At New Manchester, Angus Ferguson operated the saw mill upstream and the brick making facility through Ferguson's Merchants Mills, using slave labor to supply the lumber and bricks for construction of the mill and lumber for the other buildings in the area. He was known for being kind to his slaves, and many remained with him until his death in 1892. The river's elevation began dropping at the first shoal and dam and continued to fall past the factory toward the Chattahoochee. The millrace was built with stacked stone side walls, stretched 1,525 feet, and was hand dug by slaves. Nathaniel Humphries operated the three-story company store, which held dry goods and a post office on the first floor and two apartments on each of the upper floors; it was also rumored that he and his four brothers ran a shoe manufacturing operation for the Confederacy in the basement, and one apartment was believed to have been William J. Russell's Civil War home. The New Manchester Mill opened on December 21, 1849, and the spillway returned water from the millrace to the river, allowing repairs to the water wheel and providing overflow drainage during floods.