Diary of Margaret Junkin Preston: April 10, 1862

Ground white with snow; no mails still: Mr. P. consents to postpone his going to the army, till there is a more decided change in George (an ill child). How this unnatural war affects everything! Mr. P. asks me for some old pants of Willy's or Randolph's, for a boy at the farm. I tell him that on them I am relying wholly to clothe John and George this summer.

For months we have had no service at night in any church in town, owing to the scarcity of candles, or rather to save lights and fuel. Common brown sugar, too dark to use in coffee, sells here now for 25 cents per lb. Salt is 50 cents per quart in Richmond. I jot down things like these, to show how the war is affecting us. A bit of silver is never seen. We are afraid of all sorts of notes. Mr. P. is trying to put what means he has left, from the wreck of his handsome fortune, in land, as the only safe investment; he bought a farm (which he does not want, and doesn't know how to get cultivated) the other day from Dr. Leyburn, so as to have something tangible for his money. While watching beside my child, I have managed to read, “Twelve Years of a Soldier's Life in India,” a most interesting book. What a brave, noble fellow Hodson was! But in its best, most exciting aspects, how unattractive (to me at least) is a soldier's life!

I think continually of Father and Julia, and long to hear from them. Thank God they are not suffering the apprehension — the undefined fear — the constant dread — which I am never free from. We hesitate about engaging in anything. Is it worth while to have garden made? We may be flying before an advancing Federal army before many weeks. Mrs. Cocke writes imploring us to come down to Oakland, bag and baggage; but to fly (in case of the occupation of the Valley) would be to give up everything to certain destruction. The disposition of people here seems to be

— very universally, to hold on to their homes. I shall do so, unless Mr. P. constrains me to go away.

One thing surprises me very much in the progress of this war; and I think it is a matter of general surprise — the entire quietness and subordination of the negroes. We have slept all winter with the doors of our house, outside and inside, all unlocked; indeed the back door has not even a hasp on it, and stands open. I have shut it frequently at midnight (when accident called me down stairs), to keep the dogs out; and some $600 worth of silver, most of it in an unlocked closet, is in the dining room. Would I get my Northern friends to believe this? It is more remarkable, this quietness and sense of security, because there are no men left in the town, except the old men and boys. I note this thing, by the way, as an unexpected phase of these war times. There is not, and never has been, a particle of fear of anything like insurrectionary movements. I am sure I have none.

SOURCE: Elizabeth Preston Allan, The Life and Letters of Margaret Junkin Preston, p. 135-7

Diary of Alexander G. Downing: Thursday, October 29, 1863

It is quite pleasant today. The Mississippi river is slowly rising. Produce is very high here at Vicksburg and fruit and vegetables are scarce this fall because of the large armies in and around this section for more than a year. What little stuff has been grown by the farmers was confiscated by the soldiers before it was matured, so what we get is shipped down from the North, and we have to pay about four prices for it. Potatoes and onions are $4.00 a bushel, cheese (with worms) is fifty cents per pound, and butter — true, it's only forty cents a pound, but you can tell the article in camp twenty rods away. Vicksburg being under military rule makes it difficult for the few citizens to get supplies, which they can obtain only from the small traders who continued in business after the surrender, or from the army sutlers. No farmers are allowed to come in through the lines without passes, and even then no farmer, unless he lives a long distance from Vicksburg, has anything to bring in.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 149-50

John Brown Jr. to John Brown, June 22, 1855

Brownsville, Brown Co.,* K. T.,

Friday Morning, June 22, 1855.

Dear Father, — Day before yesterday we received a letter from you dated Rockford, Ill., 24th May, which for some unaccountable cause has been very long delayed on the road. We are exceedingly glad to hear from you, and that you still intend coming on. Our health is now excellent, and our crops, cattle, and horses look finely. We have now about twelve acres of sod corn in the ground, more than a quarter acre of white beans, two and a half bushels seed potatoes planted and once hoed, besides a good garden containing corn, potatoes, beets, cabbages, turnips, a few onions, some peas, cucumbers, melons, squashes, etc. Jason's fruit-trees, grape-vines, etc., that survived the long period of transportation, look very well: probably more than half he started with are living, with the exception of peaches; of these he has only one or two trees. As we arrived so late in the season, we have but little expectation of harvesting much corn, and but few potatoes. The rainy season usually commences here early in April or before, and continues from six to eight weeks, during which a great amount of rain falls. This year we had no rain of any consequence before the 12th or 15th of May; since then have had two heavy rains accompanied with some wind and most tremendous thunder and lightning; have also had a number of gentle rains, continuing from one to twenty-four hours ; but probably not more than half the usual fall of rain has yet come. As the season last year was irregular in this respect, probably this will be to some extent. We intend to keep our garden, beans, and some potatoes watered if we can, so as to have something if our corn should be a failure. As it is, the prospect is middling fair, and the ground is ploughed ready for early planting next year. Old settlers here say that people should calculate on having the spring's sowing and planting all done by the middle of April; in that case their crops are more abundant. The prairies are covered with grass, which begins to wave in the wind most beautifully; shall be able to cut any quantity of this, and it is of far better quality than I had any idea.

In answer to your questions: Good oxen are from $50 to $80 per yoke, — have been higher; common cows, from $15 to $25, — probably will not be higher; heifers in proportion. Limited demand as yet for fine stock. Very best horses from $100 to $150 each ; average fair to good, $75 to $80. No great demand now for cattle or horses. A good strong buggy would sell well, — probably a Lumberee best. Mr. Adair has had several chances to sell his. Very few Lumberee buggies among the settlers. White beans, $5 per bushel; corn meal, $1.75 per bushel of fifty pounds, tending downward; flour, $7 per hundred pounds; dried apples, 12½ cents per pound; bacon, 12 to 14 cents here; fresh beef, 5 to 6 cents per pound. Enclosed is a slip cut from a late number of the “Kansas Tribune” giving the markets there, which differ somewhat from prices in this section. It is the paper published at Lawrence by the Speers.

I have no doubt it would be much cheaper and healthier for you to come in the way you propose, with a “covered lumber buggy and one horse or mule,” especially from St Louis here. The navigation of the Missouri River, except by the light-draught boats recently built for the Kansas River, is a horrid business in a low stage of water, which is a considerable portion of the year. You will be able to see much more of the country on your way, and if you carry some provisions along it is altogether the cheaper mode of travelling; besides, such a conveyance is just what you want here to carry on the business of surveying. You can have a good road here whithersoever you may wish to go. Flour, white beans, and dried fruit will doubtless continue for some time to come to be high. It is believed that a much larger emigration will arrive here this fall than before. Should you buy anything to send by water, you can send it either to Lawrence, thirty-five miles north of us, or to Kansas City, Mo., care of Walker & Chick, sixty miles northeast of us.

A surveyor would soon find that great numbers are holding more land, and especially timber, than can be covered by 160 acres, or even 320, and that great numbers are holding claims for their friends; so that I have no doubt people will find a sufficient amount of timber yet for a long time. Owing to the rapid settlement of the country by squatters, it does not open a good field for speculators.

The land on which we are located was ceded by the Pottawatomie Indians to the Government. The Ottawa lands are soon to be sold, each person of the tribe reserving and choosing two hundred acres; the remainder open to pre-emption after their choice is made. The Peoria lands have been bargained for by the Government, and are to be sold to the highest bidder without reservation. But Missourians have illegally gone on to these Peoria lands, intending to combine and prevent their going higher than $1.25 per acre, and then claim, if they go higher, a large amount of improvements, — thus cheating the Indians. The Ottawas intend to divide into families, and cultivate the soil and the habits of civilized life, as many of them are now doing. They are a fine people. The Peorias are well advanced, and might do the same but for a bad bargain with our Government.

[Here is drawn a plan of the Brown settlement or claim.]

There is a town site recently laid out on the space marked “village plat;” as there are two or three in sight, it is uncertain which will be taken. The semicircle is even ground, sloping every way, and affording a view in every way of from twenty to thirty miles in every direction, except one small point in the direction of Osawatomie; the view from this ground is beautiful beyond measure. The timbered lands on Middle Creek are covered with claims; the claimants, many of them from Ohio, Illinois, and the East, are mostly Free-State folks. There are probably twenty families within five or six miles of us.

Day before yesterday Owen and I ran the Peoria line east to see if there might not be found a patch of timber on some of the numerous small streams which put into the Osage, and which would be south of the Peoria line. We found on a clear little stream sufficient timber for a log-house, and wood enough to last say twenty families for two or three years, perhaps more, and until one could buy and raise more. Here a good claim could be made by some one. The prairie land which would be included is of the very best I have ever seen; plenty of excellent stone on and adjoining it. Claims will soon be made here that will have no more than two or three acres of timber; and after these are exhausted prairie claims will be taken, the claimants depending on buying their timber. Already this is the case, and many are selling off twenty, thirty, and forty acres from their timber claims to those who have none.

_______________

* This is now Cutler, in Franklin County.

 SOURCE: Franklin B. Sanborn, The Life and Letters of John Brown, p. 194-7

Starvation Prices in Richmond

From the Richmond Examiner, May 2.

With the removal of General Winder’s tariff, the prices of country produce and fish flew back with a recoil in proportion to the heavy pressure which had been removed.  Eggs sold yesterday morning for seventy-five cents per dozen, and butter for a dollar and a half a pound.  High as these prices appear, they are not exorbitant in comparison with the prices demanded for butchers’ meat, bacon, groceries, dry goods, wood, etc.  Butchers’ meat was held according to quality, at between thirty-five and a half and fifty cents a pound; bacon (hog round), thirty-five cents; common brown sugar, forty cents; and firewood, from country carts, is sold at the rate of twelve dollars a cord.  In the way of dry goods, we give a few instances: Unbleached cotton is sold from twenty-five to thirty-seven and forty cents a yard, according to the conscience of the dry goods man; bleached cotton from thirty to forty cents per yard, and often sold for sixty-two and a half cents a yard; spool cotton, two dollars a dozen; Irish linen, from seventy-five cents to one dollar and a quarter a yard, and domestics at fifty cents a yard.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Wednesday Morning, May 21, 1862, p. 2

Local Matters

HOGS. – There are altogether too many of these quadrupeds loose upon our streets.  The Marshal should see to it that if people will keep hogs in a city, that they keep them in pens.

CORPORAL DANFORTH, of the R. I. Argus is indulging his natural propensity for low epithets.  He calls us “granny!”  One would suppose the knave never had a grandmother, that he should try to make that endearing name a term of reproach.

DOG KILLING BEGUN. – Fifteen dogs died yesterday very suddenly, as a punishment for violating the dog law in not getting themselves registered.  Served them right.  All the constables and policemen will be at work in a few days; then the canines will expire very fast.

SCALDED TO DEATH. – The Rock Island Argus says, that on Monday evening of last week, a little child of Thomas Slatterly, in the lower part of that city, pulled a pan of hot water from the table, spilling it over and scalding himself so badly that it died on Saturday morning.  The child was about three years old.

NOTARY PUBLIC. – D. B. Shelley, Esq., whose office is at the GAZETTE counting room, took twelve acknowledgements yesterday, which is very fair, considering that every other man, with few exceptions, in our city, is a Notary.  It all arose from the fact, however, of the business that has been attracted to Perry street by the removal of the printing offices there.

THE WEATHER for the last few days has not been of a kind we care about “puffing” much.  After the rain last Saturday the thermometer fell several degrees, and for the last two days and nights overcoats have been in request, and cast-off flannels donned again. – A white frost has covered the ground for a couple of nights, but we have heard of no damage done by it.

DR. GILFORD’S LECTURE. – Our citizens should not forget the lecture of Dr. Guilford, at the Congregational Church this evening.. – His subject is one of general interest, and the Doctor is said to be an excellent speaker.  Let the subject be investigated, and if anything is to be learned of the science of medicine, one upon which mankind is altogether too ignorant, why let’s learn it.  Let us –

“Seize upon knowledge wherever found,

Whether on Christian or heathen ground.”

WHERE THERE IS A WILL THERE IS A WAY. – So thought Mr. DeLand when he set himself about the work of producing an article of Saleratus from all impure and deleterious substances, which could be sold as cheap as any other, and make lighter and better bread.  The article produced was the celebrated chemical Saleratus: Sold at retail by respectable grocers everywhere.  We advise all good housewives who desire to make light biscuits to call for DeLand’s Chemical Saleratus, and use none other.  For sale by wholesale grocers in Chicago.

GYMNASTICS. – Going along Third street a day or two ago, we noticed in a yard a pole extended between two uprights.  On this pole a number of young men and boys were going through a variety of acrobatic performances, tying themselves in knots, spinning around the pole like a top, &c.  They reminded one very much of Mrs. Partington’s opinion of circus performers, that they were originally made for the business, India rubber being the principal material in their composition.  Such exercises are admirably calculated to develop muscle and bodily strength.  More of the same kind would do no harm.

WHEAT declined three cents yesterday.  It is continually declining in New York.  Prices are now about the same as they were a year ago at the present time.  Then whet subsequently declined till, on the first of July, it had fallen to 52 cents.  This was owing to the blockade, which will not operate this year, rather the reverse, and the river will in all probability be open by that time; hence prices are likely to be little if any lower than at present.  Other grain is rather higher than a year ago.  Barley is about double the price it was at that time.

__________

Insurance against fire and the perils of inland transportation, and live insurance, can be had of W. F. ROSS, general insurance agent, Metropolitan building, who will not represent any but the most reliable companies.

__________

PAINFUL ACCIDENT. – A painful accident happened at Bard’s saw-mill yesterday morning to Thomas Leighton, a laborer employed in the bill.  He was at work near the rotary saw, and placed his right foot in such a position that it slipped and was cut by the saw, which penetrated his foot to the ankle bone.  A man who was standing by seized him, and pulled him back – otherwise he would have been drawn on to the saw, and perhaps torn to pieces.  Dr. McCarn was summoned, and dressed the wound, which is of a very serious character – threatening the loss of his limb, though this, Dr. M. thinks can be averted.  Mr. Leighton has a wife and four children, and lives in East Davenport.  He had been at work in the mill only a day or two.  A similar accident occurred at the same saw about five years ago.

AGENTS WANTED. – See advertisement in another column of agents wanted to sell maps.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Wednesday Morning, May 21, 1862, p. 1

Diary of Alexander G. Downing: Friday, January 30, 1863

Everything is quiet today. It came my turn to go on duty. Another gunboat came down the river today. General McArthur moved his headquarters from the boat, lying here in the river, out into a plantation house nearby. Things are very expensive here; butter is fifty cents a pound and cheese is forty cents.

Source: Alexander G. Downing, Edited by Olynthus B., Clark, Downing’s Civil War Diary, p. 97-8

New Orleans and the War

We have just had the pleasure of enjoying a protracted conversation with a highly intelligent gentleman, long a resident of that city, who left New Orleans for the North about ten days ago.  Without further particulars as to our informant himself, it is enough to say that he is eminently reliable, a gentleman of mature judgment and excellent sense, and thus worth of the utmost confidence in his statements. – We shall do injustice to his lucid and graphic statements of the condition of affairs in the Metropolis of the Southwest, trusting only to memory to siege the details, but some points will interest our readers, even thus imperfectly presented.

Louisiana was a strong Union State, and the influence of New Orleans eminently so, long after the secession of other states.  The “Co-operationists” represented the intermediate state of public sentiment from loyalty to disloyalty, but leaned most strongly in favor of adherence to the Constitution and the Union. – They took their name and shaped their policy on the scheme of a co-operaiton of the Southern States in order to secure additional pledges from the General Government, and they carried the State to this measure, but the ground taken was not enough and secession came next, and became dominant, overpowering everything.

What of the Union element in New Orleans to-day?  The question might as well be asked in mid winter of a snow covered field, as to what is seeded down, and what it will bear.  Just now secession holds sway and Unionism is crushed out.  Only one sentiment is expressed because but one is safe, and martyrdom would be sure to follow the other.  Let this terrorism be removed, and there would come the time for judging as the share of this and other Southern communities who would welcome the restoration of the Federal power and unite with it in utterly sweeping away the reckless demagogues who have betrayed and outraged the South.  Our informant speaks hopefully with reference to the men who are thus “biding their time.”

In New Orleans, under the all overpowering influence of secession, there is but one opinion expressed in public.  The city is quiet and orderly, for its lower order of white society have gone to the wars.  There are no riots, nor disturbances.  The city is dull in commercial respects.  Whatever products belong to their market are plenty and without sale whatever they have been accustomed to seek form abroad are proportionately high.  Thus sugar is 1½ to 2 cents per lb., and mess pork is $50 per barrel.  All fabrics are high, and stocks are very light.  Owing to the scarcity of meats, the planters are feeding their slaves on mush and molasses, the latter staple being cheap.  The scarcity of ardent compounds being also great, large quantities of molasses are being manufactured into New England rum, which the whisky loving must need use in place of the coveted but scarcer article.

In monetary matters, the change is a striking one.  All specie has disappeared from circulation.  It has gone into private hoards, and bills of the sound banks of Louisiana (and there are not better in the United States) are also being stored away by holders, who see no advantage in presenting them for redemption in Confederate Notes.  Said a bank officer of the State Bank of Louisiana to our informant, “Out of $250,000 in currency received in making our Exchanges with other banks, only twenty five dollars of our own issues were received.”  For an institution with a circulation of one and a half million, this is a significant statement.

Another proof of the distrust of the people in the notes of the C. S. A. is seen in the fact of greatly stimulated prices of New Orleans real estate.  Secessionists who do not look beneath the surface wax vastly jubilant over the aspect. – “There, sir, look at it – see what the war, and this cutting loose from the North has done for us.  Real estate in New Orleans has gone up one half.  Glorious!! Sir, don’t you see it?  The cause of exultation diminishes rapidly when it is understood that all this is but the natural cause of holders of property who say to their possessions, in view of the everywhere present Confederate notes – “take any shape but that.”  No wonder they prefer real estate at exorbitant prices, and pass the shinplasters out of their fingers as fast as possible.  This is the sole secret of the flush times in New Orleans real estate.

The money in circulation from hand to hand is “everybody’s checks,” and omnibus tickets for small charge, and the most mongrel brood of wild cats and kittens that ever distressed a business community.  We saw in the hand of our informant, a bank note for five cents, issued by the Bank of Nashville!  Besides small issues of shinplasters, notes in circulation are divided, A desiring to pay B two dollars and a half, cuts a five dollar note in two, and the dissevered portion goes floating about distressedly looking up its better half, (or otherwise) according to which end bears the bank signatures.

As to the feeling of the community regarding the war, the outspoken sentiment is one of intense hatred to the North, or “the United States,” as they express it.  They affect to believe that spoliation, rapine and outrage of every dye would follow the invasion of Northern troops.  Their own troops are only indifferently provided with outfit, and camp comforts are scarce.  A very significant statement was recently made in the St. Charles Hotel, in the hearing of our informant, which we deem to give as nearly in his own words as possible.  A gentleman had gone up to the camps at Nashville, having in charge donations from the citizens of New Orleans.  On his return his unofficial statements were about as follows: “I tell you, you have no idea of the suffering there among our troops.  It would make your heart bleed to see them lying there sick and dying without nurses and medicine.  New Orleans has done a great deal, but she must do more.”

A Bystander – “But why don’t people up that way do something?”

“Well, I’ll tell you.  The fact is, about one half of them say they never wanted the troops to come there at all, and don’t care how soon they are removed.  The other half are doing all they can, but cannot do all.”

“Why don’t they set their niggers to tending the sick?”

“Well, that’s the squalliest point on the whole.  The niggers say that if they were Lincoln soldiers they would attend them.”

A Bystander (hotly) – “Why don’t they shoot the ______ treacherous sons of ______.”

“Well (meaningly) they don’t think it’s quite safe up there to begin that sort of thing.”

A pretty significant confession, one would think to be made publicly in the rotunda of the St. Charles.  And this brings us to speak of the position of the blacks.  What do they think of the War?  The gentleman we quote says “the blacks have been educated fast within the past six months.  They are a different race from what they were.  Their docility is a thing of the past, and their masters stand appalled at the transformation.”  In several of the parishes about New Orleans, what were believed to be the germs of dangerous insurrections have been several times discovered within the past few months.  In St. Mary’s thirteen slaves were shot at one time.  The South have thought it would aid their plans by telling the slaves that the enemy of the Union was the “army of freedom,” and the blacks believe it.  Certainly no Abolition sheet of the North is responsible for the circulation of such a statement.

An instance was told us of a man sent to the North from New Orleans, with the purpose of looking about him a little [bare] and gaining an idea of matters.  He accomplished his mission after diverse adventures, and came back to the Crescent City.  Wherever his formal report was made, it certainly was pretty much summed up in a statement he made openly in a secession coterie at the St. Charles.  Said he, “I went to New York, business is going on there about as ever – never saw things more busy there – should not judge any body had gone to the war didn’t actually hear much about the South.  Then I went to where they were turning out the things for war, and saw how they were doing it, and, and then was when I began to smell h-ll.”

We are exceeding the limits we had proposed for our statement, but let us add a few brief facts.  As to the defences of New Orleans.  There are two forts on the river below the city, which once passed, New Orleans would be in Federal hands in twenty four hours, for it has no defences in itself.  Earthworks were thrown up south of the city, but no guns have been mounted.  The secessionists feel the danger of their position, and are loud in censures of their Confederate government for its dilatoriness.  The foreign population of New Orleans are alarmed at the aspect of affairs.  A large meeting of French citizens has been held, and a delegation waited on the French Consul to ask him to present their petition to the French Emperor to send a national vessel to take them from the city.

It is upon a community thus constituted and filled with these real sources of alarm that the news of Zollicoffer’s defeat must fall.  It will be spread like wildfire all throughout the South.  If Confederate notes were a drug before, and only taken under protest and unwillingly, what will happen when notes “redeemable on the establishment of the Southern Confederacy” are made even more shaky as a currency by the imminent danger of the government.  The beginning of the end is at hand, and thus at no distant day. – {Chicago Tribune.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, February 1, 1862, p. 1

At New Orleans . . .

. . . flour was selling at twenty-two dollars and fifty cents per barrel.

– Published in The Cedar Valley Times, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Thursday, April 17, 1862, p. 1

The price of pork in Montreal . . .

. . . is lower than it has been for eighteen years, a grievous fact of Canadian farms, arising from the war between the North and South, which shuts western produce out of the slave States, and deluges Canada and Europe with it.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, February 8, 1862, p. 2

Foreign News

NEW YORK, March 25. – The China arrived up this p. m.

The China’s news is two days later than that brought by the Hermann.

The China’s News is unimportant.

The proposed amendment of the Liberals in the French Legislature to a paragraph in the address relative to America had been withdrawn.

Liverpool, 14 – Flour declined 6d.  Wheat dull–1@2 lower.  Corn declined 6d.  Beef steady.  Pork steady.  Lard active and steady.  Sugar Dull.  Coffee firm.  Rice firm.

London – Breadstuffs declining.  Sugar quiet and steady.  Tea firm.  Coffee firm.

American securities active and advancing.

LATEST. – Liverpool 15. – Breadstuffs dull and unchanged.

Provisions quiet and steady.  Bacon firm.

London 15. – Consols 93 5/8@93¾ money.  I. C. Shares 43½@42½ discount.  Erie 32@33.

In  Parliament Lord Goodman, in reply to Gregory, stated that no information had been received by Government as to the proposed increase duties on imports into the United States, consequent upon such duties being paid in specie.

The Times says the occasion presented by the recent victories for concluding peace – that the Federals have it now in their power to retire from this unnatural strife, with something like honor.

The Daily News argues that by simply refusing any sort of participation in the slavery question the Federal Government will practically doom slavery.

The London Times speculates on the difficulties of settlement and points out public debt, tariff, taxation, slave law, &c., as rocks ahead and looks for the day which is to give two republics.

France is reported to have urgently called upon Spain at once to put an end to misunderstanding between Spanish and French Commanders at Vera Cruz.

It is asserted that the Greek insurrection is gaining ground.  The Government has called out thirty thousand men to complete the army.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, March 29, 1862, p. 3

From Winchester

WINCHESTER, March 12. – Despatches say Gen. Jackson’s force yesterday consisted of Loring’s brigade and several fine batteries and 300 of Ashley’s cavalry, 4,000 in all.  They commenced evacuating the place about sunset last night.  The cavalry were the last to leave.  They departed just before we entered the town.

It is represented that there is a large secession force at Strasburg, and that they intend to make a stand there.  Owing to the state of affairs at Manassas, it is believed that Gen. Jackson will make his way up the Shenandoah valley to the Virginia Central Railroad and thence to Richmond.

Prominent secessionists here say that the rebel forces will make a stand at Gordonsville and that the place is well fortified.

Several prisoners and a small amount of ammunition are all the seizures we have made.

WINCHESTER, VA., March 12. – Gen. Jackson’s forces left here last night.  The forces of Generals Hamilton and Williams are just entering the town.  There was a strong fort one mile out which was evacuated by Gen. Jackson last night.  As the regiments pass along they are cheered and greeted by the citizens and responded to by our officers and men.  The other column of General Banks’ division, which will approach the Berryville route, have not yet arrived.  Not a shot has been fired.

Yesterday the rebels arrested eighty of the most prominent unionists and sent them to Richmond.

Coffee sells at seventy-five cents and one dollar per pound; sugar twenty-five to thirty-seven cents; calico fifty cents.  Other articles are more abundant.

It is represented by the resident friends of the Union that two-thirds of the population of the town and country are loyal, but have been compelled to succumb to the secession pressure so far as the expression of opinion is concerned.

There have been no Richmond papers received here for a week and the citizens are entirely ignorant of the thrilling events which have transpired within that period.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, March 15, 1862, p. 3

Direct from Memphis

(From the St. Louis News, March 1st.)

We had an opportunity, yesterday, of conversing with a gentleman, who left Memphis last Saturday, and reached St. Louis yesterday morning.  He came to New Madrid by boat, thence by land to Price’s Landing, where he crossed the river to Illinois, reaching the Central Railroad.  He has been a citizen of St. Louis, but for some time past has been living at Memphis.

He says there was much depression at Memphis caused by the late rebel defeats, particularly those on the Tennessee and Cumberland rivers; and it was generally admitted that Memphis was in great danger.  All the gold and silver in the Banks, and the treasures of private individuals, had been sent off to New Orleans for safety.  Confederate money, Tennessee notes, and shinplasters had gone down – or rather, all commodities had gone up.  There was no money to be had but paper notes and shinplasters, and of course they had to circulate at their variable value, being indicated not by their own fall, but the rise in price of all articles of trade and consumption.

He says gold could not be bought at any price, and even silver change had entirely disappeared from circulation.  The people of Memphis, however, show no signs of yielding, but say they will defend their city.  All persons of military age turn out at two o’clock in the afternoon every day for the purpose of drilling.  Only a few shot guns were to be had in the city.  A large number of pikes were being manufactured, and with these they hope to compete with the minie rifles and muskets of the Federal troops.

There are no fortifications at Memphis.  The design is to protect the city, if possible, by a defence at Fort Pillow, just below Randolph, sixty miles above Memphis.  At this point there is a bold and nearly precipitous bluff, abut eighty feet above the level of the river, commanding a stretch of the river for three miles above, while the land approach to the fort is protected by a rugged conformation of the ground, and by the Hatchee river, which empties into the Mississippi a mile above the fort.  A call has been made for several thousand negroes from the neighboring counties to complete the works at Fort Pillow.

There were no troops at Memphis.  At New Madrid, there is a fort just below the town, defended by a force whose strength our informant had no means of ascertaining.  He understood that the post was under the command of a Gen. Grant.  It is a mistake, our informant states, to suppose that many St. Louisians who went to Memphis, last summer, are in the army.  Very few of them are, but are living in Memphis as private citizens, making a living as best they can.

There is no great scarcity of necessaries at the South, though many articles such as tea, coffee, butter and salt, are high.  Sweet potatoes are abundant and cheap, and many persons make them their chief article of food. – Leather has become cheaper since the erection of tanneries throughout the country.  Nearly all articles of clothing and other fabrics of general use, formerly imported, were being manufactured in the Southern States.  The stores, however, are destitute of the find goods formerly sold, and the apothecary shops are almost entirely bare.

The rebels have established powder mills in Virginia, South Carolina, Georgia and Alabama, and have an abundance of powder, such as it is – a weak article, and deficient in power.  As an evidence of this, it may be stated that many of the Federal soldiers wounded at Fort Donelson, picked the buck-shot out of their merely skin-deep wounds without the assistance of surgeons.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, March 8, 1862, p. 2

Markets

Burlington, Friday p.m.

The weather after a rainy week is again pleasant – how long it will remain so is uncertain. The roads are very bad and little coming to town by wagon. The river is again rising at this point rapidly, and a large rise is coming down. Millers are in want of grain, and we advance our quotations for spring wheat to 58, winter to 70c.

SUGAR – 9@10 – crushed, 12, refined white 11 ½c; clarified 11c.
COFFEE – 20@22c.
MOLASSES – by the bbl., reboiled, 40; syrup, 45; kegs $4.50. Sorghum 25@30c.
NAILS – Ass.,$3 7c@4.
RICE – 8@9c.
FRUIT – Raisins, prime, new $4.50
BROOMS – $1.25@1 50 per dozen.
FLOUR – Wholesale $4.50 to $5.00; Spring $4.00@$4.55
WHEAT – Spring, 50@55, choice 58; Winter 60@70 firm.
CORN – 15c.
RYE – 25c.
BEANS – 75c@$1.00 per bush.
POTATOES – 25@30c per bush.
OATS – 20c.
BUTTER – 10@12 ½c.
EGGS – 5c.
CHICKENS – 90@$1.25 per doz.
ONIONS – 25c. – no market.
HAY – Timothy,$7@$9
WOOD – $2.50@$3.00
HIDES – Green 4½c; Dry Flint 11@12½c; Green Salted 5½c.
GREEN CALF SKINS – 5c.; salted, 6@7c.
SHEEP PELTS – 35@100.
WHISKEY – 20@22c.
LARD – 4@6c.per lb. in bbl.
APPLES – 30@50c.
DRIED APPLES – 6@7c. per lb.
TIMOTHY SEED – $1.25 to $1.50 per bush.
HUNGARIAN GRASS SEED – 15@25c bush. No Sale.
CLOVER SEED – $4.75@5.50
FLAX SEED – prime, $1.25@$1.50
CORN MEAL – 25c per bush.
BACON – hams 4@50c; shoulders 3@4 cents; side 5c.
RAGS – 1½c per lb.

– Published in the Burlington Daily Hawk-Eye and Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, both published on Saturday, April 19, 1862

Southern News.

The military authorities of New Orleans have established a maximum of prices for provisions, above which they are not allowed to be sold: Beef at retail, is to be from 11 to 17 cents per pound; fresh pork, 13 to 17 cents; hams and sides, 22 to 28 cents; lard, 20 to 22 cents; extra flour, $16 to $17 per bbl; corn, $1.10 to $1.25 per bushel; coffee, 50 cents per pound; wheat, $2.50 cents per bushel; salt $7. Per sack. High enough in all conscience, but those who supply New Orleans have no other market, and therefore the tariff is likely to be a good thing for the consumer there.

The military authorities have regulated prices in Mobile to prevent extortion, as follows: molasses, 45 cents; sugar 7 to 10 cents; flour, $12 to $15 dollars; rice, 6 cents; coffee, 50 to 55 cents; bacon 25 to 30 cents.

The Macon (Ga.) Telegraph says: “since the Federals have taken possession of Tennessee, prices of every article of food have risen every hour. Blue beef has risen from ten to twenty cents in the Macon market – corn is a dollar and forty cents – salt swine’s flesh, of the most miserable description, is from thirty three to forty cents per pound.”

- Published in The Tri-Weekly News, Shelbyville, Tennessee, Volume 1 Number 1, April 19, 1862 and reprinted by The Blockade Runner.