We walk to Richmond with a dark blue wall
We carry stripes and stars in front of us, John Brown's body lies damp in the ground
But his soul calls us into battle!
Battle Anthem of the Republic, USA, 1861
Weapons from museums. It is generally accepted in our country that the southern states during the war between the North and the South were so poor and unhappy in technical terms that it is impossible to say something, since "all heavy industry was concentrated in the North." However, this is not so, or rather, not quite so. For example, in Richmond, Virginia, the city that was the capital of the Confederation, there was the Tredegar Iron Works, opened there in 1837. By 1860, it was the third largest of its kind in the United States. So during the Civil War there was someone there to produce metal, and artillery, and shells for the army. Another thing is that there was not enough metal itself. Moreover, when the city was to be occupied by the troops of the northerners in 1865, it escaped destruction and then successfully worked at the end of the 19th century and then in the first half of the 20th century, and even during both world wars. Well, today a museum is open in it. Here we must pay tribute to the Americans: they can make a museum out of everything, the main thing is that the object is old enough and has its own history. In addition, there is also the office of the famous national park - Richmond National Battlefield Park.
It is interesting that already in 1841, which is shortly after the opening, the owners of the plant put it under the management of a young (28-year-old) engineer Joseph Reed Anderson, who coped with this difficult task as well as possible. Moreover, he coped so well that by 1848 he became a co-owner of this enterprise and achieved that his plant began to receive orders from the federal government.
In addition, Anderson was very smart. The famous Scarlett O'Hara began to hire convicts to lower the cost of production of her sawmills, and he used the labor of slaves, and very efficiently. So, by 1861, almost half of the factory workers, and about 900 of them worked there, were slaves, including even the foremen! And back in 1860, a certain Robert Archer, a relative of Anderson, also took part in this business, invested his own funds in the plant and became one of the largest metal producers in the United States. And for KSA this enterprise was definitely the largest.
It is interesting that this enterprise produced a variety of artillery pieces. So, in the documents for the supply of the army appear 6-pound bronze rifled guns and 12-pound bronze smooth-bore howitzers. Moreover, the guns were sold … by weight, at a price of 55 cents per pound. Again, if you look at the documents, it turns out to be quite an interesting thing: while the weight of the howitzers is within tolerance, the 6-pound rifled cannons weighed forty pounds more than the regulations required.
In the United States, there is a national register of surviving artillery pieces from the Civil War, which records all the guns that have survived to this day, their locations and the numbers and brands that have survived on them. It was possible to find out that the Tredegar plant throughout the war supplied the southern armies with a wide variety of artillery pieces, primarily 3-inch iron field guns, and 6-pounder rifled bronze cannons, and smooth-bore guns.
Another enterprise that produced artillery pieces for the army of the southern states was the Noble Brothers factory from Rome, Georgia - Noble Brothers Foundry. This foundry was built by James Noble Sr. and his six sons (William, James Jr., Stephen, George, Samuel, and John) in about 1855. Around the same time, the brothers ordered a huge lathe from Pennsylvania. And it was so large that it was first taken first by steamer to Mobile, Alabama, from where it was transported by river boat up the Kusa River to the first waterfall. Here it was dismantled, and already on carts delivered by carts to an enterprise in Rome.
The foundry manufactured ship steam engines, steam boilers and steam locomotives. In 1857, the foundry produced the first locomotive for the Roman Railroad, the first steam locomotive to be built south of Richmond. In 1861, the Confederate government ordered a foundry to produce cannons and other war materials.
In 1862, in Cedar Bluff, a neighboring town to Rome, the brothers built a blast furnace in order to have their own metal on hand. The Noble Brothers' enterprise produced mainly copies of the Parrott cannons in caliber 10 and 20 pounds, which from here were distributed throughout the batteries of the armies of the South. The importance of the southerners to this production is evidenced by the fact that all six Noble brothers were exempted from conscription. Confederate President Jefferson Davis put it this way: "… six Noble brothers are exempt from the draft, because we have many people who can fight, but few who can make cannons." True, the production of guns in 1864 was suspended here due to claims to their quality.
In November 1864, Union troops burned down the Noble brothers' factory, and on their wonderful lathe (and it has survived to this day!) At a height of 10 feet, traces of the sledgehammers with which the northerners tried to destroy it are still visible. But … none of this came of it. The massive machine had a steam drive, then electric and worked … almost until the mid-1960s!
The city of Macon also had an iron factory, which the Southerners began to use as an arsenal and produce ammunition there, as well as the 6- and 12-pounder Napoleon and Parrot guns. It functioned until April 1865, when it was destroyed during a raid by General James Wilson. In total, about 90 guns of various calibers were produced here.
In total, the Noble brothers' enterprise produced about 60 cannons for the Confederation, 24 of which were 3-inch iron cannons, which very clearly shows the problems with production among the southerners. Yes, they could make both weapons and ammunition, but they simply did not have enough raw materials for this!
In the spring of 1862, the Memphis-based firm Quinby & Robinson also set out to become a major cannon manufacturer for the Confederation. The firm began manufacturing weapons in April and ended up supplying nearly 80 guns to the Confederation. These were mainly 6- and 12-pounder field howitzers, and the company became one of the first manufacturers of "Napoleonic" guns for the Confederate army. And in February of that year, Major William Richardson Hunt approved the receipt of more than $ 2,500 of ammunition from the company. But this enterprise also lacked metal. It got to the point that rifled bronze guns with worn out cutting were simply melted into smooth-bore "Napoleons" in order to have at least some tools.
It should also be remembered about the enterprise A. B. Reading & Brother from Vicksburg, Mississippi. There, businessman Abram Brich Reading, along with his brother, set up a foundry and an engineering plant by the river. The firm produced boilers and steam engines for steamers and machine tools for light industry. Shortly after the outbreak of the war, the company switched to military products. But later that year, the firm leased most of its equipment to an arsenal in Atlanta and stopped making its own cannons. However, between December 1861 and May 1862, the company produced 45 guns with its own markings. They were all bronze field 6-pound, 12-pound and 3-inch rifled guns. Moreover, at least fourteen were delivered 3-inch.
Some of the guns that the North and South have inherited since pre-war times have not been modernized due to their specificity. We are talking about 12-pounder mountain howitzers, which had a bronze barrel and arranged so that they could be transported both on a gun carriage and in packs, which, in fact (and also weighing!), Mountain guns and howitzers differ from all others.
Well, some artillery pieces ended up in the States by accident. This is how, for example, an Austrian 3, 75-inch rifled howitzer fell on American soil. A plaque attached to its plinth states that it is an "Austrian 6-pound rifled howitzer" and that it was captured on the Columbia on August 3, 1862. The Columbia was a 500-ton steamer and was a typical blockade-breaker vessel of that time. She was captured by the northerners after a six-hour chase at sea 75 miles north of the Bahamas island of Abasco.
The vessel was loaded with ammunition, rifles, iron, blankets and other supplies and weapons, including two brass 24-pound rifled guns. One of them bears the inscription: "Vienna 1852", on the other - "Vienna 1854". The guns have survived, and although their barrels are clogged with wooden plugs, it can be seen that the rifling on them is deeper than that used in the United States, but the design of the barrels is more traditional. So the captains (breakers of the blockade) from the northerners like Rhett Butler from Gone with the Wind carried not only ribbons and laces to the southern ladies, but also brought serious help to the CSA, delivering the materials and even weapons it needed in exchange for the cotton of the South.
