Bisbee daily review., 1920-11-30
AUDITOR ALLEGES HUGE GRAF I IN
 SHIP REPAIRS
Witnesses Say German Ships Were Reconditioned, Sold
 At Big Loss to U. s.
MAY TESTIFY
Presidents Brother : in law Reported Preparing State
 ment for Investigation

NEW YORK, Nov 29.-Testimony that 10 per cent of the $7OOO, 900 shipping board repair bills in the South Atlantic district was graft" was given here today to the Walsh congressional committee examining into shipping board affairs The al legation was made, by Charles Ban zahf, q travelling auditor of the board out of New York. It was contained in letter written by the witness to the general comptroller of the board last July, read today by Chairman Walsh and identified by the witness
 Means by which the alleged graft" was made possible, the witness tes- tified, included lack of inspection failure to check repair work. over charges for materials and labor and unnecessary repairs. He cited an in stance of a repair engineer who. he said. had sat in st pilot house and ap- proved repair bills amounting to thousands of dollars without ever looking at the work. He declared in spectors had been told that costs" were none Of their business and that there was spirit to make, rather than cut down. repair work.
 German Ships Mentioned
 Two Of the former German ships were brought into the inquiry for the first time oy Banzahf He as serted he had been instructed to check up bills for the re-conditioning of the former German liner Hamburg now the New Rochelle This ship was sold on a charter purchase con tract to the Baltic Steamship COrpor- atiOn. The sale price. he understood. was approximately S9S5, 900 and the shipping beard had advanced for the reconditioning of the ship about $40C,000. The bill Of repairs for this ship. he added. was about S1 300 900 which an audit of accounts reduced approximately $337 ,O0O The dis crepancy between the sale price of the ship and the cost of recondition- ing, he said he could not explain without the contract Cf sale which he did not have with him.
 The contract for the recondition- ing, he said. was awarded tn the Morgan Engineering Company. of Jersey City. He also testified the steamer Mercury. formerly the Far boeS, was taken to the same yard for reconditioning but after $175.O00 had been expended. work was stepped because of lack of funds.
 Boiling To Appear
 Up to six or seven months ago. he continued, repair work in New York yards, generally speaking. showed many Irregularities including charg- ing of hundreds of hours that were not rendered. eXcesses of class labor and eXcesses in materials.
 { Wooden ship construction con tracts promulgated by the Emergen- cy Fleet Corporation in the early | days of it's organization were gone | into by Eads Johnson who was dis i tTict officer of the fleet Johnson ! generally condemned the wooden ship | idea and said he resigned because 1 he could not conform to it. In des. i cribing an experience with a south l ern contractor who wanted to build | such ships. JohnsCn said the ideae seemed to be build one million wooden ships that would take one 1 million German torpedoes to sink.
 Sales Of surplus material new av eraging about S1.0000OO was made ' C. D. Watt. manager of the eastern ! division Of the sales and warehouse ! section testified. The payroll of the division is about $2OOO OOO year l Watt said if the present ratio oi sales continued. it would require about so months to close cut the | property.
 i It was said by members of the l committee that R. w Boiling. treas urer; Lester Sisler. former secretary 1 and AlOnzo Tweedale now general comptroller of the shipping board ! would appear before the committee 1 tomorrow. Boiling is expected to make d formal statement