Jippd wrote:I forsee a problem with this map on trench and 1 v 1. If I started on the bottom and went first I feel like it would be very easy for me to keep the top half on their base for a while. I would slowly creep forward and be safe until plum creek from bombardment..by that time autodeploys would save me while I utilize attackers dice advantage to keep the top half on their base
OK. From the vidoes and research readings, there was a lot of challenges gaining momentum for these two lines.
From
http://www.railswest.com/pacificrailroad.htmlCentral Pacific Railroad Begins Construction in Sacramento
The Central Pacific Railroad broke ground at Front and K Streets in Sacramento on January 8, 1863, the Union Pacific a Omaha on December 2, 1863. The Central Pacific laid its first rail on October 26. The Central Pacific's first locomotive, No. 1 Governor Stanford, was placed in service on November 10. Most of the rail, supplies and equipment for the Central Pacific had to be shipped around Cape Horn at the tip of South America. It typically took from three to seven months or longer for shipments to arrive from the East.
Progress was slow for both companies during the war years with price of materials high and labor scarce. The Railroad Act of 1864 doubled the resources made available to the railroads by the previous act.
The Central Pacific pushed their rails 18 miles east of Sacramento to Roseville by February 1864 and train service began in April. Track was completed 31 miles to Newcastle and trains began running in June. Progress slowed as track crews entered the Sierra Nevada foothills. Winter weather and the increasing necessity for tunneling in the mountains began to slow progress further. The CPRR reached Clipper Gap, 43 miles away, was reached on June 10, 1865, and Colfax, 55 miles away, was reached on September 10, 1865.
The work began with the surveyors who selected the best route. The graders followed behind the surveyors, digging through the hills, blasting tunnels, filling in the valleys and building bridges. All grading and track laying was done by hand, using picks and shovels, black powder for blasting, and mule carts to hall the debris away. Behind the graders followed the track layers, laying down the hand hewn wooden ties and rails. the rails were measured to make sure they were exactly the right distance apart then spiked into place using specially designed hammers.
Silver was discovered in Nevada in 1865. Many able bodied men left for Nevada to search for silver, depleting the work force of the Central Pacific. The Central Pacific had hired only white men (mostly Irish) up to this point in time. Faced with a shortage of white workers willing to work on the railroad, Charles Crocker, amid much dispute, began hiring Chinese workers to fill in for the white labor shortage. Although initially thought to be too weak or fragile to do this type of work, the Chinese workers proved to be very efficient and industrious. The decision was made to hire as many as could be found in California, and others were imported from China. The construction crews worked from sunrise to sunset, six days in the week.
An estimated 6000 Chinese workers faced a formidable challenge blasting rock and cutting a roadbed through the Sierras. The rock was so hard that as little as seven to eight inches of progress were made in a day, although the use of nitroglycerin did speed up the process in 1866.
Watertower and windmill at LaramieIn December 1866 the Central Pacific opened 92 miles to Cisco, California. The first CPRR locomotive crossed the California - Nevada border on December 13, 1867. The mountain work was soon completed, and the CP was pushing eastward across the Nevada plane, following the Truckee River to Wadsworth, then the California Trail and Humbolt River eastward toward Utah. Tracks were completed 10 miles east of Elko, Nevada by the end of 1868.
To reduce conflict with the local Native American groups James Strobridge, the construction superintendent of the Central Pacific, offered the Paiute and Shoshone Indians free rides on the trains. The Central Pacific also employed some Native Americans building the railroad.
Union Pacific Begins Laying Track in Omaha
The Union Pacific Railroad was incorporated on July 1, 1862 in the wake of the Pacific Railroad Act of 1862. Its dominant stockholder and partner was Thomas C. Durant who was also selected as Vice President.
The determination for the starting point of the Union Pacific was left up to President Lincoln who selected Council Bluffs, Iowa, on the East bank of the Missouri River, based on the advise of his former client Thomas Durant. Council Bluffs was a major outfitting point on the Missouri for the Oregon Trail with a lively steamboat trade. Omaha, Nebraska was directly across the river. Council Bluffs and Omaha were well north of the Civil War fighting taking place in Missouri, was the shortest route to the South Pass break in the Rockies in Wyoming, and would follow a fertile river that would encourage settlement.
Durant created a separate company, Crédit Mobilier of America, to cary out the construction of the railroad, to limit the liability of stockholders and to maximize profits from construction. The company was the sole bidder for construction contracts from Union Pacific, with the substantial fees being paid by federal subsidies. The company also provided discounted shares of stock to members of Congress who agreed to support additional funding.
UP Construction at Green River, Wyoming Winter 1868 Citadel Rock is in the background (A. J. Russell)The Union Pacific didn't start laying rail in Omaha until July 1865. By January 1866, the Central Pacific had laid 60 miles of track, and the Union Pacific had only laid 40 miles of track to Fremont, Nebraska. The tracks roughly paralleled the Oregon Trail and the Platte River to North Platte, which was reached in December 1866. From North Platte the tracks followed the South Platte River to Julesburg, Colorado Territory, which was reached in June 1867.
The Union Pacific crews were led by Grenville Dodge, the Chief Engineer, and Jack Casement who supervised the Union Pacific construction. Crews were made up of primarily Irish immigrants and Civil War veterans. Others included Native Americans, German and English immigrants, and a few local workers including Mormons in Utah. In addition to the track layers, construction also required hundreds of blacksmiths, carpenters, engineers, masons, surveyors, teamsters, telegraphers, and even cooks.
The Union Pacific progress was often resisted by Native American Indian groups who opposed the incursion of the work gangs and railroad into their hunting areas. They saw the construction of the railroad as a violation of their treaties with the United States. War parties began to raid the moving labor camps that followed the progress of the line. Union Pacific responded by increasing security and by hiring marksmen to kill American Bison - which were both a physical threat to trains and the primary food source for many of the Plains Indians.
The Union Pacific reached Cheyenne, Wyoming in November 1867; and had completed 450 miles of track to the Utah - Wyoming border by the end of 1868.
Maybe we can take the Indian attack from Cheyenne and place the bombardment at Freemont...since that first point was roughly the same for both RRs.
