What an intriguing map.
The nearest rail heads to us here in western Iowa were at the Mississippi River and at St. Joe, Missouri.
Iowa had only been a state for four years. Our part of the state only had a smattering of people.
The south generally lacked strategic east-west railroads suficient to shift forces and war materiel between theaters. The only time they really did was the loan of Longstreet’s Corps to the west for Chickamauga. The north, on the other hand could shift resources at will.
I’d also like to see a railroad map for 1865.
Didn't I-80 go past there in the late 1850s?
Ooooooh, sorry, wrong century. ;-)
I will chime in on the railroad expansion in the Missouri/Kansas area. If you notice, prior to the Civil War the crossing of the Mississippi at Hannibal was extended to mid-Missouri and went through Moberly, Missouri. It was called Magic Town due to its growth in that era. It then extended and at Saint Joseph, a town that was to push over 100k in the late 1800s, it was a simple crossing to Kansas at what came to be called the Pony Express crossing as there were firm bluffs on the Missouri side close to the river.
Then, i the Civil War, St. Joseph went strongly to the confederate side. The Kansas City crossing was much more complex, but it won out. The Hannibal Railroad swing bridge was built in the Kansas City area near where the Missouri River is joined by the Kansas River and turns north to head to Nebraska forming the border from that point between Kansas and Missouri.
That bridge was started and 1867 just after the Civil War and would turn out to promote Kansas City enough to cause it to grow and Saint Joseph to later wain because they did not get a rail bridge for a further five years. Kansas City, Missouri and Kansas City, Kansas had four huge river bottom areas that became vast rail yards over the next fifty years.
Kansas City was controlled by the Union during the war and Saint Joseph was not. Central Missouri of Moberly lost its great growth as well as now trans’Missouri rail lines to the south of the river could reach with rail bottoms in Kansas City to cross over and go west and the Hannibal to Moberly line lost its exclusive early start.