Basic Weekly Diets of Selected Groups, 1755-1790

(all amounts in pounds or gallons unless otherwise specified)

Year and Cals per day Bread Flour Oatmeal Peas Rice Cornmeal Fish Beef Pork Cheese Butter Beer Molasses Population

About 1790, slaves on George Washington's plantation 2,800 11.3 2.4 1780, French prisoners returned to France and English repatriates 3,100 7 7 3 1/2 1780, Continental Army Ration 2,600-4000 7 or 7 1 3/4. 7 or 6 1/2 1776, Tory Prisoners inMaryland 3,600-4200 7 or 7 3 pts. 1 qt. 7 or 5 1/4 7 gills 1775, Continental Army Ration 3,000-5,400 7 or 7 3 pts. lpi. 7 or 7 or 5 1/4 3 1/4 or 2/3 About 1770, Convicts sent to Va., Md., and the Carolinas from England 2,000 4 2/3 1 2/3 1 2/3 1/2 2/3 1 1/4 1761, British Army in Canada 3,300-3,800 7 3 pts. 1/2 7 or 4 3/8 1757, Virginia Militia in the field 2,900 7 7 or 7 or 7 1755, Acadians sent to Maryland 1,400 5 1 Sources: Histoncal Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970 (Washington, D.C.: Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, 1975); Billy G. Smith, "The Material Lives of Laboring Philadelphians, 1750-1800," in Material Life in America, 1600-1860, edited by Robert B. St...