, Sept. 9, 1809.]
The upland people of Georgia and the two Carolinas made prompt response to
the new opportunity. By 1800 even Tennessee had joined the movement, and
a gin of such excellence was erected near Nashville that the proprietors
exacted fees from visitors wishing to view it;[27] and by 1802 not only
were consignments being shipped to New Orleans for the European market, but
part of the crop was beginning to be peddled in wagons to Kentucky and in
pole-boats on the Ohio as far as Pittsburg, for the domestic making of
homespun.[28] In 1805 John Baird advertised at Nashville that, having
received a commission from correspondents at Baltimore, he was ready to
buy as much as one hundred thousand pounds of lint at fifteen cents a
pound.[29] In the settlements about Vicksburg in the Mississippi Territory,
cotton was not only the staple product by 1809, but was also for the time
being the medium of exchange, while in Arkansas the squatters were debarred
from the new venture only by the poverty which precluded them from getting
gins.[30] In Virginia also, in such of the southerly counties as had
summers long enough for the crop to ripen in moderate security, cotton
growing became popular.
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