In making contracts for supplies of all kinds, we were obliged to take careful precautions against frauds. I had a colleague in the Department, the Hon. Peter H. Watson, the distinguished patent lawyer, who had a great knack at detecting army frauds. One which Watson had spent much time in trying to ferret out came to light soon after I went into office. This was an extensive fraud in forage furnished to the Army of the Potomac. The trick of the fraud consisted in a dishonest mixture of oats and Indian corn for the horses and mules of the army. By changing the proportions of the two sorts of grain, the contractors were able to make a great difference in the cost of the bushel, on account of the difference in the weight and price of the grain, and it was difficult to detect the cheat. However, Watson found it out, and at once arrested the men who were most directly involved.
Soon after the arrest Watson went to New York. While he was gone, certain parties from Philadelphia, interested in the swindle, came to me at the War Department. Among them was the president of the Corn Exchange. They paid me $33,000 to cover the sum which one of the men confessed he had appropriated; $32,000 was restored by another individual, The morning after this transaction the Philadelphians returned to me, demanding that both the villains should be released, and that the papers and funds belonging to them, taken at the time of their arrest, should be restored. It was my judgment that, instead of being released, they should be remanded to solitary confinement until they could clear up all the forage frauds and make complete justice possible. Then I would have released them, but not before. So I telegraphed to Watson what had happened, and asked him to return to prevent any false step.
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GENERAL JAMES LONGSTREET, COMMANDER OF THE CONFEDERATE FORCE OPERATING AGAINST KNOXVILLE IN 1863.
Now it happened that the men arrested were of some political importance in Pennsylvania, and eminent politicians took a hand in getting them out of the scrape. Among others the Hon. David Wilmot, ex-Senator of the United States and author of the famous Wilmot proviso, was very active. He went to Mr. Lincoln, and made such representations and appeals that finally the President consented to go with him over to the War Department and see Watson in his office. Wilmot remained outside, and Mr. Lincoln went in to labor with the Assistant Secretary. Watson eloquently described the nature of the fraud, and the extent to which it had already been developed by his partial investigation. The President in reply dwelt upon the fact that a large amount of money had been refunded by the guilty men, and urged the greater question of the safety of the cause and the necessity of preserving united the powerful support which Pennsylvania was giving to the administration in suppressing the rebellion, Watson answered:
"Very well, Mr. President, if you wish to have these men released, all that is necessary is to give the order; but I shall ask
