Viewing page 224 of 228

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

Report on the condition of Bureau Affairs in the Sub District of Amelia & Powhatan Counties Va.-made by Lieut J.B. Clinton Asst. Supt. Bur. R.F. & AL.- for the month ending January 31st 1867.

In this, there is little to report for this month, as the weather has been cold and bad, there has been but very little business transacted between the Whites and Freedmen. Except making engagements and contracts for the present year, which a large number of the freedmen have cheerfully entered into, and most of them for money wages, the opinion of both parties being that it will prove a more prefferable system than working for a share of the crops. The wages agreed upon are from seven to ten dollars per month for adult males, with proper food, quarters and fuel furnished by the employer, with, as a general thing the employe having the privilege of raising one or two Hogs and a few chickens on the premises and having a garden spot and truck patch (as they call it) furnished them. What has more particularly attracted my attention is the great number of orphan Colored Children and the manner in which they are being treated. They have been taken possession of by relations, (and many instances very distant ones) and hired out, and the assumed guardian appropriating their wages to his or her own use, while the children who earned the money are suffering for clothing.

Transcription Notes:
---------- Reopened for Editing 2024-03-10 23:01:10