The evening times., 1899-03-09
THE HORSE MEAT SCANDAL.
General Miles Friends to Demand q
Thorough investigation.

| IhOTOush ihSesSlSAttOn
| Though the Beef Court has shifted its
sessions to Chicago, the army food scan
dal remains the leading topic with army
officers and War Department officials at
Washington. The enemies of the General
| Commanding continue their work and his
! friends are not idle. The opposing forces
are preparing TO reopen the battle OF tes
| timony when the Beef Court shall have
| returned to Washington. An army Off .er,
who is a Miles partisan, said today:
| "One of the facts which our side will
seek to prove Will be that a large quantity
/ or cheap horse meat was bought by the
| Commissary Department and issued TO the
| troops as beef. Labels on the tin cans rep
resented boiled horse as roast beef. There
! is large trade in horse meat. | have Oft
| en- heard persons express wonder as to
what becomes of the old horses that break
| down in the service OF their masters. There
are in the big cities brokers in horse
! meat. They are engaged in the business of
! buying decrepit horses. The average price
| is SO a head. The hide is of some value
| and the meat a rule is made into Sau-
! sage or Hamburg steaks 1t was brought
out in a New York court yesterday that
! there are slaughterhouses on Long ISL
and which butcher worn-out horses and
| sell the flesh at low price in the poor
districts of big cities. Sometimes these old
animals are bought for 81. There are also
horse siaughtering establishments in New
/ Jersey. The claim of the men engaged in
! this business is that they slaughter and
! pack for export and that their product is
! sold not as beef, but horse meat. 1t
| may be true that now and then some OF
J the horse meat is exported, but the bulk
! OF 1t is bought by the very poor people
in great cities. 1t is usually sold under
the name OF beef. don't know that
chemist can positively identify horse meat
| by analysis, but its general appearance is
/ no more like that of beef, than mutton is
/ IL Is the same character of flesh as that
taken from some of the cans which were
/ alleged TO contain roast beef
Major Lee, of the Ninth Infantry who
! Is acting in the capacity of counsel Tor
! General Miles, Will cross examine the
! Commissary General when that officer
: goes on the stand before the Beef Court
/ Ii he should not be voluntarily called by
| the Court Major Lee will insist that he
be made to appear. We will seek TO ex-
| tract from the witness information as TO
! where the Prize Winner Brand" of red
meat came from. We will then try to
1 trace This meat TO its source. We Will
/ send several of the red cans to experts
! that We may have their opinion as TO
! whether the flesh is that of a horse or a
/ steer"
The friends of General Miles are discus
| sing the evident hostility OF the Beef
! Court TO the Commanding General. This
| antagonism of the Court has besn appar-
ent TO all the disinterested men who have
attended the sessions. Those witnesses
| VINO in nearly all Instances were officers
in the Subsistence Department, who testi-
fed that they heard no complaint against
the beef. were examined at great length.
They were taken over the same ground
AGAIN and again. and their statements
! were listened to with pleasure. When
| the direct examination of the witness
would be concluded. the various members
! of the Court. particularly General Davis
and Colonel Gillespie. would ask questions
! which would cause the witness to repeat
| nearly all the testimony which he had
| given during his examination by the Re
corder. The result would be that the rec
| crd would be padded with evidence in ia
| vor OF the beef.
When an adverse witness would appear
his examination would be made as lrief
as possible. He would be asked TO con-
tent himself with making direct answers
/ 10 questions, though in the case OF the
commissary officers they were permitted
I 10 make statements speeches to the
Court in defence Of rations they issued.
! No statements would be tolerated from
witnesses against the beef. They would
be cut short with the admoniiion Let
10 the line OF examination, or Well, We
. will come TO that in the proper time
! (which frequently was not done.
When a witness. despite the efforts of
the Court succeeded i'll injecting adverse
! testimony into the record, the Court at
once proceeded TO attack him with a view
10 discrediting his testimony. For in
! stance. when a sergeant in the Sixth Mass
achusetts Volunteers testified that The re-
frigerated beef had an odor that reSem-
bled more the odor OF a corpse than the
odor of purid meat the Court succeeded in
confusing him by insisting that he state
the difference between the TWO smells md
urged him 10 tell the Court the names and
| natures of the gases arising from decaying
meat OF course. the witness couldn't do
this but contented himself by adhering 10
his statement that the refrigerated beef
had "deathlike smell which did not le-
| semble the odor of tainted meat.
! 1t is said al the War Department that as
soon the Court can shut of the exami-
/ nation of anti-beef witnesses. il will call
! hundreds Of interested witnesses who will
| testify that the beef was not bad. This
| will weigh down the record of the proceed
| ings OF the Court, with apparently favor
able evidence, and will give the Court a
| reason To find what il has already deter
| mined 10 find. that the character of the
| beef has been much maligned by General
! Miles
| Although the information was not given
| publicly. it was learned that the Court has
| sent two cases of canned meat TO chemists
| at Georgetown University and at Yale, that
! they may determine the proportion of nu-
| triton it contains.
| A friend of the Commanding General
| said this afternoon: 1T seems to me 10
make no difference what percentage of
nutrition the meat contains, if the men alb
solutely refused to eat it. They refused TO
| use this meat because it was unpalatable
10 all the men and nauseating to the ma
| jority of them. To bring into court table
showing the nutritive properties of the beef
| will be no defence of the Commissary De-
| partment. The fact is. the men were sick
| ened by the meat and finally would not
eat it
The counsel for General Miles will bring
out prominently in the record that beef
condemned by the French army as unfit
| for use was sold 10 the American arm at
| full price.
Major Lee will seek to show that a con.
| signment of canned beef was shipped by
one of the big packing houses to France on
| an order from the French government 1t
! was inspected and rejected. 1t remained
| Then it brought back to the United
| States and was placed in storage where it
| remained for perhaps year. When the
| Spanish American war broke out, the pack
| ers pasted new clean labels on the cans
| and the meat was sold TO the Commissary
| Department for issue TO American soldiers.
PORT ARTHUR SHIP CANAL