IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES.

JANUARY 30, 1857.-Ordered to be printed.

Mr. WELLER made the following

REPORT.

[To accompany bill S. 537.]

The Committee on Military Affairs, to whom was referred the petition of Captain Alexander Montgomery, assistant quartermaster of the United States army, having had the same under consideration, port:

re

The petitioner prays to be relieved from the payment of an amount standing against him upon the books of the treasury for which he is unable to account by proper vouchers.

Captain Montgomery, while acting in his official capacity during the war in Mexico, was charged with the safe keeping of very large sums of money in silver coin, without having competent means of securing it against robbers, of which that country was then so full. Instead of iron safes, he was compelled to use wooden boxes; and often, when he had more coin than his boxes would contain, he was forced to pile it up upon the floor of a room which was only fastened by an ordinary door. It is by no means surprising that he lost largely of these funds; and upon his application to Congress in 1848, an act was readily passed relieving him from liability for losses sustained by him under such circumstances.

In making up the petitioner's accounts at the close of the Mexican war, in 1848, the balance against him was stated to be about fortyfour thousand dollars, and relief was granted accordingly for the balance, as it then appeared; but, upon subsequent examination of Captain Montgomery's accounts, it was found that he had entered te his credit certain amounts to which he supposed himself entitled, but which properly belonged to other officers. These sums arose chiefly from drafts outstanding against him, and which, through inadvertance in his clerk, were omitted to be charged to him.

The amount for which the petitioner now prays relief is about $7,000; and the committee, not doubting, under the circumstances, that Congress would have granted relief to Captain Montgomery in this additional amount in 1840, if his account had been properly stated, and being well acquainted with his enviable character as a man of integrity and honesty, who would be slow to ask for the al

lowance of an unjust claim against the government, report a bill, and recommend its passage, authorizing the cancelling of the amount now charged against him as an assistant quartermaster in the army during his service as such in the Mexican war.

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES.

JANUARY 30, 1857.-Ordered to be printed.

Mr. WELLER made the following

REPORT.

[To accompany bill S. 538.]

The Committee on Military Affairs, to whom was referred the petition of Joseph Verbiski, having had the same under consideration, report:

That the petitioner enlisted in the United States army in October, 1851, as a private, and was attached to company I, 2d infantry. While engaged in firing a national salute at Fort Yuma, California, on the 4th of July, 1852, the accidental discharge of a cannon blew his left arm from his body, seriously injured his right arm, almost destroyed his power of speech, and otherwise so injured him that he is totally unfit for manual labor. He was honorably discharged from the army at San Diego, California, in January, 1853, when his name was placed upon the pension rolls, under the existing laws, at $8 per month, it being the largest amount to which he was so entitled. His injuries, received in the manner above stated, prevent him from engaging in any profitable employment, and his pension is now entirely insufficient to yield him decent support, and he prays for its increase to $20 per month.

The first lieutenant of the regiment to which the petitioner belonged speaks of him, in a paper accompanying his petition, in the very highest terms, and says that Verbiski would soon have been made a non-commissioned officer, as he was much esteemed by the whole regiment. The committee, seeing the extent of his disability, and as it is obvious that his present pension is too small, report a bill, and recommend its passage, to increase the petitioner's pension to $17 per month, which he would have received if he had been a non-commissioned officer at the time he was wounded.

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES.

JANUARY 30, 1857.-Ordered to be printed.

Mr. WELLER made the following

REPORT.

[To accompany bill S. 539.]

The Committee on Military Affairs, to whom were referred the petitions of Lieutenant James G. Benton, Brevet Majors E. B. Babbitt and James Longstreet, of the United States army, having had them under consideration, report:

It appears that while these officers were stationed at San Antonio, Texas, in July 1850, application was made to them, respectively, for ordnance stores, quartermaster's stores, and subsistence stores, by Parker H. French, the chief of a body of emigrants, on their journey to California.

The said French bore and exhibited to the petitioners what purported to be a letter of credit from Howland & Aspinwall, of New York, and he possessed the confidence of numerous citizens and merchants of Texas, to some of whom he was personally known. He was the acknowledged chief of an emigrating party, and was, to all appearances, a reliable and responsible man.

By authority of the joint resolution of Congress, approved March 2, 1849, officers in these departments are allowed to sell to persons emigrating to California such stores as the state of the public supplies will permit, and, with the concurrence of Brevet Major General Brooke, they sold to the said French as follows: ordnance stores, $1,021 04; quartermaster's stores, $519 93; subsistence stores, $448 98; for which said French gave them separate drafts upon Howland & Aspinwall, of New York, which drafts, having been forwarded for collection, were protested for non-acceptance. It was then discovered that the letter of credit exhibited by French was a forgery, and all his representations were false. Several of the best merchants of San Antonio were at the same time and in the same manner imposed upon for large amounts of money, &c., and the imposter has fled beyond the reach of law. It is apparent that these petitioners, in all these transactions, exercised due diligence, acted under the instruction of their commanding general, and that the money was lost without any fault of theirs. The committee, therefore, recommend a bill for their relief, authorizing and directing the proper accounting officers of the treasury to credit their accounts the several amounts of which they were respectively defrauded.