Better prepared CSA?

[cerebropetrologist]

Could they have produced the ammunition for such weapons?

The Dreyse cartridge is paper containing a lead bullet lubricated with tallow, held in a papier-mache sabot with a small pellet of fulminate of mercury in the base. If you can make a musket cartridge and percussion cap, you should probably be able to make a Dreyse round.

The conventional thinking that it's lack of range would be crippling might dissuade the CSA from purchasing any

Given that most of the Confederate troops had muskets, I can't see this being a deal-breaker.

in addition, didn't the Prussian government basically monopolize production?

The Prussian government only started manufacturing them in Spandau in 1855; the Dreyse factory at Sommerda made the majority of guns. One was sent to Britain for trials in 1849, and the Swiss, Austrians and Americans also had a go with it. Electoral Hesse carried them against the Prussians in 1866, while Hanover had a batch on order when the war broke out. So although there seem to be some solid reasons why the Confederates might not have bought the Dreyse, it doesn't appear these particular ones are included.

 

[Anaxagoras]

For shortages... Northrop must be removed from his OTL position.

I have always said that Northrop did more to lose the war for the CSA than any other single individual. But keep in mind that he was in charge of the Commissary Department, in charge of food and clothes, not the Ordnance Department, in charge of weaponry. The latter was the responsibility of Josiah Gorgas, who was as capable as Northrop was incompetent. So Confederate soldiers might often be half-starved with rags wrapped around their feet, but they generally held good rifles and had enough ammunition.

 

[Anaxagoras]

To bring up again something that I mentioned earlier. . . the single prewar change that would have made the greatest difference to the Confederate war effort would have been to have developed the capability to manufacture steam engines for ships. When one reads the stories of the Confederate ironclad program, the greatest weakness of the ships is that their engines had to be cannibalized from other vessels and were never designed to propel the heavy warships in which they were installed. Had they had decent engines, they would have been incredibly more effective than they turned out to be.

 

[GohanLSSJ2]

I have always said that Northrop did more to lose the war for the CSA than any other single individual. But keep in mind that he was in charge of the Commissary Department, in charge of food and clothes, not the Ordnance Department, in charge of weaponry. The latter was the responsibility of Josiah Gorgas, who was as capable as Northrop was incompetent. So Confederate soldiers might often be half-starved with rags wrapped around their feet, but they generally held good rifles and had enough ammunition.

Any chance to merge the two positions under Gorgas?

 

[Jared]

More in general, call it the high-level equilibrium trap. The society of the South worked very well for the planter elite, to the point where they described it as the beau idea of civilized life. And for getting the iron goods they wanted, getting them cheaply from Pittsburgh, for a notoriously debt ridden elite, is probably better than shelling out the cash to make them locally.

I wouldn't characterise things as a high-level equilibrium trap, just as a scenario where there was limited labour supply and competing demands for that labour. Planters' attitudes to things like industrialisation were very malleable. Even in the greatest of agricultural boom times, there were still slaveowners who were keen to set up factories and other such pursuits. Whenever agricultural prices dropped (which they did, several times), hey presto, most of the slaveowners were prepared to try out industrialisation in greater detail. That had happened before, and would happen again.

More specifically, though, the downturn in iron production had nothing to do with any anti-industry attitudes from planters. It was entirely to do with the economics of the new form of steel production, which was both more price-competitive in itself and also depended on available natural resources (anthracite) which were geographically concentrated. New England, which was the most industrialised part of the USA, and probably the second-most industrialised in the world after Britain (or maybe behind Belgium), also had a collapse in iron production.

(Other side of the coin though, Birmingham is nice linked to seaborne transportation. I think for Jared's idea there needs to be a reason, not involving prescience, that has such a group of Southern planters deciding it's worth the short term cost and pain. But that's certainly possible.

The syndicate I described was what existed in OTL. There's no need to invent such a syndicate. What's needed is for them to get enough clout to overcome the small-farmer opposition in the legislature. This should be feasible with a reasonable PoD. (Although, as an aside, this demonstrates that the idea that the planters ran everything in the South was an overstatement. Here was planters being defeated politically by small farmers.)

All that was required was the (relatively) small investment of building a couple of railroads, at the state level. That happened all the time with other railroads. It failed on this occasion, but that doesn't mean it's guaranteed to fail.

While I think that you can postulate some slave-industrialization (they were trying it OTL, after all) the South will still be on the reverse side of a wicked imbalance in miles of rail, industrial capacity, and population that no amount of gallantry and wonderwaffe can wave away.

The odds against the Rebs are long, certainly. All this does is reduce those odds somewhat.

For slave industrialisation, though... without wanting to get this thread off-topic, slaves were widely used in industry. The problem was one of limited slave supplies when faced with a cotton boom (which also stripped slaves out of other agricultural pursuits, incidentally). Whenever cotton prices dropped, industrialisation went up dramatically in the South. And cotton prices were due for a dive in 1860 anyway, due to massive overproduction. (There was about a year's worth of cotton in British warehouses at the outbreak of the ACW). The ACW delayed that cotton price drop for a few years, but as soon as the ACW is over, cotton prices are going through the floor... and suddenly industrialisation looks more attractive again, as happened before.

 

[Fabius Maximus]

For slave industrialisation, though... without wanting to get this thread off-topic, slaves were widely used in industry. The problem was one of limited slave supplies when faced with a cotton boom (which also stripped slaves out of other agricultural pursuits, incidentally). Whenever cotton prices dropped, industrialisation went up dramatically in the South. And cotton prices were due for a dive in 1860 anyway, due to massive overproduction. (There was about a year's worth of cotton in British warehouses at the outbreak of the ACW). The ACW delayed that cotton price drop for a few years, but as soon as the ACW is over, cotton prices are going through the floor... and suddenly industrialisation looks more attractive again, as happened before.

I'm not very familiar with the economics of mid-19th-century America, but would it be plausible to have a period of low cotton prices throughout the 1850s, leading to Southern planters putting more effort into promoting industry during that time? Then, when the Civil War does finally break out, the South has had a decade of industrial expansion, and the mismatch between CSA and USA is less than in OTL?

 

[TheYoungPretender]

For slave industrialisation, though... without wanting to get this thread off-topic, slaves were widely used in industry. The problem was one of limited slave supplies when faced with a cotton boom (which also stripped slaves out of other agricultural pursuits, incidentally). Whenever cotton prices dropped, industrialisation went up dramatically in the South. And cotton prices were due for a dive in 1860 anyway, due to massive overproduction. (There was about a year's worth of cotton in British warehouses at the outbreak of the ACW). The ACW delayed that cotton price drop for a few years, but as soon as the ACW is over, cotton prices are going through the floor... and suddenly industrialisation looks more attractive again, as happened before.

Far from being off topic, I think this is the heart of any better prepared South question - there ability to have more of an industrial plant, and to do so with the labor model that the pre-War South had. The reasons why some ardent partisans of the CSA on these boards don't like looking at doesn't effect that fact. The CSA's scenario for victory, realistically, is Northern war exhaustion. If the South is going to have the sort of vigorous 1862 this war exhaustion plausibly relies on, slave industrialization will be pretty necessary. More steam powered ironclad, more ammunition, more rifled weapons - these are all all vital, and the way the South gets them indigenously is to slave driven industrialization. Horrifying as that would likely be.

I'm thinking some of the attitudes towards labor already present (And bound to grow after the OTL ACW, and likely the ATL one) that were already pretty dire. Have a South industrialize through unfree labor, win independence, and then introduce the gospel according to Herbert Spencer. Ghastly thought.

I'm not very familiar with the economics of mid-19th-century America, but would it be plausible to have a period of low cotton prices throughout the 1850s, leading to Southern planters putting more effort into promoting industry during that time? Then, when the Civil War does finally break out, the South has had a decade of industrial expansion, and the mismatch between CSA and USA is less than in OTL?

This does seem somewhat plausible, especially given the Birmingham proposal above.

 

[Saphroneth]

I think it could be argued that there are three outcomes where the CSA becomes independent.


1) Gloriously.
This is basically a succession of victories, probably in 1861-2, which involve the CSA getting a combination of good luck (they pick their most competent generals, including some who never got a chance OTL) and good judgement, plus some Union mis-moves (e.g. the Union retools for repeaters and breechloaders at the start of the war, thus f*cking up their own production system for rifles) to actually militarily defeat the Union. Trent probably falls into a category like this as it makes the Union weaker.
For this one, better preparation means having a plan for a quick victory that happens to be a good one, and sticking to it. Hire on dozens of ex-sergeants from Europe, train troops quickly, try to get out an effective (if comparatively small) modern army before the Union has time to mobilize.

2) By exhaustion.
This is the one where the CSA manages to hold long enough that the Union loses the will to continue the war. This could bite in 1862 (midterms) or 1864 (election), or possibly in 1863 depending on the situation.
Here better preparation means a strong CS industrial sector, so that in the terms of industrial warfare the CSA is as close to the US as possible. CS cannons are better or more numerous than US ones, attacking a CS position becomes a byword for death while CS attacks on the Union do moderately well (bit better than OTL due to better cannon support). Possibly the South has better disease precautions too?

3) By insurrection.
This one's a little off-base, but possible if hard IMO. It's the one where the population of the South by and large are die-hards who will wage guerilla war against the North (seen as invaders) and where no mid- or post-war reconciliation takes place, so eventually the South is let go as too much bloody work.
This one depends in large part on Union actions (bloody shirts needed) but something important as well is that the groundwork for the South As A Nation is already well advanced when the first shots are fired - and ideally the first shots are fired by the North. Preparation here would consist of essentially propaganda (subtle or blatant) with skill and done pervasively, and in the case of the first shots being fired they'd need to make sure the people to command various points of future conflict are well chosen. (Cool headed, willing to tip-and-run Union military men, possibly even willing to provoke a "Charleston Five" or the like.)

 

[TheYoungPretender]

I think it could be argued that there are three outcomes where the CSA becomes independent.

3) By insurrection.
This one's a little off-base, but possible if hard IMO. It's the one where the population of the South by and large are die-hards who will wage guerilla war against the North (seen as invaders) and where no mid- or post-war reconciliation takes place, so eventually the South is let go as too much bloody work.
This one depends in large part on Union actions (bloody shirts needed) but something important as well is that the groundwork for the South As A Nation is already well advanced when the first shots are fired - and ideally the first shots are fired by the North. Preparation here would consist of essentially propaganda (subtle or blatant) with skill and done pervasively, and in the case of the first shots being fired they'd need to make sure the people to command various points of future conflict are well chosen. (Cool headed, willing to tip-and-run Union military men, possibly even willing to provoke a "Charleston Five" or the like.)

Bluntly, if you look at the political goals of the South in the ACW, and don't arbitrarily draw the line for the end of the war at Appomattox, this is OTL. By 1876, the Southern elite is still the Southern elite, and the bottom rung of the social ladder is still the bottom rung on the social ladder. Saying that the label applied to this rung changing from "slave" to "share-cropper" (or "chain-gang convict"), with their second rank status enshrined in law and barely any more access to the law or to the courts than they had before 1860 is a very small foundation for the idea of the Northern war aims circa 1865 having been imposed upon the South.

I think 3) is very on base for the same reason that discussing slave-driven industrialization is vital to discuss 1): they are realistic paths to Southern victory that comport with the historical record, and not simply the legends and myth-making attached to them.

 

[Jared]

I'm not very familiar with the economics of mid-19th-century America, but would it be plausible to have a period of low cotton prices throughout the 1850s, leading to Southern planters putting more effort into promoting industry during that time? Then, when the Civil War does finally break out, the South has had a decade of industrial expansion, and the mismatch between CSA and USA is less than in OTL?

Lower cotton prices would require that because of <handwave> Britain (and maybe France too) wants much less cotton starting in about 1850. This causes a cotton glut, malaise in the South, a willingness to agree with the North on tariffs for a change and a gradual reallocation of slaves from cotton to industry (and tobacco too, assuming tobacco prices hold up).

The question is whether a South still in the grips of economic malaise would be so confident that they are prepared to secede. It's not impossible, but may bear thinking about. I think that *Bleeding Kansas will still happen on schedule, which was probably the single biggest driver for secession, so it's still possible. But much of the Confederate attitudes during the early part of the war (e.g. "we can embargo Britain and France into supporting us") will no longer apply.

I'm thinking some of the attitudes towards labor already present (And bound to grow after the OTL ACW, and likely the ATL one) that were already pretty dire. Have a South industrialize through unfree labor, win independence, and then introduce the gospel according to Herbert Spencer. Ghastly thought.

It is indeed, and if I were in the mood to write another dystopia, might be one I'd explore further.

 

[Fabius Maximus]

Lower cotton prices would require that because of <handwave> Britain (and maybe France too) wants much less cotton starting in about 1850. This causes a cotton glut, malaise in the South, a willingness to agree with the North on tariffs for a change and a gradual reallocation of slaves from cotton to industry (and tobacco too, assuming tobacco prices hold up).

The question is whether a South still in the grips of economic malaise would be so confident that they are prepared to secede. It's not impossible, but may bear thinking about. I think that *Bleeding Kansas will still happen on schedule, which was probably the single biggest driver for secession, so it's still possible. But much of the Confederate attitudes during the early part of the war (e.g. "we can embargo Britain and France into supporting us") will no longer apply.

Perhaps there would be a way to boost cotton production in other countries (e.g., Egypt, India), so the American imports are facing more competition and cotton growing is consequently less profitable for the South?

 

[Anaxagoras]

Perhaps there would be a way to boost cotton production in other countries (e.g., Egypt, India), so the American imports are facing more competition and cotton growing is consequently less profitable for the South?

Cotton from Egypt and India was of inferior quality to that of the South, which is why production there only increased when the war broke out. So you'd have to find some way for its quality to be improved. Or perhaps some British politicians would get the idea of Imperial Preference into their heads earlier than IOTL and then be more successful in getting it implemented. The latter seems unlikely, though, since the 1850-1860 was the heyday of Richard Cobden and free trade.

 

[Fabius Maximus]

Cotton from Egypt and India was of inferior quality to that of the South, which is why production there only increased when the war broke out. So you'd have to find some way for its quality to be improved. Or perhaps some British politicians would get the idea of Imperial Preference into their heads earlier than IOTL and then be more successful in getting it implemented. The latter seems unlikely, though, since the 1850-1860 was the heyday of Richard Cobden and free trade.

A quick glance at Wikipedia suggests that American cotton was superior because of the type of cotton grown there, so maybe someone could introduce this type of India and/or Egypt.

 

[Anaxagoras]

A quick glance at Wikipedia suggests that American cotton was superior because of the type of cotton grown there, so maybe someone could introduce this type of India and/or Egypt.

They could try planting the seeds. Transplanting the soil and climate conditions would be rather more difficult, however.

 

[Dave Howery]

Not really. The Augusta facility (which was never taken by the Federals) and smaller facilities produced sufficient gunpowder for their needs. There was never a single battle that the Confederates lost because they lacked enough gunpowder. Now, the quality of the gunpowder, especially in terms of artillery fuses, was a different story.

one of my books that deals with the ACW claimed that the CSA was producing more gunpowder than it needed by the end of the war... but had a hard time delivering any of it due to the degradation of the railroad net, loss of horses/wagons, etc...

 

[Jurgen Wullenwever]

I seem to have a vague memory of reading that Southern cotton money paid for Northern industrialisation, in the decades before 1860. Is that correct? If so, and Southern money instead had been directed towards developing the Southern states, could there have been less of a difference in economic power between North and South?

 

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

The Key Problem, as I see it ...

Is the More Likely the South is to Win the War, the Less Likely, they are to Secede in the First Place!

Saphroneth's 3rd idea, probably shows the most promise, because all it would do, is make the South harder to Conquer ...

But, what would Make that a Reality, whereas in OTL it wasn't?

 

[Maximilien.]

If the Confederate States would have prepared better, they would have won the war.

 

[ZaphodBeeblebrox]

Understood ...

But, what is it, that Makes that Happen?

 

[Maximilien.]

But, what is it, that Makes that Happen?

For example, the victory in Gettysburg.