Manchester Powder Mill

During the nineteenth century, the Duck River was a valuable power source for factories and mills along its banks. With the outbreak of war in 1861, the Confederacy quickly established gunpowder mills to support the Southern war effort. The combination of abundant water power and access to the Nashville & Chattanooga Railroad, including a spur line from nearby Tullahoma through Manchester to McMinnville, made Manchester an ideal powder-mill site. The Tennessee Military and Finance Board contracted with Nashville businessman William S. Whiteman to build the mill, advancing him $15,000. By the fall of 1861, the Manchester Powder Mill, located in what is now the park, was producing 1,500 pounds of powder a day. Only a handful of Confederate powder mills existed besides this one, in Nashville, Augusta, Georgia, New Orleans, Louisiana, Marshall, Texas, and Petersburg, Virginia. This mill provided a desperately needed resource while the Augusta facility was under construction and produced 125,000 pounds of gunpowder during its brief existence. On March 26, 1862, Federal troops arrived in Manchester and immediately burned the mill to the ground to cripple the Confederate war machine. Union Col. John Kennett of the 4th Ohio Cavalry reported that Capt. Robie reached Manchester as planned, found the powder mill burned, and continued to Tullahoma, arriving there at 5 P.M. on the 27th. After this expedition into Manchester, the Union army soon left the area but returned and occupied the town on June 23, 1863. The powder mill never operated again. At the forks of the Duck River, Native Americans also built a series of walls within the boundaries of today’s Old Stone Fort State Archeological Park, and although their exact use is a mystery, the walls are oriented to within one degree of sunrise at the summer solstice.

Tennessee · United States