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women who have children to encumber them, so small that they cannot work. There is at least fifty women of this class, with their four or five children.  At least two hundred women and children must have help immediately or they will suffer."

Mr. G. H. Melcher, Supt. at LaGrange writes that, "many cases occur where the freedmen often being driven from their crops have lost their entire years wages for the want of funds to carry their claims through the Civil Courts, and many whites are taking advantage of their present condition to defraud the freedmen of their earnings.  If the final settlement could be made before a Justice Court it would be different, but with the appeals &c it seems a waste of time to commence. 

From my own observation and all the information I can gather, I am confident that it will be necessary to issue gratuitous rations during the coming winter.  There are many aged freedmen and children who have no means of driving the wolf from the door. One source of relief in the spring and early summer would be a supply of seeds from the office of the commissioner.