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“Loading Cotton on the
Alabama River”
Illustrated London News, May 4,
1861
Our Number of April 13
contained some Illustrations of the methods of
conveying cotton in India to the ports of shipment; and
we follow up the subject-of special interest at the
present time-by giving this week two companion
Engravings illustrating the singular manner in which
cotton-bales are sometimes taken on board steam-boats
in the Alabama River, in Alabama, one of the seven
Southern Confederate States of America. On the
Mississippi the bales are merely dragged and trundled
over a plank on board ship. But on the Alabama, the
banks of which are frequently high and steep, a more
dashing style of embarkation is adopted. Of our two
Engravings the first
represents the “shoot” in extenso, the
other the mouth, whence the cotton-bales are projected
on board the steam-boat. Mr. F. Bellew, the gentleman
to whom we are indebted for our illustrations, supplies
the following particulars of the manner in which cotton
is taken on board the steam-boats that ply on the
Alabama:-“It was on a dark night in February that
I jumped off the top of a high bank at Montgomery on to
the Magnolia steam-boat, then lying on the turgid bosom
of the Alabama River, waiting for passengers going to
Mobile. There were many passengers, and plenty of
negroes about, but apparently no officers. The superb
cabins were brilliantly lighted, and huge volumes of
smoke were careering out of the double funnels. Having
collected our luggage and seen an elderly clergyman
break his collarbone in attempting to leap on board, I
went to bed, slept, and awoke next morning to find
myself eighty miles down the river. Going on deck, I
was not a little surprised to observe our vessel in the
act of violating all reconceived notions of aquatic
law, by going head first into a partially-submerged
forest, crashing and breaking through the young trees
with high-pressure indifference: she was merely going
to the bank to ship a few bales of cotton, which being
done, she backed out and went on her way snorting,
every now and then repeating the operation like a big
duck seeking food among the sedges. Sometimes the
Magnolia would extract a feed of the staple from the
most unpromising jungle; at another time an open
clearing decorated with a pineshed and a few sleepy
[negros] would afford a meal. But the grand repast of
our painting vessel was to come. In a certain part of
the river, banked by wood-clad mountains, we suddenly
slackened our speed opposite a long shed running from
the water’s edge to the hill’s summit. The
planter, in order to get his produce from the height
above to the means of transport below, had constructed
an extensive slide, about three hundred and fifty feet
in length, and about four feet six inches wide, made of
longitudinal plans, with a raised guard on each side to
preserve the bales from slipping off in their descent.
Parallel to the slide ran a flight of steps, the whole
being covered over. Our vessel ran its nose boldly into
the shore; a wide gangboard was thrown to the foot of
the shoot, making a complete connection with our lower
deck, where the busy hands had already constructed a
species of barricade of cotton-bales to receive the
shock of their coming brother bale. And now the process
of loading commenced. At a given signal from below a
thousand-pound package of the staple was started at the
top of the slide, two hundred and fifty feet
perpendicular above the level of the water. Slowly it
moved at first, but, gaining momentum as it proceeded,
the pace quickened-quicker, quicker, quicker-till at
last it fell like a thunderbolt on the deck, knocking
the bales of the barricade in every direction. In one
moment a dozen black fellows, were upon the new
arrival, dragging it out of the way with instruments
resembling boothooks, or busying themselves with
reconstructing the barricade. The sable workmen having
scrambled to places of safety, and the signal
“All right!” given, another
thousand-pounder came thundering on deck, shaking our
big ship from stern to stern, till every beam and
rafter trembled to the uttermost end of its two hundred
and fifty feet of length. The effect was
absolutely terrific, and required some nerve merely to
contemplate. If a man gets in the way, as sometimes
happens, he is crushed like a fly under the hand of a
coalbeaver. However, no accident happened on the
present occasion. The Magnolia received her fifty
shocks, packed her cargo neatly round the boiler, and
steamed onward.”
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