Overview

During Reconstruction, an alliance of southern planters and northern capitalists rebuilt the southern railway system using remnants of the Confederate railroads that had been built and destroyed during the Civil War. In the process of linking Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia by rail, this alliance created one of the largest corporations in the world, engendered bitter political struggles, and transformed the South in lasting ways, says Scott Nelson. Iron Confederacies uses the history of southern railways to explore linkages among the themes of states' rights, racial violence, labor strife, and big business in the nineteenth-century South. By 1868, Ku Klux Klan leaders had begun mobilizing white resentment against rapid economic change by asserting that railroad consolidation led to political corruption and black economic success. As Nelson notes, some of the Klan's most violent activity was concentrated along the Richmond-Atlanta rail corridor. But conflicts over railroads were eventually resolved, he argues, in agreements between northern railroad barons and Klan leaders that allowed white terrorism against black voters while surrendering states' control over the southern economy. |Focusing on the Reconstruction era, this book links the expansion of Southern railways by Southern planters and northern capitalists to issues of State's rights, racial violence, and big business.

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9780807848036

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[I]t is a sparkling example of scholarship that moves effortlessly across the boundaries of business, social, and political history.<p> Journal of American History

[I]t is a sparkling example of scholarship that moves effortlessly across the boundaries of business, social, and political history. Journal of American History [A] fine study, which offers new and fresh interpretations and does so by integrating a range of disciplines. Civil War Book Review �I�t is a sparkling example of scholarship that moves effortlessly across the boundaries of business, social, and political history. Journal of American History Nelson's truly innovative insights, solid research, and narrative skill make his book a significant and welcome contribution. American Historical Review �Nelson� offers a new perspective on North-South relations during the era of Redemption. Virginia Magazine of History and Biography The story is captivatingly written, briskly paced, and contains a wealth of detail. Journal of Southern History [I]t is a sparkling example of scholarship that moves effortlessly across the boundaries of business, social, and political history. Journal of American History Nelson's truly innovative insights, solid research, and narrative skill make his book a significant and welcome contribution. American Historical Review [A] fine study, which offers new and fresh interpretations and does so by integrating a range of disciplines. Civil War Book Review [Nelson] offers a new perspective on North-South relations during the era of Redemption. Virginia Magazine of History and Biography The story is captivatingly written, briskly paced, and contains a wealth of detail. Journal of Southern History

Author Information

Scott Reynolds Nelson is assistant professor of history at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia.

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