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  • | Contract

    Gallaher & Mc Elroy's Estimate No.37 for the Month of March, 1853

    Contractors on the Blue Ridge Railroad and Tunnel project filled out elaborate and detailed descriptions of work that they were to complete.

  • | Newspaper

    Further Particulars Of The Depot Fire

    This article from the July 21, 1877 issue of the Baltimore Sun gives an account of the fire started by rioters at Camden Station in Baltimore.

  • | Newspaper

    Further Particulars

    This article from the July 21, 1877 issue of the Baltimore Sun provides numerous details of the Baltimore riot, including names of the killed and wounded and an account of what occurred.

  • | Photograph

    Fredericksburg from the river. Showing Confederate troops and bridge. (taken at a distance of one mile.)

    Similar in composition to the December 13, 1862 Harper's Weekly image, in this picture the close proximity of armies to one another is evident.

  • | Newspaper

    Firing On The Crowd

    This July 21, 1877 article from the Baltimore Sun gives an account of the Maryland Sixth Infantry Regiment firing into the crowd in Baltimore.

  • | Illustration

    Firing into a Mob on Baltimore Street

    Railroad detective Allan Pinkerton's history of the strike emphasized the unruliness of the mob and the threat of foreign, anarchist, and communist influences on American labor. Here, his illustration shows the military defending law and order, firing their weapons into a mob in Baltimore during the 1877 strike.

  • | Newspaper

    Failure To Close The Drinking Houses

    This letter to the editor, printed in the July 22, 1877 edition of the Baltimore American, asks why saloons in Baltimore remained open, even after receiving the order to close, and seemed to indicate the ineffectiveness of the police in the situation.

  • | Illustration

    Exchanging Salutations with the Enemy

    Harper's Weekly featured regular illustrations of southern towns and battlefields for Northern audiences following the war. This image of Fredericksburg echoes a photograph by Matthew Brady.

  • | Photograph

    Eastern view of round house and depot, Orange & Alexandria Railroad

  • | Legal decision

    Draft of Catharine Brown, Evidence Given

    Catharine Brown's case--Case No. 4582--was scheduled to go to trial in October 1868 in the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, but was delayed because of various procedural motions by the railroad's attorneys. When these motions were denied, the case was tried over three days in March 1870. The all white jury rendered a verdict of guilty against the railroad company and awarded Brown $1,500 in damages. Then, the defendant railroad attorney's sought an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. Here is their statement of argument, denying that the railroad used violence or made derogatory remarks. Furthermore, in denying Brown's claims, the railroad argued that there were distinctions between through and local passenger types of service, even on the Baltimore and Ohio, and that separate colored cars on local lines were run at the request of black passengers.

  • | Newspaper

    DISCRIMINATION ON ACCOUNT OF COLOR ON RAILROADS

    The New York Times reported on its front page the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Catharine Brown's case. The case aroused Republicans to reconsider the intent and purpose of the Congress in the midst of the Civil War because it turned on the railroad's Congressional charter from 1863 which clearly barred any discrimination on the basis of race or color. The railroad's main argument before the Supreme Court rested first on the idea that separate cars were customary, locally sanctioned, and equally accommodated, and second on the specious reasoning that because they carried colored passengers they had not violated the Congressional charter--colored persons were carried, just in a different car. The spirit of the Congress in 1863, the Court decided, suggested otherwise. The decision, however significant and newsworthy, was sorely limited in its application. Only a handful of railroads in the District of Columbia possessed such language in their originating charters.

  • | Newspaper

    Determined to Fight

    This article from the July 20, 1877 edition of the Baltimore American notes the attitude of the railroad workers toward any attempted to break up the strike.

  • | Contract

    Contract for Negro Slaves, December 23, 1853

    In December 1853, George A. Farrow and David Hansbrough signed a contract with the Blue Ridge Railroad to provide fifty slaves to assist in the construction of the Blue Ridge railroad tunnel.

  • | Contract

    Contract Between the Illinois Central Railroad Company and Pinkerton & Company, February 1, 1855

    In this February 1, 1855 contract between the Illinois Central Railroad and Allan Pinkerton's Detective Agency, Pinkerton & Company agree to establish a "Police Agency" in Chicago to assist the Railroad in the "prompt and efficient performance of their business."

  • | Letter

    Claudius Crozet's Monthly Report for December, 1853

    In his report Claudius Crozet explains the high costs of white labor and the difficulties of securing enslaved labor.

  • | Contract

    Claudius Crozet's Comparative Estimate of the Five Lowest Bids Offered for Blue Ridge Tunnel No. 1, January 21, 1850

    Claudius Crozet offers the Board of Public Works his assessment of the bids for one section of the Tunnel project.

  • | Legal decision

    Catharine Brown, Plaintiff's Prayers

    A brief description of the judgement Catherine Brown hoped for as the jury decided her case.

  • Catharine Brown, Complaint

    Catharine Brown filed suit against the Washington, Alexandria and Georgetown Railroad in March 1868, arguing that a month earlier she was forcibly and violently ejected from the ladies car in Alexandria, Virginia, because of her color. She sought damages of $20,000 to pay for her medical care and to compensate for the injustice of segregation and discrimination. Brown's original petition focused on the railroad's duty as a common carrier and on Brown's first-class ticket which permitted her to ride in the ladies car.

  • | Photograph

    Camden Station

    This 1928 image of Camden Station shows the look of the Baltimore landmark years after the 1877 strike.

  • | Speech

    Bryan-Thurston Second 1894 Debate (Omaha World Herald)

    This article from the October 19, 1894 edition of the Omaha World Herald summarizes the second debate between Republican candidate John M. Thurston and Democratic candidate William Jennings Bryan during the 1894 Nebraska Senate campaign. The article also presents each man's speech, in full, as well as their rebuttal statements.