18. Confederate agents monitored the cargoes at their points of origin
By 1864, officers of the Confederate government operated in all of the island ports. Their role was to inspect cargoes bound for the Confederacy to ensure they were in compliance with the new shipping regulations. Many proved to be susceptible to bribes. Though the flow of military supplies increased in late 1864, it never returned to its peak levels of early 1863. More salt beef and pork replaced cannon and rifles, and as Lee’s army withdrew from Grant’s during the Overland Campaign it subsided primarily on salt meat provided by blockade runners carrying it to Wilmington.
Sherman left Atlanta in ruins and the Southern railroad network to the west was destroyed in late 1864. Supplies still penetrating the Union blockade sat in warehouses, the means of getting them to the remaining troops in the field gone. In December, Savannah fell to the Union, though its port had been closed since the earliest days of the war. Blockade runners continued to use Galveston as a destination, but goods from Texas could not be sent to the rest of the Confederacy since the Mississippi River was controlled by the Union and patrolled by the Union Navy.