The President is
expected back to-day. A letter from Gen. Lee indicates that the
Commissary-General has been suggesting that he (the general) should impress
supplies for his army. This the general deprecates, and suggests that if
supplies cannot be purchased, they should be impressed by the agents of the
Commissary Department; and that the burden should be laid on the farmers
equally, in all the States. Gen. Lee does not covet the odium. But it is
plain, now, that the extortionate farmers, who were willing to see us
non-producing people starve, unless we paid them ten prices for their surplus
products, will be likely to get only the comparatively low schedule price fixed
by the government. Instead of $20 per bushel for potatoes, they will receive
only $2 or $3. This will be a good enough maximum law. But the government must
sell to us at cost, or I know not what may be the consequences.
SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's
Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 2, p.
104
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