South Side RR Stock 1852

1852 South Side RR Stock Certificate. Historic early Virginia railroad scripophily certificate with vignette of very early steam locomotive pulling several cars. The South Side RR, completed in 1854, was an important supply route in the Civil War. The railroad began at City Point in Hopewell on the James River and extended westward through Petersburg, Burkeville, Farmville, Appomattox Station, and finally Lynchburg, in western Virginia, for a total of about 132 miles. The South Side RR supplied the Confederate army with food, military supplies, and troops. Behind the lines of battle, the South Side line saw little damage for the first few years of the war. However, as the conflict moved south in 1864-65, it incurred heavy damage from both the Confederate and Union army as each sought to cut the supply lines of the other. After the war, Southern General William Mahone rebuilt the South Side RR and consolidated it with two other Virginia lines he ran to form the Atlantic Mississippi & Ohio RR. When this line fell on hard times in the 1870s, it was sold, and renamed the Norfolk & Western. Certificate is in VF condition.