Beschreibung:

The Committee on Commerce and Manufactures … as relates to the subject of Government ships, for procuring machinery and supplies, respectfully Report
Issued with:] A Bill To procure supplies and furnish the implements of agricultural and manufacturing industry for the soldiers and people of the State, by a union of the State with the Importing and Exporting Company of South Carolina. [N.p. but Columbia?]: 7 December 1863. 3 pp., bifolium (315 x 216 mm). The first report signed in print by Richard Yeadon. Unbound, as issued. Condition : spotting, toned overall. The first page of this Confederate document, published for the use of the South Carolina House of Representatives, includes the report of a committee on the subject and is followed on the next two pages by a line-numbered, double-spaced printing of a proposed bill. The proposal called for the state to become a quarter partner to William C. Bee’s importing and exporting company and co-owner to various blockade-runners. Bee’s company, the Importing and Exporting Company of South Carolina, was among the earliest South Carolina-based blockade running firms. In 1862, after raising capital by selling stock in the company, Bee purchased his first ship and ran the blockade with a ship full of cotton to Nassau and back laden with supplies. Here, the South Carolina House committee proposed investing into Bee’s company as an inexpensive way to become blockade runners themselves and transport cotton to Europe, with a greater yield and reduced risk. This ephemeral government printing appears to be unrecorded.