Charles Morgan (April 21, 1795 – May 8, 1878) was an American railroad and shipping magnate. He played a leading role in the development of transportation and commerce in the Southern United States through the mid- to late-19th century.

Morgan started working in New York City at the age of 14. He managed both wholesale and retail businesses before specializing in marine shipping. He invested in sailing vessels as early as 1819, while managing all aspects of the business from his office at the wharf in New York City. He started his first partnership for a packet company in 1831. During the 1830s, he held stakes in companies shipping to Kingston, Jamaica, and Charleston, South Carolina, from New York, and a stake in a company shipping between New Orleans and Galveston, Texas. During this time, he invested more in steamships than sailing ships. The LouisianaTexas packets became so successful that he gradually withdrew from the Atlantic trade in the late 1830s.

In the 1840s and 1850s, Morgan expanded his shipping business in the Gulf of Mexico, expanding service to Mexico, Florida, and adding stops in Texas. Texas statehood and the Mexican War were boons to his enterprises of shipping mail, troops, and war material. By 1846, he sold his last stake in a sailing vessel. After 1849 and through part of the 1850s, Morgan responded to transportation demand to California driven by the gold rush. He offered passenger service from New York City to San Francisco via Panama. These activities pulled him into business alliances and rivalries with Cornelius Vanderbilt which culminated in Morgan's support of William Walker's filibuster in Nicaragua. Morgan also attempted to damage Vanderbilt's investments and his business positions before they agreed to a truce in 1858. In the late 1850s, a lucrative business developed out of a segment of railroad running between New Orleans and Berwick Bay, Louisiana. The railroad terminated in a desolate part of the state, and Morgan's steamers enabled the railroad to create revenue from an expensive infrastructure investment. In return, the railroad shortened Morgan's Louisiana to Texas route by about 150 miles. In 1855, Morgan incorporated his assets for the first time, co-founding the Southern Steamship Company. With family and other close friends managing the company, Morgan accelerated his investments in steamboats.

During the Civil War, he lost some of his investments to seizures by the North and the South. Most of the steamers seized were corporately owned by the Southern Steamship Company, which led to its liquidation in 1863. Morgan, however, prospered during the war despite these losses. He ran blockade runners for the Confederacy, but his most profitable venture during this period was the Morgan Iron Works. This shop built engines for thirteen ships sold to the Union Navy. At the end of the war, he repurchased some of these steamships at favorable prices.

During Reconstruction, Morgan sold his interest in the Morgan Iron Works. He also took advantage of the buyer's market for steamships and expanded his fleet. He resumed his Gulf packet service between New Orleans and Texas, and between New Orleans and Mobile, Alabama. In 1869, he acquired his first railroad. Two more railroad acquisitions followed in the 1870s. He died on May 8, 1878, at his home in New York City. Just prior to his death, he incorporated Morgan's Louisiana and Texas Railroad and Steamship Company and distributed his shares to several family members.

Family life Charles Morgan was born April 21, 1795, to George and Betsy Morgan. His native town was then known as Killingworth, Connecticut, but is now known as Clinton. Charles had a younger sister named Wealthy Ann (b. September 6, 1798) and older brothers, Elias (b. September 26, 1790) and John (b. December 3, 1791).Baughman (1968), pp. 58.

George Morgan was a successful farmer, and Charles had a comfortable upbringing in a rural area. However, a changing economy induced Charles to follow his brothers who had moved to New York City in 1809. He married Emily Reeves in 1817, several years after establishing himself as a merchant, and they had five children together: Emily Ann (1818), Frances Eliza (1823), Charles W. (1825), Henry R. (1827), and Maria Louise (1832). They remained married until Emily's death in 1850.Baughman (1968), pp. 111112.

Morgan's daughter Frances Eliza married George W. Quintard in either 1843 or early in 1844. Like her father, Quintard grew up in Connecticut and left his hometown as a teenager seeking opportunity in New York City. Concurrent with his marriage, Quintard opened a shop, combining a grocery and ship chandlery. In 1847, he joined the marine engineering firm of T. F. Secor & Co., in which Charles Morgan was a partner, and in 1850, Quintard and Morgan purchased the firm outright and renamed it the Morgan Iron Works. Morgan's eldest daughter Emily Ann married Israel C. Harris of New Orleans. In December 1847, Harris founded a partnership with Charles Morgan's youngest son Henry, and the firm of Harris & Morgan assumed agency for all of Morgan's ships.Baughman (1968), pp. 5356. In 1853, Maria Louise Morgan married Charles A. Whitney, a shipping agent. Out of Morgan's family, his sons-in-laws assumed the most active roles in his transportation businesses. His eldest son, Charles W., eschewed the shipping business and opened his own grocery in 1849. His youngest son, Henry Morgan, married Laura Mallard of New Orleans in 1854.

On June 24, 1851, Morgan married his second wife, Mary Jane Sexton, who taught math and French in New York. Charles and Mary Jane Morgan commissioned the construction of a large mansion at 7 East 26th Street, where they resided from 1852 until their deaths.

Early career

Charles Morgan left home for New York City at age fourteen to work for a merchant, but he later started his own import business. His arrival in the city and coming of age coincided with the growing importance of New York as a port. He conducted business as both a grocer and a chandler, but his early business activities included importer and exporter, retailer and wholesaler, and shipping merchant.Baughman (1968), pp. 89.

Morgan owned stakes in eighteen sailing packet ships and fifteen sailing tramp vessels between 1819 and 1846.Baughman (1968), p. 9. In addition to equity shares, he acted as ship's husband for seven vessels of The Ship Line, and for thirteen sailing vessels in which he had owned shares. His duties as husband included bookkeeping, dispatching, maintenance, and outfitter. In 1831, Morgan partnered with Benjamin Aymars to establish the first packet service from New York to Kingston, Jamaica. He also served as line master, who was responsible for coordination of all ships within the shipping line.Baughman (1968), pp. 911, 249.

Shipping companies

New York and Charleston Steam Packet Company

The New York and Charleston Steam Packet Company was formed in June 1834 by Charles Morgan, James P. Allaire, and John Haggerty. Allaire owned an iron foundry which counted Robert Fulton among its clients, and he acquired Fulton's shop after his death and combined it with his existing foundry. He had the side-wheeler David Brown built and dispatched it to run between New York and Charleston, South Carolina, in November 1833. The firm acquired the William Gibbons the same year, and by March 1, 1834, both steamers were making weekly runs.Baughman (1968), pp. 1215.

At this time, sailing vessels still dominated ocean navigation, including the coastal trade, but Morgan and his brother-in-law John Haggerty joined with Allaire to develop coastal steam packets, focusing on the route between New York and Charleston. Morgan was the operations manager of the New YorkCharleston line, as well as the Jamaica packet line. By June 1835, he was dispatching two steamers per week to Charleston, David Brown and the newly acquired Columbia. The packet company had won the bid for the United States Mail contract, worth $7,200 annually, and its ships were earning more than $1,000 per trip in profits.Baughman (1968), 1517.

However, the risks faced by ocean-going steamers threatened the company. William Gibbons sank in October 1836, which caused a loss of public confidence in addition to the direct financial loss. Some of the investors sold David Brown and then abandoned the company, leaving Morgan, Allaire, and Haggerty as the sole partners and Columbia as their only ship. Yet the partnership built new steamers of the line which they christened Home and New York, and they accomplished this despite the Panic of 1837. They also supplemented their packet revenue with contracts to carry mail along their line, and contracts to carry military troops to Florida.

Another lost ship threatened the New York and Charleston Steam Packet Company. Home started its last voyageand only its third overallon October 7, 1837. Home had cost nearly $90,000 to build and included a cabin with luxury amenities to accommodate as many as 120 first-class passengers. She ran aground while departing New York Harbor, but continued to the ocean without any apparent damage. However, a storm with rough seas battered the ship near Cape Hatteras, North Carolina; she started taking on water and her engine failed, and her sails were not able to drive and control the ship. The storm pushed Home toward the shore and ran it aground, and 99 people died trying to reach land.Baughman (1968), 1718.

Gulf coast packets In 1837, Morgan started running steamboat service between New Orleans and Galveston, Texas, which was the first packet boat service running between these cities on a regular schedule. However, this had not been Morgan's first foray in shipping in the Gulf of Mexico. The previous year, the New York and Charleston Steam Packet Company deployed the steamship David Brown to sail a route from New Orleans to Key West, Florida, and Havana, Cuba. The Home catastrophe forced a reorganization of the partnership, with the new company shifting its emphasis to the Gulf trade, and Columbia sailed out of the port of New Orleans for Galveston on November 18, 1837, about five weeks after the Home wreck.Baughman (1968), pp. 1921.

Allaire and several investors divested themselves from the New York and Charleston Steam Packet Company, leaving Morgan and John Haggerty as the sole partners: thus the Morgan Line was born and Columbia was its first ship, committed to the New OrleansGalveston route. During this era, New Orleans was the main port for Gulf traffic, and the newly formed Republic of Texas attracted many immigrants and demand for trade goods. On June 8, 1838, the owners of Columbia and the owners of the steamship Cuba formed a cartel known as the New Orleans and Texas Line, which included coordination of rates and scheduling of shipping between New Orleans and Galveston. The New Orleans and Texas Line dominated transportation in the two cities after the last half of 1838.Baughman (1968), pp. 2325.

Gulf trade experienced seasonal cycles. June marked the beginning of the slack season, which lasted throughout the summer and part of the fall, and business picked up again in early October. Morgan would remove some of his ships from service during slack times and send them to New York for refitting and repairs. He continued to maintain New York City as his residence and the main location for shipbuilding and repair, even though his main shipping market was located on the Gulf coast.Baughman (1968), p. 31. He sold the last of his sailing vessels in 1846, while he increased his investment in T. F. Secor & Company, a builder of marine steam engines.Baughman (1968), p. 39.

Mexican War