any of them remained honest very long." Some of the natives, even, became
cotton thieves. In a report made in 1866, McCulloch describes their methods:
"Contractors, anxious for gain, were sometimes guilty of bad faith and
peculation, and frequently took possession of cotton and delivered it under
contracts as captured or abandoned, when in fact it was not such, and they had
no right to touch it . . . . Residents and others in the districts where these
peculations were going on took advantage of the unsettled condition of the
country, and representing themselves as agents of this department, went about
robbing under such pretended authority, and thus added to the difficulties of
the situation by causing unjust opprobrium and suspicion to rest upon officers
engaged in the faithful discharge of their duties. Agents, . . . frequently
received or collected property, and sent it forward which the law did not
authorize them to take . . . . Lawless men, singly and in organized bands,
engaged in general plunder; every species of intrigue and peculation and theft
were resorted to."

These agents turned over to the United States about $34,000,000. About 40,000
claimants were subsequently indemnified on the ground that the property taken
from them did not belong to the Confederate Government, but many thousands of
other claimants have been unable to prove that their property was seized by
government agents and hence have received nothing. It is probable that the
actual Confederate property was nearly all stolen by the agents. One agent in
Alabama sold an appointment as assistant for $25,000, and a few months later
both the assistant and the agent were tried by a military court for stealing
and were fined $90,000 and $250,000 respectively in addition to being
imprisoned.

Other property, including horses, mules, wagons, tobacco, rice, and sugar
which the natives claimed as their own, was seized. In some places the agents
even collected delinquent Confederate taxes. Much of the confiscable property