gmertca, , ?|emp, an& JUapoleon - Vote Hemp

$6.50America, IXuaata, S>emp, anb NapoleonAmerican Trade with Russia and the Baltic,1783-1812BY ALFRED W. CROSBY, JR.On the twelfth of June, 1783, a ship of 500 tonssailed into the Russian harbor of Riga and droppedanchor. As the tide pivoted her around her mooring,the Russians on the waterfront could see clearly thebanner that she flew — a strange device of white starson a blue ground and horizontal red and whitestripes. Russo-American trade had irrevocably begun.Merchants — Muscovite and Yankee — had met andpolitely sounded the depths of each other's purses.And they had agreed to do business.In the years that followed, until 1812, the youngAmerican nation became economically tied to Russiato a degree that has not, perhaps, been realized todate. The United States desperately needed Russianhemp and linen; the American sailor of the earlynineteenth century — who was possibly the mostimportant individual in the American economy —thought twice before he took any craft not equippedwith Russian rigging, cables, and sails beyond theharbor mouth. To an appreciable extent, the Americaneconomy survived and prospered because it hadaccess to the unending labor and rough skill of theRussian peasant.The United States found, when it emerged as a free(Continued on back flap)