US Military Posts named for Confederate generals

[L Verge]

(06-02-2013 07:47 PM)william l. richter Wrote:  Camels were used as pack animals across desert areas of the Southwest. They had no relation to the Pony Express. The
latter was a scheme by Stephen A Douglas and Chicago rail interests (which included Abraham Lincoln who went to Council Bluffs across the Missouri River from Omaha, Neb, before the Civil War and called it the terminus of the new rail network) to prove that the central overland route could be used in winter. The winter cross plains travel did prove feasible even though the Pony Express broke the contract company Russell, Majors, and Waddell, noted freighters on the Great Plains. But RMW also lost a lot of equipment in the Mormon War of 1858 trying to supply the army that moved on Utah. By 1861, the telegraph and the secession of the South had killed off the Pony Express for fast mail delivery and the Southern route to California for rail service. This meant that the rails had to use the Central Route and it became home to the Union Pacific Railroad as it still is today. Illinois (remember where Lincoln was from?), Douglas, and the Chicago interests began building Chicago into the "Second City" next to New York City for American finance and trade to the West through a massive rail network. The Pacific Railroad was part of the Republican platform of 1860 and passed in 1862 and revised in 1864 and completed in 1867, work having been started during the Civil War.

As much as I am afraid to disagree with you, Bill, there is reference to an 1855 appropriation from Congress for $30,000 to be invested in camels for the Pony Express. I first learned of the camels and the Pony Express about thirty years ago in corresponding with the historian for the old Postmaster General's office. I just found it again online (and forgot to copy the address).

I was interested in the Pony Express way back when because so many authors were claiming that Isaac Surratt worked for the Express. He didn't.