| From the Southern Confederacy (Atlanta,
Ga.) |
| |
| March 11, 1863 |
| |
| A Most Important Work |
| The following letter will
explain itself, and as it is on a subject of general interest, we take
the liberty of publishing it. |
| |
| Gen. Braxton Bragg, C. S. A. |
| |
| My Dear Sir, |
| Please accept the accompanying
maps, showing the connections which the Dalton & Jacksonville
Railroad (of which the Blue Mountain & Rome road is a part) will
make when completed. |
| I am aware that it is a
favorite enterprise with you, and that you will do all in your power
to expedite its completion. The Directors of the Ala. & Tenn. R.
R. {Alabama & Tennessee River RR}, at
their last meeting, placed this work in my charge, and after three
months delay, since Congress made the appropriation, I feel as though
the work should be pushed with the utmost dispatch. A few months, with
all the facilities that can be thrown upon the line, would complete
the work from Blue M/t to Rome, and open the communication between the
Railroads of the Northeast and Southwest of the Confederacy. There is
no heavy work on the line, and the whole amount of excavation to be
done, cannot exceed 250,000 cubic yards, scattered over sixty miles of
road, it being chiefly light embankment. |
| By the 22d of this month, we
want 500 hands upon the work, and by the 22d of June next, you and
your staff will be able to make a through trip, almost without a
change of cars, from New Orleans -- yes, New Orleans, to Richmond, in
sixty hours. |
| From New Orleans to Richmond
by way of Jacksonville and Rome, is 1200 miles; by way of Montgomery
and Kingston, 1440, and by Augusta and Wilmington, fourteen hundred
and eighty miles. |
| Meanwhile provisions and tools
must be provided, and properly disposed along the line. May I not,
with reasonable hope, ask you cooperation to enable us to carry out
this programme? I have this hope sir, knowing your zeal in the problem
of the day, and your ability to work it out. |
| There is an abundance of
provisions within reach, but they hang on high -- the holders
insisting on blockade prices. |
| Second -- The government has
an quantity of shovels, picks and wheelbarrows: and if I understand it
rightly, the breastworks system of fighting has been abandoned, and
the tools may be idle. |
| Third -- Again, for the sixty
miles of road we want 150,000 cross ties, and other timbers in
proportion. I have advertised we will pay thirty-five cents per stick,
for first class ties of oak, which in ordinary times would be a
remunerative price. The timber is on the rout and overlooking the road
bed for the most of the way, and we only lack a few men to take the
contracts, and lay the axe at the root of the trees. All these ties
can be let within ten days, if one man to the mile (hardly
a corporal's guard may be detailed for this service. I have assurances
to this effect, and how can sixty men be of more service to the
country than by securing the early completion of the Blue Mt. &
Rome Railroad. |
| Fourth -- There are saw mills
along the line, nearly all of which are shut down, because their
owners are away in the army, which would immediately go to work for
us, if the above suggestions are answered. This is a very quiet way of
doing the war -- but this would have been, and will yet be an
important arm of the service. |
| Allow me to express my
conviction that an early peace awaits us, and that a most triumphant
prosperity is in the future for the New Republic; and I am free to say
it is the boldness of your own and other hearts; together with the
blessings of Him, who doeth all things well, which has done so much to
achieve it. |
| I am respectfully, your &c, |
| Geo. Wadsworth |
| Chief Eng. Blue Mt. & Rome R. R. |
| Jacksonville, Ala., Feb. 6, 1863 |
|