This Week in History: April 21–27, 1846
The Mexican-American War, Carolina Gold Rush, and Plank Road Boom
Welcome to a journey through the South’s past, one week at a time. This series introduces you to our region’s history: its people, places, events, and headlines—including those lesser-known stories that didn’t make the front page.
This week, we travel 178 years back in time to April 21–27, 1846.
Don’t Mess With Texas
This phrase originated with the Texas Department of Transportation’s 1986 anti-littering campaign, but it can surely be applied—retroactively—to what happened in response to the Thornton Affair on April 25, 1846. That’s when Mexican forces ambushed an American scouting party at Rancho de Carricitos under the command of Captain Seth Thornton, killing eleven U.S. soldiers, then taking Thornton and forty-five of his men prisoner.
Upon hearing the news, President James K. Polk accused Mexican forces of attacking Americans on U.S. soil and asked Congress to declare war on Mexico. The Senate did so on May 12, 1846, after voting 40–2 in favor of Polk’s request.
The Mexican-American War raged on until February 2, 1848, when the U.S. State Department’s chief clerk (Nicholas Trist) and three Mexican representatives (Luis Cuevas, Bernardo Couto, and Miguel Atristain) signed the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. This agreement required Mexico to cede 55 percent of its territory to the United States. It covered all claims to Texas, with the Rio Grande serving as the United States’ southern boundary; present-day California, Nevada, Utah, and New Mexico; most of Arizona and Colorado; and parts of Oklahoma, Kansas, and Wyoming.
Reshaping America
James Knox Polk, a Jacksonian Democrat from Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, served as the United State’s 11th president from 1845 to 1849. Prior to that, he was a member of the Tennessee legislature and U.S. House of Representatives. Most historians consider Polk our nation’s first dark horse candidate.
Upon winning the presidency, Polk aimed to finish what his predecessor, John Tyler, had started. Tyler was a member of the Whig party and facilitated the annexation of Texas before leaving office on March 4, 1845. Three days earlier, on March 1, 1845, Congress voted in favor of a joint resolution to make Texas a state. The resolution became official December 29, 1845, and a formal transfer of government took place February 19, 1846—after Polk became president, but before the Thornton Affair. For this reason, Polk felt justified in declaring war on Mexico after the April 25 skirmish.
But Polk was just getting started. Revered as the U.S. president most closely aligned with achieving Manifest Destiny, Polk oversaw the largest territorial expansion in American history, adding more than one million square miles of land he acquired through a treaty with England and the war with Mexico.
Personal note: My grandfather was born in Morelia, Mexico, in 1924. He grew up there during the years that followed another pivotal event in Mexico’s history: the Mexican Revolution of 1910–1920. I share some thoughts about Mexico’s impact on his life and the work his parents did there as Presbyterian missionaries in this post.
Manufacturing an Economy
The South’s economy was predominantly agricultural in 1846, fueled largely by slave labor for the production of cotton, tobacco, rice, and other cash crops. Georgia led the South in textile production 1840–1890, but South Carolina’s lowcountry wasn’t far behind. The upcountry, meanwhile, focused on commercial iron and was producing 4,000 tons of it per year by the 1850s.
In Aiken County, South Carolina, William Gregg built one of the South’s first cotton textile mills in 1846. More commonly known as Graniteville Mill, Graniteville Manufacturing Company would officially open in 1849 and create a foundation for textile industry expansion across the state. By the late 19th century, textile production had become South Carolina’s most dominant manufacturing industry.
The Carolina Gold Rush
Before the California gold rush, North Carolina’s gold belt got all the glory. Cabarrus, Stanley, Union, Davidson, Guilford, McDowell, and Randolph counties produced the nation’s gold supply from 1803 until 1848, when California took over as the industry leader. Cabarrus County’s Reed Gold Mine, established in 1803, was estimated to have produced $1 million worth of gold between 1804 and 1846. It’s now a state historic site.
Riding the Plank
In 1846, horses were the primary source of transportation. People rode individually on horseback or together in horse-drawn wagons, carts, or carriages. Stagecoach lines also transported passengers—and mail—between towns and cities. But the ride could be rough.
Enter the wooden plank road. Built with pine and oak sills measuring 5 feet by 8 feet, planks were laid down horizontally then covered with gravel or sand, which would harden into a fairly smooth surface for wagons and stagecoaches to travel on. Plank roads also provided a better means of transportation for military convoys during the Civil War.
A plank road boom took place 1840–1860. Virginia claimed the South’s most extensive network of plank roads, with over 1,200 miles constructed by the 1850s. North Carolina took second place, peaking at about 500 miles of plank roads during that time.
These roads were expensive to build and maintain. Tolls helped cover costs. In North Carolina, a horse and one rider paid .5 cent per mile, a teamster with two horses paid 2 cents per mile, a teamster with three horses paid 3 cents per mile, and a teamster with six horses paid 4 cents per mile.
Other methods of transportation in 1846 included steamboats, which were widely used for both freight and passenger transport along inland waterways and coastal routes; and the railroad network, which was not as common because it was still in the early stages of development.
That’s a wrap for this week! Thanks for reading my second installment of This Week in History. Please let me know your thoughts in the comments, and be sure to check out my bonus post about the Protestant missionary movement in Mexico that followed the Mexican Revolution of 1910–1920.
Thank you for doing this. We tend to dwell on current politics so much we become blind to the past.