THE CRENSHAW WOOLEN COMPANY. - Second in importance as an
auxiliary to Southern independence, scarcely to the Tredegar Iron Works, and the
Virginia Armory, is the Crenshaw Woolen Company, the factory of which
immediately adjoins the Tredegar works, presenting in strong and proximate
contrast the arts of peace and of war – the labors of the anvil and of the loom,
made equally subservient to the success of a people engaged in an arduous
struggle for their liberties. The Crenshaw Woolen Works, established but little
over a year ago, has, in that brief period, achieved a remarkable triumph,
inasmuch as that it has demonstrated, notwithstanding the many disadvantages so
suddenly imposed upon the enterprise of the company, by the blockade, the
perfect ability of the South to compete with the North, even in the field of
manufactures, exclusive precedence in which has heretofore been so arrogantly
claimed by the latter. It has practically demonstrated, too, to our own
capitalists, the unequal natural advantages of Richmond as a manufacturing town,
and is destined, we hope, to win a yet more memorable distinction than its
energy and enterprise have achieved, as the first of a number of similar
establishments which shall confer upon our city the title of the Manchester of
the South.
The fabrics manufactured by the Crenshaw Company, chiefly
the light, blue and grey cloths, adopted for the regulation uniform of the
Confederacy; broad cloths and blankets, although lacking, it may be, somewhat of
the high finish of those made in Northern mills, are certainly far superior in
every other respect. This superiority is especially observable in the weight and
strength of the material, and in the firmness of its color. Where Yankee cloth
may be torn by the slightest exertion of force, it requires the exercise of
considerable muscular power to rend that manufactured by the Crenshaw Company.
The marked inferiority of the former in this respect, is due to the almost
general introduction into Yankee manufactures, as a substitute for wool, of the
material technically known as shoddy, which, while it cheapens the manufactured
article nearly 25 per cent., without detracting in the slightest degree from its
appearance to the inexperienced eye, renders it comparatively worthless for
actual use.
The clothing first furnished to the Northern army by Yankee
contractors, were chiefly manufactured from this article, and newspaper readers
can scarcely have forgotten the virtuously indignant howl which the great Yankee
nation, whose prosperity was - for it is no longer a thing of the present -
based upon trade deceptions, from wooden nutmegs down to paper soles – set up on
discovering that there was no honor among rogues, and that the shoddy clothing
falling to pieces in the course of a few weeks’ wear, left their braves in a
nearly nude condition.
Shoddy is nothing more than old woolen clothing reconverted
by means of machinery into something resembling wool, but possessing, perhaps,
not 15 per cent of the genuine article, and that so rotten by long use as to be
unfit for any other than holiday service. The exact economy, therefore, obtained
in the use of the article, may be determined by every reader for himself. It may
be as well to mention here for the benefit of the uninitiated, that there are
few articles of woolen manufacture emanating from Northern mills, into the
composition of which shoddy does not freely enter.
The saving to the manufacturer from the introduction of
this substitute for wool, may be gathered from the fact that while wool, ready
prepared for the mill, costs from 28 to 60 cents per pound, shoddy can be
purchased in Boston for 25 cents per pound, to equal which in cheapness, wool
must be purchased at 10 cents.
Another fraud upon purchasers, extensively practiced by
Northern manufacturers, is in the adulterated character of the dyes used in the
manufacture of broad cloths, principally log-wood and chloride of tin, the
effect of which is to give to the cloth a highly glossed color, superior even in
appearance to that obtained from indigo - the proper dye - but which fades away
before a few days of exposure to the weather. In this respect, also, the cloth
of the Crenshaw Company is superior to much the greater portion of that which
finds its way to this market from the North, and is seized upon with eagerness
by inexperienced purchasers, willing to sacrifice substance to show. We have
ourselves witnessed a practical comparison, by means of chemical tests, between
the cloth of the Crenshaw Company and a specimen of that from Northern mills,
the result of which was to establish beyond cavil the excellent - we may say -
the honest coloring of the former, and the thoroughly Yankee - i.e., tricky and
unreliable - nature of the colors employed in the latter. Even English
manufacturers, we are told, use the spurious dyes.
The sudden blockading of the ports of the South bade fair
for awhile to terminate, or very much cripple, at least, the operations of the
Crenshaw mills, as far as the manufacture of broadcloths was concerned, by
cutting off the supply of logwood; but fortunately the much talked about ship
Tropic Wind, which ran the blockade in April, brought within available distance
of Richmond a full cargo of the necessary material, found on board a wreck which
was encountered on the coast of Cuba. The Crenshaw Company are now enabled to
furnish their less fortunate manufacturing friends throughout the South with as
much logwood as can be needed for months to come. Some difficulty was also at
first experienced in procuring the cotton warp necessary for manufacturing
purposes, and which prior to the war had been usually brought from England, but
an ample supply, nearly as excellent in quality as the British warps, is now
obtained through the agency of a manufactory established at Franklinsville,
N.C., under the direction of Coffee, Foush & Co. The woolen warps necessary for
their business are here made in the mills of the Crenshaw Company.
The finest wool used in these manufactures is brought from
South America, but the Merino wool raised in Fairfax county, in the vicinity of
the now classic locality of Manassas, and the Texas wool, are very nearly equal
to the South American, requiring perhaps, but care and systematic attention to
render it fully so. At all events, the Virginia and Texas wools are far superior
to that elsewhere to be found within the limits of North America, and are quite
good enough to meet the chief requirements of the finest manufactures.
MECHANICAL
OPERATIONS OF THE CRENSHAW COMPANY.
The Crenshaw Company - the only one, by the way, in the
South now engaged in the manufacture of broadcloths - employ at present 25 broad
looms, and an addition of 15 more are now in the course of construction; 5 setts
of carding machines – three in each sett - and 8 spinning jacks, comprising
about 270 spindles in each. About 130 work people in all are employed, 25 of
whom are females, the latter earning wages to the average amount of about $7.50
a week each. Several children ranging in their ages from 10 to 12 years, are
also employed in the light and simple labor of filling shuttles. The male
employees are principally foreigners, from the English, Irish, and German
factories. Their labors are superintended by experienced overseers from England.
There are 8 dye vaults in the establishment, with an
aggregate capacity equal to about 2,000 pounds per day; and 4 double fulling
mills, in which the cloth, in its rough state of manufacture, is shrunk, to
render it firm preparatory to receiving the final finish. The operation of
raising the nap of the cloth, is an exceedingly simple one, and is performed
upon a gig mill of a German mill.
Attached to the works is a machine shop, where much of the
necessary machinery is constructed, repairs performed, &c.
The Crenshaw Works are now exclusively engaged under a
Government contract, in the manufacture of regulation cloth for army uniforms,
blankets, and stocking yarn, all for the use of the army. About 5,000 yards in
all of cloth is manufactured weekly, and abut 450 blankets. The latter, of which
large numbers have already been furnished to the army, are quite equal to the
English army blanket, many of which are made of shoddy, and superior to those of
the Yankees. The blankets of the Crenshaw company are 60 by 80 inches in
dimensions; are made wholly of wool, and weigh but 3 7/8 pounds.
The management of the interests of the company is in the
hands of the following gentlemen:
L.D. Crenshaw, President; Directors - Samuel P. Mitchell,
Wellington Goddin, John H. Montague, P.W. Harwood. Crenshaw & Co. Agents. John
Waterhouse, Superintendent.
