Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1884-06-27
REPUBLICAN RASCALITY.
THE FRAUDS IN THE DEPART
MENTS UNDER FIRE.

some OF the principals and their Ac-
completes in Robbing the Bureau OF
Medicine Put Under Bond-Secretary
Chandler Tries t. Explain the Tax
Methods Which Made the Thievery
Possible.
WASHINGTON, June 26.-E. c. Kirk.
wood, the Clerk of the Naval Bureau OF
Medicine and Surgery, who was recently
arrested on charge of misappropriating
money by means of false accounts and
vouchers, and James D. Cummings, W.
H. Dempsy, j. W. Drew, and A. Burg
dorf, charged with completely IN the
fraud and with the presentation Of false
bills, appeared in the Polio Court to-day
with their counsel. All the defendants
except Cummings waved examination
and gave bail. Cummings. who was
charged with making and presenting
false bills amounting to S463. for rubber
hose, reels, ETC., desired a hearing,
and Medical Director Philip S.
Wales, who was Surgeon General
Of the navy for the four years ended in
January last, was called as the first Wit
ness. He described the method of pur-
chasing supplies for the Bureau of Medi-
cine and Surgery, and said that Cum
mings, the defendant, it was believed, fur
nished the bureau with supplies. The
witness was shown the alleged fraudulent
voucher on which the charge against
Cummings is based, and was asked
whether his own signature appearing on
it was genuine. he replied that he could
not swear to it, but he would say that this
was not the voucher he signed. lift was his
signature the voucher had been altered
afterwards. A number Ofaccounting and
auditing officers of the Navy and Treasury
Departments were then called by the gov
ernment to identify the voucher and Cum
mings' signature thereto, and several
medical officers in charge Of hospitals and
stations, to prove that no such goods as
those described in the voucher had ever
been delivered to them. This closed the
governments case, and, as the defense
waived further examination, the court
held Cummings for the action of the grand
jury, fixing bail at 81, 500.
District Attorney Worthington said,
this afternoon, that these cases would be
presented to the grand jury as soon as
possible, and that he hoped to have some
of them tried before the summer recess of
the Criminal Court.
CHANDLER ON THE FRAUDS.
Secretary Chandler appeared to-day as
a witness before the subcommittee of the
Senate Committee on Expenditures of
Public Money and was examined in rela-
the Bureau of Medicine and Surgery.
He said that the frauds had been COM
mitted by means of false vouchers for
goods never delivered. He produced a
list of four vouchers from the Second
COmptrOller's office and sixty-two from
the Fourth Auditors, all of which were
supposed to be fraudulent. The earliest
was dated on June 81, 1880, and the last on
January %, 1884. The total Ofthe suspicious
vouchers was about $4,000. Secretary
Chandler produced copies of two of the
vouchers, one being in favor of j. r. Ag-
new, and the other of Jones t5 Webster.
There was, Secretary Chandler said, no
such firm as Jones & Agnew, and no such
person as j. r. Agnew. Lake r. Jones,
who drew the Jones & Webster voucher,
was a watchman in the department. He
got the money and shared it equally with
Daniel Carrigan, chief clerk in the Bureau
of Medicine and Surgery, and Edwin C.
Kirkwood, who had been in charge of the
accounts.
VOUCHERS FOR FICTITIOUS SERVICES.
Vouchers to the amount of $4,000 were
m ade IN the name of a single fictitious
firm. The suspicious vouchers were not
all, however, in fictitious names. Some of
them bore the names of actual persons.
The Secretary explains in detail the
method of transaeting the business of the
department in relation to the purchase of
supplies, and, in reply to inquiries by
members of the committee, described the
measure of responsibility Of the heads of
the bureaus and the head of the depart
ment. The chiefs of the bureaus were,
he said, made responsible by stat
ute. Their acts were in law the
acts Of the Secretary, although the
Secretary might oYerrule or amend them.
They consulted the Secretary in large
matters, but in smaller ones acted on their
own responsibility. The Bureau of Medi-
cine and Surgery, besides its share of the
annual appropriation, expended the navy
hospital fund, which accrued from the
assessment of 20 cents per month upon
each of the officers and men of the navy.
Fraudulent vouchers were made against
this fund for the reason doubtless that it
was less likely to be closely looked after
than the appropriations.
THE OTHER DEPARTMENTS ALL RIGHT.
Since the fraud had become known the
heads of all the bureaus had been directed
to make comparisons between the records
of their officers and those of the Treasury
Department. One or two had already
made such comparisons for recent pc
riOd and found the records of their offices
to be correct. This was good evidence
that 10 frauds similar to those in the Bu-
reau of Medicine and Surgery existed
elsewhere. 1t was almost universal in
other bureaus to require some evil
dence upon voucher that the
goods had been delivered. The
frauds in the Bureau of Medicine and
Surgery seem to have been made possible
largely by the omission of that wise pre-
caution of having the receiving officers
certificate upon the voucher itself.
Senator WilSon-"In how many cases
presented by you are such receipts want
ing?
Il think that there are none upon the
face of the vouchers, and in such in
stances as certificates have been pro-
duced they are mainly those Of Carri-
gam"
Mr.. Plumb-"Whatl led to the discovery
of these frauds?"
''Tbe first tangible evidence came from
William p. Wood, who induced a man
who had been connected with them to
confess, and he became States evidence
and disclosed the conspiracy Of Carrigan
and KirkwOod."
THE DISCOvERER.