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The American people did not plunge suddenly into the War between the States. They reluctantly, fearfully waded into it. So unwilling were they to face the unpleasant fact that every forward step into the breakers was taken in the peculiar hope that it would lead back to dry land. Until the very announcement of the election of Lincoln, hundreds of thousands pinned their hopes on his defeat; until Southern States actually seceded, they claimed it could never happen; until Sumpter was fired on, they talked nothing but compromise plans; until the war had run a year with no signs of quick victory for either side, they promised a speedy peace.
It was really not until the fall of 1862 that the people of the North generally, and of Lancaster county in particular, finally resigned themselves to the cold, grim fact that war is hell, and lasts a long time. An invasion of Pennsylvania drove that unpleasant truth firmly home.With the Confederates marching on Hanover and threatening Harrisburg, Lancaster ceased thinking of the conflict as a far-off skirmish. With editorials like the following in the local papers, they laid aside the glamour and took up the hatred that is the backbone of successful war . Wrote the Daily Evening Express on September 12, 1862: "The rebel hordes have invaded and are desecrating the soil of Pennsylvania. They come not to occupy our fair country according to the usages of civilized warfare, but to
pillage, burn, and desolate. They come with the bitterest hate rankling in their hearts ...If they once fairly penetrate our State, the charred walls of Hell itself, could they be made to speak, could reveal no such horrors as these Southern hordes will perpetrate upon our soil. Their program has already been published to the world. They say in plain words they come to destroy; to let us taste the bitter fruits of the horrible war which they themselves inaugurated. This, then, is their design without concealment. Have we courage enough to meet the issue? Shall we go boldly forward and meet them at the threshold, or shall we, craven like, stand still to be eventually driven from our homes by the advancing tide? It is for you, citizens of Lancaster county, to decide."
From the very start of the struggle volunteer organizations of men, women and children sprang up like mushrooms. The Dorcas Society for local poor relief devoted its energies to collecting soldiers' supplies. The Patriot Daughters of Lancaster was organized and gathered thousands of dollars' worth of commodities, from pickles to mattresses. There were the Stocking Knitting Association
of Enterprise, the Samaria Association of Martic Township, the Ladies of New Holland, of Leacock Township, and of Intercourse, .the Soldiers' Aid Organization of Fulton Township, the Columbia Ladies' Aid, the Ladies Social Knitting Society of Marietta and many others. In Lancaster city, the Female High School Fair, run by children during October, 1862, netted almost $300 for the wounded soldiers.
Immediately, also, volunteer army units were set up. The newspapers teemed with advertisements for men:
"Wickersham Guardslll Recruits wanted in a Company now forming at the State Normal School. This Company will be recruited for the new Lancaster County Regiment. Capt. A. R. Byerly." The Schaeffer Zouaves, W. F. Duncan, captain, offered bounties of $50 from the county. $25 from the federal government, $2 premium, and one month's pay ($13) in advance to every recruit. J. Miller Ranck's Company, early in August, 1862, offered $88 in bounties
for each volunteer.
As recruits did not come in fast enough, bounties were raised. By the middle of August, Marietta Borough was offering $102 for a recruit. "What other town in the county can show so fair a record of patriotism?" queried the local press. By August 20, B. Frank Brenneman's company advertised a bounty of $165, and publicly appealed for volunteers "to save our county from the ignominy of the draft." On the same date Philadelphia companies were advertising in the Lancaster papers, promising an inducement of $175.
But the general failure of volunteering had forced upon the government the passage of a draft law. At ten o'clock of a Thursday morning, October 16, 1862, the moment "so long talked of, so long dreaded, so long postponed," had arrived. Commissioner James L. Reynolds, the sheriff, and a large number of citizens met solemnly in the Orphans' Court room, the numbers were shaken, and a blindfolded citizen drew from the box the first draft number ever to be called in Lancaster's history.
Immediately a new type of advertisement made its appearance in the papers. The new law allowed a draftee to be excused by providing a. substitute. The results were as follows: " A Chance: Any person wanting a person, not subject to the draft, as a substitute, will please enquire at the Express Office. Price, $900:' And again, "Men desirous of going into the Army as substitutes, for which they will receive a large bounty, inquire George K. Reed." Substitute brokers were soon in bad odor among the
soldiers. On November 10, 1862, some of the Lancaster Regiment caught two of them and rode them out of town on a rail. In the summer 0£ 1863, the following appeared in the Examiner. Herald and Union. relative to the above:
"We understand that persons who figured extensively in the substitute business last fall are again on hand. ..It is said that these worthies have imported £rom Philadelphia and elsewhere a lot of pick-pockets and loafers and deserters whom they are anxious to put in as substitutes for drafted citizens. The game however, does not promise to win, as Captain Bolenius is cautious who he accepts as substitutes."
The 1862 draft law was not inclusive enough. In March, 1863, another was passed, calling out many more men, and providing for exemption by the payment of $300. This draft, which went into effect on July 15, 1863, caused serious bloodshed and rioting in New York City, and not a little trouble in Lancaster. An "unruly mob of the lowest class and prostitutes" came to the Court House, advanced on it and successfully prevented the selection from proceeding. A posse of. one hundred armed men lowered bayonets and charged, dlspersmg the mob wIthout fatalItIes but not wIthout considerable scuffling. The affray originated, according to the papers, among a group of "German outlaws,"but no names are given. On July 18, 1863, the local papers presented an appearance then new, now familiar-their pages were devoted to lists of names of draftees. By July 25 the Examiner. Herald and Union reported that 50% of local draftees were claiming exemption on the grounds of physical disability. By August 15 an article noted that 475
Lancastrians had within the month paid the government $142,500 under the $300 exemption rule.
But all the while Lancaster's Volunteer Regiment was in service and thousands of draftees were off to camp. That the military situation was critical is indicated by the announcement, in 1863, that still more men were wanted in an Invalid Corps. In this there were to be three classes. Those least wounded were to be given guns and sent out on active duty again. Those who had lost an arm or a hand were to act as provost guards and as garrisons for captured cities. Those who had lost a foot or a leg were to be clerks, orderlies in hospitals, or guards in public buildings. Such men were assigned at Captain Bolenius' office at 12 North Duke street.
The impact of the war shows all too plainly, also, in the advertisement of local lawyers, offering to present and collect, gratis, all claims for "bounties, arrearages of pay and pensions for all widows and orphans of soldiers of Lancaster County." Signing this notice were R. W. Shenk, Andrew J. Steinman, Benjamin F. Bear, Thaddeus Stevens, James K. .Alexander, Roland Kinzer, Abram Shenk, and J. R. Sypher.
From a strictly military standpoint, the county had two terrible shocks. The first came in September, 1862. The Daily Evening Express of August 9, 1862, announced: "The foes of liberty, the foes of the Union. ..have at length set foot upon and are desecrating the soil of Pennsylvania. The reports in our news columns say that the rebels have crossed the border and are marching upon Hanover, York and the State Capitol. What are we doing here to prevent them from invading our beautiful county? Almost nothing. Our business is going on as usual. Our farmers are busy at their plows. Our people, in brief, seem to have folded their arms and contemplate the rebel approach with stolid indifference. It would appear as if it were impossible for the press to make the people comprehend the imminence of the danger. ..We should not have specified hours for suspending business and going to the drill place,
but we should drill constantly, day and night."
Three days before, Mayor Sanderson's proclamation had ordered all places of business closed at three o'clock in order that the citizens could drill at various designated places. As the rebels continued eastward, symptoms of panic began to appear. "Drill! Drilll Citizens of the Northeastward over 45 years of age or otherwise exempt from military duty, who wish to be drilled, will please meet at Lechler's Hotel, East King street, at 7Y2 o'clock this evening" (Sept. 9). On September 10th a proclamation of Governor Curtin callded "all able-bodied men" to be "ready for marching orders on one hour's notice." Here was war indeed, at the very back door. Rumors of the wildest kind were flying about, "going almost so far as to place the rebel pickets on the opposite side of the Conestoga." There was a scrambling search for rifles, shotguns, revolvers, bowie knives-anything to arm the newly mobilized citizenry.
But the invasion was stayed by the bloody battle at Antietam. Scarcely a week later, as soon as the immediate
danger had passed, the Express remonstrated editorially: "We notice that many (indeed most) of the stores are beginning to be open in the afternoon during the hours set apart for drill; this evidence of abetter feeling for their pocket book than their country is by no means creditable."
The second shock came in the summer of 1863 when the Confederate advance guard came as far east as Wrightsville
while the maip body was fighting at Gettysburg. Every able-bodied manwas called out with orders to supply himself with gun and ammunition, three days' rations and trench tools-axe, pick or shovel. Rifle pits and breast works were thrown up along the whole length of the county facing the Susquehanna River. Every straggler along the river bank was stopped and forced to give account of himself or be imprisoned. If the Confederates had tried to force a passage, they would have met a warm reception, as anyone familiar with the east bank of our Susquehanna can readily imagine. The hills fairly bristled with men.
The bitter reality of war soon awoke the witch-hunters to activity. Being a member of the Democratic party was held next thing to being a rebel. As r:.ancaster city had for forty years been a stronghold of Democracy, and continued to vote majorities for tllat ticket, against a tremendous Republican majority in the county, terrible animosity developed. Buchanan was one of its focal points. Local Republican papers, for example, recorded the following incident with glee. A five dollar bill on the Pottsville Bank contained in one corner a vignette of James Buchanan. "Some loyal persons" obtained one of these, bunged the eyes with red ink, drew a gallows above his head from which a rope was suspended that went around his neck, and then branded his forehead with the word "Judas." So great was the popular indignation with Buchanan that this note issue had to be withdrawn.
Equally senseless was the persecution of U. S. Newcomer, proprietor of the Ephrata Springs Hotel. Reading newspapers in the autumn of 1862 set up a howl that guests from Baltimore had torn down the American flag outside the hotel. which so exasperated the servants that a hanging party almost took place on the lawn. Toasts to Jeff Davis were regularly drunk at the bar with the full knowledge and sympathy of the host. In short. the hotel was nothing less
than a nest of copperheads. A thorough investigation was launched which proved the whole story to have been trumped up; there was not a word of truth in it. One little unfounded rumor, in the space of hours, had aroused the populace to shouting "traitor" at one of the most sincere patriots in the county.
At about the same time, Brigadier General Wadsworth and two privates visited Harrisburg to arrest Montgomery Foster and 0. Barrett. editors 0£ the Patriot and the Union, and took them to Washington charged with "treasonable and inflammatory publications.'. Wrote the editors 0£ the Lancaster Daily Evening Express: "It is a great pity that while Provost Marshall Wadsworth was so near Lancaster he did not extend his investigations to this city. The examination of the last number of a certain sham-Democratic paper, printed not far £rom the Court House, might have induced the Marshall to increase the number 0£ his pas- sengers to Washington."
These are clear instances of war hysteria. In none of the cases cited were the charges justified by the facts. But
there did exist in the county a fifth column clearly treasonable in its intent and action. On October 8, 1862, the following advertisement appeared in the local papers: "One Hundred Dollars Reward: Information having been made of the existence of a disloyal and treasonable league or association in the city and county of Lancaster, having for its purpose the embarrassment of the Government in the prosecution and conduct of the war, the members being bound together by secret oaths or obligations for mutual
aid and assistance and charged to be connected with the so-called 'Knights of the Golden Circle'- ...I will pay one hundred dollars to such persons. ..as will enable the national authorities to arrest and bring to trial. ..such parties implicated. Signed, 0.J. Dickey." This organization did exist and caused not a little trouble until its leaders were hunted down and incarcerated.
One of the most visible impacts of the war was upon labor conditions. The "Help Wanted'. columns of the papers grew ever longer. Carpenters. machinists, boilermakers, grocery clerks, journeymen shoemakers and laborers of every sort were in demand. A number of stores began employing women as clerks. B. Yecker. of 28 North Queen Street wanted 25 good harness hands to make cavalry equipment; A. A. Hauke and Co., 20 East King. advertised for 200 women to work on army clothing; Killian and Erisman wanted 200 tailors for army coats; J. K. Hiester, John A. Erben and S. W. Raub wanted several hundred more
for the same purpose. Leman's Rifle Works needed 250 iron workers and polishers. Calls for help from Philadelphia vied with local demands. The scarcity of men is well illustrated by the thinned.out condition of the volunteer fire companies. some of which went out of existence entirely.
The decreased labor supply plus the increased demand for foodstuffs soon sent food prices skyrocketing. Look at the local market quotations on a few standard items during the war:
Jan. Jan. Jan. Jan.
1862 1863 1864 1865
Wheat flour (bbl.) 5.12 6.75 7.00 11.00
Wheat (bu.) 1.30 1.60 1.65 2.50
Corn (bu.) .50 .70 1.00 1.60
Oats (32Ib.) .33 .50 .80 .80
Rye (bu.) .62 .85 1.25 1.50
Butter (lb.) .22 .25 .30 .50
Lard (lb.) .12 .12 .12 .30
Eggs (doz.) .20 .22 .25 .40
In addition to the operation of the law of supply and demand, government taxes raised prices on some commodities. On tea, for example, was a tariff duty of 20c per pound; on coffee, 5c; on sugar, 3c; on molasses, 6c per gallon.
This led to considerable experimentation, partly in ersatz, partly with new crops. We read in the Daily Evening Express of December 16, 1861: "Since the price of coffee has so materially advanced, many of the farmers and country people are going back to the custom. of their fathers. Rye is again being used as a substitute for coffee, and it is said by taking an equal quantity of rye and coffee, a very pleasant beverage is obtained. Wheat is also used. It is first boiled and dried, then roasted and ground and used as coffee," Numerous local enterprises prepared and marketed such products. Wolfe and Stibgen of Marietta announced they had perfected a new wheat coffee one tablespoonful of which, well boiled, would make two quarts of delicious drink. The editor of the Express tried a wheat coffee processed by Mr. Thomas Fairer, of Lancaster , pronouncing it "nearer the genuine article than any
other we have tried." john D. Skiles, grocer, offered to the public dandelion coffee, prepared from the freshest and tenderest roots. This drink, he claimed, was "superior to the finest java, to say nothing of its great and acknowledged medicinal benefits." Still others made malt coffee.
The sugar shortage led to the planting 0£ sugar cane in the county. Fulton Township farmers in the fall of 1862 reported a larger acreage, and a larger production per acre than in 1861. A number of molasses mills were set up which turned out the finished article at a cost of 17c per gallon. Molasses was then selling at 50c per gallon.
The war did not interrupt the advancement of scientific agriculture; rather it stimulated better methods of production. Thaddeus Stevens distributed from his office on South Queen Street each year the agricultural portion of the Report of the Commissioner of Patents, describing the latest inventions in farm machinery. McCormick by 1863 was making a new reaper and mower vastly better
than its predecessor John B. Erb, of Lititz, was distributor for this district. Brinton Walter, of Christiana, however, was offering considerable competition with his Buckeye Mower and Reaper, just patented.
Particularly noticeable are the growing columns of advertisements of new seed varieties and fertilizers. Every drug and hardware store now began to offer "tested" or "trade-marked" seeds. The influence of war is easily discovered, in offerings of sugar beet and cane cuttings. The progress of scientific experiment appears in the advertisement of Early Rose potatoes for the first time. Guano was still available, but the interruption of shipping had boosted its price to $60 per ton. Replacing it were Baugh's Raw Bone Super Phosphate of Lime, at "$46 per ton, cash." Allen and Needles could supply Super Phosphate of Lime for $47.50; Tasker and Clarke a phosphate fertilizer for $45, or a meat and bone compost at $27; while A. Peysson had made a reality of the prediction of a decade before by preparing disinfected poudrette at $15.
In the development of Lancaster County agriculture, farm organizations were playing an increasingly vital part. The Lancaster County Horticultural and Agricultural Society, founded in this decade, was to last for many years and to be a potent factor in farm education. The exact date of its £ormation is not certain. Frank R. DiffenderfIer,
in his Historical Sketch of the Society, states it was organized as the Lancaster County Horticultural Society on
Monday, September 3, 1866, at the Cooper House on West King Street. The writer, however, has found newspaper
accounts of meetings of an organization bearing the same name, and meeting at the same place under the presidency of C. Hiller during the summer of 1863. At any rate, it was not until Levi S. Reist took charge as president, and Alexander Harris as secretary, that the Society began its real work, holding numerous exhibitions in Fulton Hall, establishing a library (the membership fee was $8.00 for life, or $10 worth of good books), and publishing an excellent periodical called "The Lancaster Farmer" which
made widely available the most recent discoveries in every branch of agriculture.
How effective were these various stimuli is seen nowhere more clearly than in the census of 1870. By that year the
county was leading every other in the state in the cash value of its farms, in the cash value of farm machinery, in total wages paid to help, in the total value of all products, and in the value, specifically, of live stock, winter wheat, Indian corn, oats and tobacco. The acreage of improved land had remained about the same since 1860. The value of that land had increased by 20 million dollars, and led every other county by 30 million. The total value of all products was up to 12 million dollars annually--- 4 million more than the closest competitor.
On this subject, two articles by Mr. Reist in The Lancaster Farmer may be quoted here. The first, entitled "Does Farming Pay in Lancastcr County?" is a contrast between the Southern States and Lancaster. "Land is now (1869) selling in this county from $200 to $225, and in some instances even above that price, an acre; whilst in Virginia, and the Carolinas, it can be bought at from $2.50 to $20 per acre. One man in this county raised .13,000 pounds of tobacco on six acres, in one season, whIle another raised 5,000 bushels of corn on sixty.eight acres. ...
I know a farmer who lately sold two Conestoga horses for $700, one bringing $450 and the other $250. These may be exceptIonal cases, but as they only exhibit the productIve Powers of a single district, it is safe to infer that every district in the county may be able to furnlsh a corresponding exhibit. ...Under any circumstances, it must be evident, that even at the present high prices of land, farming in Lancaster county will pay."
In the second article, also published in 1869, Mr. Reist tells how Lancaster farmers did their work and made their money. What he says would apply today almost as truly as it did seventy years ago.
"Our farms are subdivided about as they are in other sections of the State and Union, and yet the particular mode of farming which obtains in this county, and which is famed and spoken of far and wide throughout the country, is much less known and understood than is generally supposed.
"Our farms average £rom twenty to one hundred and fifty acres; eighty acres being about the average size. These farms as a general thing are worked by the owner of the land, or by his tenant; the owner and a hired man, or the owner and his son together; except in harvest time and haymaking, when some additional hired help is needed; and in doing so the farmer and his hired help generally rise at 4 o'clock in the morning, and retire at 8 o'clock in the evening. We could single out many of our principal farmers that are in very easy circumstances, owning two or three large farms, and who work with their hired hands during all the seasons of the year, and at all kinds of work, as though working for stipulated wages. We may safely venture the assertion that farmers in this county, as a general rule, work harder than they do perhaps in any other section of the whole Union. This is indeed the great secret of their success in this line of Industry.
The West can boast of its large cattle and corn farms; the South of its large cotton and corn farms; they can show their farms of one thousand acres, worth $30 per acre, $30,000; or their farms of two thousand acres, worth $40 per acre, amounting to $80,000. We can, however, in Lancaster county, point them out many whose dimensions, as to numbers of acres, by no means run into the thousands, yet whose wealth and annual increase fully equal those of the South and West. I would, in this connection, call special attention to J. L. Erb, of West Earl Township, Lancaster county, a farmer who resides near Brownstown, and who owns six farms, three of which average about 40 acres each, and three of which average about 140 acres each; besides about 60 acres of timber land that he owns in the vicinity. Mr. Erb, although the independent owner of these fine properties, yet superintends, manages, and farms them himself. He raises yearly over 3,000 bushels of wheat, over 3,000 bushels of corn, more than 3,000 bushels of oats, about 800 bushels of barley, and about 200 tons of hay; besides a large quantityof clover and timothy seeds. This farmer keeps in his employ a considerable number of hired hands. He mostly keeps mules to do his work, instead of horses, and he feeds and grazes from sixty to eighty head of cattle. His land would commandnow, if not quite $200 per acre on an average all around, and would, therefore, be worth $120,000. All of this extensive domain this industrious farmer, who has not yet passed the meridian of life, manages and farms himself, and is even now looking around him to purchase another farm, and to add additional acres to his already ample estate; and which, when acquired, he would, no doubt, farm in the same manner in which he is now doing that
already in his possession. We might, in like manner, make reference to many other farmers in Lancaster county who thus manage and superintend their extensive plantations."
The war gave a new lease of life to mining operations in Lancaster County. When it was learned in December, 1861, that the Navy Department had determined to sheath its war vessels with iron armor fastened to the timber, the Daily Evening Express editorialized: "There is no section of the country more interested in the consumption of lron than our own immediate vicinity, and no doubt our iron manufacturers will secure a large share of this work for the bone and sinew of our working men." In the Chestnut Hill range "holes large enough to bury a city" were made in removing the brown hematite without any signs of an end to the deposit. The Chestnut Hill mines, in addition to producing ore of 80% richness, were full of curious geological formations which attracted naturalists and travelers from all over the world.
In Little Britain Township, the Wood mine, operated by Isaac Tyson, for many years had had the distinction of being the largest source of chromium in the world. It was worked during the war, producing about 500 tons of chromium per month, but in 1868 the mine was flooded and the project had to be suspended. Although the mine was pumped out in 1875, production never again came
up to the Civil War level.
To the east the Gap mines were re-opened. The Gap Mining Company, formed in 1849, had originally been interested in copper, but within a few years it was learned that nickel was present in sufficient quantity to be commercially profitable, and after this the company devoted itself exclusively to the mining of nickel. In 1860, operations, both mining and smelting, were suspended; two years later the company sold out to Mr. Joseph Wharton of Philadelphia, who pumped out the mine, repaired the machinery, and in 1863 again began nickel production. Under Mr. Wharton's management the output was tremendously increased and the mine was worked continuously until 1893.
The main products of manufacture remained the same as in the previous decade. Flour milling still brought in the greatest income-three million dollars per year by 1870; the iron and textile manufactures came next, with two million dollars annually. The facilities for iron production were not much increased after 1860. In textiles, the Conestoga Mills passed into the hands 0£ John Farnum, of Philadelphia, and another plant was constructed by William Wiley and Company at the corner of North Duke
and Lemon Streets.
We have already seen what a boom there was in the production of army clothing and harness. In addition, gun and carriage works in Lancaster were at an all-time peak of production. The Henry E. Leman Company was employing more than twice the normal quota of men and was repairing 1,000 rifles per week. The activity in gunmaking is indicated by the announcement of the First
Annual Ball of the Lancaster Gunmakers, called for December 24, 1861: "Price, 50 cents, Positively no lady will be admitted without a circular from the Board of Managers."
Cox's Carriage Works held much the same sort of interest then as plants manufacturing mechanized equipment do now. The Daily Evening Express of December 17 , 1861, remarks upon the great excitement in town upon the arrival of fifty teams of six mules cach which were to haul away a large convoy of army wagons made by Cox. A huge crowd jammed the area of Graeff's Landing to watch the departure, but was sorely disappointed because the greasing of the wagons delayed the start for 36 hours.
The Cox plant must have been truly a remarkable one. In 1863, the Cox advertisement announced that "persons wanting carriages can select £rom fi£ty different styles all in one room"-at Duke and Vine Streets. In how many automobile showrooms in the country today can a prospective buyer view fifty different models? There was another modern phase in Cox's offerings. The "Weekly Sport
Special," 0£ June, 1863, was a "Shifting Top Buggy" the equivalent of the current convertible coupe with automatic top. At West Orange and Prince Streets, Altick and McGinnis had their carriage showrooms and factory.
In 1863 the Norris brothers, Edward and James, secured the Lancaster Locomotive Works and built it up again into a prosperous business, making engines for the Pennsylvania Railroad, camel-backs for the Philadelphia and Reading, and also supplying some engines for the Western Pacific Railroad, which were shipped around Cape Horn. The plant was closed in October, 1868, reopened by a Mr. Tyng in 1869, and discontinued permanently as a locomotive building establishment in 1870.
The following table shows clearly the character and size of manufacturing enterprises in Lancaster city and county in 1870:
Article Capital Plants Products Grist milling $1,500,000 143 $3,000,000 Cotton goods 1,500,000 9 2,000,000 Pig iron 2.500,000 12 2,000,000 Leather 400,000 26 600,000 Tobacco (mEr.) 150,000 95 435,000 Rolled iron 350,000 3 406,000 Carriages 200,000 90 347,000 Lumber 150,000 16 300,000 Men's clothing 100,000 55 262,000 Lime 100,000 45 250,000 Liquor 200,000 16 200,000 Agricultural tools 180,000 24 200,000 Woolen goods 150,000 13 193,000 Paper 150,000 2 182,000 Machinery 150,000 13 181,000
In all, Lancaster county operated 1,616 manufacturing establishments in 1870, which gave it second place among the counties of the state. In water-produced horse power also it was second. In capital invested it was fourth, in hands employed, sixth, and in wages paid, seventh. .The total value of manufactured products in 1870 was fourteen million dollars-almost double the figure of ten years before.
The dire need of the government for money to prosecute the war led to the passage of financial legislation which seems common enough today, but which was unprecedented at the time. Lancaster County's distinguished congressman, Thaddeus Stevens, was chairman of the committee that framed the War Tax Law of July 1, 1862 which, among other things, imposed the first tax in our history on incomes. Three per cent was levied on incomes from $600 to $10,000 and five percent on incomes in excess of
$10,000. By the end of the War the per capita internal revenue tax for Lancaster county was $6,50; when World War taxes were at their peak the per capita figure was $29.41.
The income tax was supplemented by a variety of other duties. Government stamps had to be affixed to bonds, mortgages, legal writs, bank checks, insurance policies, custom house papers, bills of Jading, and so forth. The familiar revenue stamps on cigar boxes made their appearance at this time.
The Civil War period also marked the beginning of modern methods of bond selling. Formerly government bonds were offered only to banks or a few private individuals of great wealth. Thus, the war loans of April 12 and May 16, 1861, were subscribed to by Lancaster banks but not by the public. The Columbia Bank took up $40,000; the Lancaster County Bank and the Farmers
Bank, $20,000 each. As sufficient income was not forthcoming by this system, new loans were authorized, the bonds to be issued in small denominations and sold to the general public. Newspaper advertisements, posters, patriotic meetings, parades, special booths, local quotas, and every marketing method that the fertile brain of Jay Cooke could devise were utilized to get government bonds into the hands of every citizen.
Partly to assist in marketing the government bonds and partly to bring some order into the chaotic currency system, the National Banking Act was passed in 1863. This placed a prohibitive tax on state bank notes and authorized banks coming under the national system to issue untaxed notes. The need for such a measure is indicated by the fact that in Pennsylvania, just before its passage, only 16 of the state's 66 banks had their notes listed in the currency register at par. Among the sixteen were the
Farmers Bank of Lancaster and the Lancaster County Bank. Both these banks joined the national system. In addition, the First National Bank of Lancaster was established. All apparently profited by the change, for the newspapers of May 19, 1865, announced substantial dividends: $2.00 per share with an extra dividend of $4.50 per share for the Lancaster County Bank; $3.50 per share
for the Farmers Bank; and 7 1/2% for the First National Bank.
The disappearance of gold and silver money and the inflation of national currency affected everyone. The advertisements of Reed, McGrann and Company, brokers, indicate the trend. On August 7, 1862, this firm was offering 15% premium on U. S. gold, 9% on U. S. silver, 3% on Spanish quarters, and 1% on pennies. On October 8 the premium on U. S. coins had gone up to 17%, on
December 31 it was 25%, on June 20, 1863, it was 45% and was to go still higher. Wentz Brothers Bee Hive Store in August, 1862, was allowing $1.20 worth of merchandise for every gold dollar and $1.10 worth £or every silver dollar.
For the average citizen the most fruitful source of cumplaint was not high prices but the scarcity of small change. "It can't be had for love or money," wrote the editor of the Express and the consequence is that many unpleasant episodes in business occur almost hourly. A purchaser goes into a store for an article the retail price of which is 10 or 12 cents and throws down a dollar note. The dealer then can't make the change. The purchaser is probably an entire stranger and the result is probably no trade." In the restaurant business the difficulty was particularly exasperating, £or the oysters and soup couldn't very well be returned. As the offer to pay was made, the proprietor without change became of necessity the donor of a meal. This quickly developed into a racket,
and to prevent it, many a Lancaster restaurant in Civil War days carried a sign prominently displayed: "No Change" or "No change over 25c."
The condition covered the country. By the winter of 1862 many communities were literally overrun with shinplasters and token money, issued by individuals, corporations, or the cities themselves. Postal currency existed, in fractional denominations, but there was not yet enough of it. Lancaster suffered more in the early stage from lack of change than most communities because it did not go into the shinplaster business, but profited in the end as it did not have a flood of questionable currency to liquidate. So far as can be learned the city itself never issued fractional currency as did New York and other business centers.
It is always interesting to discover the first appearance of the commodities that we today take for granted. It was in May, 1865, for example, that Lancaster drug and stationery stores first advertised paper clips-"Metallic Paper Fasteners" they were called then. Lest that invention seem too trivial, recall for a moment that before paper clips were available, documents were usually pinned together; hard to get apart, hard to get together; that because of the inconvenience records generally were entered in bound volumes. One could almost say that the whole loose-Ieaf system of filing had to wait for the invention of the paper clip.
Another thing we take for granted today is the soda fountain. In 1862 Heitshu's Drug Store and J. B. Markley's Drug Store installed a new kind of soda fountain. Said Heitshu's announcement: "Soda Water, cold and sparkling, with Plain and Cream Syrups. The water is drawn from porcelain lined iron fountains, the only fountains of this kind in the city." At Markley's fountain, strawberry, raspberry, orange, sherry, nectar and Union Hock were "all the go."
G. Sener and Sons had just secured a number of "Patent Weighing Carts" and were ready to "deliver the best coal at the lowest prices, and weigh it at the purchaser's door." Patent spring beds and mattresses were on sale at Amos K. Hoffmeier's on Water Street between King and Orange. These, of course, were the last word in sleeping comfort. Hair or corn-husk mattresses and rope or slat beds were the standard articles. A. C. Flinn's Housekeepers' Furnishing Store, 11 North Queen Street, advertised bath-tubs and water closets in 1862-the first mention of either of these items in the local papers.
The "Age of whiskers" was just about to break upon the world of fashion. Handle-bar moustaches or a luxurious growth on the chin were guaranteed to one and all who would call on Messrs. Chapman or Warner, local barbers. Warner's Grecian Compound would force whiskers to grow on the smoothest face or chin in six weeks, or money back. One of the barbers of the time was something of a local "character"-Elijah Boston, of the Lancaster Emporium of Taste, .'Professor of the Tonsorial Institute, and Physiognomical Hair Cutter and Extatic Shaver. He will shave you clean as a city broker. Shampooning done in the most
improved style:' Boston was a gentleman of color and more or less attached to a lovely negro girl whose throaty voice and magnificent antics made her a favorite entertainer of the town. On one occasion she rose to the dignity of a concert in Fulton Hall, where, rocking in an old arm chair, she rendered ballads and popular songs with such effect that the audience of young blades roared in approval and demanded encores far into the night. From then on she was billed as the Black Swan.
Her husband, the tonsorial artist, had, it seems, a habit of entertaining young girls in his quarters back of the shop after hours. Gossip spread and eventually one of the county commissioners stationed two lads by the barber shop door near Centre Square to report developments. One evening, two dusky maidens, aged about fifteen, entered the shop, whereupon an alarm was given, Commissioner Shaum collected a mob, the door was broken in and Barber Boston was placed on a fence rail and given a ride down
North Queen Street amid loud threats that tar and feathers or worse awaited at the end of' the journey. Before the crowd could accomplish its object the city police took a hand, rescued the victim and put him in a cell for safety. The upshot was a trial of the leaders of the mob. Nothing could be found to incriminate Boston. The affray, however, ended the role of the Black Swan.
The war did not much upset retail business except during the periods of threatened invasion. Late in June, 1863, just before the Battle of Gettysburg, the city was denuded of stocks. On July 11, the Examiner and Herald noted that the .'business men who in the excitement consequent upon the advance of the rebels into Pennsylvania had packed up and shipped off their goods, are now reopening their stocks, and today business will be very generally resumed. This we hope will give a new impetus to trade and remove the Sunday-like stillness whicll reigned in the streets.during the last week."
In at least one instance the war caused the opening rather than the closing of business houses. Mr. N. W. Haines, driven from his home in Winchester, Virginia, because he was a Union man, camc to Lancaster and started a tobacco store at 53 West King Street in 1862.
The era of hoop-skirts was at its peak. Wentz Brothers Bee Hive Store, which always used considerable originality in its advertising, was in 1862 offering $1,000 premium to any lady tall enough to wear a large hoop skirt on exhibition there. Presumably the hoop was big enough to keep the $1,000 safe, for the ad' concludcd: "Ladies are invited to call and see it and contend for the premium; at least to secure one of the 3,000 hoop skirts which Wentz Brothers are offering."
Lancaster's major development during the 1860's was in manufacturing. The public works program 0£ the preceding decade, and the considerable transportation system which had been built up served their purpose well but were not much more enlarged. In fact, one of the railroads, from Leaman Place to Strasburg, went out of existence in 1861. The road from Columbia to Reading was still in
process of construction during the war, but that had been started in 1857. Mail and passenger stage lines still handled most of the rural traffic, the Lancaster, Susquehanna, and Slackwater Navigation Company was actively functioning, and the Pennsylvania Railroad was the main connecting link with more distant points. The one development in transportation was the Peach Bottom Railroad, which was first surveyed in 1861, discussed thoughout the decade, chartered on March 24, 1868, and finally built in the 1870's. The original idea had been to build a trunk line from Wilmington, Delaware, to the Mississippi. This project fell by the wayside during the war, and when it was revived took the form of a line from York to Peach Bottom, across lower Lancaster County to Chester and Philadelphia. It was anticipated that abridge would be built at Peach Bottom for wagon traffic, and connecting links to the main lines of the Pennsylvania Railroad and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad would eventually be constructed.
It was the express service that held most interest to Lancaster countians during the early war years. In December, 1861, the citizens of Lancaster were exerting themselves especially hard in order that the local volunteers. then in Kentucky, should spend their first Christmas in the field as happily as possible. The volunteers of Colonel Hambright's regiment, upon being asked what they wanted, wrote to Lancaster £riends that nothing would be more acceptable to thcm for Christmas dinner than a good mess of sauer kraut to go with their salt pork rations. The Patriot Daughters got busy and soon had the kraut, but were told at the Adams Express office that it would cost $9.371/2 to send it. Contributions were solicited, but when the ladies took the money to the office, they were
told by the managers of the Adams Express Company that the rate had advanced to $13.50. The editor of one of the local papers saw to it that a receipt was obtained for the latter amount, "which we have some notion of getting framed," he wrote, "and preserving it as a memorial of the patriotism and liberality of the Adams Express Company in the War of 1861. In that event it may be appropriately labelled, 'The Sauer Kraut of Patriotism'."
That was just the beginning. It was very shortly learned that a number of packages sent from Lancaster to the troops in Kentucky, prepaid, had been retained at the other end until the soldiers paid for their carriage a second time. In one case, where a receipt was taken in Lancaster for 75c. the recipient had to pay $1.15 more. Public indignation here and clsewhere for the practice was general caused a terrific outburst of newspaper fury and demands for investigation, which finally brought a correction of some of the worst abuses. But during the winter of 1861, in the midst of the great local campaign for equipment and gfts for the volunteer regiment-the army was still poorly supplied from government sources-the uncertainty whether packages would ever arrive at their destination or not was highly irritating to the community and had more than a little effect in checking the more obvious forms
of war profiteering.
The rates for passenger travel certainly were cheap enough. A land company in Missouri, advertising in the Lancaster newspapers, stated that its tract (near Hannibal) was "three days travel from any Atlantic city, for less than $25." The Pennsylvania Railroad had been using, since 1852, a standard rate of 2 1/2 cents per mile. Cheaper still was ocean travel. The Steam Weekly to Liverpool, from Philadelphia, charged $80 for first cabin, or $32.50 for steerage, in coin. But if tickets were cheap, there were still
other ways in which a trip might prove expensive. The Lancaster gentry, in 1862, were warned to "beware of sharpers on the cars from N. Y. and Philadelphia, inquiring your business, destination, etc."
Lancaster county doctors had their work cut out for them during the war, serving actively in the field, in the local encampment, and for a while in the emergency hospital set up in the buildings of Franklin and Marshall College. The lawyers were busied with the red tape of new war legislation, especially the tax laws, and in addition had to handle a tremendous amount of pension and salary claims work. The schools got along as best they could. The Lancaster Mercantile College was doing well under the
direction of T. H. Pollock and was offering courses in double entry bookkeeping, commercial calculations, business
writing, and mercantile la\v. Franklin and Marshall College was just about settled in her new buildings Of the commencement exercises in Fulton Hall, July, 1863, the newspapers wrote: "The late rebel raid into the State prevented the graduates from preparing their usual orations, essays, etc., and this part 0£ the program was dispensed with." Edwin Forrest, the great tragedian, was one of the honor guests on the occasion-relieved, no doubt, that there were no orations. In 1865 a seminary for young
ladies, called the Conestoga Collegiate Institute, was organized and classes were held at 32 South Lime Street. The school was a good one, but for lack of patronage was discontinued at the conclusion of its first graduation exercises four years later .
Outside of the schools the intellectual life of the community centered in debating societies and lectures. The debaters, in 1862, appear to have been out of favor with the press, according to the following squib: "It too frequently happens that the subjects propounded are foolish and silly to the last degree. The public are not immediately interested in the comparative merits of Mark Antony and Andrew Jackson, nor do they care much about discussing the query as to whether women are entitled to the elective
franchise or not." Fulton Hall was in constant use for functions ranging from the torch singing Black Swan to the musical soiree
of the "Inimitable Fakir of Vishnu." Visiting lecturers on phrenology appeared with increasing frequency, offering to fascinated audiences talks on "Noses, their significance, The Roman, Grecian, Indian, Negro, Celestial, Aqueline, Turn Up and Pug Noses, with the Character Revealed by each. Also, by the Mouth, Hair, Cheeks, Ears, Neck, Skin, Walk and Talk," and similar topics. Neither the city nor the county had grown very much between 1860 and 1870. The city's population had changed from 17,000 to 20,000; the county's from 116,000 to 121,000.
During the preceding decade the city had increased by 5,000 and the county by 18,000. The city, in Civil War day's, was still easily confined within the limits of its two mile square. It. was then still possible to advertise the plot at Walnut and Mary Streets as "bounded by open streets on all sides" and commanding "a fine view of the entire city and of the Conestoga and Susquehanna range of HiIls."
But while the great day of expansion had not arrived. it had already been foretold. The one hundred per cent
increase in manufacturing was not an accident or mere war boom. It was the beginning of a growth that was to continue steadily until our own day.