During the months of June, July, August, and September, 1864, there was an
aggregate number of prisoners of about twenty-eight thousand for each
month. To supply this vast number of men with bread would have been
ordinarily no easy task, requiring, as it would have done, twenty-eight
thousand rations of bread daily, or eight hundred and forty thousand
rations monthly. We have shown that the bakery could not have furnished
more than ninety-six hundred rations of corn bread, of the United States
weight of twenty ounces, or ninety-six hundred rations daily, or two
hundred and eighty-eight thousand rations monthly, and probably furnished
but five thousand rations daily, or one hundred and fifty thousand rations
monthly. If this deficiency of a half a million of rations existed, how
can it be explained?
Was munition bread brought from a distance to supply the deficiency? When
and whence, we will ask?
During the period embracing the months of July, August, and September,
1864, the rebel commissary furnished, according to his statements, two
hundred and twenty-three thousand bushels of corn meal, and thirty-seven
hundred bushels of flour for the prison.
There was, during this time (ninety-two days), a monthly aggregate of
twenty-nine thousand prisoners, who required twenty-nine thousand rations
of corn meal daily; or, multiplied by ninety-two days, two million six
hundred and sixty-eight thousand rations for the period of three months;
or, allowing the same weight as the rebel ration, we have 2,668,000 x
1-1/3 = 3,567,333 pounds of corn meal, or seventy-one thousand one
hundred and forty-six bushels, allowing fifty pounds to the bushel. If we
now estimate the rebel garrison to have been four thousand in the
aggregate, we will have for the requirements, 4000 x 92 x 1-1/2 = 552,000
pounds of meal, or ten thousand one hundred and ninety bushels, which
gives, as total for the prison and garrison, eighty-one thousand two
hundred and eighty-six bushels of corn meal.
Yet the commissary states that he sent two hundred and twenty-three
thousand bushels, or almost three times as much as the quantity required.
This is a strange statement to make, as we shall endeavor to show.
The rebel ration allowed by their law gave thirty-seven and a half pounds
of corn meal, three pounds of rice, or five pounds of peas, ten pounds of
bacon, salt, &c., monthly, of twenty-eight days, or about twenty ounces of
meal daily, and about six ounces of bacon. We have, as an aggregate number
of men for the above period (prisoners and guards), 29,000 + 4000 x 92 =
3,036,000 men, requiring, according to law, three million seven hundred
and ninety-five thousand pounds of corn meal. Now the commissary states
that he furnished 226,700 bushels of corn meal and flour; or, multiplied
by 50 pounds = 11,335,000 pounds, thus giving to each man more than three
and one-fifth pounds of meal and flour; or, allowing the usual per cent.
of water, more than four pounds of bread. That these men had sixty-eight
ounces of corn bread apiece, or that they could have eaten it if they had
been furnished that quantity, is not for a moment to be considered. This
analysis betrays the falsity of the commissary's statement, and
invalidates the remainder of his accounts.
It cannot be said that this meal was to be stored for future use, for it
is well known that corn meal will not keep in this climate but for a few
days without fermentation taking place. There is, again, another serious
item to be considered in connection with this statement. Why should this
overplus, of more than seven millions of pounds of meal, be sent to this
prison, when the army of Virginia was calling loudly for grain? The
statement and the figures indicate simply a foolish desire to cover up
deficiencies, and that too in a very hasty manner.