Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Railroad Riots in July, 1877: Read in the Senate and House of Representatives May 23, 1878Pennsylvania. General Assembly. Committee Appointed to Investigate the Railroad Riots in July, 1877
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Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Railroad Riots in July, 1877: Read in the Senate and House of Representatives May 23, 1878
Pennsylvania. General Assembly. Committee Appointed to Investigate the Railroad Riots in July, 1877
Q. About the scene of the riot?
A. Right there.
Q. What was he doing there?
A. All he could to prevent the depredations. He was with the police;
but we could not do anything. He went to Union depot and made a speech
to the mob; but that did not have any effect. They stoned him, and he
had to get out.
By Mr. Lindsey:
Q. What time was that?
A. I do not have any distinct recollection of any time that day. It
was, perhaps, half an hour previous to the burning of Union depot.
Q. Was he out there on Sunday when the fire was going on?
A. Yes.
Q. The fire commenced out beyond Twenty-eighth street and worked down
this way?
A. Yes.
Q. How many men were engaged in burning cars, or in the actual
destruction of property there, during Sunday?
A. That is a hard matter for me to say. The track in some places--I
suppose there are three or four or five rows--and the freight cars were
packed in alongside of one another, and on the top of those cars and in
between them, there was a crowd of people all the time. Some of them
may not have had a hand in doing any damage, but I think that most
everybody that was on the track--of course there were some spectators
that didn't have any hand in it--but the majority of the people there
would break open a car or gut a car whenever they could. I could not
say how many, but a great many, three hundred or four hundred anyhow.
Q. Were those men armed? Had they weapons?
A. I didn't see any weapons except a few revolvers.
Q. As chief of police, I ask you if you do not think you could have
taken one hundred policemen, with their maces, or the weapons that they
usually carry, and have thrown them across the track there, and driven
back that crowd?
A. No.
Q. Why not?
A. Because the crowd was on all sides, and I would not know how to form
the men to do that to have a solid line. The crowd was along the track
and in between the cars as much as five hundred or six hundred yards at
a time, and they would come rushing in and yelling every way, from
below and above.
Q. I ask you if, in your judgment, you do not think that you could have
taken one hundred policemen and stationed them across the track in
front of Union depot, from the hill down to the block of buildings, and
have driven back the crowd as they came up?
A. If I had had one hundred men there that might have been
accomplished. I did try it with what men I had.
By Senator Reyburn:
Q. How many men did you have?
A. Not more than fifteen or sixteen together at one time. The
policemen, of course, got around among the people, or the mob, and we
could not find them.
Q. It was not possible to keep them together?
A. I could not keep them together. In order to get at the men, the
policemen would have to divide, and it was such a big mob, we could not
keep them together.
By Mr. Lindsey:
Q. Could you not have formed at some cross street, say Fifteenth or
Sixteenth street, and then have resisted the crowd and kept them back?
A. On the street?
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