S. B. Holabird to Nathaniel P. Banks, September 6, 1864

Maj. Gen. N. P. BANKS, Commanding :

GENERAL: The strikes among boiler makers and machinists and the exorbitant demand for wages require that action be immediately taken to protect and forward the public interests. The competition with the naval and civil authorities, private parties, and other causes, have demoralized the white labor of the department, doubled and quadrupled the army expenditures connected therewith, besides greatly diminishing the effective service rendered to the Government. For this reason I have the honor to ask and recommend: First. That a call be made upon the white troops for 100 machinists, including at least twenty boiler makers. There are many such men in the service constantly making application for such employment. Second. 200 carpenters, 50 bricklayers, 50 blacksmiths, and 100 miscellaneous mechanics to be detailed from the colored troops in this department. Third. That the conscripted and impressed colored men, rejected by the examining surgeons at the town asylum, or a select portion of them, shall be delivered to the quartermaster’s department as laborers, instead of being given to speculators, planters, &c. No hands can be obtained to unload the coal from the boats, and a daily risk of its total loss is incurred from want of labor. There is a similar delay in discharging vessels under expensive charters. Fourth. It is recommended that detailed white men who are mechanics be allowed $30 per month extra as a matter of public expediency and necessity, and an inducement to undertake the extra fatigue and exposure to heat and climate, and to advance the public works; that the colored mechanics receive but $15 extra, since their occupation puts them in the second and third class of skilled labor, and that colored laborers conscripted be allowed $20 per month, with rations and clothing not to exceed $2.50 per month.

Trusting that this may receive the immediate action of the authorities, as the emergency is pressing,

I have the honor to be, most respectfully, your obedient servant,