622 



OBITUARIES, UNITED STATES. 



tunneling in the Blue Ridge, and grading done 

 on the seventy miles not yet finished to Paint 

 Rock. 



The State has appealed from the decree of 

 the District Court to the Supreme Court of the 

 United States, and it is hoped that the late de- 

 cision in favor of the sale of the stock held by 

 the State in the North Carolina Railroad may 

 be reversed. But, if it should be confirmed, 

 the probability is, that the main objects of the 

 consolidation bill will be defeated, and the 

 people of Western North Carolina, who have 

 been so long deprived of the immense benefits 

 and advantages of railroad facilities, will have 

 to suffer still longer for want of those impor- 

 tant veins and arteries of trade and commerce 

 which so greatly promote the prosperity and 

 wealth of the country. 



On the llth of September, 1871, the North 

 Carolina Railroad and all its property was 

 leased to the Richmond & Danville Railroad 

 Company, for a term of thirty years, for a rent 

 of $260,000 per annum, payable on the 1st 

 days of July and January of each year. The 

 Richmond & Danville Company is also bound 

 by the lease to pay any tax imposed on said 

 Railroad, not to exceed $10,000 per annum. 

 The rent has been paid regularly thus far, and 

 the money applied to the payment of interest 

 on the construction bonds, in accordance with . 

 a decree of the United States Court. 



The sum necessary to be raised by the pres- 

 ent General Assembly to pay the past-due in- 

 terest on the construction bonds, and thus save 

 the stock of the State from sale under the de- 

 cree of the United States Circuit Court, will 

 probably amount to more than $200,000. 



Another road destined to have an important 

 influence on the prosperity of the State is the 

 Western North Carolina. Most of the road is 

 already completed; but, in consequence of a 

 portion being unfinished, the State is unable 

 to reap any of the advantages of this great 

 through line. 



The Eastern Division of the Western North 

 Carolina Railroad extends from Salisbury to 

 the French Broad River, near Asheville, and 

 has been completed and in operation for sev- 



eral years from Salisbury to Old Fort, in Mc- 

 Dowell County, a distance of 115 miles, and 

 cost $6,000,000, $4,000,000 of which was paid 

 by the State, and $2,000,000 by individuals. 



The Western Division extends from near 

 Asheville down the French Broad River to the 

 Tennessee line at Paint Rock, some few miles 

 below the Warm Springs, in Madison County. 



Old Fort is 25 miles from Morgan town, and 

 24 miles from the French Broad River. This 

 24 miles includes the mountain-section and all 

 the tunnels, three small ones and one large one 

 at the top of the mountain. The small tunnels 

 were nearly completed, when the work was 

 suspended, and the large one, through solid 

 rock, nearly half finished. The large tunnel is 

 about 1,600 feet in length, 700 feet of which 

 is complete, and some 900 to finish. The en- 

 tire tunneling yet to do in all four of the tun- 

 nels is a little more than a fourth of a mile, 

 and a very large proportion of the grading be- 

 tween Old Fort to the top of the mountain is 

 done, and considerable grading has also been 

 done from the mountain to the French Broad 

 River. The company, previous to the war, 

 had surveyed and located the section from the 

 French Broad River to the Tennessee line, 

 near Ducktown, a distance of 135 miles from 

 Asheville, at the estimated cost of over $5,000,- 

 000, and had located the road from the French 

 Broad River down that river to Paint Rock on 

 the Tennessee line, 44 miles from Asheville. 



The Western North Carolina road has been 

 under mortgage since 1867, and suit is now 

 pending in the Circuit Court of the United 

 States for the Western District of North Caro- 

 lina, for the sale of said road, and it is under- 

 stood that the North Carolina Railroad Com- 

 pany have made arrangements with the cred- 

 itors of the Western North Carolina road to 

 purchase it whenever it is sold, as without 

 that the consolidation act will be a failure. 

 And, by reason of objections to that act, appli- 

 cations have been pending in the State and 

 Federal Courts for injunctions and orders to 

 restrain the North Carolina Railroad Company 

 from purchasing the Western North Carolina 

 Railroad. 



O 



OBITUARIES, AMERICAN. Jan. 1. SWEET, 

 General BENJAMIN J., Deputy Commissioner 

 of Internal Revenue, a gallant officer in the 

 late war ; died in Washington, D. 0., aged 41 

 years. In August, 1862, he aided in organizing 

 the Twenty-first Wisconsin Infantry, of which 

 regiment he became colonel, and soon after 

 rendered effective service at Chaplin Hills. 

 By some mistake the regiment was ordered to 

 a position too far in advance of the main line, 

 where the men were under the fire both of 

 the Union troops and the Confederates. Many 

 lives were lost, and among the wounded was 



Colonel Sweet, who was so disabled that he 

 was thenceforth unfitted for field-duty. Upon 

 his recovery he was placed in command of 

 Camp Douglas, near Chicago, where by his 

 energetic measures he repressed the revolt 

 contemplated by the prisoners at that place on 

 the evening prior to the presidential election 

 of 1864. He discharged the duties of his last 

 official position with honor and integrity, win- 

 ning the respect and confidence of all who had 

 official or personal relations with him. 



Jan. 2. PARKER, JAMKS, a famous railroad- 

 conductor; died at Springfield, Mass., aged 58 



