Civil War is the only civil war in American history. Both parties participated in the war were the United States of America in the north and the United States Union of the South. The war started with the Southern Union shelling of Sumter Fortress and eventually ended with the victory of the Northern Union. At the beginning of the war, the north fought to maintain national unity, and later it evolved into a revolutionary war to eliminate slavery.
The first impression that the Civil War gave everyone may be mentioned in the history class in middle school: The Civil War paved the way for American capitalists, liberated the black-skinned race, reshuffled the industrial market in the northern United States, and opened up the sales channels and raw material supply of industrial products. Although the impact of this war is good and far-reaching, its cruelty cannot be ignored.
It can be said that the Civil War was the "precursor" of the war that broke out half a century later. Military equipment such as machine guns, fortresses, trenches, warships, etc. were put into the battlefield for the first time, and these murderous machines brought countless blood and deaths. The so-called romance of the Civil War and the magnificent heroism are just fantasies of novelists. Two groups of people in blue and gray were thrown into blood in the Stone Wall War, in the Gettysburg War, and in the Atlanta War, countless people died in this disaster.
In the collision of blood and iron, there is always a group of people taking the opportunity to make a fortune in war. War dealers can be seen in almost all wars, and the nineteenth century America is no exception.
This group of tyrants cleared the officialdom, relied on bribes to exchange for arms orders, and then rushed to produce a batch of defective products with low quality and high prices. Their behavior is tantamount to extortion. Soldiers working on the front line not only have to bear the risk of death in battle, but also have to use low-quality arms products. The so-called "A cannon fires, ten thousand taels of gold." For officials and profiteers who profit from it, war is a treasure pot, a treasure pot that produces gold by squeezing the lives of ordinary soldiers.
Although among the industrial giants and financial tycoons during this period, there were many capable and righteous people who contributed to the country, there were also hidden in the injustice who deliberately made great money in war. For example: U.S. Secretary of the Navy Wells , as an important leader of the Northern Federation, Wells handed over the power to purchase ships to his cousin George and allowed George to draw huge commissions from procurement. This commission is still astronomical.
However, in the political arena, General Wells' behavior is reasonable and legal and will not be condemned. Wells' methods are exactly the same as those of some members of the current U.S. Congress.
Another leader of the Northern Federation in the 19th century, Major General Ripley, was also a guy from the Great Farley City in the war. I don’t know whether Ripley was from a professional military perspective or his own interests. He refused to let the Northern Army use any advanced military equipment. Even the Northern Army introduced Spencer to fire rifles at that time, but the Major General was opposed by the Major General.
Here, when it comes to Spencer M1865 continuous rifle, the first thing that military fans think of must be the unique loading mode of this rifle. Unlike modern continuous-shot rifles, Spencer is loaded from the buttstock and has a capacity of seven rounds. Compared with the various bore-bricked rifles that were popular on the battlefield at the same time, Spencer stabilized the other rifles in terms of firing rate, power and stability.
It can be said that a soldier with this continuous rifle is tantamount to the "terminator" on the battlefield, becoming the most terrifying nightmare in the eyes of the enemy. But to this day, the reason why Major General Ripley refused to introduce Spencer is a mystery.
What type of officer is the easiest type of officer who makes money on the battlefield? There is no doubt about the issue of
, and it is definitely a military officer. Gastels McKin, who joined the army in 1838, participated in the Battle of Sermino and the Battle of Mexico. He was promoted to the Minister of Military Control Commission of the Western Army in 1861 for his outstanding performance on the battlefield. He also chose to take the team to Major General Flemon, which made his career rise to the top. In September of the same year, he was promoted to brigade general.
After the Civil War broke out, the north and the south quickly expanded their troops. As the military commander who controlled the northern military supplies, the task of expanding the military supplies naturally fell on McKinn's head.At that time, many weapons suppliers lacked the corresponding qualifications, and the products in their military factories were all unqualified and defective. However, these suppliers cleverly took advantage of McKin’s hidden line and obtained government licenses from McKin, while McKind took kickbacks from one weapon transaction after another.
The dirty transaction between the two sides lasted for a year, and soon attracted the attention of the supervisory agency. After multiple investigations, McKin was prosecuted, sentenced to fraud and dereliction of duty, and was discharged from military service. This is the only general who was removed from office for corruption in the Civil War. McKin quickly spent all his property, and his wife and children eventually left McKin because of his family's poverty. In 1897, before McKind died, he wrote in his reputation for his inheritance: "As a soldier, I have not left any inheritance." During the Civil War, soldiers usually owned the following personal belongings: shavers, soap, towels, wooden combs, tableware, Bibles, handkerchiefs, tailor bags, cigarettes, etc. These items were all supplied by the quarantine. Thousands of soldiers bring huge gains, and this gain in turn prompts suppliers to engage in gray transactions with the quartermasters.
Pringer IV was one of the most successful senators during the Civil War, but his great political successes lay the groundwork for the business of the Plinger family.
At first, the Pringer family established the country's largest printing factory in Cranston, maintaining trade with five large textile mills in England. In 1860, the twenty-nine-year-old Pringer was proud and was elected governor of Rhode Island. Cranston was Pringer's jurisdiction. Three years later, Pringer entered the Senate as governor of Rhode Island, serving as a senator for twelve years.
At the outbreak of the Civil War, Pringer felt unprecedented pressure. As the governor of Rods, he must support the Northern Federation for political reasons. However, if Pringer took the lead in the Northern Federation, then his family industry would not be able to continue to purchase cotton and other raw materials from , South , which seriously affected the development of the Pringer family printing industry.
Pringer begged the Northern Federal Government to lift the ban, but it did not obtain consent.
As a senator who has been immersed in the calculation of the organs for many years, Pringer thought of a clever plan. At Pringer's instruction, Captain Hoyt purchased three merchant ships and "transferred" one of them to a British merchant, so that the merchant ship could be hung with the British flag and not under the jurisdiction of the Northern Federation.
Then, the merchant ship traveled back and forth between Mexico and "British" in the name of the British. First, he sold nails, soap, butter and other goods to the Southern Federation, and purchased a large amount of cotton on his return journey. Then, the merchant ship "passed" through New York during the return journey and sent the smuggled cotton to the factory of the Pringer family.
The Pringer family's business grew bigger and bigger, and soon attracted the attention of the Northern Federation. Federal officials interrogated a captain under Pringer, who explained the facts. Pringer insisted that he did not participate in smuggling, and faced with six treason accusations of treason Plinger denied it. Perhaps God is on Pringer's side, and the federal officials who tried the Pringer case were not long after, were sent to jail for being reported.
After a while, Lincoln was assassinated, which opened the public's attention. Pringer smuggled as usual and has never been convicted since then.
In the 19th century, due to the Civil War, the coastline of the southern United States was blocked by the federal government, and cotton in the southern United States could not be exported, which directly led to the collapse of the world cotton market. In addition to the lack of cotton in the United States and the northern part of the United States, the textile industries in European countries such as France and the United Kingdom are also in urgent need of raw materials.
In this form, the price of cotton has risen, and smuggling of cotton has become a high-risk and high-reward profitable industry. In the novel "Gone with Gone", there is a captain, Berkeley, who is engaged in a cotton smuggling business. At that time, cotton dealers usually purchased cotton in the southern United States and then came to the border between the United States and Mexico for transportation.
As mentioned above, during the Civil War, both sides were in urgent need of troops. At first, both sides recruited volunteers to participate in the war. However, as the war progressed, the soldiers on both sides suffered huge losses and the volunteers decreased relatively.Under such circumstances, the north and the south had to use the means of "there must be a brave man under heavy rewards" to take out huge military pay to attract strong men to join the army.
So, many "bounty gangsters" who only receive military pay but do not join the army appeared. The group of people first signed up for the army, and after receiving the bounty, they were deserters and sneaked to other places to repeat the activity. Of course, deserters in the south have lower incomes, while deserters in the north have a better profit. In the north, every young man who enlisted in the army could receive a reward of 300 US dollars, and by 1864 the bounty increased to 1,000 US dollars.
Of course, this kind of bounty fraud also has to bear high risks. After 1863, deserters were sentenced to death, and bounty fraud often had to risk being executed.
Colt designed the Colt revolver. During the Civil War, Colt made a fortune with this patent and ranked among the top of the American richest man list. In the mid-nineteenth century, Colt sold revolver to both the north and the south to make huge profits. Colt's behavior was soon condemned by public opinion. The public believed that Colt was a supporter of the South and forced Colt to make a choice between the north and the south. In the end, Colt stopped selling revolvers to the south and focused on selling weapons to the northern army.
The cost of a Colt revolver is about $4 to $9, while the ex-factory price of a revolver is around $12. The British government can buy revolvers at the original price and sell them to the American people at a profit of two dollars. The Northern Federal Government does not have such "treatment". They have to buy a Colt pistol for $25.
In order to stabilize the trade relations between the two sides, Colt often "generously" funded to sponsor northern politicians and gave exquisitely crafted Colt pistols as gifts to Northern Federal officials. The Remington pistol at that time was also excellent in performance and fair in price, selling for only thirteen dollars. However, the military officers of the Northern Federation did not choose this kind of low-quality weapon, but chose the Colt pistol of twenty-five dollars. The tricks in it are naturally inhumane.
During the Civil War, Remington sold only a few thousand, while the high-priced Colt pistols sold hundreds of thousands. When Colt died, he left his descendants with a legacy of $15 million, which is equivalent to the current $900 million.
For a long time, war trade has been the most profitable of all industries in the world. None of them. The profit is not only huge, but also produces long-term and continuous returns, and is accompanied by political returns. It is a very profitable and very not simple business. Historically, war trade has always been comparable to drug trade and smuggling trade, and is known as the world's three major profit-making industries.
Reference:
["American Civil War" and "War Trafficking in the Civil War"]
