Viewing page 10 of 205

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

191

knowing that this was a demand for labor in the Valley of the Mississippi, while in Washington I called Gen'l Howard's attention to the subject, and got his permission to send freed people to that part of the Country, whenever I could thus provide them with good homes and good compensation for their labor.  In compliance therewith, from 500 to 1000 have been thus disposed of at very good wages.  The direct result of this movement, as was anticipated, has been to raise the price of wages in the State, and create a healthy, vigorous demand for labor so that now it is no longer necessary to give transportation to parties going beyond the limits of the State to seek places of labor.  It is still however necessary to give transportation quite liberally to freed people going from the upper and poorer parts of the State to others where they can get employment and so present their becoming a charge upon the Government Especially is this necessary now when contracts for labor are being made for this next year.  The freedpeople are generally so poor that, if not aided in moving to those parts of the State where labor is in demand, they would not avail themselves of the opportunities to get good wages.  Without the authority to give transportation, my efforts to arrange the question of labor for this