DAILY MISSOURI DEMOCRAT [ST. LOUIS], January 22, 1864, p. 4, c. 2
UNION REFUGEES.--The number of poor, destitute refugees arriving in our city from Pilot Knob, Rolla, and elsewhere is very great. The Refugee Home, established some months ago by the Western Sanitary Commission, is full, and it is exceedingly difficult to provide for this helpless and dependant class, a large proportion of whom are women and children. What is done for them by the Sanitary Commission is by means of distinct and separate contributions, aside from their general sanitary work. But the wants of these people in clothing, food and shelter are far beyond any means provided for their relief. The Secretary of the Commission is overburdened with the care of those arriving from day to day, and those already on his hands, and he will be glad of any voluntary aid given for this purpose.
It should also be made known to families of this class, at Pilot Knob, Rolla and elsewhere that if they have any way to live where they are it is better not to come to St. Louis. Some have foolishly imagined that if they could only get to this city the government would take care of them, provide homes and support them without any effort of their own. This is a great mistake. A single room here costs four dollars a month rent, and very few can be found at that rate. Most of these people come without an article of furniture, and with their persons poorly clad. Being non-residents they have no claim upon the county for support or aid, and do not come within the range of any of the existing charitable institutions. It is better where they have any way of getting along in their present localities, that they should endure the evils they now suffer than to come to the city and encounter others that they know not of.
DAILY MISSOURI DEMOCRAT [ST. LOUIS], January 29, 1864, p. 1, c. 3
OFFICE OF SUPERINTENDENT OF REFUGEES,
PILOT KNOB, MO., Jan. 27, 1864.
Editors Missouri Democrat:
...Now a few facts may help our benevolent friends to submit to the infliction with Christian patience. I have over one thousand women and children to look after. Many of these are houseless, and are living in sheds, hovels, and shanties, of the rudest description, and some live in tents, in which they can have no fire. Many, as a consequence were badly frozen during the late severe winter weather. They are nearly naked, and are barefoot, and all that Government allows is half rations of bread, hominy, bacon and beans, and to such only as are in danger of starvation if not temporarily relieved. Many of these women with their girls, chop cordwood for the coal burners for sixty cents per cord, to get a more pitiful pittance. Little do the inhabitants of St. Louis know, as they recline on their couches of down, of the sufferings of these hundreds of women and children, without fire, without bedding or clothes or shoes, and many of them having husbands and fathers, their natural protectors in the field, fighting to protect them in the privilege they now have of reaping a rich harvest of profits from increasing lucrative pursuits. St. Louis has done nobly by her balls, concerts, fairs, readings, etc., for these persons, but Messrs. Editors, do not complain for God's sake, if two or three houseless, naked, families are sent to the large and rich and charitable city of St. Louis with its 200,000 inhabitants from this little mining town. The ladies of Trenton, God bless them, have formed themselves into a society to aid, as far as they can, in clothing the most distressed. "But what are they among so many?" These ladies, in connection with two or three at this place, have worked night and day, traveled through the deep snow and mud, and have in many instances "strengthened the things that were ready to perish" dried the orphan's tear and caused the maiden's heart to rejoice. Besides those that reside at the Knob, Ironton, and Arcadia, women come forty and fifty miles with their starved beasts, requiring eight days to come and return, sleeping on their wagons at night. They must do this or starve. There is no food to be purchased in many places even if they had the gold to pay for it. The drought and the frost destroyed the crops throughout a great portion of the surrounding country, and with corn meal at two dollars a bushel, which is the price, tell me, you charitable ones, how are these persons to live until after harvest without large contributions from some source. May I suggest, Messrs. Editors, would it not be well to devote more attention to the suffering wives and children of the soldiers, and the widows and orphans of such as have died in the service of their country, and less to the soldiers themselves, who are fed and clothed after some sort, while the former are in the most destitute condition imaginable.
Yours respectfully,
A. WRIGHT,
Chaplain and Superintendent of Refugees.