Records Relating to the Issuing of Rations to Freedmen
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content: Records of the Assistant Commissioner for the District of Columbia, Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, 1865–1869
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: National Museum of African American History and Culture
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NMAAHC.FB.M1055, Series 7
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: Among the records relating to the distribution of rations to freedmen is a volume of monthly reports of rations, clothing, and medicine issued, July 1865-December 1868. The volume is arranged chronologically, and each report gives the number of men, women, and children receiving rations; the number of births or deaths among recipients; the number and cost of rations issued; and the cost of clothing issued. This volume appears to have been prepared from information contained in the unbound consolidated monthly reports of rations, clothing, and medicine issued, compiled by the Assistant Commissioner's Office, August 1865–February 1868. The consolidated reports, which also are arranged chronologically, were, in turn, based on information found in the monthly reports of rations, clothing, and medicine issued, submitted by local superintendents, July 1865–October 1868. The superintendents' reports are arranged by name of State or office and thereunder chronologically. The forms used in preparing the monthly reports in the three series are identical. Other series of records relating to the issuance of rations include a register of ration requests, March 1866–August 1869, arranged chronologically, with each entry giving the name of the officer requesting the rations, the total cash value of the rations, the reason for the request, and the date the request was approved by the Assistant Commissioner; a list of teachers given certificates for the purchase of fuel and rations, June 1865–October 1866, showing the name of the teacher and the date and type of certificate; and trimonthly reports of rations issued at the Soup House on New Jersey Avenue, Washington, D. C., September–December 1865, arranged chronologically, giving the number of men, women, and children issued soup rations on a day–by–day basis.