I said that upwards of 95% of all tariff income was collected in 3 Northern ports, because that's where the consumers were. You can claim that tariff was collected in 300 places or 3000. Until you post some dollar figures on the amounts collected that gives me no reason to doubt what I've said.
You may have no doubt, but you would also be wrong.
The only factual basis for a contention of the sort you are making would be shipping data associated with the landing of goods. Dollar value collected tells you nothing.
Whether or not you can bring yourself to admit it, point of landing data on the value of goods and tariff collection tells you nothing more than that certain goods of a specific value landed at a particular place, and that a tariff value was assigned.
The customs data you have quoted tells you nothing more than that.
I have given you a post that shows several hundred locations where tariffs were collected.
You again insist that a dollar amount of collection in any of these locations is a firm indicator of the amount of imported goods landing at that spot.
Well, you cannot extrapolate that data to provide any valid data on who finally consumed the goods, and was therefore, the ultimate payer of the tariffs.
Concerning your questions on why goods were not direct shipped, the answer has already been given.
It's called the Warehousing Act of and it gave importers a strong economic incentive to drop their goods off at one place where there were warehouses. In 1860 that place for not only the south but for all of North America as well as Central and South America happened to be New York City, which had a large preexisting warehousing industry when the act came into being. The result? Many goods destined for virtually anywhere be it Ohio or Alabama went in through New York.
Goods landed, some tariffs were paid and some not.
But you have no data to support any contention of where the goods were consumed, and ultimately paid for.