INTESHGATION OF THE FUR-SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA. 149 



The bill was fully considered by the Ways and Means Committee. I appeared for 

 it; the lessees approved it. It was reported out and passed by the House on February 

 22, 1895, but could not be reached in the Senate before adjournment sine die, March 4, 

 following. 



Now, gentlemen, what happened? We come right back to this letter of Ogden 

 Mills. A new administration took charge, March 4, 1895. I determined to get copies 

 of those " affidavits" which Charles Foster published a mention of in the New York 

 Tribune, May (9?), as his authority for that suppression of my report of 1890, and those 

 of my official associates, Messrs. Goff, Murray, Nettleton, and Lavender. 



I called on Secretary John G. Carlisle, of the Treasuiy. He evinced the liveliest 

 interest in this question and asked Assistant Secretary Charles S. Hamlin to go with 

 me to the chief supervising special agent's office and furnish me with copies of those 

 affidavits, Capt. Healey's letter, etc. 



Did we find those affidavits or the Healey letter? No. We traced them out from 

 the Ogden Mills letter receipt in April, 1891, to one division after another only to find 

 that they had been received, had been noted, and had disappeared from the files when 

 Charles Foster left the Secretary's office, March 4, 1895. 



Why were those "affidavits" and that letter of Healey removed and taken from the 

 official files when Charles Foster published notes of them as his official warrant for 

 suppressing the sworn official reports of Charles I. Goff and his three assistants in charge 

 of the seal islands for 1890, and my special report of 1890 to Mr. Windom? (ordered by 

 act approved April 5, 1890). 



Why? Because their authors had perjured themselves, and if those "affidavits'' 

 had been in the hands of John G. Carlisle the lessees would have been obliged in my 

 opinion, by Mr. Carlisle, to surrender their lease. That is why they were abstracted 

 by or with the full knowledge and consent of Charles Foster, Secretary of the Treasury, 

 on or some time before March 4, 1895. Nobody else could have removed them or would 

 have dared to do so, as I was told by the Treasury officials. 



Those men whose names were signed to these bogus "affidavits" as inclosed in that 

 "Ogden Mills" letter above cited are all dead save one. That survivor of this job 

 is one James C. Redpath. He has been the general overseer and assistant general 

 manager of the lessees ever since May 21, 1890, up to the hour that their lease expired, 

 May 1. 1890. 



In connection with the felonious abstraction of these "affidavits" from the Treasury 

 files on or about March 4, 1895, as above stated, Mr. Hamlin and I searched in vain for 

 the official joint statement signed by Chief Special Agent Charles I. Goff and myself, 

 setting forth the specific reasons why we stopped the work of the lessees on July 20, 



1890, on account of killing female seals, etc. 



This joint statement was drawn up in Gen. A. B. Nettleton's office in the Treasury 

 Department; he was then the Acting Secretary, since Mr. Windom's sudden death, 

 January 29, 1891, left the Secretary's office vacant. Gen. Nettleton asked us to 

 prepare and sign this statement, because he said that it might be necessary to have 

 it in case the lessees sued the Government or attempted to do so. This affidavit, or 

 joint statement rather, was signed on or about the middle of February, I think; I 

 did not take a copy of it at the time, because it was entered and filed the day we 

 signed it, and I had previously given Secretary Windom a report specifically made 

 on this subject September 7, 1890. 



Pursuant to this understanding between President Harrison and 

 his Secretary of the Treasury, Charles Foster, as early as May 4, 



1891, that no killing by the lessees would be permitted, except 

 7,500 for natives food, the following order is found on the Chief 

 Special Agent's Journal, St. Paul Island, under date of entry of 

 "July 11th, 1891": 



On page 355, under date of u Wednesday, June 10, 1891," Special 

 Agent Joseph E. Murray makes the following entry: 



While I was away from the village the Revenue Cutter Rush arrived and the 

 following officers and other persons arrived and landed: W. H. Williams, Treasury 

 agent, S. R. Nettleton, assistant agent, Milton Barnes, a special employee, J. Stanley 

 Brown, special agent, Mrs. Nettleton and daughter. 



True copy. Attest: 

 A. F. Gallegher. 



