Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 1.djvu/476

438 attempted to be neutral, that the Confederacy would not abandon them for the sake of securing peace. In West Virginia there was also a large number of adherents to the South who objected to the proposed dismemberment of Virginia. The resolution gave to them also a similar pledge that Virginia should not be divided by the con sent of the Confederate States.

Another bill containing a retaliatory clause against the United States failed to pass. It was a House bill on free trade, repealing the tariff and throwing open the Confederate ports to the commerce of the world, except the United States. Congress adjourned on April 2ist, to meet again on the i8th of August.

The privations resulting from the interruptions of foreign trade which caused the Confederates to practice the closest economy also gave a remarkable stimulation to all kinds of domestic manufacturing. Saltpeter and salt works were established, salt mines were opened, extensive tanneries were put in operation, foundries especially for cannon and for making swords and for altering and repairing guns were erected. Cotton mills were worked to their utmost, small woolen mills were built, and the manufacturing of boots, shoes, clothing and blankets sprang up in every State. The common domestic looms supplied with thread from the cotton cards, the reel and the warping bars, were built and operated by the Southern women in every county. Plain, of course, were many of the fabrics thus produced, but they sufficed to work up the raw material rapidly and contributed largely to meet the pressing wants of the armies.

A convention of representative business men from several States assembled February 26, 1862, in Richmond, to consider the uses to which the production of cotton and tobacco might be put in aiding the Confederacy. The question was under consideration in Congress, and its difficulties had not been solved. But the convention, with patriotic fervor, determined to devote these two