Page:The History of the Standard Oil Company Vol 2.djvu/400



[In the case of Parker Handy and John Paton, Trustees, vs. The Cleveland and Marietta Railroad Company et al., Circuit Court of the United States, Southern District of Ohio, Eastern Division.]

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 * Southern District of Ohio, Eastern Division.

By an order of your court made on the 18th day of December, 1885, in the case of Parker Handy and John Paton, Trustees, vs. The Cleveland and Marietta Railroad Company et al., I was appointed a special master commissioner to investigate and report to the court for its action what discriminations have been made in freights by Receiver Pease, or during his administration by those under him, and to this end I was authorised to summon and examine witnesses and to cause their testimony to be reduced to writing so far as in my discretion it might be necessary. I was also required to inquire fully and particularly into the facts and report to the court what discriminations had been made, under what arrangements and to what extent, and to report fully all the facts and show to what extent and under what circumstances discriminations have been made against shippers as well as in favour of shippers, and by whom such discriminations were authorised and by whom made. In compliance with this order I proceeded to examine the matters therein referred to, and in the course of such examination called the following-named persons as witnesses:

T. D. Dale, C. C. Pickering (auditor of the Cleveland and Marietta Railroad Company under Receiver Pease), F. G. Carrel, J. E. Terry, Daniel O'Day, George Rice, H. L. Wilgus, W. H. Slack, W. J. Cramm, George Best, Jr., and J. C. McCarty, whose evidence I caused to be reduced to writing by A. C. Armstrong, a stenographer, and is herewith submitted.

I find from the evidence that soon after General Pease was appointed receiver of the Cleveland and Marietta Railroad, an arrangement was entered into with Daniel O'Day and W. T. Scheide, by which it was agreed that the rate to be charged by Receiver Pease and his subordinates upon all crude oil shipped from Macksburg and vicinity upon the line of the Cleveland and Marietta Railroad Company to Marietta