Hi, this is Linda Derry from Alabama with a belated reply to Sharyn
Woodcock's April 21, 1997 inquiry about anyone coming  "across [camels]
being used in a similar way elsewhere. eg. carrying the ores to the nearest
railhead." I have some info. from the cotton belt in Alabama, USA.
 
Of course its not about carrying ores.  In 1859 a Mr. Benj. M. Woolsey
imported camels and a trainer from the Canary islands.  He intended them to
pull  wagons and prairie turning plows.  Woolsey  reported that he:  "sent
twelve bushes of corn to Selma to be ground, on the same camel.  The corn
was placed upon a saddle weighing 170 lbs, and the camel driver 160 lbs.,
making a burthen of 1,002 lbs - a very good mill wagon and team, I think."
Mr. Woolsey also wrote that "I am not interested in the sale of them except
as a planter, desirous of checking the immense draught upon our cotton for
mules, by substituting a procreating animal of more power and greater
longevity, and which requires less expensive food to keep in working
condition."   He put ten camels in an old field where a mule would starve
and found them "luxuriating upon weeds, briars and shrubbery."  He also
hoped that they could be taught to eat cottonseed.
 
I doubt if Mr. Woolsey's camels were very successfull, afterall there no
camels in the county today --- but then there are few mules either!  I do
know that according to the editor of the Cahawba paper (Cahawba being the
town site I'm working on) camel rides were a real big hit that year (1859)
in town.
 
Linda Derry
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