Civil War Supply Lines, Then and Now

Start with a question. In the winter of 1864, Lee's army at Petersburg needed food and ammunition every day. Where did it come from, how did it travel, and what runs over the same ground now?

Almost all of it moved by rail. By 1865 the Confederate states had about 8,700 miles of railroad, and the Union and border states had about 24,000. This map draws every one of those miles and checks each one against the federal rail map of today.

Two routes out of the Carolinas carried much of the load to Virginia. The Wilmington line ran from the blockade-running port up the Wilmington and Weldon to Petersburg. The inland line ran from Charleston and Columbia to Charlotte, then on the North Carolina Railroad to Greensboro. In May 1864 the Piedmont Railroad closed the last gap, about forty miles to Danville, built with rails torn up from other lines.

Gauge mattered. The South Carolina lines were laid 5 feet apart and the North Carolina Railroad at 4 feet 8½ inches, so a car from Columbia could not roll onto the North Carolina Railroad at Charlotte. Color the map by gauge to see where cargo had to change cars.

The Union cut the lines one at a time. Warren's corps took the Petersburg Railroad at Globe Tavern in August 1864, and Confederates then hauled supplies 30 miles by wagon around the break. Fort Fisher fell on January 15, 1865, and Wilmington was sealed to blockade runners. Sherman's troops destroyed or damaged about 55 miles of railroad around Columbia in February. On April 2, 1865, Union troops took the South Side Railroad at Sutherland's Station, Lee's last supply line into Petersburg, and he left Petersburg and Richmond that night.

The Union drew on a network almost three times as large. By 1865 the Union and border states had about 24,800 miles of railroad, and about seven in ten of those miles carry trains today. Springfield Armory's output rose from 9,601 rifles in 1860 to 276,200 in 1864. The Continental Iron Works at Greenpoint launched the Monitor in 101 days. The Schuylkill Arsenal in Philadelphia employed up to 10,000 seamstresses and tailors outside its walls to make uniforms, tents and bedding. Cairo, Louisville and Nashville passed it all south to the armies.

The supply lines did not stop at the coast. Most of the arms sent to the Confederacy left from Liverpool, where Fraser, Trenholm and Company handled its shipping and finance. Cargo ships carried them to Bermuda and Nassau, and blockade runners made the last run in, 674 miles from Bermuda to Wilmington. The London Armoury Company shipped more than 70,000 rifles to the South. The Union bought abroad too, and imported 226,924 Lorenz rifles.

Most of that ground still carries freight. About four in five miles of the Confederacy's 1865 railroads lie under track in service today, and Norfolk Southern and CSX own most of it. The North Carolina Railroad between Goldsboro and Charlotte is almost entirely in service. Long stretches of the Wilmington and Manchester and the Greenville and Columbia are gone, and part of the South Side is a rail trail.