The shortage of food during the Civil War affected many Southerners on the homefront. Although some parts of the South enjoyed an abundance of foodstuffs, other parts of the Confederacy experienced severe deprivation. As the war continued and conditions grew worse, Southerners' winter of discontent turned into years of unhappiness and sacrifice. Southerners consumed milk, corn, butter, meal, and an occasional piece of meat. Tea, sugar, and coffee were rare commodities for them.

Agriculture suffered as farms and plantations were neglected when men left home to fulfill their military obligations to the Confederacy. The inability of families to cultivate and harvest crops was a constant reminder of how their world had been turned upside down by the war. The long and brutal conflict tested the endurance of men, women, and children, not least in terms of how they coped with and reacted to the scarcity of...