636 TESTIMONY. 



on by Lim under tlie firm name of C. A. Williams & Co. ; that said firma 

 have been and the latter still is engaged in the whaling and seal hunt- 

 ing business, and prior to the formation of said firm of Williams & 

 Haven, upwards of forty years ago, the same business was carried on 

 by deponent's father and grandfather, from the beginning of this cen- 

 tury. That during the time said business has been in deponent's hands 

 he has employed upwards of twenty-five vessels in the sealing business 

 and has had as many as eight or ten vessels at one time engaged in 



that business. That deponent's vessels have taken 

 ^^Forraer sources of ggjQg during the last forty years from the North Pacific, 

 *"^^^" Cape of Good Hope, Cape Horn, South Shetland 



Islands, South Georgia, Crozetts, Desolation Islands, Sandwich Land, 

 and Gough Island. That immediately after the cession of Russian 

 America to the United States, deponent dispatched the American bark 

 Peru to the Bering Sea from Honolulu (where deponent at that time 

 had for some years been residing), for the purpose of investigating the 

 possibilities of seal fishing in that locality. That about the year 1870 



deponent was associated with several other gentlemen 

 ka^COTi^CTciaf Com- "^ forming the Alaska Commercial Company, which 

 pauy. company obtained, in the year 1870, a lease irom the 



United Stales Government for a period of twenty years 

 of the right to take seals on the Pribilof Islands, in the Bering Sea; 

 those islands consisting of islands St. Paul, St. George, and Walrus 

 Island. At the expiration of the said lease, in 1890, the United States 

 Government invited bids for a lease for a second period of tAventy 

 years, and a lease was given to tlie North American Commercial Com- 

 pany, and in this company deponent has never had any interest. That 

 during the whole of the period which deponent has been engaged in 

 this business it has had his close attention. Deponent has talked at 

 great length with the captains of his various ships, most of whom are 

 now no longer living, and with officers of the Alaska Commercial Com- 

 pany ; he has also inspected many thousands of skins of seals caught by 

 his vessels, and has also seen many thousands of skins in the ware- 

 houses of C. M. Lampson & Co., in London. The members of that 

 firm at the present time are Sir George Lampson, Emil Teichman, Nor- 

 juan Lampson, and Alfred Eraser. The firm of C. M. Lampson & Co. 

 receive, handle, and sell a very much larger number of seal skins than 

 all the other houses in the world together. The whole catch of the 

 Alaska Commercial Company was annually consigned to that firm for 



sale at public auction in the city of London, and much 

 r^<w^t?^ ^f wp^t the larger proportion of all the other catches that have 

 of Pribilof and Pais- bccu made by deponent's vessels m other parts ot the 

 dep"oienr'^'' ^""^ °^ world liavc likewlsc been consigned to them; and the 



in-esent lessees of the Pribilof Islands, deponent under- 

 stands, still consign their catches to them, as do the Eussian Seal 

 Skin Company, who are the lessees of the Russian Islands in the Bering 

 Sea, known as the Commander Islands. 



Second. Deponent's views as to the history of the 

 as^o^sSgbJS sealing business down to the year 1887 are best i^et 

 set forth iu statement forth iu a Statement prepared bv him personally, and 

 submitted to Con- ^^^^^,^^1^^^^^! ^0 a Committee of Congress on merchant 



marine, hereto annexed and marked A. Before sub- 

 mitting that statement to the committee, deponent submitted it to the 

 firm of C. M. Lampson &Co., of London, who have been his correspond- 

 ents, and in reply received from them a letter, the original of which 



