Show THOSE ARMOR PLATE FRAUDS naval secretary herberts statement method by which the frauds were perpetrated Cern ecle phipps co shown to been the victims of their workmen vast amount involved in the mat ter Heavy assessment made upon tho Company Fairness of the dentin dent in theLo cs washington march 26 secretary herbert has made a reply to the resolution passed by the house calling for the details of thea recent alleged violation by carnegie chippa co of the armor plate con trac discloses one of the most gigantic frauds known to our naval adminis trat loii the secretary that last september he received from an attorney representing certain employees of carnegie phipps A co an offer for a consideration to reveal the facts as to ex frauds being in the manufacture of armor plates for alie naval vessels in the works at homestead it was finally agreed to pay them 25 per cant of all damages recovered by the government as a consequence of their revelations the men came to Wash inetor and to tho secretary large maes of evidence which they had been gathering a long ume to abow that the were not properly or evenly tempered and that after naval inspectors had selected one plate from each group to be tested as a representative senta tive of the entire group test plates were taken at night and carefully annealed and all blow holes were plugged as to give them a much higher quality thai the rest of the plates furnished it was further shown from original slips that the records of the time of li eating and manner of handling as furni ebed by tha workmen to be reported to the government had been tampered with tills was dolp under the direction of superintendents schwab Core yand oline captain sampson chief of the bureau of ordnance was then called in and put in possession of the facts and with skilled assistants made a investigation vesti gation demonstrating the truth of the revelations and assessing the dam cee at 15 per cent on the amount of armor delivered alien the chief officer oi abo company frick and hunsicker were called jn and informed of the facts the informants haying said that they had no evidence that they knew anything about the matter and tho tary irae convinced they did not they greatly astonished but thanked the secretary for the fairness with which the investigation had been made frick also eaid that lie biad been informed that irregularities wore being practiced and bad written a letter to schwab in charge ol 01 heating find tempering cautioning him to extra vigilance in the fulfillment fulfilment of tho contract which letter he turned over to the secretary herbert informed them that lie bad decided approve the recommendation men dation eliat the company be 15 per cent damage at a later date frick asked if the re decision was subject to appeal to the president being informed eliat it was they went before the president pre and presented their case the president alter long and careful considers afon rendered ilia decision to the effect that the executive of ahe company did not appear to be involved in the frauds and having in tact put a stop to them of their own motion as eoon as made acae of them he wae willing that the damages be assessed at 10 cent on all armor delivered per within the time shown within which frauds existed that was from novem ber 3 to september the amount manufactured during that time tons valued at was ten per cent of this the president therefore decided should bo forfeited to the government the decision waa accepted by the company who paid af the pittsburg bank to the ia laj credit of the informants and credited vouchers for plates furnished the government to tho amount of the secretary though the plates on which damages were assessed were not up to the limit of alie very best work possible they were nevertie lees fully 5 per cent above the limit of tolerance and believed to be better than those furnished alio ships of other countries this was because of the extremely high standard of excellence demanded by the specifications cat ions which were so high in tact that the company was compelled to discard at least one third of the plates made moreover it was fortunate that the company at the time was engaged on light armor and not on that for battle ships the secretary was also pleased to state that no naval officers were suspected of any irregularities in the matter furthermore superintendent schwab had been removed to another department of work and the an bealine was put in the hands of diun eicker and arrangements made to have government inspectors on duty night and day |