Southern Watchman [Athens, Ga], October 9, 1861
Stern necessity compels us to appear before the public this week on a half sheet. It is no fault of ours. We almost “compassed sea and land” in search of paper, but could find none in the Southern Confederacy, and we were afraid to go to Doodledom after it. We are indebted to the courtesy of Mr. Winter of the Bath Mills, S. C., for the loan of a small lot—he had none for sale.We may possibly have to appear again on a half sheet next week; but after that, we hope to be able to avoid doing so again. We regret the necessity exceedingly–we never expected to see the Watchman thus cut down; but it could not be helped. We were obliged to yield.
One third of the papers in the Confederate States have been entirely discontinued; while of the remainder, more than one half are published either on a half sheet or have been reduced in size.
In order to secure a supply of paper, we shall be obliged to reduce our size for the present. The great decrease in our advertising patronage, however, will enable us to give our readers more reading matter than we did in our mammoth sheet in more prosperous times.
We trust that we shall not lose one subscriber from this cause. We adopt the plan not to defraud them, but because necessity drives us to it. It will now cost us more to furnish them with a smaller paper than it did to supply them with a large one; while our receipts from advertising have been cut down at least two-thirds, with a large falling off in job work. As soon as circumstances will permit, we will resume the large size.