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
A. Yes; between eleven and twelve o'clock that night. There was a board
pile between Twenty-sixth and Twenty-seventh streets, and a good many
of them got in behind that, and they just rattled volley after volley
into the round-house. I was standing there; but I thought it was too
hot, and went to the other side. I then remained in the round-house
until about twelve o'clock, and then told an officer that I would go
out. He said I had better see General Brinton first, that I might do
him some good. I saw General Brinton; but he had nothing to say, and I
said nothing to him. I started to go out the back way of the carpenter
shop; but there was a lot of rioters there, and we thought that it
would not be safe, so we came on back to where the superintendent's
office stood, and he proposed that I might go out the gate at
Twenty-sixth street, and that he would tell his soldiers not to fire on
me. The firing was going on at Twenty-sixth street. I got out then and
went on home.
Q. Were you molested by the rioters?
A. Not then; but on Friday night or Saturday morning, between twelve
and one o'clock, we were getting out two passenger engines to go east.
It was not my business to know what the engines were going to haul. I
got orders to get them out, and I went out in the street then and got
two engineers and firemen, but a man came in and gave us to understand
that the engines couldn't go, and I knew it was no use to argue the
point with them, because there were four or five hundred of them there
on Twenty-eighth street.
By Senator Yutzy:
Q. Was that man a railroader?
A. Not at that time. I believe he had been suspended. He is in the
work-house now. Then we had two engines coming west on the fast line
that same night, and we cut one engine off and took the accommodation
engine at Wall's, and let the accommodation engine bring the train in,
and let the other engine go back to Altoona; but we found they had her
blocked. I went to Twenty-eighth street, and they were pretty noisy at
that time. Some of them came to me, and asked what kind of a hand I was
taking in the matter. I told them I was not taking any more hand in it
than I ought to, and they told me if I didn't get out right quick they
would shoot me so full of holes that I couldn't get away. I found it
was pretty hot, and I got away. On Friday morning, when the troops came
there, there was not over twenty or thirty men at Twenty-eighth street.
They seemed to go away, but after that, of course, they commenced
gathering in groups, and I noticed the troops were not there very long
until they were among them themselves. I noticed that morning, before I
went home, that they were walking together in the street, our own men
and the soldiers. I thought there was no use for those soldiers there.
By Senator Reyburn:
Q. What morning was that?
A. Saturday morning.
By Senator Yutzy:
Q. What troops were those?
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