Weekly Atlanta intelligencer. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1865-18??, November 17, 1869, Image 1

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Newspaper Page Text“ ERROR CEA8>£8 TO Bfe DANRKROCF WED Ig LSFT TREE TO COJtBAT it ” Jsftrum VOL. XXI. VTLWTA OEORGTA WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 17 1869 NO. 48 REPORT Of Rev. C. W. Howard to Col. E. R'lCbert, Superintendent Western & Atlantic Railroad, m ^ Coal, Iron and OH formation* of Worthiest Georgia. W. A A. R., Superintendent’s Office, ) Atlanta, Ga., September 3, 1869. S Jteo. C. W. Howard, Hingston, Ga.: Sir ;—Impressed with the conviction that valuable deposits of coal exist on, or not far from, the line of tho W. A A. R. R-, and believing it to be of vital importance to the Hoad and peo ple of Georgia to be assured ot the fact, if it be so, that the business of the Road may be augmented and the development of other great interests facilitated, I hereby authorize and empower you to make a general preliminary exploration of the portion of the territory of Georgia between the W.AA.R. lo an'd the State of Alabama and Tennessee, north of R* me, Ga., with a view to testing whether or not coal exists there. Although the information sought is of great importance, it is desirable that the time employed should bo as short, and the trip as inexpensive as possible. Hoping and believing your search will be successful, and wishing you a pleasant and instruc tive tour, I am Tours respectfully. K IIULBERT, Supt. W. A. A. R R. Kingston, October 25, 1869. Col. E. Halbert, Sup't W. A A. Railroad. Sib:—Under your direction, I have made a general exami nation of the coal and iron beds of Northwestern Georgia, including Chattooga and Walker counties; also of the oil indi cations of those counties, including a portion of Floyd county. As to the report of my trip, which I now make, I beg to say that I do not pretend to a scientific knowledge of geology and mineralogy. My knowledge of those subjects is that of a care ful general reader. My report, therefore, will not be a scien tific one, but will give the result of my observations, chiefly on the surface, as to coal, iron and oil in the counties referred to. T. thought it best to begin near the North and Northwest Georgia lines bordering on Tennessee and Alabama. I ascended Lookout Mountain at Cooper’s Gap, between fifteen and twenty miles west of Ringgold, on the Western A Atlantic Railroad, Lookout Mountain at this point is between five and six miles broad. About midway of the mountain and on the top, there ris«-s a comparatively small mountain, which is called Round Mountain. This elevation is 300 or 40Q feet high above the general surface of Lookout. It is about two miles in diameter at its base, about six miles in circumference. I found coal crop ping out at ten diflerent places around the base of the mountain. Three different seams show themselves at diflerent elevations., ’These seams vary in thickness from twenty-four to forty inches, but always increase in depth aa they are opened. The ooal is of excellent quality, very free from sulphur, and burning freely on a wood lire. Seventeen different blacksmith shops in the valley are now using this ooaL The -smiths pro nounce it to be better than any of the Tennessee coal which they have used for their purposes. It is free from slate, and, leaves but little ashes. They find no difficulty in working steel with it. The quantity of coal in this locality must be enormous. The seams are horizontal and the opportunity for drainage admirable. The bed now mostly worked was discovered in a gully in a field. There arc about three feet of earth above it. The coal is merely uncovered and thrown out for -sale. It is •old in small quantities tu the blacksmiths st the mine, at 12 cents per bushel. Round Mountain and vicinity can supply the coal wants of Georgia for an indefinite^ period., It is fit-, teen miles from LaFayette and about the same distancei from Chattanooga, to which place they are now hauling hemlock bark in large quantity lor tanning. It (Round Mountain) is about two and a half miles from the brow of Lookout on both sides, and is distant from Trenton, on the Alabama A Chattanoga, Railroad, five miles. Chalybeate springs of excellent quality are found in connection with every seam. The views from the eastern brow are magniffoeut. On the west they are less striking, as the mountains which are visible are ridges presenting no peaks. Opposite to Trenton there is a huge chasm, perhaps a half mile wide at its mouth, running back more than a mile into the mountain. The perpendioular rooks on both sides are between one and two thousand feet high. It is a fearfully grand spec-, facie. This portion of Lookout Mountain has a considerable popu lation, one militia district entirely on top of mountain casting one hundred and eighty votes. This population is destitute of enterprise, like onr mountaineers generally, but.is quiet and orderly. At the base of Lookout Mountain, in McLemore’s cove, there are very large beds of fossiiiferous iron ore of excellent* quality, sufficient to supply a number of furnaces. At Dug Gap in Pigeon Mountain, bounding the cove on the South, there oocurs a large quantity ot shale. Some years since the papers contained an account of a volcano in Walker couuty, which occasioned great alarm to the inhabitants. This shale had been thrown out in digging the gap, and some logs had been piled upon it. The woods being on fire, the flames were communicated to the dry logs, and from these to the loose shale, which continued to burn until it was exhausted. Hence the story of the volcano. The strongly bituminous character of this shale indi cates oil beneath it. These indications occur repeatedly IN TUE COVE, AT THE FOOT OF LOOKOUT AND PlGKON MoUN- Besides the mineral products of this cove and the adjacent mountains, few persons have a correct idea of the extent and agricultural value of this magnificent body of land. It is large euough for a respectable county, being about twent-ffive miles in length, and averaging perhaps eight to ten miles in breadth. W ith the exception of a few ridges, it is an aitnost unbroken body of arable land, of great fertility. Tiie chief market of this cove is now Chattanooga. It should be found m our own State. Besides, the middle of this cove is about ten miles from the Alabama A Chattanooga Railroad. The Lookout Mountain sinks so low at a certain j»oint that it will be attended with small expense, comparatively, to dig out a road from, the cove to that railroad. It is a question of politi cal economy whether it will not be worth a serious outlay by the tState to saoe these products of Georgia to Georgia. I omitted at the proper place to speak of the excellent fire clay-which is found in connection with the coal at Round Moun tain on Lookout. 1 submit a specimen, together with speci mens of coal from the mountain, and iron ore from the cove. Pigeon Mountaiu, which, for a number of miles, is quite as high as Lookout, is a kiud of offset from the latter—Pigeon Mountain turning sharply to the east, while Lookout preserves its direction. A few. miles from Lafayette, Pigeon mountain sinks and disappears. It is the junction of the two mountains in the form of a V which encloses the cove. I passed down the entire southern base of Pigeon Mountain and found no coal, though I had been informed differently. I again ascended Look out Mountain at Neal’s Gap. I found a number of places at which coal exhibited itself, but in all these instances they were surface sedms, and not thick enough to be valuable, varying from ten to eighteen inches in depth. No search has ever been made for coal, as it would tunc be valueless for want of trans portation.. The mountain is, here, from twelve to thirteen miles wide. From the west side of the mountain,the Alabama A Chattanooga Railroad has opened a coal mine some fifty feet from the top of the mountain. A heavy force is now at work there. The seam is said to be very thick, and the coal of good quality. The railroad is between one and two miles from the mine at Winston. The place is 44 miles from Chattanooga. I examined, as carefully as practicable, the top of the Moun tain, from its junction with Pigeon Mountain down to the point at which it leaves the Georgia line, a distance of some 15 miles. Coal crops out at intervals along the whole way, but always in the thin seams referred to. That there is a vast quantity of coal in Lookout Mountain for forty miles within the territory of Georgia I have no doubt. The width of this Georgia coal territory varies from one to twelve milks. I infer this because I found it showing itself at intervals accidentally duriug the whole distance. I found it at the falls of Little River, near the surface, and the mountain resting upon it at the bottom of the chasm at least two hundred feet deep. As there has been no search for coal on the mountain, it exhibits itself only by denudation in tbe bottom of little streams. I did not hear of a well on the whole mountain, springs, sometimes freestone but generally chalybeate, being abundant. I was therefore deprived of this usual mode of determining tbe strata from ten to sixty feet below the surface. The mountain dishes gradually towards the middle from both sides, both brows befog higher than the middle. Hence the imperfect denudation. On each side of the mountain, there are impregnable masses of rock. Water makes a very slow impres sion upon them. Nature seems to have guarded her treasures of c«al by these rocky embattlements, east and west. Round Mountain makes an exception. It rises from this central basin. Its sides not being rocky, are. denuded into raviues by water, hence the coal shows itself freely. Equal quantities may exist, and, reasoning from analogy, probably do exist, elsewhere on the mountain, but from the nat ure of things, they do hot and can not with equal facility exhibit themselves. Adequate facilities for transportation, only, will induce laborious AND COSTLY EXCAVATION. Before leaving Lookout Mountain, I cannnot refrain from some remarks upon the scenes of great interest which meet the eye npon different points on the top (you cannot say summit) of Lookout. One is near the residence of Wm. Dougherty, Esq. It is from the point of departure of Pigeou Mountain from Lookout. From their junction the monster mountains widen. Lookout Mountain goes on uutil the Tennessee river washes it away. Pigeon Mountain expires withiu sight. The cove enlarges at your feet until at last the landscape closes by Wal dron’s Ridge running athwart it, far away in the distance in Tennessee. The other scene is that presented ^t the falls of Little River,, near the line between Georgia and Alabama. Twenty five years ago, my attention was drawn to them by reading Norman’s Rambles in Yucatan, in which reference is made to these falls. I visited them then. The impressions of a second visit were greater even than the first. These falls are comparatively un known, yet from the combination of objects of natural and artificial interest, they afford one of the most striking scenes on this continent. Tuey can be reached, via Chattanooga, by the Alabama A Chattanooga R. R., being some ten miles from Winston, on that road. There are two falls, one of about, forty, the other about eighty feet. Within fifty feet below the'falls, a precipice has been worn on the side or tbe chasm, of ; some 200 feet of sand rock and slate. The precipice has ‘Assumed the appearance of a horse shoe, enclosing three or four acres on the top. Across the heel of the shoe, there are the remains of two stone walls, thirty steps apart, extending across from brow to brow of the precipice. There is also a demi-lune covering a portion of the outer walls. On the Side of the precipice, about thirty foet from tbe top and nearly 200. feet from the bottom, and ap proached by a narrow ledge in the rock, there are three cham bers cut into the solid' rock, connecting with each other and approachable only by -this narrow ledge, and facing the chasm. These chambers, which are partially ^closed in front by solid- stone pillars, ‘Vary’ from ten to thtbe'oT* fourin height. It is altogether a most extraordinary locality. It has evidently,: at a very remote periojd, been'd place of refuge and .defence. But for and by whom? ; There are large chestnut-oaks growing' out of and lapping with their rootSkUho cocks of these walls. Who did,this ancient and curious work? It is to these rock chambers that Norman chiefly refers. It will be proper, in |this connection, to refer to Rock Town, on Pigeon Monntain, 7 or 8 ihilea from Lafayette. This locality I did not visit; but it is described as.being a very curious place, of about one-half a mile in length and a quarter of a mile in bi^adth, She rocks stripped of .theirldarthy covering rising, to .a. Considerable height, as houses of several stories separated by streets and lanes. These scenes of interest are referred to, although not strictly within the bounds of my report, because, should a railroad ren der them accessible, thfjy will give to our people a delightful method of passing their summer months, without going out of the bounds of their .own State. • • ' ! I descended the Mountain by Henderson’s Gap, with an inten tion of following the mountain still further south into Alabama, as far the point at which Little River pitches, off. the mountain on the east side, but was prevented by befog told that the chasm was inaccessible, and that I could-learn nothing of the struc ture of the mountain. t :. ' Along the- base of the Lookout*.and separated by a narrow valley of an average of one ball-mile, there is a small mountain called Shinbone, which accompaniesUopkoat from Gadsden.to the termiuus'of Pigeon Mountain- JEtifttihe frigate and its.ten der. One of the minor throws' in'Lookhut was thrown up in the great agony of the" earth /from the depths below. This Shinbone mountain is an ^almostcontinuous bed of pore fossiiiferous iron ore, from ft^bfgihhing^ its end. Thus the coal and the iron ore are within a mile of each other for a dis tance of more than forty miles. The’time wifi come when this nar row valley will be filled with furnaces. There is the coal, the iron, lime, sand-stone, fire-clay, the wood and the water—all that is needed gs capital and transpobtation. Leaving Shinbone, I crossed east to Dirt Seller mountain, in the southern portion of Broom Town valley, in Chattooga county. This mountain runs northeast and southwest, and is about twelve miles long- I saw upon it, wrthout exaggeration, acres of ground literally paved with’ the heaviest and finest of fossiiiferous iron ore, of which I present specimens. The north east terminus of this remarkable mountain is separated from Taylor’s Ridge by the Chattooga river. I crossed Taylor’s Ridge at what is known by some aa Campmeeting Gap, by others aa Treadaway’a Gap, near the head of Texas valley. I examined the iron ore of the east side of Taylor's Ridge, between Maddox Gap and Treadaioay. It is impossible to exaggerate the quantity and value of this orb. It is in exhaustible, AND IS THE SAME FOS9LLIFFEROUS ORE NOW USED AT COUNWALL AND FOUND AT ROUND MOUNTAIN—perhaps heavier and richer than either. I found the people near these ridges sawing the iron ore into blocks, to put into the backs of their chimneys, as its stands fire well. This is general in several localities. Leaving Taylor’s Ridge, I passed Little Sand Mountain, con taining mill stone grit and grind stone rock, but no iron ore. In John’s Mountain I found no iron ore, but in John’s Valley the oil indications are remarkable as upheavals, regularity of stratification, absence of fissures, richness of fossils and bitu minous shale and bituminous lime stone rock. None of these indications cross the Oostanaula river. On the west bank .of that river, there rises a cliff of limestone from the water forty or fifty feet in perpendicular height. Fragments of this lime stone, when fresh broken are offensive from the smell of petro leum. These indications occur from John’s valley to Coosaville, ten miles below Rome, at the foot of the ridges which are thrown up in wild confusion. At John’s Mountain, my exam inations closed. A large portion of the counties of Chattooga and Walker is imprisoned by mountains. Pigeon on the north, Taylor’s Ridge on the east, Lookout on tbe west, and Dirtseller on the south, forming a parallelogram. The soil thus enclosed, including the cove and Armuchee valley, is excellent farming valley land, pro ducing the best cotton tbatrl have^eeir this year, in any part of the State. The value is of coarse much depreciated by want of t ransportation. From many portions, it costs 25 cents to get a bushel of wheat to market, and other things in proportion. As a consequence, there is. a labgk emigration from these coun ties, principally to Texas, Arkansas and Kansas. This is? prin cipally from the tenant and laboring class, aad not the land holders. These must suffer severely for want of labor HEREAFTER. ; Vi .« f’ . Trion Factory, on the Chattooga, is a plaice of ranch interest. The principal building is four stories high, 1 70 feet long and 44 fret wide. A population of 450 persons is here assembled. The horse power is rated at 175. Five hundred and thirty tjraosand pounds of cotton were used'lastj year, and the gross shies amounted to $222,133. The annual expense of transpor tation is $3,500. 4,932 spindles and 116 looms are in operatiou. Ip 1866, over $12,000 freight was-paid at Ringgold. The prin cipal proprietor, Mr. Allgood^ a gentleman of unusual intelli gence and energj, states that, with railroad facilities, the pro ducts, of this mill could be greatly increased. A few more such establishments would go very lar towards the support of a rail road. If the object be to reach coal and iron and oil alone, these ends could be obtained by a railroad from Ringgold to Cooper’s Gap, in McLemore’s cove, a distance of less than twenty liiiips. %t i£ in connection with these, it is designed to liberate the agricultural and mineral resources of this whole section, there is.wu easy route from Kingston for a railroad. Turning off from the State Road one and a half miles from Kingston, the road would cross the Oostanaula at Hope’s Ferry, sweep up the Armuchee valley, cross Taylor’s Ridge at Treadaway’s Gap, keep up the valley of the Chattooga river by Trion Factory, cross Pigeon Monntain (hardly a hill) at Catlett’s Gap, and, passing through tbe cove, reach Lookout Mountain at Cooper’s Gap, a distance of about sixty miles. The first eight miles of this route, after leaving Kingston, is poor, valuable only for timber, which is fine. Four out of these eight miles are rough. From the Oostanaula to Taylor’s Ridge, the country is very level. Taylor’s Ridge, on the east side, is steep; on the west, it descends very gradually. The Ridge at the gap would afford no serious obstacle to a railroad. After passing this ridge, the whole of the rest of the route would be a continous level, with the exception of Catlett’s Gap, in Pigeon Mountain. Coal would be found much nearer than at Round Monntain or Lookout. But as far as developed, the seams on the surface south of it are too thin to be valuable. Thicker seams doubt less exist below them. But this is to be tested. At Round Mountain they are now ready for profitable work. This examination has cost much exposure, discomfort and fatigue, on my part. But tbe results have been so unexpectedly satisfactory that I would have undergone mach more in order to attain them. They disclose a vast amount of dormant MATERIAL WEALTH HERETOFORE AND NOW WHOLLY USELESS TO the State. It is proper in this connection to offer som& words of caution. There are what are called “ false coal measures,” which are co extensive with the Appalachian coal basin. These false meas ures extend from the Calskill to tbe southern terminus of Look out Mountain. This stratum has beeu picked and pried into at many ,1008111108, and occasionally thin seams of crashed and im pure eoal are found, but too impure, irregular and thin to be of any certain commercial value.” The best authorities indicate the fact that Lookout Mountain is the eastern boundary of workable coal in Georgia. I certainly have found some of the coal flora in Sugar Valley, Gordon county , within five miles oif tbe Western and Atlantic Railroad. But there is reason to fear that these are 1 indications only of the “ false coal meas urea, and that coal, if found, would be so tliiu and impure as to be utterly valueless. With the present lights, it would be unwise to expend money in an exploration for coal in Georgia east of Lookont Mountain. It is fortunate for us that Lookout, in Georgia, contains a full supply of coal for all. our wants. 1 Tbe question now arises as to whether it would remunerate theSifte to develop these dormant resources by affording to them railroad transportation. It is ifow a settled fact that WE HAVE OOAL, IBON ORE, AND PROBABLY OIL, IN GREAT ABUN DANCE. They are now worthless for want-of transpor tation. There is not now sufficient private capital in the State to afford it. In order to learn what would be the effect upon Georgia of the development of these resources, we must exam ine its effects in other States, where they have been developed.. Upon this subject, I have procured a mass of information from the recent and admirable work of T. H. Daddow, of Pottsville, Pa., on Coal, Iron, and Oil. The importance, and, to our people, the novelty of the subjects, as to their statistics, warrant me in quoting largely from this very valuable and exhaustive work. In fact, tbe rest of my report will be so much made up of either literal extracts or condensations from Daddow that, with this general acknowledgement, I do not think quotation marks to be necessary. The vaiue of coal and iron in building up cities and giving them permanent prosperity is, beyond expression, great. Mark the astonishing growth in Great Britain of Manchester, Bir mingham. Leeds, and Sheffield, and compare it with the old and declining towns of Canterbury, Winchester, and Salisbury. The difference is due to the presence or absence of coal. Prof. Daniels writes thus of Pittsburg, in Pennsylvania: “ If you would see wbat coal can do for a people who turn it to full account, look at Pittsburg, a city of 150,000 inhabitants, built up by its mines of coal. It lost $30,000,000 by the rebellion without shocking its credit. No city on this continent con tains more solid wealth in’ proportion to its population. Its prosperity is permanent, for it is based upon the creation of values. Possessing in its coal the creative power, it stretches out its mighty arms and gathers in the wealth of half a 1 continent into its lap. It brings to its furnaces and forges the iron and copper of Lake Superior; glass sand from New England, Missouri and Illinois; lead from Wisconsin and Mis souri; zinc, brass and tin from beyond the seas. You pass through its gigantic establishments, and are amazed at the variety and extent of their perfected productions. Yet all these, from the most delicate fabric of glass,to the ponderous cannon and steam engine, are in tbe coal which underlies the smoky hills of Pittsburg. Philadelphia, New York, and all the manu facturing cities of New England have the greatest source of their productive power iu the mountains of Pennsylvania. What is to prevent our having a Pittsburg in Georgia? We have the coal, the iron ore, the lime, the fire clay, and the sand rock. Shall we not also have the transportion ? Capital will follow it. The addition to a people’s physical strength who use coal in the production of steam is prodigious. Ten pounds of coal applied to the production of mechanical power through the agency of steam is equal to a day’s work of a strong man, or one and a half tons of coal to a year of manual labor. Ten millions tons of coal, applied in England to mechanical labor saving operations, is the equivalent of 7,500,00 able bodied men per annum. It would require 700 men to transport the prodncuon of a large colliery, producing 500 tons of coal per day, a distance of 600 feet perpendicular. But a steam engine of 100 horse power, using five tons of coal a day, will do the same work with ease. The following paragraphs from Daddow are so pregnant with meaning that special attention is invited to them. It shonld be remembered that the author is a Northern man, and that his work was written before the close of the war, but when our defeat was a mere question of time. “The chief industrial or productive force of the slave States was derived from the labor of their 4,000,000 slaves. Of these, perhaps not more than 1,000,000 were productive as full grown persons; or the entire productive value of men, women and children was equal to the labor of 1,000,000 full grown men. This labor, as a rule, was exerted simply as brute force, without the assistance of skill or mechanical means, but representing a capital valuation, according to Southern figures, of $2,000,000,- 000. The same amount of force would be exerted by 150,000 horse power in steam machinery, costing, at $100 per horse power, $15,000,000. Such an addition of force , would be of tenfold more value to tbe 8,000,000 whites of the Sonth than their slave labor. Or, if added to the slave labor, under the intelligent development attainable by tbe slave, the productive power of the South would be increased a hundred fold, accord ing to the degree of mechanical skill displayed and the uses to which power is applied. The secret of the rapid decay of Southern resources and means of defense is primarily in their lack of coal, or their appreciation of its value. Had they developed their mineral resources, which are abundant* and increased their industrial or productive power-by the fnehhanieal Force derived from the judicious use of coal and iron, these 12,000,000 people would never have rebelled,; but.hgmng rebelled, would never have been brought to submission. The qbility to produce iron in sufficient quantities to supply the wants of a nation, under all circumstauces of war or peace, constitutes an element of strength never before so fully esti mated or exemplified as in the present contest. Our ability to produce iron is equal to our wants, consequently we make use of that element of strength to its fullest extent in the prod no tion of irou-clad ships, the fabrication of superior guns, the manufacture of the most effective small arms, and an unlimited supply of rails, rolling stock,’ etc. And not only have we tbe iron in abundance for all these purposes, but our iron and coal enable our mechanics to multiply their labor or productive abil ity over a hundredfold as compared with the productive power of- the unskilled labor of the South. Had the Confederates the means and ability to build iron clad rams in proportion to their numbers and mineral resources, our great superiority on tho water would have been neutralized and their cotton made available for war purposes. But depending entirely on brute force, their resources aud means of defense have depreciated in ratio ot their loss of able bodied men, from whatever cause. Virginia. contains more coal than Pennsylvania, yet, though the oldest State, she has never made it available by developmert, and not one pound of her coal has been used for the production of iron by the blast furnace since the commencement of the war, and but a few tons before, the Richmond coal befog too impure for such purposes. Tennessee was the only Southern State in which iron was madefrom mineral coal, and the production there ceased on the occupation of Chattanooga by the Federal forces.” Will our Georgia Statesmen and lawmakers ponder these par agraphs, and avoid that fatuity by which, in the language of Coleridge, “ our experience is a light in the stern of a ship, shining only over her wake.” The development of onr iron and coal resources in North Georgia, by transportation afforded by the State, would be not merely a local or sectional benefit, while every man in Georgia, in whatever part of it, who uses a saw or hammer, or drives a nail, or runs a plough or a wagon, is interested in cheapening coal and iron. There is a higher and wider result to be attained, a fit preparation by the whole State as a commonweath for all the exigencies of the times, whether sudden or expected, of peace or war. The appreciation in the value of a large body of now val ueless lands, and the consequent increase in the taxable property of the State, are objects worthy of consideration. The coal territory of Lookout' Mountain covers a large space. By coal territory is meant the whole body of land in which coal shows itself at intervals, givipg reason to believe that the surface is underlaid with coal seams, at greater or less depth, and of greater or less thickness, and discoverable by mining with greater or less profit. This coal territory is some forty miles long, and averag ing six miles in breadth, and contains about 140,000 acres. These lands, for the most part, are wild lands, and would not sell for an average of one dollar per acre. If, by the development of coal at djfferefit points, their average value could be brought up to $ ;0 per aerie, their value Would be $3,000,000. The annual State tax, at existing rates, would amount to.somewhat under $12,00.0, against less than $600, provided tax be now paid on all of them. It would require but a few large collieries at different points to advance the lands to an average value of $20 per acre: 1 As late as 1820*, the e«»al lauds of the Pennsylvania mountains were worth no more than the present value of tho Lookout lands. Yet the Pennsylvania eoal lands sell at an average of $250'per acre. Good coal lands can be purchased at $150~ per acre, but they also, command $1,000 per acre. It is seldom that a large coal tract can be purchased without taking in a portion of un productive land. English coal lands, containing one-half the workable thickness of coal, sell readily at $5,000 per acre. The whole anthracite region of Pennsylvania contains 320,000 acres, about double the quantity of land on Lookout mountain in Chattooga and Walker counties. Yet the value of these anthra cite lknds in Pennsylvania is estimated at $80,000,000. The cap ital iuvested in mining them is $40,000. The value of the rail roads built to transport the coal is $70,000,000; of canals for the same purpose, from $40,(100,000 to $50,000,000, making a grand tot;tl invested in tiro extraction and transportation of coal alone, in this small area of 500 square miles, of $230,000,- 000. These figures will exhibit the vastness of the coal interest when fully developed. This estimate does not include the investment of iron abd oil, but coal alone. Thus, in an area in Pennsylvania' less in size than one of our large counties, we find an investment.in taxable property more than equalling the whole, taxable*property of Georgia, in 1866, in coal alone. A person not familiar with this subject will be amazed at the number and length of canals and railroads built for the trans portation^ of coal. As early as 1829, the Delaware and Hudson canal Company had completed a line of canal from the Hudson to Honesdale in Pennsylvania, a distance of 108 miles, and a railroad 15 miles long, over a mountain 1,000 feet high, at a cost of $7,000,000, for the sole object of reaching the coal of Wyoming valley. In 1864,1,561,203 tons of coal were shipped over this route. Notwithstanding this large investment, this company, for 40 years, has been declaring handsome dividends. Besides this canal, there are six railroad outlets to the coal of the Wyoming region. By these outlets, there were shipped, in 1864, from the Wyoming region, 4,304,811 tons ol coal. From the Shamokin region, there are four outlets by rail roads built for the purpose, making a total length of more than 109 miles. But these enumerations might be multiplied to weariness. The following summary Mill be sufficient. Total length of canals employed in the anthracite coal trade in Pennsylvania 905 miles. Tbe length of locomotive tracks, including sidelings, used exclu sively as coal roads, is 1,531^ miles, aud the length of the main lines 856. The length of the mining tracks, inside and outside of the mines, including tramways leading from mines to ship ping points, is 780 miles. It must be remembered that these figures refer to the small anthracite region in Pennsylvania. When we consider the vast regions qf bituminous coal in other States, the IeDgth of coal railways in the United States must be very great. In view of these facts, and of our individual poverty, will the State of Georgia hesitate to develope her coal domain by a short side line ot 20, or even 60, miles in length ? The total products of the United States in iron, coal and oil, for 1864, were as follows: In iron, 1,200,000 tons of pig iron. In 1810, the total production was 54,000 tons. In coal, the total production in 1865 was 22,856,939 tons. This includes both anthracite and bituminous coal. In oil, the total production, iu 1866, was estimated at 12,000 barrels per day, or more than 3,000,000 barrels per annum. The oil trade of Pennsylvania alone, for 1868, is estimated at $60,- 000,000. This includes not merely the crude oil, but the articles manufactured from it. In 1862, 10,887,701 gallons of oil were exported. This was sold in Europe for specie at very high prices, and during that year of the war revived the staggering credit of the United States currency. The growth of this trade has been magical. It afforded, for a few years, the basis of wild speculation. But this specula tion filled an otherwise worthless territory with cities and rail roads. It has now subsided into as regular and lucrative a branch of industry as coal or iron. < I have stated, in a former part of this report, my firm con viction that oil can be found in remunerative quantity in the section of the State which has been.the subject of my examina tion. But the land holders are too poor to bore for it. It requires about $10,000 capital to sink an oil well. It might require less under favorable circumstances. In view of the magnitude of the results (if the boring was successful), could the State act more wisely than to employ a proper person, prac tically as well as theoretically familiar with the subject, to exam ine the sections which-I have designated, and if the indications were deemed by him sufficient, to sink a well as an experiment? In case of failure, the loss to the State would be trifling. Iu case of success, the result would be grandly advantageous to her. I may be pardoned, even in an industrial report, for referring to a well known and most apposite classical incident. (continued on fourth face.)

Georgia Historic Newspapers

Weekly Atlanta intelligencer. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1865-18??, November 17, 1869, Image 1