From the Richmond Examiner, 6/18/1864

WHAT RICHMOND HAS GIVEN UP to aid the Confederate Government in the prosecution of this war, has never been rightly estimated nor appreciated out side of Virginia. Her public buildings and institutions have been mainly monopolized by the general Government, of course with the consent of the authorities, for what would not the citizens of Richmond give if it were asked of them? This commenced with the transfer of the seat of Government from Montgomery to Richmond. First, the State Capitol was occupied by the Confederate Congress; the Mechanics' Institute by the War Department; the City Postoffice by the Treasury Department. The Mechanics' Institute has no longer an existence, and the Postoffice is removed to more contracted quarters under the Spottswood. - Since the army of "occupation" came our hotels have been pressed to supply other government accommodations; court martials sit in our churches; committees in our school houses; Yankee prisoners cram our warehouses; the wounded fill our dwellings; the refugees are quartered upon us by the thousands, and the original citizens are pushed into the smallest possible corner. We do not make these assertions in a spirit of fault finding; far from it. Richmond does not murmur, while the grand old mother of States and statesmen utters not a groan, no matter how much friend and foe trample upon and tear her fair bosom. She battles and suffers in hope, and looks for the day of her deliverance.

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