The Civil War Salt Wars
Southerners felt the shortage of salt almost immediately, and suffered all the more from the maneuverings of speculators and the South’s inadequate transportation network. In November 1861 The Daily Vicksburg Whig complained that “all the salt in New Orleans and elsewhere is now in the hands of speculators. … Something must be done,” continued the editorialist, for “we are not willing for them to suck the very life blood out of the people.”