The Mills Become Towns 181 



The officers of the militia called their men and commandeered 

 rations. Up went the price of wheat up went the price of 

 corn. Farmers stationed their sons beside the green fields of 

 growing grain to protect the crops. 



A plump little man in a pair of nankeen breeches and a 

 blue coat with shining silver buttons a little man who looked 

 not unlike the caricatures of King George III which were set 

 up all over the city, appeared at militia headquarters. 



"Mr. Christopher Ludwick to see the commanding officer." 



The officer knew the name. Too, the Governor of Laetitia 

 Court was a well-known figure in the city. He was shown in 

 to the Colonel at once. 



What Mr. Christopher Ludwick had come to do was to 

 turn over his supply of flour and grain, and his bake-ovens, to 

 the use of the Continental Army. He had come, too, to offer 

 his own services. Not as a soldier for that he was too old and 

 too corpulent. No, but as a baker. There was no one in the 

 colonies, he ventured to say without boasting, better skilled 

 than he in the trade. No one who could get more out of a 

 pound of flour than he. No one with more cleverness in 

 substituting corn meal for costly wheat flour, and molasses for 

 sugar. Let him bake for the army, and the troops could be 

 sure of good bread. 



So Christopher Ludwick served the cause of a free America 

 in a white apron and cap. He marshaled his cooks and he 

 measured out the supplies to them, keeping sharp watch of 

 every ounce. When the flour and the grain he had bought 

 were gone, he used his own money to buy more. He mounted 

 his fat pony looking more than ever like King George 

 and rode to the mills round about Philadelphia. There he over- 

 saw the grinding of the army's corn. 



Each miller has his own way of grinding corn meal. Some of 

 them crack the corn first before feeding it into the tedder. 

 Some of them leave the stones far apart, making a coarse meal. 

 Others tighten the stones, and grind the kernels into a meal 

 only slightly rougher than a flour. 



