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With the Selma & Meridian Railroad well under construction, the
next segment of the southern cross-Confederacy railroad line
needed to be addressed, the connection between Montgomery and
Selma, Alabama. The two cities were already connected by a
substantial river boat fleet on the Alabama River. A continuous
rail line would have saved the loading and unloading times,
would have been faster than the boats and could operate without
regard to the river level. |
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The connection did have drawbacks. First, the railroad that
wanted to construct the link was the Montgomery & West Point,
best known in Civil War history as the railroad that refused to
change their gauge to the 5-foot gauge of all the other
railroads in the deep South. Second was the shortage of labor
and rails to complete the work. |
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Montgomery & West Point Railroad President Charles T. Pollard
had intended to build this road as an extension of his existing
road, since he got this one chartered in 1854, with the
intention of capturing a significant portion of the Richmond to
Mississippi River through traffic. There is no reason to believe
that he intended to make this road in the 5-foot gauge or to
change the gauge of his present road. This would mean that the
transportation odd man would just grow larger and would be
unable to increase his stock of locomotives to handle the
additional forty-four miles of track. |
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Pollard’s intentions were published in a New Orleans newspaper
in early January, 1862. By the end of the month, he was writing
that he was attempting to contract out the road, with the
grading to be done by the end of 1862. Of course, he was short
of money and hoped he could get $100,000 from the Government to
enable him to buy the iron, provided he could find it. He
believed he could have the road completed by April 1, 1863,
except for the Alabama River bridge, which might take to the end
of that year. |
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Since wartime newspaper coverage from Montgomery is very
limited, there are no labor or supply advertisements to indicate
Pollard’s progress. In July, a letter from the Secretary of War
to Sam Tate, building the Selma & Meridian Railroad, mentioned
that the Alabama & Florida (of Florida) Railroad’s iron might be
needed for the Montgomery & Selma road. |
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There exists one advertisement of note – the November 26, 1862
Selma Morning Reporter carried an ad for 100 hands to
work on the road, between Selma and Benton (fifteen miles east
of Selma) at a pay of $1.25 per day. Three months’ employment
was offered, with pay weekly or monthly. The owners (of the
slaves, I believe) were to feed the hands and provide them a
shovel and a spade. It is usually noted that the river bottom
area where the road was to be built was swampy and not healthy
and procuring labor was probably very difficult. |
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Nothing else survives in the records until February, 1865, when
financial requirements for the new year were being discussed.
The Engineer Bureau and the War Department included the
Montgomery & Selma Railroad in the short list of construction
projects the government should pursue and assist. With the
required rebuilding of the roads in Georgia that had received
Sherman’s destructive visits, it is very unlikely that any
additional work was done before the end of the war. |
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The road was finished by Pollard a couple of years after the
war. |
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