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| A brigade commissary at Brandy Station, Va. |
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on sale for their convenience.
The monthly allowance of officers in infantry, including servants, was as follows: Colonel, six rations worth $56, and two servants;
Lieutenant-Colonel, five rations worth $45, and two servants; Major, four rations worth $36, and two servants; Captain, four rations worth $36, and one servant; First and Second Lieutenants, jointly, the same as Captains.
In addition to the above, the field officers had an allowance of horses and forage proportioned to their rank.
I will speak of the rations more in detail, beginning with the hard bread, or, to use the name by which it was known in the Army of the Potomac, Hardtack. What was hardtack?
It was a plain flour-and-water biscuit.
Two which I have in my possession as mementos measure three and one-eighth by two and seven-eighths inches, and are nearly half and inch thick.
Although these biscuits were furnished to organizations by weight, they were dealt out to the men by number, nine constituting a ration in some regiments, and ten in others ; but there were usually enough for those who wanted more, as some men would not draw them.
While hardtack was nutritious, yet a hungry man could eat his ten in a short time and still be hungry.
When they were poor and fit objects for the soldiers' wrath, it was due to one
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