After 1830 Harpers Ferry, already recognized as an important industrial center, attained prominence as a vital link in the transportation and communications line between the Ohio and Shenandoah Valleys and the East. By 1830 a semi-weekly stagecoach service connected the town with Washington, D.C. The one-way trip usually required a full day’s travel. That same year a turnpike company was founded to construct a 16-mile macadamized toll road from Harpers Ferry to Middleway, 5 miles west of Charles Town. A turnpike being built from Frederick, Md., about 20 miles to the east, reached the town in 1832. Still another turnpike company, organized in 1851, ran a road from Harpers Ferry southeastward to Hillsborough, about 10 miles away. But the signal impetus to the establishment of the town’s commercial position was the arrival of canal and railroad. Waging a bitter battle to reach the rich Ohio Valley and carry its trade to the East, impeding each other’s progress at every opportunity, the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal (originating in Washington, D.C.) and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (originating in Baltimore, Md.) reached Harpers Ferry in the early 1830’s. Following the winding Potomac River northward and westward from Georgetown, the C & O Canal arrived at Harpers Ferry in November 1833, more than a year ahead of its rival. But the railroad pushed on to the Ohio Valley while the canal stopped at Cumberland, Md. The establishment of these two arteries provided shippers with a cheaper carrier for their products and assured travelers of a more efficient and economical means of reaching their destinations. With the expansion of industry and the development of superior transportation facilities, the population of the community swelled to nearly 3,000 by 1859. Of these about 150 were “free coloreds” and 150 were slaves. The total number of slaves in the entire six-county area around Harpers Ferry was just slightly more than 18,000, of which less than 5,000 were men. There were no large plantations because the land and the climate could not sustain a plantation economy. The few slaveholders maintained farms, and their blacks were mainly “well-kept house-servants.” Most of the white residents of Harpers Ferry worked at the armory or at the manufacturing plants on Virginius Island. Because land was at a premium, the houses, saloons, hotels, and shops were tightly aligned along Shenandoah, Potomac, and High Streets, and sprawled up the slopes of Bolivar Heights. In some places the rocky cliffs were blasted away to make room for another building. Most of the homes were of simple design, but the Government-built residences of the armory officials were more elaborate.