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Q. Do you not know that there is a train which leaves Boston for Concord at eight o'clock in the morning?-A. I believe so.

Q. Do you not know that a train leaves Boston for Concord at twelve o'clock at noon?-A. I do not.

Q. State at what hours the trains leave Concord for Boston.-A. One train leaves Concord for Boston at half past seven in the morning, and I believe there is one before that, at half past five.

Q. What is the next train?-A. There is a train that leaves Concord for Boston somewhere about half past ten in the morning.

Q. Is there any other train from Concord to Boston?-A. There is one between three and four o'clock in the afternoon.

Q. Is there any other?-A. There is one between seven and eight, I think, in the evening.

Q. On what train did you leave Concord for Portsmouth when you were mailagent?-A. On the half past seven o'clock train.

Q. What time does that train arrive at Portsmonth ?-A. At ten minutes past ten. Q. Did you spend the day at Portsmouth ?-A. Yes, sir.

Q. And you returned to Concord the same day?-A. Yes.

Q. What time does the train leave Portsmonth?—A. At a quarter past five.

Q. At what time does it arrive in Concord generally?-A. At a quarter before nine. Q. What has been your occupation in Portsmouth during the day time, after the arrival of your train?-A. I bad but very little to do at that time. Since then I have been in the country-produce business.

Q. Have you not, during the time that you occupied the position of route-agent, been engaged in trading in butter?-A. More or less.

Q. To what extent ?-A. While I was in town with nothing else to do, I would try to do a little business to support myself. My salary would not support me, and really I bad leave from the department to do so.

Q. What evidence had you of your having leave?-A. There were several anonymous letters written from Portsmouth to the department (I understood so from Mr. Cheney) complaining of my doing business in Portsmouth. There was a friend of mine coming here to Washington, and I got him to go to the department about it. They asked him at the department if I attended to my mail business and he said I did. They said they did not care how much butter I sold if I only attended to my business. That is what I heard from a good reliable friend of mine. Since I have been off the road I have attended to that business entirely.

Q. Did you ever get any letter from Mr. Cheney's office in regard to that subject?— A. Yes, sir.

Q. What was the purport of that letter?-A. The purport of it was about the same as I have stated; that there had been letters sent from Portsmouth to the department on the subject. I likewise saw Mr. Cheney at Concord and spoke to him about it, and he said he did not think there would be any trouble about it.

Q. What report did you make of the amount of mail matter which you handled?— A. I used to return a slip to the office and mark it O. K.

Q. Was there a blank which you filled as to the number of packages of letters and newspapers that you carried in the mail?-A. I think not; I never received any orders to do so. I think I never had any blanks. These slips that accumulated I reserved and sent in once a week or ten days, and if there were any errors I marked them. Being on a short route, I did not send in reports every day as they do on some of the long

routes.

Q. For what were you removed?-A. I cannot tell you.

Q. What was said to you as the canse of your removal?-A. There never was any statement made to me about it, and I never took the trouble to inquire.

By Mr. MONEY:

Q. What is the distance between Concord and Boston?-A. I think 72 or 74 miles, but my business never brought me to Boston over that route. I should think it would take about three hours.

Q. What is the distance from Concord to Hillsboro'?-A. Twenty-three miles.

Q. How many post offices are there between these two points?-A. There are two roads, and one of them branches off before you get to Hillsboro'. The road from Contoocook to Hillsboro' is fourteen miles.

Q. How many post offices are there between these two points?-A. There is one small town between them.

Q. Is not a postal agent on these roads unnecessary ?-A. That was my best judg

ment.

Q. How far is it from Pittsfield to Hookset?-A. Sixteen miles.

Q. How many post offices are there between those two points?-A. There is no place of any account.

Q. Then, there is no need of a mail agent on that route? The mails could go in a closed pouch-A. That is my best judgment.

Q. How far is it from Claremont to Concord ?-A. Mr. Tappan, who runs that train does not go the whole length, but meets another train. He is gone only three or four hours. He meets the other train somewhere about Newport. From Clairmont to Con cord is about forty miles.

Q. Is there only one agent on that road?-A. There is another agent who goes through to Claremont. I suggested once to Mr. Cheney that that was rather an unnecessary run and wish that he would give me that man to relieve me.

Q. Is there not a good deal of increased travel over those roads in summer?-A. Yes. Q. How far is it from Plymouth to Concord ?-A. I do not know.

Q. How many post offices are there between those two points ?-A. The most prominent offices are Meredith, Laconia, and Ashland.

By Mr. CANNON :

Q. You ran from Concord to Portsmouth ?-A. Yes, and back every day.

Q. That is a distance of about fifty miles?-A. The distance is 118 miles for the round trip.

Q. And you ran two weeks on and one week off?-A. Yes, sir.

Q. What route did Wright run on ?-A. From Plymouth to Concord.

Q. What is the distance?-A. About fifty miles.

Q. Then his round trip is 100 miles a day ?-A. Yes.

Q. Is there more mail carried on your route than on his ?-A. My route is a very important route for a short route.

By Mr. MONEY:

Q. Did you have a postal car?-A. Yes, sir; a very good car, through my exertions. By Mr. CANNON:

Q. What amount of mail used you to run out with when you got the heaviest mail?-A. The heaviest mail I got at Portsmouth, from the Boston and Maine road coming up.

Q. What amount did you ordinarily get there in weight?-A. About one hundred pounds weight.

Q. What proportion of that was in letters and what proportion was in newspapers ?-A. I do not know. There were a large number of bundles of letters.

Q. Then you would gather up the mail between Plymouth and Concord ?-A. Yes; the first town was four miles off.

Q. Did you get pretty heavy mails on the road?-A. New Market Junction was a large place for mails.

Q. How much did you get there?-A. More than double what we got at Portsmouth. Q. Then you got, say, 200 pounds weight there?-A. Perhaps 300 pounds, sometimes. Q. Your mails ran lighter when you come from Concord toward Portemouth ?-A. No. sir. At Concord I received the mail from the Saint Albans night train.

Q. Were they heavier than they were the other way?-A. I should think they would be heavier. Then I receive a large mail at Manchester coming down and quite a mail at New Market Junction coming down.

Q. Do you know what compensation the railroad company gets ?-A. I do not know. Q. It was three years ago when you wanted your relief to come on, and that he had to run for Mr. Wright?-A. Yes, sir.

Q. Where you engaged in politics at that time?-A. I always felt more or less interest in politics.

Q. You dropped around at the Republican headquarters and took your due share of interest in the matter?-A. Yes, sir.

Q. Did you vote?-A. I voted always.

Q. Did you sometimes talk politics?-A. Not on the mail-car.

Q. You had no chance to talk politics there, had you?-A. No, sir.

Q. When did you first report Mr. Cheney's presence three years ago in the committeeroom at Concord?-A. I never reported it.

Q. Whom did you first tell about it?-A. I do not know that I told anybody. I may have in my own city within a year past told some friends of mine.

Q. You never made any complaint about it ?-A. No, sir. I had no right to make a complaint.

Q. You tell it now for the first time?-A. No; I may have mentioned it to friends at Portsmouth and other places.

Q. This man Tappan, whom you speak of running for nearly five months in the year. runs the balance of his time on other routes ?-Yes, more or less.

Q. As to whether it is necessary for him to do so, have you any knowledge?-A. The mails are lighter in the winter than they are in the summer, and it isn't to be supposed that the roads need extra service in winter.

Q. I want to find out whether this man is a superfluous agent or whether he was performing service for his pay?-A. He would not be a superfluous agent if he had anything to do, because he is a good agent.

Q. Did you understand that to be an apt answer to my question? Did you make it in good faith-A. I did.

Q. What I want to find out is whether this man Tappan's services are not requisite for the whole year. If you have any knowledge on that head be kind enough to state it.-A. I have known that he has been off the road and out of employment for, perhaps, a month at a time.

Q. Running nowhere?-A. Running nowhere. He has told me so. I have looked over the pay-roll and have seen Mr. Tappan's name there when he has been off duty. Q. The last year that you ran in the mail-service I understood you to say that Mr. Tappan ran for about five months?--A. Yes, sir.

Q. How many runs did he make and on what routes did he run the balance of the year?-A. He ran for me.

Q. For the year immediately before your discharge where was Mr. Tappan for the seven months that he was not on his regular runs ?-A. If my memory serves me right, he did not run any for me that year. He ran some for Mr. Wright.

Q. How many runs did he make for Mr. Wright?-A. I cannot tell you.

Q. You have no idea whether it was one or fifty runs ?-A. I have no official knowledge. I can guess.

Q. On what other roads did he run?—A. On the Claremont and Lawrence Road.

Q. How many runs did he make on that road?-A. I cannot tell you.

Q. What other roads did he run on ?-A. I think they sent him down from Dover to Alton for two or three days, while the mail-agent was sick.

Q. How much of his time was he in running on any road in that year?-A. I have no knowledge only what he has told me.

Q. Did he live in the same town as you ?-A. He lived in Concord.

Q. Then you do not know about it except from what somebody else has told you?— A. He told me himself.

Q. Is he living now?-A. Yes.

Q. Up in New Hampshire?—A. Yes.

By Mr. EASTMAN:

Q. How does the amount of mail matter carried on over Wright's route compare with the amount carried on your road?-A. That is a question which I cannot answer. I have seen him doing his business in the baggage-car.

Q. At what time does he arrive in Concord-A. About half past ten.

Q. What time does he leave Concord on the return train ?-A. About half past three. Q. You have been away from Concord during those hours?-A. Yes.

Q. How, then, could you see him doing business?-A. During the time that I was relieved I have been obliged to pass up and down the road a good deal, having a friend sick at Hillsborough, and therefore I should be likely to know.

Q. Did you go into that car at all?-A. I have been in to see him and have spoken with him often. I always do when traveling.

Q. When was Mr. Tappan appointed route-agent?-A. Mr. Tappan has had his appointment a good many years.

Q. How long have you been in the service?—A. I have been in the service about eight years.

Q. You feel certain that the Plymouth and Concord route was a very unimportant one?-A. I always took it to be so. When I have been in the car at Concord I would see Mr. Wright put his pigeon-holes up on one side of the baggage-car and begin to do bis work, and it did not appear to me as if it would take him five minutes to do the work at the starting point.

Q. Explain the situation of the road that you ran over with reference to the railroads between Concord and Portsmouth. Through what large city does the train pass after leaving Concord?-A. First through Manchester.

Q. How far is that from Concord ?-A. Eighteen miles.

Q. Is that on the line of the Portsmouth and Concord Railroad, or in going from Concord to Manchester do you pass over some other railroad?—A. Yes; you pass over the Concord Railroad.

Q. Is that a part of the line between Concord and Boston?-A. Yes.

Q. When you get to Manchester do you continue in the same direction ?-A. No; you turn off on another road.

Q. And there for the first time you strike the Concord and Portsmouth road?-A. Yes.

By Mr. MONEY:

Q. Is it the custom in the railway mail service when the mail business is heavy on roads to give a car to the route-agent?-A. I have yet to learn of another agent anywhere who has not a car. The contract allows one.

By Mr. EASTMAN:

Q. Do you mean to say that in all the roads in New Hampshire the postal agent has

a whole car to himself or merely a room in a car?-A. No, sir; merely a room in the car, but this man Wright had no room except the baggage-room; at least I have been in the car a number of times, and never found any other.

By Mr. WILLIAMS:

Q. You say you do not know any other road on which there is not a postal car?—A I do not.

Q. Have you been on any other roads -A. Yes; and when I am traveling I always go into the mail-car.

WASHINGTON, D. C., March 2, 1878.

WILLIAM S. WEST recalled.

By Mr. MONEY:

Question. You heard the testimony just given relative to these short railway routes ? Answer. Yes, sir.

Q. The mail-agent on the route from Contoocook to Hillsborough runs twelve months in the year; the one from Pittsfield to Hooksett, twelve months in the year; the one from Claremont to Concord, four or five months in the year; and the one from Portsmouth to Concord, the whole year?-A. That is correct.

Q. Are you familiar with those routes?-A. I run through that section of country. The trunk line on which I run supplies these short routes.

Q. Then you have a knowledge of the business done on those routes?-A. Yes, sir; we supply all these routes, more or less, with mail.

Q. Is a mail-agent necessary on these short routes?-A. That is not for me to say. Q. Could not the mail be just as well sent in locked-up pouches ?-A. Judging from some other lines of railroad where there is no mail-messenger, I think it might be done. Q. Is it usual in the railway mail service to give the agent a room in a car, where there is no considerable business done?-A. That matter is governed by the amount of mail-matter that we have to handle. On our routes we have a whole car. On some other routes they have a portion of a car in the end or center. That depends largely upon the amount of mail-matter that is to be handled.

By Mr. TOWNSEND:

Q. On different routes they have different rules about that?-A. Yes, sir.

By Mr. MONEY:

Q. It is a matter that is regulated by the amount of business?-A. It is intended to be. There may be something about it in the contracts, but they are generally governed by the amount of mail matter.

Q. Are you acquainted with the fact that Mr. Tappan runs for only four or five months on one route and that for the balance of the year he serves on different other routes? A. Yes, sir; I am, because I supply him with mail.

Q. Do you know how long he serves on this Claremont and Concord road?—A. I do not. I should say four months this year.

Q. Do you know where he goes afterward?-A. I have received his slips running between Plymouth and Concord; that is, his label slips which he puts on packages or letters, with his name on them.

Q. How much of his time is he on that road?-A. I cannot tell you.

Q. Is it any considerable time of the twelve months?-A. I think that during two of my weeks' runnings I received slips from him.

Q. Have you received slips from him on any other road this winter?-A. Not to my knowledge.

Q. Does he draw pay for the whole year?-A. I do not know.

By Mr. CALDWELL:

Q. As compared with routes in Massachusetts, what do you think of those New Hampshire routes? Are there any more facilities furnished in New Hampshire in the way of route-agents than there are in Massachusetts ?-A. There are some lines of railroad in Massachusetts which have no mail-agents, and which are quite as long as some of these in New Hampshire, and longer, running through settled portions of

the State.

By Mr. MONEY:

Q. Does not the necessity for an agent depend more upon the number of intermediate post-offices than upon the length of line?-A. Yes, sir; and it depends upon the population and business on the line of road.

By Mr. CANNON :

Q. Does not the efficiency of the whole postal service depend somewhat upon the general appropriation made for it every year?-A. That is going into the financial part of it, which I know nothing about.

Q. You could not run a very effective postal service without money?—A. No, sir.

By Mr. CALDWELL:

Q. Do you know anything about the South Shore Road of Massachusetts?-A. Yes, sir; I have been over the road.

Q. What is the length of it?-A. I think it is about twenty-one miles.

Q. Are there several post-offices and a large population along the road?-A. Yes, sir. Q. Do you know anything about the Boston and Providence Road?-A. Yes, sir; I have run over that road.

Q. What is the length of that?-A. About forty miles.

Q. How long is it since a mail-agent has been appointed on that line?-A. When the road first commenced to run there was an agent there, but he was taken off, and then there was no agent there for a number of years. That is a very important road, because it runs through large manufacturing places, such as Attleborough. I should think it a very important line, but for years it did not have any mail-agent.

Q. Do you know anything about the Gloucester branch of the Eastern Road?-A. A. Yes, sir; that is about the same length as the South Shore Road.

Q. Did that road have a mail-agent ?-A. No, sir.

Q. How long is the Boston and Plymouth branch of the Old Colony line?-A. From twenty-eight to thirty miles.

Q. How are those lines in regard to population and business and length of road, in comparison with the New Hampshire roads that are supplied with mail-agents ?-A. The towns on these Massachusetts roads are supplied by direct pouches from Boston. For instance, if a man at Duxbury wants to send a letter to a post-office between Duxbury and Boston, the letter has to come to Boston, from whence it is sent back. That is the way that they do where the lines are not supplied with mail-agents.

Q. Is there as much necessity for agents on those lines to which I have just called your attention as there is on the New Hampshire lines?-A. I should think there was much more.

By Mr. WILLIAMS:

Q. Are not the trains very frequent on those Massachusetts lines?-A. They are.

By Mr. EASTMAN:

Q. Do you know whether Mr. Cheney has recommended mail-agents on these Massachusetts lines ?-A. I do not.

Q. Do you know when Mr. Tappan was appointed mail-agent?-A. Mr. Tappan was appointed, in the first place, in the year 1861. During the war he resigned, enlisted, and was out some time; how long, I cannot say; but afterwards he was reappointed.

Q. Is he a relative of Mr. Cheney's?-A. Not that I know of; he is a good agent.
Q. What number of post-offices are supplied on the road between Contoocook and
Hillsborough -A. I think not over three.

Q. Can you state the number of post-offices supplied on the road between Pittsfield and Hookset?-A. I cannot.

Q. Do you know the amount of business done on the line between Concord and Portsmouth ?-A. No, sir; I never was over the road.

Q. And the nature of your own business does not give you any impression about it-A. Yes; I have an impression about it, because I know something about the size of the towns on the road, and of the amount of mail-matter which would naturally flow into such towns.

Q. Are there any railroads in New Hampshire that have not route-agents?-A. Yes; there are some short roads that have not.

Q. When was your attention first called to these Massachusetts roads that have no route-agents?-A. I spoke to Mr. Cheney about the time the Pittsfield Road was

started.

Q. Have you been talking it over since you have been here?-A. I have not been talking anything about it any more than what was said here.

Q. Nothing more than what was said on the stand?-A. I think that Mr. Conn mentioned something yesterday about these roads, but I cannot tell the conversation.

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