"In all Lee probably delivered more than 20,000 horses and mules seized in Pennsylvania and Maryland. He had to leave about 12,000 head of cattle and 8,000 head of sheep along the muddy roads between Gettysburg and the Potomac River. Some were lost crossing the river. Tet Lee was able to save nearly 30,000 head of cattle, almost 25,000 head of sheep and thousands of hogs."
"Apart from the livestock transported across the Potomac, Lee returned with thousands of tons of hay and grains of all kinds, as well as thousands of barrels of flour for the soldiers.
"...Lee brought home large quantities of leather harnesses, saddles, bits, bridles iron bars, sheets of steel, bellows, forges, coal, hammers, screwdrivers, wagon parts, tar, coal, oil, pencils, pens,paper, blank books, and a wide variety of cloth materials, hats and medicinal items..."
If it wasn't nailed down Lee and the Confederates stole it. As seen in post# 1305, Sherman had nice orders regulating foraging also. Like I said, war is rough and both sides played rough- no difference!
Unless we can see original sources, Mr. Browns word is about as good as any Yankees, i.e. worthless.
That's an impressive list of stolen goods and livestock, colonel. It must be incomplete, though. Surely those rascally Rebs ransacked every home that they encountered and made off with the silverware, furniture, any personal items of value and then torched the house when their looting was complete.
Dig deeper. I'm sure that you can find some revisionist history to support your equivalency efforts.