fully protect the interests of the Government. Such a settlement, in view of the doubts arising as to the success of the United States in the lawsuits, and as to the possibility, if successful, of collecting any judg ments of any magnitude if the prior liens of the State of Tennessee are enforced, and in view of the many equities to which the companies are fairly entitled, it is clearly the privilege and duty of the Secretary, if he deems it advisable, to make. To give an opportunity for such a settlement without more extended legislation, the committee have concluded to recommend the passage of the bill as passed by the House of Repre sentatives. 3d Session. IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES. FEBRUARY 8, 1871.-Ordered to be printed. No. 350. Mr. Howe, from the Committee on Claims, submitted the following REPORT. The Committee on Claims, to whom was referred the memorial of U. P. Monroe, praying compensation for expenditures and services in opening the Sacramento River to navigation, have considered the same, and submit the following as their report: The petitioner claims remuneration for labor performed and moneys expended in removing obstructions from the Sacramento River in California, whereby he claims to have rendered that river navigable from the town of Colusa to Red Bluffs, a distance of some 160 miles. On that work he claims to have expended, during the year 1852, between one and two hundred thousand dollars. He claims to have possessed a property worth two or three hundred thousand dollars when he entered upon that undertaking, all of which was sacrificed upon that enterprise, leaving him now an old and a poor man. Wherefore he claims that he ought to be paid at least one hundred thousand dollars. It does not appear that the petitioner was authorized or encouraged in any way by any officer of the Government to undertake that work. On the contrary, he seems to have been induced to the work by the fact that he had a contract for carrying the United States mail from Sacramento to the town of Shasta, in Northern California. That he transported the mail by steamer from Sacramento as far as Colusa, then the head of navigation. From Colusa the transportation was by land over roads which, in the wet season, were impassable, until he struck the highlands above Red Bluffs. To avoid that land transportation seems to have been the claimant's object in improving the navigation of the river. Two witnesses only testify in support of the claim. They both aver that the river was not navigable above Colusa in 1852; that Monroe did render it navigable; that it has ever since been navigated by steamers at all seasons of the year; that the Government has had the use of it; and they both testify that Monroe must have spent much more than he claims on the enterprise. The precedents are numerous in which the Government has undertaken the improvement of rivers. But the committee know of no case in which the Government has assumed the cost of improvements made by others upon their own responsibility. They believe it would be unsafe to do so, except upon a report from the Chief of Engineers, showing the importance, character, and cost of the improvement. They therefore ask to be discharged from the consideration of the memorial. 3d Session. IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES. {No. 351. FEBRUARY 8, 1871.-Ordered to be printed. Mr. PRATT made the following REPORT. [To accompany bill S. No. 1319.] The Committee on Claims, to whom was referred the memorial of Jesse Warren and J. A. Moore, composing the firm of Warren & Moore, praying compensation for lumber taken from them for the use of the Army in 1862, submit the following report: About the 18th day of September, 1862, Lieutenant A. T. Drake, Eleventh Michigan Volunteers, acting assistant quartermaster Twentyninth Brigade, army of the Ohio, took from Warren & Moore fourteen thousand six hundred and seventy-nine feet of poplar lumber, valued at $293 58, or two cents per foot. Vouchers in triplicate were issued, certified as correct by Lieutenant Drake and approved by Colonel T. R. Stanley, commanding Twenty-ninth Brigade. It is stated in these bills that the lumber was used to construct defenses near the wall about the old hospital No. 10, Nashville, Tennessee. Application for payment was made to the Quartermaster General, who transferred the same to the office of the Chief of Engineers. General Humphreys rejected the claim because he was not familiar with the signatures of Drake and Stanley, and did not know whether the vouchers were genuine; and, next, because it did not appear that Lieutenant Drake had accounted for the lumber on his property returns; thirdly, because engineers were present in Nashville during the war and after its close, with money in hand, to pay for materials used in the defenses; and, lastly, because the act of July 4, 1864, forbade the settlement of any war claims except for quartermaster stores or subsistence supplies. General Humphreys, however, says that it had been customary in cases like this to refer for information to the officer of the Corps of Engineers likely to have knowledge of the transaction, but that unfortunately, in this instance, such recourse was impracticable, as the engineer officer who had charge of the defenses of Nashville was killed in battle in 1864. It appears, from a communication made to the committee by the Third Auditor, that the property return of Lieutenant Drake on file in his office, for November, 1862, shows the purchase on voucher 1, D, of fourteen thousand six hundred and seventy-nine feet of lumber from Warren, Moore & Co., for which payment was not made. He adds: "Lieutenant Drake transfers the same November 14, 1862, to James St. C. Morton, captain engineers, on voucher 2, in November, 1862." This seems to the committee to be explicit proof of the purchase of the lumber by an authorized agent of the Government; and as neither the Engineer nor Quartermaster's Department shows payment, and the memorialists aver they have never received any, they report herewith a bill for the relief of said Warren & Moore, and recommend its passage. |