Between 600,000 and 700,000 tons of German shipping seized in American ports had already been utilized as troop transports and freighters for reenforcing the American army in France. These vessels included the _Leviathan_, formerly the _Vaterland_, which was capable of carrying 10,000 troops on a single voyage, but the number was limited to 8,000 to insure comfort. In January, 1918, it was disclosed that the _Leviathan_, with fifteen other former German ships, had safely reached Entente ports laden with men and supplies. The announcement was made from the American army headquarters in France to disprove false reports circulated in Germany belittling the assistance rendered the Entente cause by the use of these vessels. They had, on their first voyage, escaped the submarines, a feat which was not palatable to Germany, who sought to bolster up a waning popular confidence in the U-boat campaign. The German vessels which had run the gantlet, besides the _Vaterland_, were the _Covington_ (ex-_Cincinnati_), _America_ (ex-_Amerika_), _President Grant_, _President Lincoln_, _Powhatan_ (ex-_Hamburg_), _Madawaska_ (ex-_König Wilhelm II_), _George Washington_, _Mount Vernon_ (ex-_Kronprinzessin Cecilie_), _Agamemnon_ (ex-_Kaiser Wilhelm II_), _Aeolus_ (ex-_Grosser Kurfürst_), _Mercury_ (ex-_Barbarossa_), _Pocahontas_ (ex-_Princess Irene_), _Huron_ (ex-_Friedrich der Grosse_), _Von Steuben_ (ex-_Kronprinz Wilhelm_), _De Kalb_ (ex-_Prinz Eitel Friedrich_). A further step to expedite the shipment of men and supplies to Europe was the formation of a Committee of Shipping Control, composed of American and Allied membership. Its chief object was to endeavor to fulfill Secretary Baker's expectation that 1,500,000 American troops and their requisite equipment could be landed in France in 1918 if sufficient shipping was available. It was endowed with power of absolute control in the allocation of all tonnage on both sides of the Atlantic, and aimed to end the complications and delays that had hitherto prevented the fullest use of American shipping for war purposes. The Shipping Board had succeeded in turning over to the War Department over 1,000,000 tons of ships on the bare board basis for the transportation of soldiers, live stock, and munitions. Much of this tonnage was commandeered by the Government for that purpose, the shipyards not being sufficiently advanced in their work to provide much new construction. To facilitate the production of the enormous amount of new tonnage under way the Board sought a further appropriation of $800,000,000, increasing the amount Congress had authorized for the shipping program to $2,100,000,000. CHAPTER XIII FOOD AS A WAR FACTOR