Mr. Barrett, an enterprising citizen of
Wytheville, Va., is manufacturing ten rifles a day, and will soon be able to turn out twenty.
Though not quite so highly polished, his rifle is equal if not superior in shooting qualities to that of
Springfield or
Harper's Ferry.
Mr. Barrett manufactures every part of the rifle except the lock, and will manufacture that when it can no longer be bought.
Mr. Brown, of
Washington county, Va., is manufacturing powder.
We are told that he turns out as much as two hundred pounds a day. He procures the ingredients from the surrounding country.
Powder is also manufactured in
Tazewell county, and in other places in that region of country.
It is of the fine quality approved by the riflemen of the mountains, which is of course enough to say on that subject.
The only difficulty is in procuring sulphur in sufficient supply.
To manufacture this article in quantity, machinery is requisite that will cost some five thousand dollars; and there are few men of ready capital at this time in that part of the
State.
The Government should give an order to some responsible and enterprising man, or set of men, in
Carroll county, where the copper beds lie and sulphur ones abound profusely, for ten or fifteen thousand dollars' worth of sulphur.
This would enable them to make all the preparations requisite for an extensive manufacture of this valuable requisite of war.
The lead mines of
Wythe county are inexhaustible, and large quantities are manufactured.
They have been continually worked since the Revolution, and the lead is of the finest quality and unusually celebrated.
There is no limit to the supply.
There are large iron foundries in
Wythe.
No better iron is found in the world than the
Graham iron of
Wythe.
It is admirable for gun-barrels; and cannon made of it undergo the severest tests that are applied to heavy ordnance.
Thus is
Southwest Virginia a great arsenal of the
South for the munitions of war. They make powder, balls, and guns from home material, and can furnish them in any quantities with a little help from capitalists.
Nor is it deficient in the more important department of good fighting men. The counties in the
Southwest have not been surpassed by those of
Eastern Virginia, in the liberality with which they have turned out soldiers for the war.--The fact is, that country is as true as steel to the
South.
Cut off from the
Northwest by mighty ranges of mountains, it has no associations, affiliations or sympathies with the wretched minions of
Carlile. It is as different a country from the extreme Northwest as
Eastern Virginia.
It was in no part settled from
Pennsylvania, but was peopled exclusively from the old stock of
Virginia people.
As
Mr. Wise would say, it is
intus et in cute Virginian.
