Weekly standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1858-1865, 1859-06-01
PATRICK MURPHY,
S. u. WALLACE,

We have received the Third ANIMAL Report of
the President and Directors of the Albemarle and
Chesapeake Canal Company" which was chartered
to connect the vast body of navgable waters lying
inside of the sand-bars and shoals on the coast of
North Carolina hitherto only accessible by the dam
gerous voyage around cape llatteras, and through
the intricate shallow and shifting channels of Hat
teras and Ocracoke inlets--with the Chesapeake
So dangerous and uncertain is this outside naviga-
tion that the usual detention of vessels from three
to fifteen days-often even twenty five and in some
instances the delay has been Erotracted that they
have been obliged to return to port for supply
of provisions.
The Company's line of navigation, which is inten-
ded to obvate all this difficulty, is about sixty five
miles in length, and commences in North Carolina
at the mouth of North Rivera wide and deep trib-
utary of Albemarle Sound-extending up that river
to the canal-through the canal to Currituck Sound
through Currituck Sound and up the North Land
ing river to the Virginia section of the canal and
thence by canal to the South West branch of Eliza
beth river, in the vicinity of Norfolk. The total
length of both canals is little more than fourteen
miles- North Carolina, from North River to Cur
rtuck Sound, and in Virginia through the Great
Bridge swamp, connecting Currituck Sound with
Elizabeth river. The residue of the line consists of
natural water courses and varies in width from two
hundred feet to several miles, There is but one lock
on the route, which is situated at the junction of the
canal with Elizabeth river. 1t is the largest on the
Atlantic coast, and only exceeded in size by two in
the United States-beng two hundred and twenty
feet in length by forty feet in width in the clear 1t
is of solid cut stone masonry from the granite quar-
res of Port Deposit, and is built in the most sub
stantfal manner, with all the modern improvements.
II is tidelock, with average lift of only about
two feet-possessing draught Of water at all times
of eight feet with capacity to pass propeller of five
hundred tons. ION the completion Of the lock
there will be a continuous channel through the en-
tire line and, if thought advisable, the line can be
opened for smaller vessels by the first of March
next QasD and within the next twelve or fifteen
months the canal be fully completed, and all the
necessary improvement Of the rivers and sounds &C
complished that there shall be q complete navi-
cation, with depth of eight feet water from the
Albemarle to the Chesapeake" Thus has quietly
progressed almost to the point of completion, one
of the most important enterprises of the day. the
practical effect of which will be to double the length
of the Chesapeake Bay, and to open up to the enter
prise of our merchants, by route the most direct
and entirely free from dangcr-a navigation of about
eighteen hundred miles. into remarkably fertile
and productive region, embracing an area Of about
twelve thousand square miles-a territory conside-
rably greater than the whole State of Maryland. To
enable the reader to form estimate of the value
of the trade thus brought to doors, give the
Company's estimate of the products of that region