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.5.

this district and more especially in that fact of it lying adjacent and contiguous to Fortress Monroe is such as to excite the gravest fears as to their future, and that of the whites and property in the neighborhood. It is estimated that there are about seven thousand Freedmen of all ages to whom were issued in the month of February about eighteen hundred rations. Although these rations were probably issued only to the "destitute", "widows" "soldiers' wives" and "women with children whose husbands are out of the Dept" yet from the number of idle, lazy negroes, who are constantly seen and who have no apparent means of earning a livelihood, is is reasonable to conclude that many others than the actual parties issued to, manage in one way or another to eke out a scanty subsistence from Government rations.

As far as the issue of rations are concerned it is probable that an increased demand will be made upon the Bureau for rations, in as much as the laws passed at the late session of the Legislature imposing tax upon the oystermen, have had the effect of stopping the foreign oyster trade almost entirely. The families of some four or five hundred oystermen will thus be probably thrown upon the Commissary Dept for their means of existence.

This all admit will be the inevitable result of the cessation of the oyster trade, and it is only by finding some kind of employment for these

Transcription Notes:
Unclear: scanty [[subsistence]] from all [[?]] will