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Offering a November 7th, 1860, invoice from Clarkson, Anderson & Co., of Richmond, importers of hardware, cutlery, guns and tools, signed by one of the owners and addressed to Joseph Hodgson. The itemized list includes gun screws, gun wipers and oak rims. A manuscript notation states, in part, “We have your bill of Rims...ordered which we hope may come to hand...”
This order comes a day after President Lincoln’s historic election. During this crucial week, businesses like Clarkson & Anderson advertised heavily to merchants across the South, reassuring them that their fall importations, recently brought in on ships, were fully stocked and competitively priced despite the looming secession crisis that led to the Civil War.
The purchase of oak rims indicates that Hodgson was stocking up on transportation components as heavy wooden rims were used by wheelwrights to build and repair carriage and wagon wheels just as the country was facing political collapse. Within five months, the country would fracture completely, and Richmond would transition from the hub of American commerce to the heavily fortified capital of the Confederacy. The hardware and transportation items sold by merchants like Clarkson & Anderson would be hoarded to sustain the Southern war effort.
On blue stationary. Light toning. One small tear away from text.
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