BLUE RIDGE RAILROAD.
OF HIS EXCELLENCY
ROBERT K. SCOTT,
GOVERNOR OF THE STATE,
TO THE
GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF SOUTH CAROLINA.
COL UMBIA, S. C.:
J OH N  W. D EN N Y   STATE'R INTE R.
1868.








BLUE RIDGE RAILROAD.
GOVERNOR'S MESSAGE.
G(entlemen of the Senate card  iozuse of Representatives:
In nmy Inaugural Message, I expressed the intention of submitting to
your honorable body a plan for the early completionl of the Blue Ridge
Railroad.  In accordance therewith, I now invite your earnest consideration of the subject, and invoke such action by you as shall speedily achieve
this great result.
For more than forty years the importance of uniting the West with the
South Atlantic Coast has been urged by the leading intellects of the country;
and many of the railroads constructed during that period, on both sides of
the mountains, have been built with a view to their direct or tributary connection with this great national highway.  Roads from  Branchville to
Columbia, from Columbia to Greenville, Abbeville and Anderson, from
Columbia to Spartanburg, from  Columbia to Charlotte, and from Charlotte
to Statesville, Morganton and Asheville, and the several roads extending
firom Cincinnati and Louisville towards Knoxville, and from Knoxville
towards the Blue Ridge, are all but the off.shoots of this great enterprise.
Even as early as 1836, when delegates from nine States assembled in a
railroad convention at Knoxville, it was declared to be the most magnificent and important public work projected in our country.
After mature deliberation, and a critical survey by the most distinguished
engineers, it was decided to locate the route between Anderson, S. 0., and
Knoxville, Tenn., the distance being only 195 miles. The total cost of the
undertaking, it was estimated by Col. Gwin, the Chief Engineer in 1860,
would not exceed $7,575,677. The work was commenced under the most
favorable auspices, and energetically pressed forward until 1860, when operations were suspended by the war. At this time thirty-four miles of the
road had been completed and were in running order. Much of the grading
and masonry in the retraining territory of South Carolina, Georgia and
North Carolina was also finished, so that the work may now be said to be
more than half completed. In this connection it is proper to state that the
grading in South Carolina alone is nearly equal to the whole grading in North




Carolina and Tennessee; the bridge and arch masonry in South Carolina is
near y equal to all the bridge and arch masonry of the remainder of the
road; while the tunnels in South Carolina exceed nearly all the tunnelling
on the rest of the line.
The suui expended upon this gigantic work is $3,287,258 —about half the
estimated cost of the whole road, and there has been incurred a debt of
only two hundred and thirty thousand dollars, beside interest, which is secured by an issue of first mIortgage bonds.  The State has subscribed and
paid in State bonds $1,310,000. The city of Charleston has subscribed and
paid in City Scrip $1,049,000; so that the State and city are interested in
the fortunes of the road to the amount of about $3,000,000   This estimate
includes unpaid interest which has accrued upon the bonds. The Railroad
Company likewise own 70,000 acres of land, and have the promise, from
citizens living along the route, of 300,000 acres more as soon as the work is
-resumed. This land will, on its completion, become very valuable.  Is it
wise financial policy for the State, by withholding the further aid required,
to hazard a sale of the assets of the road by the trustees under the first
mortgage bonds, and permit some rival enterprise to enjoy the benefit so
nearly within our reach?
The advantages of the Blue Ridge Road over any other that has been
projected are manifest.
1st. It is the shortest line through the mountains from the Seaboard to
the Ohio River. It must therefore always command both trade and travel.
The great West exrorts corn, wheat, flour, bacon, lard, tobacco, whiskey,
lime, salt, mules and cattle. These find an outlet through New York and
Baltimore on the one side, and Mobile and New Orleans on the other. At
the present time bacon may be found in Anderson which was shipped from
Cincinnati to Wheeling, thence to Baltimore, thence to Cbarleston, and
thence to the interior-a distance of more than fifteen hundred:miles.
Were the Blue Ridge Railroad completed, the distance from Anderson to
Knoxville would be only one hundred and ninety-five miles, and from Knoxville to Cincinnati less than three hundred miles, making a total of four hundred and ninety-five miles, and saving in travel and expense one thousand
miles.  To illustrate this item of expense, corn which in Columbia before
the war cost one dollar a bushel, could be bought just across the mountains
in Tennessee for twenty cents.
2d. During the winter months, Northern roads are frequently obstructed
by snow, and business is seriously interrupted. At no time is such a casualty likely to occur in the softer climate of these Southern States. Our
ports will always be an outlet through which the West can supply the markets of the world, and receive in return not only the wealth of distant peoples, but the rice and cotton of our own fertile fields. Terminating, as the
road will, upon our coast at Charleston and Port Royal, it has a further ma



terial advantage over those lines which terminate upon the Gulof  NMexlco
Here the freighted ship wmay proceed direct to sea.  There she must round
the capes of Florida, and encounter the increased difficulties and dangers of
navigation, consuming time, and swelling the cost of transportation and in.
suran ce.
3d. The Blue Ridge Railroad passes through a country rich in resources
of every kind.  The soil is of unequalled fertility and adapted to nearly all
profitable species of agriculture.  Gold, silver, iron, coal and copper lines
abound, and only wait to be tapped by the hand of industry to add their
vast stores to the wealth of the nation.  Employment may thus be furnished to thousands of sturdy laborers from every portion of Christendom;
emigration will be encouraged; hitherto unsettled country will be opened
to enterprise; our water courses will be peopled; manufactories will rear
their pleasant shapes; villages will expand into towns and towns into cities;
business will thrive and its pursuits become wIore diversified; and, in short,
the whole State will feel the pulses of a new life throbbing through this
great artery of trade.
4th. The Blue Ridge Railroad will be the feeder of every other Railroad
in South Carolina, and a large and remunerative local business must supersede the present stagnation.  Charleston and Columbia, as commercial centres of the State, are not only to be benefitted, but Port Royal with its
best harbor on the Atlantic coast between Pensacola and the Chesapeake,
must become a railroad centre from which imports will be distributed to the
North, West and South, a harbor wherein ships will likewise be gathered from
every quarter of the world, to receive at that terminus of this great higlhway
the freight which the West and South would exchange for the products of
the old world, and the East and West Indies. It is well known to commercial men that during the winter season, the price of transportation to points
north of Cape Hatteras is nearly double that paid on shipments to Southern
ports.
5th. The building of the Blue Ridge Railroad is of vast military and political importance to the Union.  Aside from  the sympathy naturally existing
between agricultural sections like the West and the South, and strengthened
as it must be by all the ties of trade, the necessity of a great air line across
the Continent in this direction, with Charleston and Port Royal for its objective points, is too great to be ignored by the General Governmlent, and I
feel confident that Congress will give its earnest consideration to an enterprise which[may add so much to the military and postal facilities of the
country.  Such a Western connection across the mountains has always been
regarded as a political and military necessity, scarcely less important than
the commercial wealth and prosperity that would result from the construction of the road.
This was the view taken even during the administration of Mr. Monroe,




6
when his Secretary of War had a survey made through the identical gap in
the mountains through which the Blue Ridge Railroad will pass, with the
intention of cutting a canal between the head waters of the Savannah and
Tennessee Rivers, before the day of Railroads.
In the event of a foreign war it would be of vital importance to the Government to have a naval station at Port Royal, where there is depth of water
and room abundant to float the largest fleets of the world. From this point
to Cincinnati is almost an air line, and the shortest route to the great heart
of the nation.
Such are some of the benefits which must accrue to the State and country
from the construction of this great thoroughfare.  Upon you, as legislators,
depends the completion of the work. You may render aid which in sixty
or ninety days will permit operations upon the road to be resumed, and once
resumed, we may confidently look for encouragement to the capitalists of
the country, if not to the public treasury itself. But whatever is done by
you should be done promptly.. Georgia and North Carolina are surrounding
us with a network of railroads, the object of which is to divert both trade
and travel from our midst. They are our competitors for Western commerce,
and it we are idle they will succeed. Virginia has loaned her credit to
encourage railroad enterprises to the extent of $12,000,000; Georgia has
expended more than $5,009,000 upon her State Road alone; North Carolina nine millions, and Tennessee, to concentrate trade within her borders,
has granted near thirty millions of dollars in guarantee of the bonds of marious railroads. South Carolina has also been liberal in the past; and yet
with all her liberality her credit has been so sacredly guarded, that her
bonded debt at this time (exclusive of the war debt) amounts to only
$5,407,215. The interest in arrears and due on this sum on the 1st of
January, 1869, will be only $564,136. This is exclusive of the Bills Receivable authorized by the Act of 1865, not more than $300,000 of which
are likely to go into general circulation. To meet these liabilities of the
State, namely the accumulated interest, and to redeems the Bills Receivable,
the ]legislature has authorized a loan of $1,500,000. It will thus be seen
that the total bonded debt of the State on the 1st of January next, after the
payment of interest due, and the redemption of the Bills Receivable —assuming that the loan of 1,500,000 recently authorized is all put upon the
market, which is not likely to be the case —will be the comparatively small
sum of $6,907,215.
With a basis of $300,000,000 in real and personal property, subject to
taxation, it is evident that with an assessment of only three mills upon the
ddllar, the interest annually accruing upon the above debt, together with
the current expenses qf the State, may be promptly met.  When it is remembered that new and valuable enterprises are being developed-that capital




7
ists from the North and West are seeking profitable investments in South
Carolina; that our lands are being cultivated under an improved system of
agriculture which promises to yield more abundant results than heretofore;
that the recent discovery of phosphate beds along the coast has opened a
new mine of wealth which has already enhanced the value of surrounding
property; that an industrious and laboring population are preparing to come
hither from various portions of the country, bringing new strength and
energy; that manufacturers from the North are turning their attention to the
magnificent water power which abounds in almost every portion of the
State, and to the extraordinary facilities whereby cotton is manufactured
fifteen per cent cheaper than at the North; that new railroads are being
projected and there is promise of increased facilities for trade; that the
completion of this Blue Ridge Railroad will of itself, open a channel of
wealth, the grand results of which no human being can fully estimate-when
all these facts are brought into review, we cannot but look with hopeful eyes
upon the future; and realize that South Carolina sets forth in her race of
progress with advantages superior to those of any of her sister Southern
States.
Having thus described the character of the road, its importance to every
interest in the State and country, and made an exhibit of the Anancial condition of the State, and its resources, which demonstrate your ability to
grant further aid to the undertaking, I now invite your attention to the
plan which I have to suggest as the most feasible, as the one which promises
the speediest results; and which will secure the sympathy and practical cooperation of those capitalists of the West, who are as deeply interested in the
construction of the road as the people of South Carolina.  I am  confident
that to effect this latter result it is only necessary to show that we are in
earnest ourselves, and determined to complete the road in the shortest time
that energy and skill can perform the work.
1st. It is essential that the Legislature shall remove the restriction imposed upon the company by the Act of 1854, which required the production of proof to the Governor of such subscriptions or aid granted in the
States of North Carolina and Tennessee, as to give reasonable assurance of
the completion of the road. These promises of aid were based upon a contract by contractors, but as the latter failed to comply with the terms of
their contract, South Carolina withheld her guarantee of any of the bonds
of the company.
2d. With the removal of this restriction, the State should pass an Act
guaranteeing the bonds of the company to the amount of one million of dollars, and authorizing the President to hypothecate or dispose of said bonds
in such manner as is best calculated to secure the immediate resumption of
the undertaking.




The engineer, Col. Gwin, states that the entire turnnelling can be completed
in one year.  Three-fourths of this work has already been finished, and
there is no reason why the remainder may not be completed within the time
above specified.  The rolling stock can then be put upon the road.  In less
than one year and a half from  this time, therefore, we may have the satisfaction of seeing a through train from the Ohio river to Charleston, and a
union between two sections of' our country, which practically have been to
each other as strangers.
Reference has already been made to the importance of this road in a military point of view. Many leading public men have recently urged its construction on this ground, and there is no doubt that Congress is prepared to
lend a willing ear to any reasonable proposition which may promise to result in the attainment of so valuable an object.
I therefore respectfully suggest that your honorable body shall request the
Senators and Representatives of the State in Congress, to lay this subject
before that body at the earliest practicable moment, to the end that the
General Government may  be induced to  render such  assistance to
the road as its importance in a military point of view may justify.  This as
sistance may be granted without hazard.
Bonds of the road, endorsed by the State, may be deposited in the United
States Public Treasury, and their equivalent in'he United States currency
be issued to the road, which will thus be put in possession of an active working capital.  Every dollar expended upon the road will then increase the
value to the General Government of the security. And, finally, when the
road is completed, the Government will have a lien utpon property worth
nearly eight millions of dollars, for which it has really advanced less than
half that amount, while the State will have derived the advantage of a cornplete road without having been compelled to pay interest on the bonds issued.  In a few years the vast business done upon the line will enable the
company t) pay all of its indebtedness.
This subject is one of the gravest with which we have to deal, because it
largely involves the material interests of the State, and promises to contribute more to their future development, than any other public enterterprise that can be suggested.
I submit these considerations to your honorable body, in that spirit of
earnestness which I trust will find a response in your early action.
Accompanying this message, is a memorial addressed to the Executive
of the State, by the President of the Blue Ridge Railroad, and a report on
the condition and prospects of the company prepared by the same officer, to
both of which I respectfully ask your attention.
Very respectfully,
ROBERT K. SCOTT,
Governor of South Carolina.