Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 2.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

Colonel — On the 15th of December, Major French dispatched me that the Secretary of War had authorized payment of local value for all supplies delivered before the 1st of February, and that money would be forwarded.

On the authority of this dispatch, I issued an appeal to the planters, urging immediate delivery of their surplus, promising that the first deliveries should be first paid, and stating that I had the highest official assurance that the funds would be promptly remitted.

The appeal failed to produce any effect, because the peopel did not believe it. They no longer credit any promise made by Government officials, and I regret to say that this effort only confirmed their incredulity, as the funds were not forwarded.

I am fully aware that you have done all in your power to procure funds, and I dislike to annoy you on the subject, but the district commissaries urge the matter so strongly upon me, that I again call your attention to the helpless condition in which we are placed for want of funds.

To show how much we have lost in the past, and how hopeless is the prospect for the future without funds, I make the following extract of a letter just received from Major Guy at Montgomery.

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“Our present indebtedness is no less than two millions of dollars. I am entirely destitute of credit, and therefore can procure nothing without money, as the fruitlessness of the recent appeal to the planters, as suggested by you, fully testifies. And I am now without a dollar for hospital or any other purposes; cannot even pay off the employees of the office, and believe that my receipt of stores in the last ten months have been cut short, say, 200,000 pounds bacon, 1,500 head beeves, 10,000 bushels wheat, and other articles in proportion, to say nothing of 12,000 head pork hogs, which I think could have been procured for slaughter in the district, if I had been furnished with money. The new bacon crop will be large, but cannot be controlled without money. There is now about $4,000,000 due on my requisitions for the two last quarters 1864, and my estimate for the present quarter has not yet been acknowledged.”

These remarks apply with equal force to the Mobile district, and in great measure to the other districts in the State. [98]

The case may be briefly stated: the Government has lost the confidence of the people, and can get no further credit from them, and without money your Department must inevitably break down.

It is not probable that the authorized issues of the Treasury will even be sufficient to pay past indebtedness and cover future purchases, but the people would be satisfied if the certificates of indebtedness held by them to a certain period were made receivable in payment of taxes, and then all funds received by disbursing officers could be used for future purchases.

Is such a measure feasible, or is there any near prospect of relief from the present extreme and dangerous embarrassment touching the subsistence of our armies?

Very respectfully,

Your obedient servant,

(Signed)

P. S.--I beg to offer the suggestion that the authority given by the Secretary of War to pay local value till 1st February, be extended indefinitely, or at all events until the new bacon crops is disposed of.