A. I was at the Monongahela house until eleven or twelve o'clock on Sunday. I then went over the Point bridge, and took that road because there was no crowd there, in company with Mr. Bennett, who drove me over. We went to Mr. Layng's office, and afterwards came back to the Monongahela house, and stayed there until two or three o'clock, and I then went to Allegheny City, and stayed there until eight o'clock, trying to get provisions to General Brinton. I succeeded in getting two wagon loads off, about eight o'clock in the evening.
Q. Had you or any of the officials of the road been able to ascertain whether there was any arrangement for a strike of the employés of the road?
A. We had heard that the men had organized the Trainmen's Union, as they call it, and that a strike was threatened; but on looking at the thing as carefully as we could, we came to the opinion, or we did not believe, that any strike would take place, and we were rather surprised when the strike did take place. We never had any delegations from the men or any committees come to see us.
Q. Were there any complaints from the men after the issuing of the order reducing the wages ten per cent.?
A. There was no formal complaints. A committee of engineers came to see Mr. Scott, and after the interview with him, they asked him to put his statement in writing—what he said to them—the necessity for the reduction and the disposition of the company to restore the wages when the business of the company revived; which he did. In reply, they wrote a letter acquiescing in the reduction, because the company believed it was a necessity, and that they would accept it as cheerfully as they could.
By Mr. Larrabee:
Q. What time was that?
A. Shortly after the reduction took effect or after it was announced—a couple of weeks before the strike. We never had any communication from any brakemen or firemen or any one respecting that. This running of double-headers, to which they objected, had been practiced on the Pittsburgh division for a number of years, but not to the same extent. Many of the coal trains were running with two engines, and, as a matter of economy, it was decided to run all through trains with two engines. On other portions of the road, we ran fifty or sixty cars to a train, but at that end, we only ran seventeen cars with one engine, and in increasing the numbers of cars, we reduced the number of train hands, and saved expenses; and in order to do this, we decided double-headers. Some of the men objected to that. That may have been a pretext for the strike, but the men were not working any more hours.
Q. Did the issuing of the order running double-headers necessarily discharge any men?
A. It reduced the force of brakeman.