The history of cotton clothing has followed an interesting path, including a period of a few decades in the United States when cotton represented ingenuity, resilience, and patriotism itself.
During the civil war, the manufacture of powder and explosives was often handled by the most vulnerable, young women and children, whose labor was needed when so many men had been sent off to war. On March 13, 1863, the confederacy experienced a munitions disaster, in the confederate capitol of Richmond.