We can get salt at Sal Tortuga for the raking and putting it into our ships; but the expense of a voyage on purpose for it is greater than to buy it at a place from whence the freight may be all saved, and to have the best salt on the cheapest terms, is, no doubt the intention of this application, as it certainly was of the other Colonies that have obtained this privilege. All the Virginians were asking, in effect, was the liberty to import from Europe what salt they wished! As the moment of Independence neared, the stress grew greater. George Washington's Mt. Vernon overseer during the crucial years, his distant relative Lund Washington, addressed a letter to him in 1775: The people are running mad about salt. You would hardly think it possible there could be such a scarcity. Five and six shillings per bushel. Conway's sloop came to Alexandria Monday last with a load. A couple of months later the crisis was reached: I have had 300 bushels more of salt put into fish barrels, which I intend to move into Muddy Hole barn, for if it should be destroyed by the enemy we shall not be able to get more. There is still fifty or sixty more bushels, perhaps a hundred in the house. I was unwilling to sell it, knowing we could not get more and our people must have fish. Therefore I told the people I had none. Two more years of adversity went by. Lund wrote in 1778: I was told a day or two past that Congress had ordered a quantity of shad to be cured on this river. I expect as everything sells high, shad will also. I should be fond of curing about 100 barrels of them, they finding salt. We have been unfortunate in our crops, therefore I could wish to make something by fish. He proposed that he cure fish "for the Continent" and make "upwards of 200 pounds": I have very little salt, of which we must make the most. I mean to make a brine and after cutting off the head and bellies, dipping them in the brine for but a short time, then hang them up and cure them by smoke, or dry them in the sun; for our people being so long accustomed to have fish whenever they wanted, would think it very bad to have none at all. All ended well for that season. Lund wrote: I have cured a sufficient quantity of fish for our people, together with about 160 or 170 barrels of shad for the Continent. One of the most interesting diarists of Revolutionary days was young Nicholas Cresswell, an Englishman of 24 when he arrived in America for a three-years visit. He was in Leesburg, Virginia, in December 1776 when he recorded this occurrence: A Dutch mob of about forty horsemen went through the town today on their way to Alexandria to search for salt. If they find any they will take it by force.... This article is exceedingly scarce; if none comes the people will revolt. They cannot possibly subsist without a considerable quantity of this article.