Many English businessmen weighed in on the side of the Confederacy because a good many of their mills depended on American cotton and other raw products. Northern protectionist tariffs damaged trade with the South, and was one cause of the Civil War. The English (and to a lesser extent, the French), were comfortable with a system which benefitted them but whose problems were at arms remove.
I don't know how northern U. S. mills and manufactories adjusted during and following the Civil War; I will have to read up on that subject.
If anyone can recommend a balanced business history, especially of raw materials producers using much black labor, especially changes over the period 1850-1870 in the U. S., I would appreciate it.