Flour, 18 oz., or bread, 22 oz.
Rice, 1⁄8 lb. or beans, 1⁄4 lb.
Sugar, 1⁄10 lb.
Coffee, 1⁄10 lb.
Special diet,—eggs, butter, milk, fruit,—was also issued.
This ration was more liberal than that adopted by the army.[46]
[46] See [Appendix I], [p. 379] ff. This General Orders No. 18, is an important document to be read in connection with any facts given about the army methods.
During the trial week the distribution of food was made to the refugees either from the stations or at the various camps or shelters. Though a fixed ration was agreed on there could be no certainty of delivery, as the quantity and variety of the food supply was indeterminate. The committee in making its report could give only an approximate estimate of the goods it had seized. It anticipated that claims would be made against it as well as against the United States army, the state militia, the police department, and the various volunteer organizations which had without authorization seized goods.
It arranged to pay the bakeries at a rate of 5 cents a loaf for the 255,630 loaves of bread which had been supplied by them to the committee, part of the payment to be made in flour, and to pay the Milk Dealers’ Association at a rate of not more than 20 cents a gallon for milk supplied by it. The committee had employed between three and four hundred men and as many trucks to transport supplies, but it did not know the extent of its obligation for the use of the latter.
During the first week after the disaster there was a growing inclination to turn to the army for the direction of the relief work. Though the army in common with every other body of persons had suffered serious losses, its efficiency as an organization could not be impaired even though the extent of the aid it could immediately give were lessened.