In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

199 Epilogue anD Then The war caMe When the Civil War erupted in April 1861, James Coldwell was among the first to volunteer to serve the Confederacy. Enlisting as a private in Company B of the 12th Virginia Infantry, the Petersburg carpenter spent most of the war wielding a hammer instead of a rifle. First he helped build his regiment’s winter quarters, then, in 1862, he went to South Carolina, where his job was to keep the telegraph lines in operation. In 1865, he rebuilt the telegraph lines William Tecumseh Sherman’s army destroyed during its devastating march to the sea. Although dramatic changes rocked his world in the antebellum era, Coldwell was willing to fight with hammer and hand, or rifle, to preserve his trade and his place as a white man in southern society.1 The economic and social changes that transformed Petersburg from a small regional trading center into a bustling industrial city were a part of the gradual shift that affected all of America in the antebellum era. The market revolution created a national economy based on the values of acquisitive capitalism. New technologies in the form of transportation improvements allowed for broader market participation. As better roads, then canals and railroads, crossed the American countryside, domestic manufactures and trade became increasingly important and led to a broader industrialization of the economy.2 Although the highest concentration of antebellum industry was in the North, southern cities, such as Petersburg, Richmond, and Baltimore, were highly industrialized and articulated developmental goals echoed in any number of growing northern towns and cities.3 1. William D. Henderson, 12th Virginia Infantry (2nd ed., Lynchburg, Va.: H. E. Howard, 1984), 117. 2. Charles Sellers, The Market Revolution: Jacksonian America, 1815–1846 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 27–28; and George Rogers Taylor, The Transportation Revolution, 1815–1860 (New York: Harper & Row, 1951), 396–398. 3. Gregg David Kimball, “Place and Perception: Richmond in Late Antebellum America” artisan workers in the upper south 200 In Petersburg, the newly evolving industrial economy brought uneven opportunities for skilled workers. Successful white masters with enough capital and proper personal connections transformed themselves into entrepreneurs, factory owners, and “bosses,” and formed the Petersburg Benevolent Mechanic Association (PBMA) to foster their interests. These men constituted the core of an emerging middle class that wielded much power in Petersburg.4 Along with merchants and lawyers, PBMA members were active in local politics. In a manner consistent with the planter-dominated oligarchies of rural Virginia, members of the emerging middle class controlled the Petersburg Hustings Court, held leadership roles in the state militia, and administered most advisory boards for local educational and poor relief institutions.5 As was the case in the antebellum North, the masters of the PBMA separated themselves economically , socially, and ideologically from their journeymen employees. They adopted middle-class values, emphasizing temperance and self-improvement through education. Even in the wake of their upward mobility, however, PBMA masters retained ties to their artisanal roots. Although most no longer participated directly in productive labor, PBMA members continued to celebrate manual labor and emphasized the importance of the mechanic arts in the new economy. They adapted the language of artisanal republicanism to fit their new status in the community and to justify their economic success. In line with masters in the antebellum North, these successful southern mechanicsturned -entrepreneurs glorified the artisanal past to promote harmony among their journeymen, who often found fewer opportunities for advancement as the era progressed. (Ph.D. diss., University of Virginia, 1997); Steven Elliott Tripp, Yankee Town, Southern City: Race and Class Relations in Civil War Lynchburg (New York: New York University Press, 1997); Frederick F. Siegel, The Roots of Southern Distinctiveness: Tobacco and Society in Danville, Virginia , 1780–1865 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1987); and Frank Towers, The Urban South and the Coming of the Civil War (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2004). 4. Stuart M. Blumin, The Emergence of the Middle Class: Social Experience in the American City, 1760–1900 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 134–136; John S. Gilkeson Jr., Middle-Class Providence, 1820–1940 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1986), 55–56; and Jonathan Daniel Wells, The Origins of the Southern Middle Class, 1800–1861 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2004), 7–11, 179–180. 5. Charles S. Sydnor, Gentlemen Freeholders: Political Practices in Washington’s Virginia (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1952), 78–81. [3.137.178.133] Project...

Share