapeake difficult.
The offings of Sandy Hook afe sheltered on the north and west, forming a lee under
which blockaders may find shelter from all gales coming from either of these two quar¬
ters of the horizon.
44 At Sandy Hook the blockaders would have to watch a ship channel way only nine
hundred yards wide. The entrance to the Chesapeake is as wide as the distance (nine
miles) between the capes of Virginia. The coast from Hatteras to Henlopen is rigid and
inhospitable, offering neither shelter nor refreshment to an enemy in distress."
Between such a system of navigation as that which centers about the mouths of the
* Ohio and Missouri, and a harbor so central, so capacious, so accessible, and so conve¬
nient for the trade of the land and of the sea as Norfolk, situated due east, on the
shortest route from the commercial center of the West, it would seem that there ought
to be opened a direct line of navigation. Nowhere on the face of the earth are two
such vast systems of navigation brought into as close proximity as those aftorded by
the waters of the Atlantic and by the rivers of the Mississippi Valley, which almost
touch each other on the territory of Virginia.
Nature has performed the maximum of the labor required for uniting them, and left
art to perform the minimum. The problem is, simply to extend the channel of the Ohio,
or rather of the Mississippi, thirty miles eastward toward the Chesapeake, so that the
Mississippi may, as to its navigation, empty by the shortest passage into the Atlantic.
The union of two such vast navigations would justify the expenditure of hundreds of
millions of dollars. •
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL#
Distances of trade points in the interior from different markets.
. Commodore Maury, in his Physical Survey of Virginia, furnishes the following table
of distances from leading commercial centers in the West, by important routes, respec¬
tively to New York and Norfolk:
Comparison of water routes as to length.
From—
F. rt Benton
Omaha
Kansas City
Mouth of Missouri River.
Mouih of Illinois River..,
Sc. Paul
St. Louis
Mouth of Ohio River
Memphis.
Louisville
Nashville
Cincinnati
Wheeling
Pittsburg
St. Paul
St. Louis
Cincinnati
Louisville
Pittsburg
Wheeling
Nashville
Mouth of the Ohio
Memphis
To Now York,
via lakes.
j
| To Norfolk via
James ltlver
1 Canal.
Miles.
Miles.
5,012
4,673
2,712
2,373
2,368
2,02S
1,912
1,573
1,SS9
1,50b
2,344
2,637
1,932
1 553
2,132
1,353
2,382
1,603
2,519
966
2,397
1,498
2,66i
824
3,043
778
3,137
.872
Via Gulf.
4,014
2,344
3,22c
1,5o3
3,552
824
3,41(
; 96C
4,028
872
3,934
1778
3,288
Z 1,498
3,02c
1,35c
2,798
1,60c
This author indulges in the following striking comments upon the facts developed by
these tables:
"These figures reveal the fact that as between New York and Norfolk, Norfolk is
not only the nearest Atlantic seaport to the great valley of the West, but that (the Vir¬
ginia water line) would open a shorter and cheaper route to New York than either the
great lakes or the Gulf now afford from any place between New Orleans and St. Paul,
and from Fort Benton to Mobile. The distance from Norfolk to New York is 279 sea
miles. And Norfolk by the proposed route will be 293 miles nearer than New York is
by present routes to all places on the Mississippi River that are situated above the
mouth of the Illinois River. When we come below that and get on the Ohio, then the
flourishing cities on both sides of that river will be 1,000 to 1,500 miles nearer to New
York via Norfolk than they are via the lakes. This Virginia route will bring all places
on the Mississippi River above Memphis, and all places on the Missouri and its tribu¬
taries, nearer to Norfolk than they now are via river and Gulf to New York by more,
than 1,600 miles, and they will bring all the landing and river towns on the Ohio from
1.700 to 3,100 miles nearer to Norfolk by water than they now are by river and Gulf to
New York."
* Relative merits of the three water routes.
The desideratum being to carry the largest possible quantity of freights at the cheap¬
est rates, the necessity of an additional canal on the shortest and most direct route,
connecting the vast system of navigation in the West with the waters of the Atlantic,
not in lieu of railroads, not in competition with them anywhere, but in addition to and
in aid of them, has been already shown. At present there are no means of water out¬
let for the produce of the great interior of the continent except by way of the Balize,
the Gulfs, and the Florida Pass on one hand, and by way of the lakes and the Erie
Canal or the St. Lawrence River on the other.
The efficiency of the northern lake and canal route is impaired by two circumstances.
The first of these is that the route is closed by ice for five-twelfths of tho year, the
closing taking place before the wheat of the interior country can be moved to market
and before the corn is sufficiently matured and dry to be shipped. The second is, that
12
90 *7 \ G JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
vessels suitable for the navigation of the Erie Canal cannot weather the storms of the
lakes, a circumstance which involves the necessity of two transshipments. The equi-
noxial storms which endanger the navigation of the lakes in September and October
set in just as the wheat of the interior begins to move toward market.
The efficiency of the southern route by the Lower Mississippi, the Gulf, and the
capes of Florida, is impaired by several circumstances. The navigation of the Gulf is
unsafe by reason of frequent and sudden stQrms, and the passage of the capes of Florida
is extremely dangerous from the presence of hidden reefs of rocks. Pilotage on the
lower river and insurance upon the Gulf voyage impose heavy taxes upon all produce
passing out from New Orleans.
Not to dwell invidiously, however, on other disadvantages belonging to these two
routes, which art and enterprise may succeed in removing, the great irremediable ob¬
jection to both of them is the circuitous distances which they require western trade to
pass over on its way to market, coupled with the misfortune that neither of them lies
wholly within the jurisdiction of the United States. The distance of St. Louis from
New York is 1,932 miles by way of the lakes, and 3,223 miles by way of New Orleans
and the Gulf. They lie along either extremity of the national territory, and require
the great bulk of interior production to move around the extremities of the country
instead of moving directly across it. If, however, there were opened a direct line of
water transportation from St. Louis to Norfolk, the distance to be traversed by western
grade in reaching the best port of the Atlantic would be only 1,553 miles.
History of the James River and Kanawha Improvement.
We come now to speak specially of the James River and Kanawha Canal of Virginia,
the completion of which is now proposed, and has become an object of a most lively
and pervading public concern.
The idea of a communication by a public highway between the valley of the Ohio
River and the valley of the James River is supposed to have originated with General
Spotswood, when, on the 20th of August, 1716, he set out from Williamsburg on his
expedition over the Blue Ridge. The first suggestion, however, of a through line was
from Rev. James Maury, in a letter dated January 10, 1756. It was reserved to Gen¬
eral Washington, however, after his expedition to the West in 1753, to bring the subject
prominently forward, which he 'did by urging upon the governor and council of Vir¬
ginia the importance, as well for commercial as for military purposes, of a connection
between the East and the West. This scheme he cherished during the remainder of
his life. . In 1770, 1772, and 1774, he made tours of examination, with a view to supply
himself with facts which would enable him to show the feasibility, expense, and ad¬
vantages of the connection. In a letter to Mr. Jefferson, 29th March, 1784, he informs
him that he had been long impressed with the importance of a communication between
the waters of the Ohio and Potomac; that he became the principal mover of a bill in
the general assembly, of which body he was then a member, to empower a number of
subscribers to undertake, at their own expense, the extension of the navigation of the
Potomac from tide-water to Wills's Creek, a distance of about one hundred and fifty
miles, with a portage between it and the streams capable of improvement which run
into the Ohio. He repeatedly referred to the same subject afterward, and seems to
have been as profoundly interested in it as De Witt Clinton afterward was in the New
York and Erie Canal. He urged the matter upon Governor Harrison, father of Presi¬
dent Harrison, who communicated the subject in a message to the legislature October
18, 1784. General Washington visited the legislature in person to confer with the
members upon a plan of internal improvement; and on the 15th December, 1784,
James Madison, chairman of a committee appointed for that purpose, reported a bill
for opening and extending the navigation of James River, which became a law Janu¬
ary 5, 1785, and was signed on that day by the speaker, John Tyler, father of Presi¬
dent Tyler. These facts show that this great improvement was the conception of the
wisest, most practical, and far-seeing minds of Virginia. •
This organization continued until the 17th day of February, 1820, on which day the
legislature passed an act to amend the "act for clearing and improving the navigation
of James River, and for uniting the eastern and western waters by the James and
Kanawha Rivers." By this act the rights and interest of the James River Company
were transferred to the commonwealth, and by an act passed February 24, 1823, all the
rights, power, duties, and privileges of the president and directors were conferred on
the board of public works, whose transactions were to be still in the name of the
"James River Company." This organization continued until the year 1835.
The old James River Company constructed a canal around the falls of James River,
extending from the city of Richmond to Westham, a distance of about seven miles,
and improved the bed of the river by sluices as high up as Buchanan.
The Second James River Company, on State account, enlarged and reconstructed the
former canal from Richmond to Westham, and extended the same to Maiden's Adven-
\
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
91717
ture, in Goocoland County, a distance of 27 miles; constructed a canal through the
Blue Ridge seven and a half miles long; constructed a turnpike road from Covington
to the mouth of Big Sandy River, two hundred and eighty miles long, and improved
the Kanawha River by wing-dams and sluices from Charleston to its mouth, a distance
of 58 miles.
The James River and Kanawha Company was incorporated March 16, 1832, and or¬
ganized May 25, 1835. By the charter the whole interest of the commonwealth in the
works and property of the then existing James River Company was transferred to the
James River and Kanawha Company; the State being interested in the latter to the
extent of three-fifths of its capital stock, and individuals and corporations to the extent
of the remaining two-fifths.
The construction of the new canal from Richmond to Lynchburg was commenced in
1836, and the work was completed about the first of December, 1840.
In that time the work of construction of the second division of the canal above
Lynchburg was commenced, and prosecuted up to the year 1842, when, for want of
funds, it was abandoned. On the 1st of March, 1847, an appropriation of $1,246,000
was made by the legislature for the purpose of completing the unfinished work be¬
tween Lynchburg and North River, and the extension and completion of the canal to
Buchanan.
The work was commenced in July, 1847, and completed in November, 1851.
Fifteen miles of the third division of the canal next above Buchanan was put under
contract in August, 1853, but for want of funds the work was suspended in the fall of
1856. The work done on this portion of the line consisted chiefly of stone locks, aque¬
ducts, and tunneling.
The original capital of the company was $5,000,000, of which the State paid $1,000,000
in old works, and of the private subscriptions there proved to be insolvent $73,336
leaving $3,926,664 as the actual available cash capital. All beyond the capital thus
realized has been money either borrowed directly from the State treasury or on bonds
guaranteed by the State, on which the company has been required to pay interest from
the day it was received, before it was expended, and of course long before it began to
yield any return.
The actual cost of construction of the James River and Kanawha Canal, including the
incomplete works above Buchanan, has been $10,436,869.
To relieve the company from its embarrassment and to enable it to complete the
canal to Covington, the legislature, on the 23d of March, 1860, passed an " act to amend
the charter of the James River and Kanawha Company," by which the capital stock of
the company was increased to $12,400,000, in shares of one hundred dollars each, and
the board of public works was directed to subscribe on behalf of the Commonwealth
in addition to the shares now owned by the State in said company, for seventy-four
thousand shares of said capital stock, which shall be declared by said company a six
per cent, preferred stock, on whick six dollars per share shall be paid to the holders
thereof before any dividend shall be paid on other stock of said company; whereof
seventy-two thousand shares shall be taken in full satisfaction of the debt now due
from the said company to the State, and for the assumption by the State of the debt
for which the State is bound as the surety for said company and the annuity to the old
James River Company; and for the residue of two thousand shares, the bonds of the
State for the aggregate amount of $200,000 are to be delivered to the company, to be
applied to the extinguishment of the floating debt of the company.
On the 1st of March, 1867, the legislature of Virginia passed an act authorizing the
James River and Kanawha Company " to borrow the sum of $750,000, to be applied to
paying off the floating debt of the company, putting and keeping its present works
in repair, and to give a mortgage on the property, franchises, and net revenues of the
company, for the purpose of securing such loan." This loan has been effected.
The capital stock is at present held as follows:
Shares.
Commonwealth of Virginia 104,000
City of Richmond 5,768
City of Lynchburg 673
Washington College 100
Individual stockholders 13,459
Description of the Virginia water line.
The Virginia water line extends from tide-water, on James River at Richmond, to the
Ohio at Point Pleasant, ijie mouth of the Great Kanawha, a distance of 482 miles, and
consists of the following completed and unfinished works:
Miles.
First. The Richmond Dock and Tide-water connection, (completed) 1.00
Second. The first division of the canal, extending from Richmond to Lynch¬
burg, (completed) l46-50
a*z \5
JAAIES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL
Third. The second division of the canal, extending from Lynchburg to Buchanan
(completed) 50.00
Fourth. The third division of the canal, extending from Buchanan to Covington, -
(partially constructed) <47.00
jFifth. The fourth division of the canal, extending from Covington to the Green¬
brier River, (not yet touched) 29.33
Sixth. The Greenbrier and New Rivers, to Lyken's Shoals on the Kanawha.... 123.21
Seventh. The Kanawha Itiver, from Lyken's Shoals to the Ohio River 85.12
482.16
The different forms of navigation on this route are thus distributed :
Two hundred and eight miles of slack-water navigation from the Ohio to Howard's
Creek, a branch of the Greenbrier.
Forty-two and three-fourth miles of slack-water, at intervals between the Greenbrier
River and Richmond.
Two hundred and thirty-four and a quarter miles of canal navigation. There are also
125 miles of river navigation from Richmond to Norfolk.
Cost and plan of the work.
In his report on this subject, Mr. Lorraine, the engineer of the James River and
Kanawha Company, speaks as follows of the plan proposed for completing the line, and
of the portion of the work now in use :
<c I have provided for a canal from Buchanan to the Greenbrier River of the same di¬
mensions as the enlarged Erie Canal, viz: 42 feet wide at the bottom, 70 feet at the
water surface, and with a depth of water of 7 feet; the locks to be 120 feet long be¬
tween the gates, and 20 feet wide.
" The locks will admit boats about 108 feet long and 19 feet wide, with 6 feet draught
of water; such boats will carry at least 280 tons, but I will put the average loads at 250
tons.
" I propose to establish the summit at a level 1,700 feet above tide, or 20 feet above
the level of the Greenbrier River at the mouth of Howard's Creek, and pass through
the Alleghany Mountain by a tunnel about, nine miles long. TVe would thus, by feeding
directly from the Greenbrier River, be enabled to pass the summit level without the aid
of reservoirs.
"I have provided for a tunnel 56 feet wide and 32 feet high, with a water-way 44 feet
wide, and a tow-path of solid mortared masonry on each side 6 feet wide, so that boats
drawn by horses can pass each other without inconvenience ; but these tow-paths may
be dispensed with, and the tunnel, excavated to its full width of 26 feet, may be navi¬
gated by steam-tugs towing the canal-boats through it.
" This tunnel, with the favorable character of the mountain for the location of numer¬
ous shafts; and the facilities which the late improvements in automatic machine drilling
have afforded for the rapid prosecution of that kind of work, could be completed prob¬
ably as quick as the rest of the work, (say in four years.) On the line of the short tun¬
nel, as located, there are three depressions in the mountain at which shafts may be sunk;
one 129 feet, one 264 feet, and one 215 feet deep, or three shafts in 2\ miles, averaging
203 feet deep.
" The estimate for the Greenbrier and New Rivers is for steamboat navigation, with
stone dams and locks, the locks to be 200 feet long and 40 feet wide, with 7 feet depth
of water; extending to Lyken's Shoals, on the Kanawha, where sluice navigation will
begin.
" As it would be useless to construct the canal from Buchanan to the Ohio River, on
an enlarged scale, without making a corresponding increase in the size of the locks and in
the depth of the canal from Richmond to Buchanan, I have made an estimate of the
cost of building new locks 120 by 20 by the side of the old ones, and of increasing the
depth of the water in the canal to 7 feet."
The cost of enlarging the present canal, of completing it to the Greenbrier River on
the enlarged scale, and of improving the navigation of the Greenbrier, the New, and the
Kanawha Rivers, on the scale thus described, is given by the engineer at $37,363,911.
The capacity of the canal thus enlarged for transmitting tonnage will be measured by
the capacity of the great tunnel on the summit level and of the locks approaching it.
This capacity is thus stated by Mr. Lorraine :
" The boats will carry, in fact, 280 tons; but I will put the average loads at 250 tons,
and will suppose that one boat will pass through the locks in every 7£ minutes, or 192
boats per day for 300 days, and obtain 14,300,000 tons as the actual capacity of the canal
with a full trade. It would be fair, then, to assume the half of this sum, or say 7,000,000
tons, as the probable tonnage."
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
The theoretic capacity of this canal will, therefore, be fourteen millions of tons, its
actual capacity at least seven millions.
The plan of construction and enlargement, thus described and devised by Mr. Lorraine,
is approved and commended by B. H. Latrobe, one of the highest authorities on such
subjects; as also by Major General Charles P. Stone, late of the United States Army.
General Stone, in a letter published in a document of the James River and Kanawha
Company, says of the long tunnel proposed by Mr. Lorraine :
" The plan requires the following operations :
1st. The driving of a tunnel nine miles long, or, in effect, nine tunnels each one mile
long, 56 feet wide, and 32 feet high.
"2d. The construction of a strong, perfect dam across the Greenbrier River,-to make
it sure as a feeder.
" Of the above nine tunnels Mr. Lorraine proposes to drive seven, each between two
shafts 12 feet in diameter—two between a shaft at one end and a thorough cut at the
other.
" As regards the feasibility of the succession of tunnels, I think there can be no ques¬
tion.
" By the sinking of eight shafts, the matter is reduced to the driving of nine tunnels,
each one mile long, so that it really is a question at each point of driving a mile of tun¬
nel. More than that has been done in Virginia, and can be done again.
" As to the feasibility of the dam across Greenbrier River, I suppose no one will hold
that to be either impracticable or even a difficult operation."
Financial promise of the work.
With reference to the financial promise of this fine of navigation, Mr. Lorraine pre¬
sents the following estimates:
Capital invested in new works, say $40,000,000
Capital invested in old works, say 4,926,664
Preferred six per cent, stock of the State 7,400,000
Total capital invested 52,326,664
Probable revenues.
7,000,000 tons through freight, 485 miles, at 2 mills per ton per mile $5,790,000
100,000 tons way freight, say 50 miles, at 1 cent per ton per mile 50,000
200,000 tons to and from Lynchburg, 146 miles, at f cent per ton per mile. 219,000
100,000 tons to and from Buchanan and Lexington, 196 miles, at \ cent
per ton per mile 9 8,000
200,000 tons to and from Covington, 243 miles, at 4 mills per ton per mile. 194,400
300,000 tons coal from Kanawha Valley to Lynchburg, and to iron fur¬
naces on line of canal, 250 miles, at 2.5 mills per ton per mile 187,500
200,000 tons coal from Kanawha Valley to Richmond, 400 miles, at 2 mills
per ton per mile 160,000
500,000 tons coal from Kanawha Valley to New York and other eastern
cities via Richmond, 400 miles, at 2 mills per ton per mile 400,000
Revenue from tonnage of Kanawha westward 400,000
Revenue from Richmond dock 400,000
Revenue from water rents 30,000
Revenue from boats and passengers 100,000
9,028,900
Expenses of repairs and administration, $750 per mile 363,750
Net revenue '. 8,665,150
"Which is more than 16 per cent, on a capital of 53,000,000
It is legitimate to conclude that this work, which will be open for business throughout
almost the whole year, will compare favorably in its financial results with the Erie
Canal.
The entire cost of constructing the Erie Canal to 18G3 was $38,977,831, (nearly thirty-
nine millions.) This sum with interest to 1863 amounted to $52,491,915. During the
same p>eriod the gross receipts from tolls were $71,783,676, (nearly seventy-two millions.)
After deducting expenses ($12,518,860) there remained a net profit of $59,264,812, not
only sufficient to pay the entire cost of construction with interest, but leaving a surplus
of nearly seven millions of dollars. Of the gross earnings,it appears that but little more
JAMBS RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
than one-sixth was required to meet expenses and repairs. Fine-sixths were net gain.
This included not only the period after the enlargement, but before, when the canal was
in an unfinished condition, with costs of repairs greater and receipts less. Since 1862,
the net earnings have been about twenty millions of dollars more. From 1862 to the end
of the fiscal year 1868, the amount of 'tolls paid to the State was $25,260,384. No other
improvement, railroad or other, can make such an exhibit. The Erie Canal has not only
paid for its own construction, but makes itself a present to the State, with about $27,-
000,000 net profit.
Freedom of the Virginia water line from ice.
Accurate memoranda have been kept of the number of days during which the Vir¬
ginia Canal has been closed by ice for twenty years past, and the grand aggregate for the
whole period has been only three hundred and two days, or an average of fifteen days
each year. During ten of these years there was no closure by freezing. But the closure
during any one season is never continuous, being broken by intervals of thaw. The ice
during these freezings is scarcely ever so thick that it cannot be readily broken by ice¬
boats. These freezings, therefore, ean never operate seriously to put a stop to navigation.
Boats may continue to run throughout the season without apprehension of any longer
detention at any one time than a few days.
The reports alluded to, of the number of days of closing by ice, refer to the mountain
portion of the Virginia Canal, to wit, the portion which passes through the Blue Ridge.
The summit section, being a tunnel, will never freeze. The unvarying temperature
of the tunnel through the Hoosac Mountain, in the high latitude of Massachusetts, is 52
degrees the year round. The temperature of the proposed tunnel through the Alle¬
ghany Mountains for the summit level will probably not be lower than that of the Hoosac
tunnel.
. The elevation of the former tunnel is only 1,700 feet above the level of the sea, and it
is more than three degrees of latitude to the south of the Hoosac.
Danger from floods of the mountain sections of the canal.
It is popularly supposed that canals through mountain sections of country are exceed¬
ingly liable to injury from floods. Experience seems to teach, however, that this is an
unfounded apprehension. From the letter of Mr. Lorraine on this subject accompany¬
ing this report, it will be seen that the mountainous sections of the James River and
Kanawha Canal have suffered no more from this cause than the sections in the low
country, and that the cost of annual repairs on the mountain sections is no greater.
Reference is made to Mr. Lorraine's letter, appended to this report, for valuable and in¬
teresting information on this subject.
Relative cost of road and water transportation.
The most important element entering into the question of an additional canal, con¬
structed as proposed, on the most direct and central route of the continent from the
center of the interior field of production, to the central shipping port of the seaboard,
is the subject of relative cheapness of carriage over long distances by water and by
rail. Mr. Lorraine, adopting the conclusions of Mr. McAlpine, of New York, presents
the following table as indicating the cost of carrying produce over different sorts of
route:
Mills.
Ocean—transportation, average 1.5
Lakes—long 2.0
Short 3.4
Rivers—Hudson, and of similar character 2.5
Mississippi and Ohio.. ' 3.0
Canal—Erie enlargement 4.0
ordinary size 5.0
Railroads—average 15.0
Over common roads, wheat cannot go to market over a greater distance than 250 miles,
nor corn further than 125. But if railroads can carry produce at as low a rate as one
and a quarter cent per ton per mile, the radii within which corn and wheat can be car¬
ried by them to market is increased respectively to 1,600 and 3,200 miles.
But if we assume five mills as the cost of freight on canal and river navigation,
(which is higher than necessary,) then wheat may be brought from a distance of 6,000
miles, still leaving 60 cents a bushel to the farmer, and corn from points 3,000 miles
from market, leaving the cost of production to the grower. Upon the scale of charges
indicated in the statement which we have given above, Mr. Lorraine has computed
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
J Aw
the following table, showing the saving in the cost of transportation which would result
to the West from the construction of the Virginia water line.
It is not contended that these tables show actual costs. They only show the result
of applying the average rates, drawn from a great multitude of transactions, to the dis¬
tances respectively indicated.
Routes.
Dubuque to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line.......
Dubuque to New York by railroads
Dubuque to New York by Chicago, lakes, and Erie Canal..
Dubuque to New York by Toledo, lakes, and Erie Canal..
Dubrque to New York by Mississippi River and ocean....
St. Louis to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line........
St. Louis to N. York by Illinois & Michigan and Erie Canals
St. Louis to N. York by Portsmouth, Ohio, and Erie Canals
St. Louis to New York by Mississippi River and ocean....
Louisville to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line.
Louisville to N. York by Portsmouth, Ohio and Erie Canals
Evansville to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line
Evansville to New York by Wabash and Erie Canals
Cincinnati to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line....
Cincinnati to N. York by Portsmouth, Ohio and Erie Canals
Cincinnati to New York by Miami and Erie Canals........
Cincinnati to New York by Mississippi River and ocean...
Wheeling to Baltimore by Baltimore and Ohio Railroad...
Wheeling to Hampton Roads by Virginia water line......
St. Louis to Liverpool by New Orleans
St. Louis to Liverpool by Virginia water line....
Cincinnati to Lyverpool by New Orleans
Cincinnati to Liverpool by Virginia water line
Louisville to Liverpool by New Orleans
Louisville to Liverpool by Virginia water line
Memphis to Norfolk by railroad
Memphis to Norfolk by Virginia water line
a
o
u
P.
03
to
ta
ft
O
1,977
$6
52
1,145
17
17
1,731
6
68
1,165
9
22
3,515
7
86
1,513
5
13
v 1,960
5
89
1,813
6
70
3,051
6
47
949
3
44
1,249
1,140
4
01
5
01
1,220
5
07
816
3
04
1,116
4
61
1,019
4
07
3,398
7
51
380
5
70
787
2
95
6,529
11
69
5,223
10
79
6,876
12
73
4,526
8
70
6,713
12
33
4,659
9
10
956
14
34
1,583
6
34
u
o
^ s
C s
_ ©
©
©
tn o
• r-< w
a
1,583
447
300
300
"so
300
203
2,582
1,306
*2,350
*1,863
00
fl
cS •
bC®
01 3
S ®
~ is
W
832
246
f 79.'
407
627
The cost of transportation is a loss in the value of the product of the industry of the
country, whether agricultural, mineral, or manufacturing, except to the extent of the
clear profit to the carriers, and it diminishes the value at home of everything which
will not bear transportation in the same proportion. This loss and this diminution is
measured by hundreds of millions of dollars annually. There is a point beyond which
the necessary charges of railroad transportation in conveying heavy freight from the
place of production to the place of consumption leave no profit to the producer, and
thus check both production and consumption. From Dubuque, only 188 miles by rail¬
road west of Chicago, the charges, when the water line through the Jakes and Erie
Canal is closed, usually average per tOn for fourth-class freight (which pays least) to
New York, $23, or at the rate of 69 cents on a bushel of wheat; for first, second and
third classes they range from $31 to $49 per ton. When wheat is worth there about $1
per bushel, it costs about 70 per cent, of its value to carry it to market. From 100
miles in -the interior of Iowa, the farmer who has 1,000 bushels of wheat has to give
600 bushels to carry the other 500 bushels to the Atlantic market. On all other cereals,
the percentage on the value paid for transportation is still greater.
West of the Missouri River from Sioux City, Omaha, Leavenworth, and Kansas City,
there is a country extending for hundreds of miles still farther from the Atlantic, with
immense capacity for the production of wheat and corn, beef and pork, which must
remain valueless as a grain-producing region, though of almost boundless capacity for
the smaller cereals, unless a less costly means of sending its produce to market be fur¬
nished than by railroad, or even by railroad and the lakes. Nor are the railroad charges
necessarily extortionate ; they are much lower than the average of charges, and from
the far West often lower than the roads can carry it with profit.
The two great railroads of New York, the Erie and the New York Central, struggling
as they have been, in competition with each other, and trying even to compete with
the Erie Canal, ought to be regarded as able to carry freight on as favorable terms as
any other lines for transportation of ordinary produce freight and merchandise, and
which are also used as lines of travel. Roads constructed as coal roads, with grades
and curves to suit an immense freight, m.iy, and in some instances do, carry at a lower
rate. But these latter bear no resemblance to the nature of structure and operating
*■} '* p V
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
expenses of such lines as must be relied on for conducting the freight and passenger
business between the Atlantic and the West.
Taking the two principal New York roads, then, as an average of what such roads can
do, their reports for the year 1866 show that the rates per ton per mile for that year
were as follows: New York Central 2.92 cents, or for the whole distance of 440 miles
from Buffalo to New York, the sum of $12 85, or at the rate of 35.6 cents for a bushel
of wheat; Erie Railroad 2.45 cents, or for the whole distance from Erie to New York of
460 miles $11 27, or for a bushel of wheat 34.4 cents.
Official reports for 1868 show that the average charges for transportation on the New
York roads for that year were a fraction over cents per ton per mile. 1 hese charges
will average from the Mississippi about $ 24 a ton, or about 72 cents for a bushel of
wheat. There may be exceptional cases, under peculiar circumstances, where the
charges may bo temporarily somewhat lower; but they oftener exceed than fall short
of that amount.
During the season of navigation with railroad transportation only to the lakes, these
charges could be considerably reduced, and are much lower than when there is not a
pressure upon the tonnage capacity of the lake vessels and of the Erie Canal.
During the earlier part of the navigation season, especially during summer, the
charges from Chicago to Buffalo range from about 5 to 10 cents per bushel on wheat,
and from Buffalo to New York, through the canal, from about 11 to 14 cents, tolls in¬
cluded ; while during September, October and November, when the bulk of the western
crop is seeking a market, the charges go up from 10 to over 26 cents from Chicago to
Buffalo, and from Buffalo to New York from 14 to as high as 30 cents per bushel,
averaging more than double the rates at which freight can be carried, and is carried
when there is no pressure upon the shipping of the iakes and upon the canal. These
charges are of course increased or diminished in like proportion as to all other freights.
The effort to escape still higher charges by railroad presses the products of the West
upon the water line, and thus enables the carriers, whether by lake or canal, to in¬
crease their charges, and the canal company is also thus enabled to increase its rate of
tolls, of which advantage both carrier and canal company are not slow to avail them¬
selves.
With the increasing products of the West and Northwest this evil will continue to
increase. Even the advantage of a water line connecting the Upper Mississippi with
the lakes, and thereby cheapening the transportation to one-third the present charges
for that portion of the route, will be to a great extent neutralized by the increased
pressure, and consequently higher charges from the lakes inward unless the pressure is
relieved and held in check by the competition of other cheap and continuous water lines
of transportation.
Relation of the work to coal supply.
It is well known to geological men that the veins of bituminous coal which pervade
the entire western slope of the Appalachian chain of mountains have their maximum
aggregate thickness in the Kanawha Valley and in the adjacent regions of West Vir¬
ginia, Kentucky, and Ohio.
The coals of these regions are now shipped around by way of New Orleans and the
Gulf to New York, at a profit to the miner and dealer. The quality of this cannel coal
is equal to that of the coals of England and Nova Scotia imported into New York. It
has become important to the manufacturing interests of the seaboard cities to obtain
adequate supplies of the best qualities of bituminous cools from shorter distances than
those from which they are now derived, and at cheaper rates. The most intelligent
manufacturers and dealers in coal, of New York and the eastern cities, recognize the
necessity of a resort to the cannel and bituminous coals of the Kanawha, Coal, Guyan-
dotte and Sandy Rivers for fuel; a fact which is fully established by the shipments
that are now making of the coals of that region by the roundabout route of New Or¬
leans to the Atlantic seaboard.
The opening of the Virginia canal will settle the question of an adequate coal supply
for the eastern cities and relieve the apprehension and scarcity now felt by eastern
manufacturers on that vital subject. Valuable as this water line will be to the West,
as shown in these pages, its importance is doubled by the fact that the work is vital to
the success of the manufacturing system of the east, as a means of supplying the best
bituminous coals of the continent from the nearest mines by the most direct navigation
and at the cheapest rates.
THE THIRD RESOLUTION.
III. Your committee approve the third resolution submitted for their consideration,
which declares that this work, being of great national importance, is " entitled to re¬
ceive such aid from the national government as will secure its completion at the earliest
possible period."
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. n
, * ** r>
One of the most distinguished American statesmen of a former generation said,
twenty-five years ago:
"The invention of Fulton has, in reality, for all practical purposes, converted the
Mississippi, with all its great tributaries, into an inland sea. Regarding it as such, I
am prepared to place it on the same footing with the Gulf and Atlantic coasts, the
Chesapeake and Delaware bays, and the lakes, in reference to the superintendence of
the General Government over its navigation. It is manifest that it is far beyond the
power of individuals or of separate States to supervise it, as there are eighteen States,
including Texas and* the Territories (more than half the Union) which lie within the
valley of the Mississippi or border on its navigable tributaries."
Claims of the great communities interested in cheap freights and cheap food upon Gov¬
ern ment for aid to this national icorJc.
If the work under discussion be necessary to the accomplishment of the two great
objects of affording adequate means of outlet to market for the products of the inte¬
rior, and supplying cheap food to the populations of the Atlantic States; if, moreover,
this work be a necessary supplement to the navigation of the Mississippi River and its
tributaries, then all that is predicated as to the duty of the Government with reference
to the western rivers is true with a reference to the proposed outlet of their navigation
by the shortest and most central line to the ocean. And, when we consider that in
time of war both of the other existing routes of water transportation between the inte¬
rior and the Atlantic seaboard are liable to complete interruption, leaving the West
glutted with vast stores of surplus food, and the East suffering from the want of it,
the failure of Government to provide an outlet of interior navigation on the most direct
and central route from the Mississippi to the ocean, safe from hostile assault or threat,
assumes a serious aspect. We come on reflection to regard the provision of such an
outlet as an urgent duty of Government, and to look upon the neglect to provide one
as a grave dereliction.
Commodore Maury makes the following cogent reflections upon this subject:
"In case of a war, in which Canada should become the seat, the farmers of the
West may well ask the question, What would become of them? The lakes would be
impassable to vessels of commerce, and their produce, as recent experience has
abundantly taught them, could not afford to pay railway freights and monopolies that
Eastern combinations would be sure to exact.
"The only inland water line by which the Mississippi Valley can be connected with
the ocean, so as to have at all times, and under all circumstances, in peace and in war,
a convenient and unmolested highway to the Atlantic sea-front, leads through Virginia.
The Alleghany Mountains afford no passes for such to the north of us, and, until the
country avails itself of these, there is no protection in war for Western commerce, and
farmers there must console themselves as best they may, under the humiliating reflec¬
tion that they are cut off with their produce from the commercial intercourse with the
great markets of their country, from the metropolis of the nation, and from the high¬
way of nations ; that if they go by lake or Gulf, the way is not their own, but such as
others may overlook, and, at pleasure, dispute and endanger, if not forbid. Whereas
their rights through Virginia none can dispute, and the way is wholly their own, and as
safe and secure in war as in peace.
"In short, considering that the expenses via New Orleans and the Florida Pass are,
in a great measure, prohibitory to Northwestern breadstuff's, and that the Erie Canal
has not the capacity to pass more of Western produce than it is now doing, and that
this produce cannot stand the charges of railway transportation from its place of pro¬
duction to New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore, it is clear that Western farmers can
contribute but little more to the exports of the country until a new way to the sea has
been opened for them. Until this be grauted them, the commerce of that portion of
the country cannot expand proportionally with the growth of the West."
Becommendations of the Committee.
Your committee find that the present works of the James River and Kanawha Com<
pany furnish a basis of credit to the amount of $10,000, free from incumbrance, except
a mortgage securing a debt (not all issued) of $750,000. The further sum of $40,000,-*
000 will be required for enlarging present works, and completing the remainder of the
line to the Ohio river. The whole work can be executed in the period of four years.
The expenditure will therefore be made nearly at the rate of $10,000,000 a year,
during which period the earnings of the line pay but a small portion of the interest on
the outlay. The maximum of interest which will thus be paid, while the work is under
construction, may reach six millions of dollars ; so that a lien taken upon the present
works of the company, worth ten millions, and upon the property of the entire line,
will secure the advance of six millions required for interest, and for the bonds which
may be used in providing the means of paying for construction.
It will have been seen that the State of Virginia, the cities of Richmond and Lynch-
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
burg and Washington College, own together 110,541 shares of the capital stock of the
James River and Kanawha Company, while only 13,459 shares are owned by private
individuals; the State herself owning 104,000 shares, or more than four-fifths of the
1 stock. The National Government, therefore, in dealing with this company, would prac¬
tically be dealing with the State herself.
As shown by the estimates of the engineer, the net annual income expected from the
line, when completed, will be $8,665,150. If we deduct one-fourth of this amount for
errors and contingencies, there will remain $6,500,000. The interest on $40,000,000
will be $2,400,000. The net income will therefore pay the interest on the bonded debt,
and produce a balance, clear of charges, of $4,100,000, which may be used as a sink¬
ing fund for the liquidation of the debt in ten years. Actual results attending the ope-
.ration of the Erie Canal sustain the validity of these calculations, and justify your com¬
mittee in the recommendations they submit.
With the foregoing statments as to the commerce of the inland States, which have
been carefully and considerately prepared, and as to existing and contemplated means
for transporting the materials of that commerce, your committee come to the following
conclusions:
That cheap transportation for the products of the interior of the country is not only
a necessity, but is demanded by the highest considerations of public policy :
That to secure it, additional direct and continuous lines of water communication are
imperatively needed, and should be provided between the Mississippi River and the
Atlantic seaboard—not only as a means of freightage, but in order that requisite
competition may be maintained between transportation lines.
That as one of these means of water communication the route to be afforded by the
James River and Kanawha Canal, if extended to the Ohio River as proposed, has spe¬
cial prominence.
That the work necessary for the completion of this canal on the scale deemed essen¬
tial for its great objects is demonstrated by eminent engineers to be practicable of early
completion and feasible.
That such a work would be national in its character and entitled to receive national
aid to secure its completion at the earliest possible period.
That in order that it shall enure to the best interests of the country, all private and
corporate proprietorship in it should be removed, (which removal should be a condi¬
tion precedent to the grant of aid by the General Government,) and when the cost of
construction, as represented by the outlay of the State of Virginia, and of the nation,
shall be fully reimbursed, the commerce conducted on the canal shall be subjected only
to such tolls as may be necessary for its repair.
As embodying these conclusions, it is respectfully recommended that the executive
council of the National Board of Trade be directed to memorialize the Congress of the
United States in reference to the subject of extending aid to the James River and Kan¬
awha Canal project, as herein set forth, praying its consideration at an early day.
J. J. PORTER, Chairman, Louisville.
JNO. A. GANO, Cincinnati.
L. Y. MUNN, Chicago.
THOS. M. MONROE, Dubuque.
R. TOPP, Memphis.
J. P. WETHERILL, Philadelphia.
R. W. HUGHES, Norfolk.
CHAS. S. CARRINGTON, Richmond.
Office of the James River and Kanawha jCompany,
Richmond, February 5, 1869.
Bear Sir : At your request, I offer the following facts in answer to the objections
made to canals in mountain districts.
It is granted that a canal in a mountain country is, on account of the lockage, less
profitable than one on a level plain, exactly as a railroad with high grades and sharp
curves is less profitable than one with low grades and easy curves; but it is denied
that there is anything inherent in mountain countries to render the construction or
maintenance of canals impracticable or unprofitable, any more than railroads or com¬
mon roads.
The main objections that have been urged against mountain canals are, that the
works are injured or destroyed and the prism of the canal filled up by the mountain
torrents falling into them* and, especially on lock and dam improvements, that the dams
are broken and swept away by the sudden incursions of high water, subjecting the
navigation to frequent interruptions and long delays.
To meet these objections it is not necessary to refer to canals in foreign countries or
f*f «'">
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL. O
in other States; they can be best answered by an appeal to the history and condition of
the James River and Kanawha Canal; and as the objections were made mainly in op¬
position to the construction of that canal, it appears to be eminently fit that it should
appear in its own defense, and appeal to the facts in its own history in contradiction of
any statement injuriously affecting its future career.
The James River Canal commences at Richmond and extends to Lynchburg, a dis¬
tance of 146£ miles. The lockage in this distance is 429 feet, or nearly 3£ feet to the
mile. At Lynchburg it may be said to enter the mountain district of the State, and 24
miles above Lynchburg it arrives at the base of the Blue Ridge Mountain, passes, in a
distance of 4£ miles, through the backbone of the Blue Ridge, and then through what-
is called the Valley of Virginia, to Buchanan, The whole distance from Lynchburg to
Buchanan is 50 miles, and the lockage between those points is 299 feet, or about six
feet per mile. Twenty-two miles is canal and twenty-eight miles is lock and dam navi¬
gation. At the mouth of North River, 28 miles above Lynchburg, there is a lateral
canal, extending along the margin of North River to Lexington, a distance of 19| miles,
10 miles of which is canal and 9| miles is slack-water navigation, the total lockage being
188 feet, or 9£ feet to the mile.
Between Lynchburg and Buchanan there are four stone dams and seven timber dams.
On the North River improvement there are nine stone dams and one timber dam.
Where the canal passes through the Blue Ridge Mountain, there is in a distance of 4|
miles a lockage of 60£ feet, or an ascent of 13 38-100 feet per mile.
The canal from Lynchburg to Buchanan was completed in 1850, and has been in ope¬
ration eighteen years. During that time there have been many and very high freshets,
and it is not to be denied that considerable damage has been inflicted; a part of the
top of two of the dams has been swept away, and a large breach occurred around the
abutment of another, and two large breaches have occurred in the guard bank of
another. But there was no necessity that any of these disasters should have occurred ;
they were not the consequence of the character of the country, because nearly as many
and similar accidents have happened on the first division, but of errors in the location
and construction of the work, errors which experience would have avoided, and which
will not be likely to occur again. But the most remarkable fact in this connection is,
that the portion of the canal which passes through the heart of the Blue Ridge is the
very part that has been most exempt from injury, and has cost less for its maintenance
and repair, in proportion to its lockage, than any other part of the line. One reason of
this is, that it passes through an uncultivated section of country, and therefore there is
but little deposit washed into the canal from the sides of the mountain, or by the small
streams that empty in it.
On the North River improvement, which traverses along the western base of the Blue
Ridge, where the fall is 9^ feet to the mile, and where there is a dam for every two miles,
no accident has ever happened to a dam from high water. One dam has partially failed
from having been built on an insecure foundation. This portion of the improvement
was constructed with inadequate funds, and consequently the work was of an inferior
description. The dams were built of rubble masonry and without cement; neverthe¬
less, with the exception mentioned above, they have stood well, and have suffered no
injury from the frequent high freshets to which they have been subjected.
A pretty good test of the comparative stability of mountain canals may be made by a
comparison of the cost of repairs of the first and second divisions of the canal, as shown
in the following tables, ranging from 1851 to 1868, inclusive :
Cost of repairs of James River and Kanawha Canal for 18 years, from 1851 to 1868,
Length;
miles.
Lockage ;
feet.
Total cost for
18 years.
Average cost
per annum.
Cost per mil*
per annum.
First division—Piedmont
Second division—Mountain
146J4
60
429
299
$1,819,589
726,871
$101,088
40,382
$690
807
It will be seen from the above table that the cost of repairs of the second or moun¬
tain division of the canal was about 17 per cent, more than that of the first or Piedmont
division, which may readily be accounted for by the increased number of mechanical
structures on the mountain division, there being on the first division a lock for every 2$
miles, and a dam for every 16 miles, while on the second division there is a lock for
every 1.3 miles, and a dam for every 3^ miles.
But if we include the North River improvement the comparison is still more favorable
for the mountain division, as will be seen by the following table ;
JOQ' JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL"
Cost of repairs of James River and Kanawha Canal for eight years from 1861 to 1868.
Length;
miles.
Lockage;
feet.
Total cost for
8 years.
Average cost
per annum.
Cost per mile
per annum.
First division
146K
4'29
$1,111,367
$138,933
$948
Second division and North River im¬
69 K
437
5-9,669
66,208
*949
provement.
It will thus be seen that, for the last eight years the cost of repairs of the mountain
division has been about the same per mile as that of the Piedmont division, after adding
on to it 19| miles of what may be more strictly called mountain canal than any other
portion of the line, a canal that has a lock for every nine-tenths of a mile, and a dam
for every two miles, and an average fall of 9£ feet to the mile.
The stability of the North River Canal and the small cost of its repairs (only $356
per mile per annum for the last eight years), notwithstanding its imperfect construc¬
tion, is a standing reply to any objections that may be urged against the improvement
of the Greenbrier and New Rivers by locks and dams. The fall in the Greenbrier is
6.37 feet per mile, very nearly the same as that in the James from Lychburg to
Buchanan; there can, therefore, be hardly any reasonable objection raised to the im¬
provement of that river. The fall in New River averages 10.4 feet per mile or about
10 inches more per mile than that in North River. Is there anything, then, in the
characteristics of New River to render its improvement impracticable or even formi¬
dable ? We have seen that the North River, with nearly as much fall, and the James
River, through the heart of the Blue Ridge, with 3 feet more fall per mile, have been
successfully improved, and that these portions of the canal have cost less to maintain
them than any other part of the canal. Moreover, as already remarked, the character
of the work on the North River is inferior, the dams being built of dry rubble masonry.
It is intended to construct the locks and dams on the New River of the very best
description of mortared masonry, that will defy the invasion of the river, let it rage
never so high. I feel confident on that score from the long experience that I have had
in building dams, and from the improvement in their construction that have been
suggested and adopted, after much observation of the causes of the failure of some of
the stone dams on James River. These improvements consist chiefly in varying the
proportions of the dams without increasing their area of cross-section, or in giving them
less thickness at the bottom and more at the top, giving a double slope to the coping,
and protecting it with timber and plank. New dams, recently constructed on these
principles below the old dams, have, even when unfinished, stood such tests as I am sure
they never could be subjected to under any other circumstances.
New River runs chiefly through a wild, uncultivated country, its banks are rock-
bound and wooded, and consequently the ponds will not be so liable to be filled up by
deposits from the hillsides, as they would be if they were bounded by cultivated lands.
There need be no apprehension in regard to the extraordinary height of the freshets
in New River, because, after a fresh has passed a certain height, by the equalization of
the water above and below the dam, the danger begins to diminish, and there is really
no more danger to the dams in a very high fresh than in one of ordinary height, and the
double slope given to the combs of the dams will throw the water in its overfall so far
from the base as to prevent any danger of undermining the foundations.
It is my opinion that the work on the Greenbrier and New Rivers, if properly exe¬
cuted, will be the most permanent, and will cost less per mile to repair than any other
part of the line, except the Kanawha River,
Yery respectfully,
E. LORRAINE,
Engineer and Superintendent.
R. W. Hughes, Esq.,
Chairman of Sub-Committee to draught report.
♦The reason -why the average cost per mile appears to be so much greater during the last eight years
is, that for four years, or one-half the time, the cost is computed in confederate currency. For the
same reason, though in a less degree, the average annual cost of repairs in the first table is consider¬
ably increased. The average cost per mile for the ten years preceding 1861 was $483 on the first di¬
vision, and $506 on the second division
/ 4 t
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
101;
THE SUBJECT OF THE JAMES RIVER AN
IN THE CINCINNATI CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, AND APPROVED MARCH,
1870.
To the Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce :
It, perhaps, devolves upon your delegates to the National Board of Trade to call your
special attention to the action of that body in respect to the Jaoies River and Kanawha
Canal project, and submit some suggestions for your consideration which will bring
that important undertaking more prominently, not only before the business men of this,
city, but before the public at large.
The final action of the National Board of Trade was embodied in the following reso¬
lutions, which constitute the conclusions of a report upon the subject made by a special
committee of the board :
Resolutions adopted by the National Board of Trade, at the meeting held at Richmond,
Virginia, December, 1869.
Resolved, That cheap transportation for the products of the interior of the country
is not only a necessity, but is demanded by the highest considerations of public
policy.
Resolved, That to secure it, additional, direct and continuous lines of water com¬
munications are imperatively needed, and should be provided, between the Mississippi
River and the Atlantic seaboard, not only as a means of freightage, but in order that
requisite competition may be maintained between transportation lines.
Resolved, That as one of these means of water communications, the route to be af¬
forded by the James River and Kanawha Canal, if extended to the Ohio River, as pro¬
posed, has special prominence.
Resolved, That the work necessary for the completion of this canal, on the scale
deemed essential for its'great object, is demonstrated by eminent engineers to be prac¬
ticable of early completion and feasible.
Resolved, That such a work would be national in its character, and entitled to receive
national aid, to secure its completion at the earliest possible period.
Resolved, That in order that it shall inure to the best interests of the country, all
private and corporate proprietorship in it should be removed, (which removal should be
a condition precedent to the grant of aid by the General Government,) and when the
cost of construction, as represented by the outlay of the State of Virginia and of the
nation, shall be fully reimbursed, that the commerce conducted on the canal shall be
subjected only to such tolls as may be necessary for its repairs.
Resolved, That the executive council be directed to memorialize the Congress of the
United States in reference to the subject of extending aid by a loan of its credit, to
stand as a first lien on the work, to the James River and Kanawha Canal project, as
herein set forth, praying its consideration at an early day.
Resolved, That the executive council be directed to suggest in the memorial to Con¬
gress, that the prosecution of the work and the management of the property, when it
shall have been completed, be committed to a board of eleven trustees, one of whom
shall be appointed by the President of the United States, one by the State of Iowa,
one by the State of Missouri, one by the State of Arkansas, one by the State of Illinois,
one by the State of Indiana, one by the State of Kentucky, one by the State of Ohio,
one by the State of West Virginia, one by the State of Virginia, and one by the State
of Maryland ; and that the work be prosecuted under the direction of Government en¬
gineers.
The first introduction of this subject to the attention of our Chamber of Commerce
was through a memorial of the legislature of the State of Iowa, which contained these
words : "That the great want of that State is cheap transportation for its heavy pro¬
ducts to the markets of the world ; that the most feasible plan to secure this end is to
provide a direct and continuous line of water communication between the Mississippi
River and the Atlantic ocean, in a latitude favorable to the safe carriage of grain in
bulk, and yet comparatively free from obstructions by frostand "that such com¬
munication, they believe, could be secured most readily by the Ohio, Kanawha, and
James Rivers, to Norfolk, Virginia." And then, after submitting to the consideration
of Congress an array of facts and arguments demonstrating the vast importance, espe¬
cially to the West, of the proposed water line through Virginia, the memorial con¬
cludes as follows : "This is a work of great national importance ; its benefits will be
shared directly by more than half the people of this country, and indirectly by all. It
is a work to be done by the whole country for the benefit of the whole country—it be¬
longs to the Government of the United States. Nothing need be donated; an advance
upon good security for the return of principal and interest, is all that will be necessary.—
Memorial of the State of Iovca.
1027 £ ^ JAMBS RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
Not only will the advance be returned in kind with the interest, but the benefits of each
year will return the outlay more than five-fold. Instead of increasing our national bur¬
den of taxation, it will so increase the means of payment as to greatly lessen it."
The necessity of a convention of representatives from all the cities and States inter¬
ested was urged with great force. But before proceeding to ask a co-operative move¬
ment of the cities, towns, and States, as invited in said memorial, it was thought best
by the friends of this movement to obtain from an authoritative source a carefully
prepared and reliable statement setting forth the history, character, description, pro¬
gress, and condition of said improvement; its feasibility and capacity, with a compari¬
son in every respect with all other lines of communication to and from the West and
the seaboard, with respect to safety, quickness, regularity, and cheapness, with all the
other advantages to be derived from the completion of said water line, direct and inci¬
dental. To this request the James River and Kanawha Company have responded by
causing to be prepared and published a pamphlet, by a gentleman eminently qualified
for the task, setting forth an array of facts and arguments which must command atten¬
tion as to the proper development of the West especially, and to the prosperity of the
whole country, of the speedy completion of the proposed central water line, connect¬
ing the Atlantic with the Mississippi Valley. * * * * *
In this pamphlet is also embodied the report of E. Lorraine, chief engineer of the
company, a gentleman of high character and eminent in his profession. This report is
characterized by a candor and fairness of statement which does not pretend to conceal
the expenses, difficulties, and obstacles of the undertaking, but admits and meets them,
fairly and squarely, a fact commending it to the confidence of the public, both for its
scientific ability and for the integrity it displays. *****
The light thrown upon the history and character of this great enterprise, and of the
great benefits to flow from its completion to the whole country, and especially to the
great West, would seem to justify the strong language of the Iowa memorial, that it
will furnish a cheap and truly valuable line of transportation from the East to the
West, and besides the immense advantages to the commercial and manufacturing inter¬
ests of the East, will be a vast saving to the West in transportation alone.
LOCATION AND CHARACTER OF THE WORK.
The proposed water line through Virginia will connect the Ohio River from the mouth
of the Great Kanawha, 284 miles below Pittsburg, with the Atlantic seaboard, at or
near the mouth of the James River, by an aggregate distance of about 611 miles.
Commencing on the Ohio River, at the mouth of the Kanawha River, the first 90
miles of navigation is to be made by deepening the channel of the latter stream, where
necessary, so as to give a depth of six feet water at all times, and sufficiently wide for
steamers towing barges; thence 119 miles farther, ascending Kanawha, New, and Green¬
brier Rivers, by lock and dam ; the locks 200 feet long and 40 feet wide, and the depth
of water, both in the locks and in the channel, to be at all times 7 feet—this portion,
also, to be navigable for steamboats and barges, or canal-boats. Having reached the
point 208 miles from the Ohio, the canal proper commences, and continues through the
Alleghany Mountains to Richmond, about 275 miles, where it locks down into tide-water :
thence by the James River, about 125 miles, to Newport News, where, or at Norfolk,
or at some other place in that vicinity, ocean navigation will be reached.
The canal proper is to be 70 feet wide at the water line, 42 wide at the bottom, with
7 feet depth of water, and with locks 120 feet long and 20 feet wide, with capacity to
pass boats of 280 tons burden, or one-sixth greater capacity than the Erie Canal, as
enlarged.
The practical capacity of the canal proper, with its locks, will, it is claimed, exceed
fifteen millions of tons per annum. The balance of the water line will be of much
greater, and comparatively of unlimited capacity.
The distance from the waters of the Greenbrier River, running west from the point
where the canal leaves it, to the waters of the James River flowing east into the Atlan¬
tic, where the canal strikes that stream, is from 28£ to 33 miles, as the longer or shorter
route may be determined on. Reaching the waters of the James River at the eastern
base of the main ridge of the Alleghanies, the water line follows that stream to the
Atlantic sea-port, which, whether it be at Norfolk or Hampton Roads, will have the
best harbor and outlet on the Atlantic.
With this improvement completed, the commerce of the Missouri, the Mississippi,
and the Ohio Rivers, with their many tributaries, will have an excellent highway to the
sea in desirable competition with those now in existence.
Over the Northern water line it will always have the advantage of being free from
obstructions by frost for at least four months of every year, and at the time when most
needed.
In the language of the writer of the pamphlet referred to, "it offers a channel of nav¬
igation from the West to East shorter than any other, cheaper than any other, more ex¬
peditious, and more free from all obstructions arising from climate or a public enemy.
7211
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL, . 103
than all the rest. Its only rivals in capacity for western trade are the Mississippi and
Gulf route on the one hand, and the great Lake Erie and St. Lawrence route on the
other, both of which are circuitous, while this central one is direct. Both of the other
routes take American produce out of the Union, in transporting it from one part of the
Union to the other, subjecting it to the dangers of war; and while one subjects our
national products to the damaging effects of a semi-tropical climate, and the hazards of
gulf and coast navigation, the other renders it liable to be seized and held for months
by the ice, or wrecked and lost by the lake storms.
More than 25,000,000 tons of freight per annum, it is computed, now passes over the
various lines of transportation, back and forth, from west to east, and east to west,
which at a saving of only five dollars reduction per ton, will make an aggregate of one
hundred and twenty-five millions of dollars annually.
The increased facilities and greatly cheapened transportation to be secured by this
improvement will not only enure to the benefit of the great agricultural interest of the
West, but its advantages must be largely shared by the commercial and mining inter¬
ests of the whole country.
Besides the special advantage to the West, and the general benefit to the whole
country, in cheaper transportation of merchandise and produce, there is also an ad¬
vantage to result from its construction, from the character of the productions of the
country through which it passes, that can hardly be overestimated. It passes through
the heart of the Kanawha mineral region, which so richly abounds in iron, coal, salt, &c.
The value of the coal in this field would alone almost justify this work.
The pamphlet referred to says, concerning
THE GREAT KANAWHA COAL FIELDS
of West Virginia, that they are superior to those of Great Britain or Pennsylvania,
They are regarded by eminent geologists as the finest deposits of coal in the world.
The quality of the Kanawha cannel coal is equal to the best English cannel; the quality
of its bituminous coal is equal to the best found in Pennsylvania; and the Kanawha
splint coal for smelting iron ore is unsurpassed. The veins lie horizontally and vary
from three feet to fifteen feet in thickness ; and the aggregate thickness of the various
veins in some localities amounts to forty and even fifty feet of solid coal. A prominent
advantage claimed for the Kanawha coal fields over those near Pittsburg is that the
Kanawha coal fields contain as good bituminous coal as the best found in the Monon-
gahela and Youghiogheny, and in addition thereto large deposits of cannel coal, equal
in quality to the finest English cannel, none of which is found in the Monongahela coal
fields.
The cannel coal of the Kanawha region, reported to be fully equal in quality to the
best coals of England and Nova Scotia, is so valuable that even now, under the greatest
disadvantages, it is sent out of the Kanawha River to the Ohio, thence down through
the Ohio and Mississippi, by New Orleans and the Gulf, around to New York, and sold
at a profit, bringing about three times as much per ton as anthracite in that market.
But it is to the West, and especially to the Upper Mississippi and Missouri region,
that the greatest-benefit is to be derived. Vessels which have gone from the great rivers
of the West up into the Kanawha River freighted with produce for an eastern market,
will, when their cargoes are discharged into the canal-boats, be empty and wanting re¬
turn freight; this, the coal, the salt, the iron and the lumber of that region will give
them, and they will be able to bring back bituminous, splint and cannel coal, all of the
very best quality, and discharge along the great rivers.
HOW CAN THE WORK BE DONE?—HOW SHOULD IT BE DONE?
The company for the construction of this work have already expended twelve mil¬
lions of dollars. Their means are exhausted; they can do no more. They can only
offer their work as a basis of credit for the amount needed for its completion. By a
loan of Government bonds for the purpose, the work can be accomplished speedily.
SHALL THE GOVERNMENT DO THIS ?
The answer to this question should be determined by the assurance of the entire
practicability of the work. To ascertain this, a corps of Government engineers should
make a survey of the whole route. If their report confirms the statements herein made,
and fully establishes the feasibility of this work, at a cost not exceeding the benefits to
be derived, and the security of a first mortgage to the Government for a loan of bonds,
or an indorsement of the bonds of the canal company, be sufficient; then, in that event,
we feel that the request of the people of the West for the aid of the Government is
reasonable, and should be acceded to.
t Whereas the States of Virginia and West Virginia, and the James River and Ka¬
nawha Canal Company, represent that they are prepared to surrender their valuable
franchise in the James River and Kanawha Canal route, on condition that the Nationa*
Government will open the projected route from the Ohio River to tide-water ; and
JAMES RIVER AND KANAWHA CANAL.
Whereas the opening of this channel of communication with the Atlantic Ocean,
if demonstrated to be feasible, would afford another outlet to a market for the surplus
products of the West, and cheapen transportation through healthful competition with
other routes to the seaboard, and thus add to the home value of the cereals and other
industrial productions of the West: Therefore, be it
Resolved, That the governor of the State of Ohio be requested to call the attention
of the legislature of this State to this project, by special message, presenting the im-
portance of increased facilities of transportation to the seaboard, and requesting the
1 ^ legislature to memorialize Congress to order a thorough survey of the proposed canal
route by competent Government engineers, and the publication of their report as to its
yO practicability and probable cost; and that he be also requested to solicit, through official
correspondence, the co-operation of the governors and legislatures of the States of Ken-
tucky and Indiana in this movement for the survey of the proposed route by a corps of
Government engineers.
JOHN A. GANO,
JAMES F. TORRENCE,
THEO. COOK,
WM. HOOPER,
S. LESTER. TAYLOR,
Committee.