Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1879-06-26
;A1isfellamepns &eadiua.
A MILLIONAIRE PLANTER.
WHO CONTROLS THE NEW ORLEANS COTTON
MARKET

WHO CONTROLS THE NEW ORLEANS COTTON
MARKET.
Edward Richardson lives in jackson, Mis-.
sissippi, but he has property interests all over
the State. He owns nineteen plantations in
the marvellously rich river country above
Vicksburg, including parts of Washington
and Issaquena counties, and the Yazoo dis
trict. He has $4,000 acres under cultivation,
$4,000 of them in cotton. He raises about
10000 bales, or 45,OOO,OOO pounds of cotton
annually. He has 5000 acres in corn and
oats for the support of his stock and his
people, And yet he has not land enough.
Whenever planter is hard up and wants to
sell his place for cash, he applies first to old
Ned Richardson, knowing that from him he
will get cash offer, though low one. l
heard Mr.. Richardson offer the owner of q
plantation $4,000 cash for land which the
latter valued at $4,000; and, though the Of
fer was at first refused, was under the i'm.
preston that it would ultimately be accepted.
Nor is Mr.. Richardson's distinction derived
only or solely from his plantations. He con-
trolls the cotton market to higher degree
than any other living man. He is the "Old
Hutch" of New Orleans. When he takes
snuff all the other brokers sneeze. As MEM
ber of the first firm, in point of the volume
of business, he receives and disposes of more
than 100000 bales of cotton annually. He
is the heaviest exporter. He has constantly
the largest supplies on hand. For instance,
when cotton sold, soon after the crop was mar
keted, for eight cents and fraction, he kept
back the bulk of his crop. He has sold most
of it since February. Last week he let lot
90 for II and IL cents. He has still 1,10O
bales back, on which he expects to realize over
13 cents. eff I hadn't waited" said Mr..
Richardson, 81 would have quit loser on the
year. But I'll make little something on
last years CROP and, if the indications for this
year don't fail, or this exodus don't break
things, ought to clear $4,000 to 100000
on this year." Mr.. Richardson was not boast
ing. These statements were pried out of him
by questions on other points. His shrewdness
as cotton dealer is evident, moreover, by the
fact that, while he is selling at the highest
price he bought at the lowest.
As chief owner of the cotton and woolen
mills at Wessor, Miss, in which he now runs
10000 spindles, and is putting in 5000 more,
he has to buy 4,300 to 4,4OO bales Of cotton
annually, near the mills, when he does not
plant himself All this was put in at 8 cents
and fraction per pound. Ifit could be sold
now, the profit on it would be about $35, 1000.
This would make it worth while to close the
mills, but for the throwing of the operatives
out of employment. 1t is not simple thing
here, where new hands would be hard to OBJ
tain, to shut down work and let the operatives
90 A; and on this account Mr.. Richardson has
not attempted to reduce wages during all the
hard times. He says, indeed, that these cot
ton mills are profitable. And there is, conse-
uuently, no reason why wages should be re-
duced. The mills return about l2a per cent.
regularly on the capital invested. The cotton
they use is all bought at the door, and costs
usually two and fraction cents less per pound
than that used in Massachusetts. At the Or
dinary price of cotton last year this would be
a difference of % per cent. in favor Of the
South. The labor here is also cheaper; and
wherever the capital can be obtained at rea-
sonable rates, such enterprises, in the opinion
of Mr.. Richardson, are always bound to sue
ceed. Their success would mean more, he be-
lieves also, than the profit of few fortunate
individuals. If there were as many cotton
mills in Mississippi, in proportion to popula-
ton, as there are in Massachusetts, thelabor
problem would be solved. There would be a
place to use labor which cannot now be EN-.
ployed in the field. Poor whites and members
of the negro family, who are now burdens on
the community, would be bread-winners Mr..
Richardson cited number of instances Of ab-
solute paupers, white and colored, who had
become selfsustaining in his mills, and assert
ed that 435 out of the $50 employed therein
would have done nothing for their own liveli-
hood if they had not been offered these situa-
tons. I asked why the mills were put at a
distance from the river, apparently at an out
ofthe.way place. The answer was that they
were then in the midst of rich wool growing
section. The mills use 1900 to 1,400 bales of
wool, or 100000 to 100000 pounds; and all
the wool, as we'll as all the cotton, is brought
to the door on wagons, from the neighboring
country. Jeans, striped cottons and brown
goods are the principal products Of the mills:
Mr. Richardson owns cotton seed oil mill
on the Mississippi, and has many other small
irons in the fire; but these only do, as Col.
Sellers says, 'for side investments" to keep
his money employed. He is reputed to be
worth from $3,O0O,O0O to $5,000,OO0, and
though he and his partner at New Orleans
have 81, 100000 already advanced on the
growing crop, they have still left more money
than they know how to employ. They are
frightened away from government bonds by
the prospect of only 4 per cent, but they are
after investments that will yield 10 to IL per
cent Correspondence Chicago Tribune.
How THE BATTLE-GROUND IN THE WILL
DERNEss LooKs.-I went over the Wilderness
route, writes a correspondent of the Cincin-
natl Enquirer, in sight almost all the way of
the leading roads on which Lees army had
moved out from behind the Rapidan to strike
Grant in the line of march for Richmond.
At that time no railroad existed through the
Wilderness A narrow gauge railroad Of very
rough quality, about thirty-nine miles long,
now reaches the whole distance from Orange
to Fredericksburg, passing within sight Of
Charlottesville, within short distance Of
the Wilderness Tavern, and crossing Mine
Run, where Meade lost so much time on a
high railroad trestle the railroad also crosses
the lines of march of Grant after he left
his camps around Culpeper and crossed the
Rapidan at Raccoon and Germania fords.
The Wilderness at the present day has
only changed as far as building small station
houses and incipient towns along the railroad
goes. 1t is one the poorest pieces of country
in Virginia, originally dug over to find sur
face iron ore; these ore pits have been
changed by the rains into gullies, which fig
ured in the great battles thereabout. All the
trees in sight are either a sickly oak or a
stunted pine. There are few creeks of any