H. K. White Statement - Part 1

invoice which had been used in its payment. --- I will ask you why that charge was omitted?

A I can only make this explanation of it; having no knowledge of the transaction previously, I made the entries in the books, if there are any entries under his sole direction, and as he instructed me to do and that is all that I could say with regard to it.

Q If you credited him in the books of the company with $5264.72 paid out, and only charged him with the actual amount of his check $2614.72, leaving a difference of $2650, you, as a book keeper must have been aware that somebody was making that $2650 against the Company. Now you must have known that it was a proper charge for you as a bookkeeper to make against

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Colton in the interest of the Company, why did you omit that?

A As I said before, having no knowledge of the transaction, I took his order and made the entry as he directed.

Q But the impression must have remained in your mind that he was given a credit for $5264. whereas he had only paid out $2600. Did you omit that entry in pursuance of the order that you received from him and not of your own motion?

A Yes sir, not of my own motion.

Q As a bookkeeper. I understand you to have been a bookkeeper in various other places besides being bookkeeper for the R M C & I Co?

A Yes sir.

Q Now you claim to be a practical book keeper, Do you not? A Yes.

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Q You know how to keep books?

A Yes sir.

Q Therefore it must have occurred to you at that time, that somebody was getting the benefit of this $2650?

A Well, whether it occurred to me or not. I can only say this; that having no knowledge of the transaction I must have made the entries as he directed, under his order.

Q But you still do not answer my question. I say, being a book keeper, knowing that you had charged against the Company in favor of Colton a certain amount, and that he had paid in that amount a certain sum which left the Company $2650 short, so you as book keeper would not have allowed such an entry to pass unless you had received, as I

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understand positive orders to leave it in that way?

A No sir. It occurred to me, of course, that there was a discrepancy.

Q Whatever you did in that you did by positive orders?

A By positive orders from him.

Q That part of it you are sure about?

A Yes sir. I might say further I did not even know that the Coal Co had a store at Almy. There were no accounts of sales ever came to San Francisco office or anything concerning that store account from the mine and I had no knowledge whatever of it, that there even was a store there belonging to the Company.

Q Didn't you call the attention of Colton at the time this transaction was had, to the fact that the Rocky M C & I Co should have

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credit for this $2650 and that some entry should be made about it: It you did what was his reply to that?

A No sir I do not recollect that I did. Whatever I did in the matter I did entirely under his instructions, whatever entry I made.

Q That is what I am speaking of: at the time that this transaction was had. If you made any entry or omitted to make any entry, was it done in consequence of your consultation about it with Colton?

A Yes sir, acting under his instructions.

Q Now then, if you saw that he had credit something over $5000, and had only paid about half that amount out, didn't you call his attention to the necessity of making an entry to balance that transaction and what it should be charged to?

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