This industrial complex, along the north bank of the Kanawha Canal and the James River in Richmond, was the leading ordnance foundry of the Confederacy during the Civil War. The Tredegar Iron Works maintained wartime production despite severe shortages of raw materials, skilled labor, and effective transportation. It enabled the South to sustain itself as a viable war machine for four years. Chartered in 1837 and named for the ironworks at Tredegar in Wales, Tredegar’s rise to preeminence began in 1841 when Joseph Reid Anderson took over the company. Known as the “Ironmaker to the Confederacy,” Anderson guided the firm through the war and to prosperity in the decades following. Tredegar eventually declined to a small local concern and left the site in 1958. The derelict complex was then acquired by Ethyl Corporation, which undertook a restoration of the complex’s antebellum buildings as a civic amenity; Tredegar is now a part of the American Civil War Museum. The Tredegar Iron Works’ principal structure is the gable-roofed gun foundry where most of the Confederate armaments were produced.
[1976 updated NHL nomination approved: 12/22/1977]