A. On Friday morning. The first was on Thursday at noon. I did not know anything about it at all till Friday morning's paper. I do not know any of our people knew there was any trouble beyond the railroad employés, but it was mentioned in Friday morning's paper, and on Friday morning we learned that a proclamation was issued, and the military were called for. I went to the depot about twelve o'clock. About half-past one I went out to the Eighteenth regiment, at Torrens station. Remained there three or four hours. There was considerable of a crowd there. I talked to Mr. Hice—he is on trial here now—he appeared to be a leader of the party there. Colonel Guthrie talked with him. He told him that he would get on the trains as they were coming into the city and inform the conductors and engineers and trainmen that there was a strike, and have them abandon their trains when they came in. I talked with him a good while, expostulating with him. He said they did not intend to perform any overt act, that they felt persuaded they could accomplish their purposes by abandoning their trains. It required experts and people of experience to take them out again. They knew such people were not about. I told them I thought it would soon get out of his hands. The sheriff and General Pearson had been out there just before. I came on the ground while he was there—probably came out on the cars. The military were called into position two or three times. The crowd was uneasy. There were no trains going eastward. I think there were some trains passed while I was there on Friday, and a good many people came out on an engine during the afternoon. I came in on Friday night. I was about at the office. Around town there was no particular excitement. We had been subject to these things for years—strikes of employés in the mills and in the mines—and they generally exhausted themselves without any violence. We did not anticipate any trouble, but on Saturday the knowledge came that the Philadelphia troops were coming, and we had our Sixth division out—the regiments and two batteries—and had a kind of a circus. Great crowds of people gathered. Crowds of women and children gathered on the hill side. I was not at the depot nor at Twenty-eighth street at the time the firing occurred, but was somewhat conversant with the condition of things.
Q. Did you know on Friday, when you went to Twenty-eighth street, that the militia had been called out? At that time did you know it?
A. There was a printed proclamation, purporting to be coming from the Governor. On Friday morning, at nine o'clock, it had been posted on the streets, calling for the local troops here. General Pearson's orders were printed in all the papers, as well as the orders of Thursday night. All the telegraphic dispatches were in the papers on Friday morning—from the sheriff, from the Secretary of the Commonwealth, Attorney General, the Adjutant General, and Mr. Farr—some eight or nine dispatches were all printed on Friday morning, and our division called out. At that time, the whole public was informed as to the fact of the military there.
Q. On Saturday night, what knowledge had you of the movements of the military?
A. I learned, after the firing, that a great deal of excitement prevailed. I might as well state now, that the fact of the firing upon the mob did not make any difference, whether it was by orders or without orders. The crowd supposed it was by orders, because their vengeance seemed to be concentrated on General Pearson, who was in command. They thought he gave orders, but practically it made no difference whether it was by an order or without an order. It makes a difference, in fact, so far as parties killed were concerned, or the act itself; but they supposed that an order had been given to fire, and that they then had a grievance, which they had not before. Before that, it was confined to railroad employés. They assumed that they had not got wages enough. There were double-headers put on, but when people were killed, they said there was then a good cause for grievance, and they rushed to the gunshops—one right opposite my office—took all the weapons they could find in there, broke open the whole place, carried off the guns, and paraded the streets. The feeling then was intense—bitter, and revengeful feelings seemed to pervade all classes of labor. There had been a sympathy with them all the way through—they were part of the labor element. I think myself that if the military had not been there, and had not provoked a collision at that unfortunate time, that there would not have been a life lost, nor a dollar's worth of property destroyed. As everybody can tell after the battle is lost how it might have been won, we find that after we survey the whole thing over again, it is pretty hard to lay the blame on anybody. The action of the militia just at that time has been the common action of the militia all over the world. It requires the strictest and sternest discipline of the regular soldier, to obey the command after he has been struck or knocked, to refrain from resistance. The militiaman is not paid for it; he carries his humanity into the ranks, and when he is struck he resists. What our militia did here, they did in Baltimore, they did all over the country, and they would do again under similar circumstances. The question of their firing without orders, is a thing you never can provide against with militia.
Q. Sunday morning, what was done by the military or civil authorities, county or city?
A. Sunday morning, at nine o'clock, when I came to my office I found a number of gentlemen there, merchants, manufacturers, and business men, alarmed and dazed by the condition of things. About the first thing that was done, was to write a resolution—they wrote a resolution to get the citizens together, and provide a leader. They waited from Thursday until Sunday, the city, the county, and the State at her back, and we had not provided any other agency for self-protection or the preservation of the peace, but these. When we ascertained on Sunday morning, that twelve hundred soldiers, veterans, under the command of experienced officers, had not been able to quell this violence, we felt that no fifty or one hundred men could do it, and we were at a loss to dam the brook on Saturday night, and the flood was then over, and we had to wait until the water subsided before we could get foothold or make a landing. We went to work as fast as we could. I went to the Union depot until about half-past nine or ten o'clock. I saw quite a lot there, they appeared to be cool but utterly unable to provide for the difficulty, the military having gone away, contrary to their instructions or their orders. While I was in there, General Gallagher, I think it was, came in. He had been around the city, and they asked him how many troops it would take to hold the city at that time, and he said, it would require at least fifteen thousand. I stayed there that time, and a servant came up and said we were the last people in the hotel building, and we had better go off. Then we went to the Monongahela House.
Q. Who is Gallagher?
A. I think he is colonel in one of the neighboring counties.
Q. Belonging to the National Guard of Pennsylvania?