| Annual Report of the North East & South
West Alabama RR |
| as of December 13, 1860, |
| President's Report |
| |
|
{This clearly a draft, with many
mark outs and corrections. It is unknown if the meeting took place and
whether this version of the draft was published as seen below} |
| |
| Tuscaloosa, December 13, 1860 |
| |
| Report of the President and Directors of
the North East & South West Alabama Railroad Company to the 7th annual
meeting of the Stockholders of said Company: |
| |
| Gentlemen, |
|
Before entering upon a statement of the measures of the
Company that have transpired since your last annual meeting it is
necessary that you should be definitely advised of the line of
policy pursued by the Board without which its separate acts
separately reviewed cannot be properly understood. We presume that
from the organization of the Company up to the present time it has
not escaped any intelligent observer who has compared the available
means of the Company with the ultimate cost of construction of the
road that at a period as early as practicable and long before any
considerable portion of the work could be completed the Company must
attain a point at which its credit could be made available for
construction The case is even stranger than this as we may safely
assert that in order to complete any portion of our road it was
indispensible that the Company should build up a credit commensurate
with the demands of the entire structure We desire therefore to
state with emphasis that since your last annual meeting every
distinctive measure of the Board has been directed solely to this
attainment of this requisite credit in so much that if asked to
state the object of any movement connected with the road which we
have made during the past year who would unhesitatingly answer it
was to obtain a credit for the Company that would build its road. |
| To fulfill all the demands of
this imperious law of our action so as to negotiate bonds at a figure
that would secure our success it was necessary: |
| First -- that we should be able to exhibit
the obligations of responsible contractors to construct our entire
roadbed furnish the cross ties lay down the rail and be actually engaged
in executing the heavy work on the line. Secondly -- that we should
actually make a purchase of rails and rolling stock sufficient to put
the road in operation from Meridian to the Bigbee or Warrior Rivers.
Thirdly that we should procure certificates to the lands donated to the
Company so as to make them available whenever advantageous rates could
be made. Fourthly -- that we should secure the ?presment load from the
State under any terms the Governor might require however stringent. For
the consummation of these objects the Board has balanced assiduously the
past year under the firm belief that if successful they would elevate the
credit of the Company to a point that would place the progress and
speedy completion of our enterprise above and beyond all the exigencies
of ordinary times. |
| With what success we have
thus labored remains to be stated. The Governor of our State under the
discretionary powers conferred on him by the Legislature required, as
you are all aware, ample personal security to be executed for the ?presment
loan and after an arduous effort his requisition was complied with and the Company now holds his written admission that the requisite security
has been filed in the proper state department and his promise to pay out
the amount of the loan to Company as soon as the State Treasury is in
funds which will be early in March as we are informed by His Excellency. |
|
On filing the security for this loan the Company used as
part of it, eighty five North Carolina 6 percent bonds fifty five of
which have been sold, and fifty thousand eight hundred and seventy
one 08/100 Dollars of the proceeds have gone into the treasury of
the Company. The balance of proceeds of the fifty five has not yet
been reported by our broker in New York. The certificates of the
General Government for our donated lands after long and serious
delays were obtained in July last. |
|
Since your last annual meeting we have closed a contract
with Messrs Scotts and Adams from Virginia to prepare the entire
road bed (including cross ties) for tracklaying excepting six miles
heretofore let to Ivis contractors who has forfeited his contract
seven hundred thousand dollars of the cost of which is to be paid in
the bonds of the Company at par value. We have also closed a
contract with the same parties to lay down the rails on the entire
line for the bonds of the Company at par value making a sum
exceeding nine hundred thousand of the cost of this stupendous work
that will be taken by our contractors in bonds. |
|
Our agent F B Diam of Lynchburg Va has closed a contract
with a Pennsylvania Company for six thousand tons of American iron
rails, at forty three dollars per ton at the mills to be paid for on
delivery one half in cash out of our ?presemnt loan and the other
half in the notes of the Company running six twelve and eighteen
months secured by the bonds of the Company to be held as collateral
security. We are also advised by Mr Diam that he has made an
arrangement to procure fasteners or chairs spikes and rolling stock
to be delivered as needed and all to be paid for in the bonds of the
Company. You will therefore perceive that within the last year the
Board has accomplished even more than was deemed necessary to put
the credit of the Company upon a footing which in the ordinary
course of events would be absolutely reliable and available for any
arrangement of means necessary to carry the work rapidly to
completion and if it were now the ??? of 1859 instead of 1860 no one
will doubt that we have placed the Company in a position to go
forward with work without difficulty or delay. We venture to assert
that in the history of rail roads there has never before been a time
when a company that could pass at par value more than nine hundred
thousand dollars of its bonds to contractors has found its credit
unavailable for any mount of money necessary to meet its legitimate
demands. But while we were engaged in the weary work of achieving
these necessary conditions of success a political revolution was
brewing that we did not and could not anticipate, and just a we had
closed on these contracts for iron and equipment and got our bonds
ready to put upon the market it burst upon the Country with
disastrous results to all material interests. You are no doubt fully
advised of its ravages. Commercial confidence is gone large
commercial houses have failed the banks of the Atlantic States have
suspended payment. Securities of all descriptions are prostrated and
the credit of the Company for which we have so long and arduously
labored is for the present at least involved in the prevailing
mistrust of all credits. |
|
You perceive then that for the last twelve months the
Board has concentrated all its efforts and staked the chances of our
enterprise upon the attainment of a credit that would enable us by
the 1st November last to realize upon our bonds adequate funds for
all purposes and we think you will concur with us in the opinion
that if we had not been overtaken by the revolution referred to we
would have triumphed to the extent of our highest expectations.
Having said this much in reference to the general measures and
policy of the present Board we proceed to present briefly the
int??on financial condition of the Company, referring you to the
reports of the engineer herewith submitted for an accurate statement
of the condition of its work. |
|
Our treasury is now without funds and as we have seen
that in times like these we cannot realize money on our bonds there
is no prospect of our being able to replenish it until credits
generally resume their former footing. The treasurer of the Company
reports to the October meeting of the Board, stock past due from
responsible subscribers, in round numbers, two hundred and thirty
thousand dollars, and we still hold thirty four thousand dollars in
bonds issued by the City of Tuscaloosa. Between forty and fifty
thousand dollars of this outstanding stock is due from subscribers
in Jefferson County and by the terms of the subscriptions can only
be used to construct the road in that county. The balance is due
from subscribers in other counties who are in default and would all
have been sent last fall but for the fact that most of the courts
having jurisdiction of the cases were held by a judge who is a
stockholder in the Company and thereby prevented from presiding in
suits against stockholders These defaulting subscribers out of
Jefferson Co will no doubt have to be sued to the ensuing spring
courts in which event the amounts cannot come into our treasury
before the fall of 1861. |
|
Before this adverse change in the value of credits we had
assurances that at the close of the present year we would be able to
dispose of the City bonds mentioned above to one party on very
favorable terms but the prevailing distrust and depreciation of
every class of securities has swept away every prospect of such a
negotiation. |
|
The Secretary of the Company reports amount due to
contractors on the first of the present months Eighty thousand four
hundred and eighty three {rest of document is
missing} |