One day I heard one of his officers complaining that he could not get some of his papers receipted, showing a delivery of rations to a certain brigade, and Weston answered, in a characteristic manner, “Damn the receipts! You give rations to anybody who wants them, and after it’s all over I’ll receipt for the whole bunch; and if the government doesn’t like it the government can have me--but the men won’t go hungry.”
Every time I had an opportunity of going to the supply depot I secured all the tobacco I could buy to give to the men at the front. It was an article worth more than its weight in gold, and there was no greater pleasure than to have the chance of making some of the men happy. There was a regulation against allowing one person to purchase more than a pound of tobacco at one time. I asked permission of Colonel Weston to be allowed to buy more; but he was loth to sell it to me until I explained that I did not use it myself, but wanted it for the men. After my explanation he would not sell it at all, but gave me all I could carry. During this time the government held his receipt for all this tobacco, and it really was equivalent to so much money. Colonel Weston’s contempt for governmental red tape saved hundreds of lives in the Santiago campaign; and instead of asking for an accounting for the lack of receipts, the Washington government made him the head of the subsistence department, where he has done the best work in rationing our army at home and in our island possessions that has ever been known.
Before the change in the head of the commissary department was made, things were not so well done. We cannot do better than to look toward England for some valuable points in the conduct of this department, especially in the matter of army supplies for the warmer or tropical countries. They have had more experience than we in feeding their forces on foreign service, and consequently they have brought the business to a state that borders on perfection. In strategy, fighting, and the movement of troops they have been found lacking; but one of the things they have done well is the feeding of their men.
It is a colossal business to supply over 200,000 healthy men, with field and mountain appetites, when they are 7,000 miles away from home, and where there is an active enemy seeking to destroy their communications. It would be a great task to feed that number of men at home, where there is no difficulty in transportation; but when a month’s time must be occupied for the delivery of the food stuffs, the problem becomes most serious.