Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Railroad Riots in July, 1877: Read in the Senate and House of Representatives May 23, 1878

In Short

This volume contains the complete official findings and eyewitness testimony collected by the Pennsylvania General Assembly following the devastating Great Railroad Strike of July 1877. Beginning its proceedings in Harrisburg and travelling directly to impacted hubs like Pittsburgh, Scranton, and Reading, the legislative committee examines the total breakdown of order that occurred when rail workers revolted against systemic wage cuts, double-header train mandates, and punitive job classifications. Through hundreds of pages of sworn depositions from railroad executives, union organizers, local police chiefs, sheriffs, and rank-and-file militia officers, the document lays bare the underlying grievances of the strikers, the paralyzing cowardice or apathy of civic officials, and the disastrous military missteps that led to blood in the streets. It stands as an essential historical artifact because it captures, in unvarnished detail, the exact moment the United States confronted the raw, explosive friction between industrial corporate power and modern organized labor.

The Story

The narrative of the report traces the escalation of a local labor dispute into a state-wide insurrection, followed by the government's grueling effort to reconstruct how public order vanished overnight. In mid-July 1877, the Pennsylvania Railroad and associated lines enacted a ten percent reduction in worker pay—the latest in a series of post-depression wage slashes—alongside new operational mandates like "double-headers" that doubled train length without increasing crew sizes or pay. On July 19th, at Twenty-eighth Street in Pittsburgh, train crews refused to move freight. The movement spread instantly; local workers laid down their tools, and within hours, freight traffic across the Commonwealth stood dead in the water.

When civic authorities attempted to intervene, the institutional machinery of law enforcement fractured completely. Pittsburgh’s mayor provided negligible police support, while Sheriff Fife found himself entirely unable to assemble a posse comitatus from a local population that overwhelmingly sympathized with the strikers. As crowds gathered around the rail yards—joined by sympathetic mill hands, glassworkers, and local citizens—railroad officials urged state intervention. Adjutant General James W. Latta and state authorities ordered militia units to the scene. Because local Pittsburgh troops were deemed too sympathetic to the crowd, the state dispatched the First Division of the National Guard from Philadelphia under General Brinton.

The crisis exploded into catastrophe on Saturday afternoon, July 21st. As Philadelphia troops attempted to clear the tracks at Twenty-eighth Street to allow trains to move, bayonets were charged, stones were thrown, and shots were fired. The military opened fire into the densely packed crowd, killing and wounding numerous civilians. Far from dispersing the crowd, the bloodshed enraged the populace. The militia found itself surrounded and besieged inside the Pennsylvania Railroad round-house and machine shops. Throughout the night, rioters used oil-drenched cars rolled down the tracks, burning buildings, and captured firearms to lay siege to the trapped soldiers. By Sunday morning, with the round-house engulfed in flames, General Brinton’s command was forced to march out in battle formation, fighting their way across the river toward Allegheny and Sharpsburg while the crowd looted and torched miles of railroad property, leaving the Union Depot, hotel, and hundreds of freight cars in smoldering ruins.

The disturbance was not contained to Pittsburgh. In Scranton, thousands of coal miners gathered at the Round Woods and silk works, bringing industry to a halt until an armed citizens' special police force, led by figures like general manager W. W. Scranton, engaged in a deadly street clash that left several dead. In Reading, militia units fired into crowds at a railroad cut, causing further casualties before local authorities and citizen patrols managed to re-establish control through mass arrests and military patrols.

The second half of the work moves from the chaos of the streets into the committee room. Created by legislative resolution in February 1878, the investigative committee—explicitly composed of lawmakers from non-affected counties to ensure impartiality—convened at Harrisburg and set out on a fact-finding circuit. Taking thousands of pages of testimony under oath, the committee systematically interrogated every level of participant: corporate titans like Vice President A. J. Cassatt and William Thaw; labor leaders like Robert "Boss" Ammon of the Trainmen's Union; local mayors, lieutenants of police, and civic leaders; and military commanders defending their tactical decisions.

The narrative arc concludes not with a dramatic physical climax, but with a sober diagnostic accounting. Through its relentless cross-examination, the committee exposes a fundamental truth: the riots were not merely spontaneous acts of criminality, but the inevitable explosion of deep-seated labor grievances combined with a total collapse of municipal authority and militia command structure. By documenting the legal arguments over who held jurisdiction, the financial claims for destroyed property, and the testimony of workers who felt starved into rebellion, the report forms a comprehensive post-mortem of a civil crisis that permanently transformed American labor relations.

How It Unfolds

The spark at Twenty-eighth Street Railroad trainmen in Pittsburgh refuse to man double-header freight trains, halting traffic and taking physical control of the tracks. Local police fail to intervene, and public sentiment quickly aligns with the striking workers.

The call for state intervention Finding the local sheriff unable to form a civilian posse to clear the tracks, state officials and railroad executives arrange to call in the Pennsylvania National Guard. Troops from Philadelphia are dispatched west to restore order where local militia units are deemed hesitant.

Bloodshed at the tracks Philadelphia troops under General Brinton advance on the crowd assembled at Twenty-eighth Street with bayonets fixed. A confrontation ensues, shots are fired, and multiple civilians fall dead, transforming a peaceful strike into an armed mob uprising.

The siege of the round-house Enraged rioters corner the Philadelphia militia inside the railroad company's round-house and machine shops. The mob sets fire to rolling stock, pushing burning cars down the tracks into the structures, forcing the troops to endure a night of continuous assault.

The retreat and destruction of property Under cover of morning, the militia evacuates the burning round-house and marches out of the city under fire. With no military or police presence remaining, crowds loot freight cars and burn the vast rail yards, including the Union Depot.

Spreading strikes in the coal country Miners and industrial laborers in Scranton and the Lackawanna region hold mass meetings, demanding wage adjustments and threatening to flood the mines. A hastily organized special police force of armed citizens clashes with crowds on the city streets, resulting in fatalities.

The legislative investigation begins The General Assembly appoints an eight-member committee to determine the causes of the riots and evaluate the performance of state troops. Meeting in Harrisburg, Pittsburgh, and Scranton, the committee summons hundreds of witnesses to give sworn testimony.

Exposing institutional failures Through relentless depositions, the committee details how corporate leaders refused concessions, how civic officials evaded responsibility, and how severe logistics failures left soldiers without rations or effective communication, culminating in the final printed report to the legislature.

The People

A. J. Cassatt As a primary executive for the Pennsylvania Railroad, Cassatt represents the unyielding corporate stance during the crisis. He wants the immediate restoration of property, the resumption of freight traffic, and the enforcement of law without making concessions to workers in "open rebellion." Throughout the testimony, he resists demands to meet with union delegates, insisting that the initial illegal taking of the trains placed the strikers outside the realm of negotiation.

Robert "Boss" Ammon A prominent figure in the Trainmen's Union and leader of the strike movement in Allegheny City and Pittsburgh, Ammon seeks a full repeal of the ten percent wage reduction and the abolition of double-headers. He positions himself as a disciplined labor leader capable of stopping the entire railroad network with a single signal. However, as the initial strike spiraled into uncontrolled rioting, Ammon finds his authority eclipsed by broad public chaos, leaving him defending the workers' moral cause while facing criminal indictment and imprisonment.

General James W. Latta The Adjutant General of Pennsylvania, Latta is tasked with deploying state military power to suppress the uprising. He seeks to maintain state authority and reopen the Commonwealth's commercial arteries, but finds himself severely hampered by burned telegraph wires, broken supply lines, and conflicting reports from field officers. His testimony highlights the confusion of state command during an unprecedented civil emergency.

Mayor Phillips and Sheriff Fife The primary civil authorities of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County, who personify the paralyzing bureaucratic paralysis during the outbreak. Sheriff Fife attempts to raise a posse comitatus to assist the railroad, only to be met with total refusal and hostility from local citizens. Mayor Phillips, believing the railroad company had bypassed municipal authority, refrains from aggressive police intervention, demonstrating how local political dynamics crippled the government's response.

General Brinton Commander of the First Division of the National Guard, Brinton leads the Philadelphia troops into the heart of the Pittsburgh conflict. Seeking to execute his orders to clear the tracks, his command becomes involved in the fatal shooting at Twenty-eighth Street and the subsequent siege in the round-house. His actions throughout the crisis—and his eventual tactical retreat across the Allegheny River—become a focal point of intense scrutiny and debate within the committee's cross-examinations.

In Its Own Voice

"I am a citizen of Pittsburgh, and here along with the rest of them, am bound to say that the newspapers pretty fairly reflected the public sentiment in what they said."

This statement from a deposition illustrates how deeply local public sympathy aligned with the striking rail workers against the railroad management prior to the outbreak of violence.

"They said we don't care a damn for you, or your posse, to-morrow at eleven o'clock we will stop every road in the Commonwealth."

Recounted by a witness describing the defiance of the crowd at Twenty-eighth Street, this line captures the fierce, unyielding spirit of the laborers as the strike spread across Pennsylvania.

"I saw no motion carried, I simply heard them offered and seconded, and put to the meeting, and then they were discussed... then the men began to disperse, and we stood talking there."

Taken from testimony regarding a labor gathering near Scranton, this quote conveys the mundane, loosely organized nature of many union meetings right before sudden, violent clashes erupted.

What It's Really About

Beneath its procedural structure and legal interrogations, this report is a fundamental examination of the tension between industrial capitalism and worker survival in Gilded Age America. The central conflict does not merely stem from a ten percent wage reduction or the introduction of "double-header" trains, but from a profound disagreement over rights, property, and the obligations of citizenship.

The testimony exposes two completely irreconcilable worldviews. On one side, corporate leaders and state authorities view the strike as an illegal usurpation of private property and an insurrection against the rule of law. On the other side, the laboring population views the arbitrary reduction of wages below subsistence levels—and the demand to perform double the labor without extra compensation—as a form of economic violence that justifies collective resistance.

Furthermore, the document explores the breakdown of civic institutions under the weight of class solidarity. When called upon to defend railroad property, local police forces vanished, sheriffs could not raise civilian posses, and local militia members refused to fire on their neighbors. The report shows that when an entire community shares the grievances of an outlawed movement, the traditional machinery of state power cannot function without resorting to external military force.

Why Read It Today

This volume will deeply absorb historians, legal scholars, and anyone fascinated by the origins of the American labor movement and urban history. Rather than offering a polished, distance-filtered history, it places the reader directly inside the smoke-filled depot rooms and courtroom hearings of 1878. Reading it feels like sifting through an unedited archive of human voices—hearing directly from frantic telegraph operators, defiant union organizers, defensive generals, and conflicted local shopkeepers.

The book is not without its reading challenges. Because it consists of verbatim testimony and official transcripts, the narrative does not flow in a conventional linear story. Information is introduced fragmentarily, witnesses frequently contradict one another, and reader patience is required to piece together exact timelines. Furthermore, period terminology, regional railroad jargon, and archaic legal phrasing require focused attention.

What stays with the reader, however, is the shocking immediacy of the crisis. The depositions reveal how rapidly a modern industrial society can fracture when economic strain reaches a boiling point. The vivid accounts of burning railcars, panicked military retreats, and intense community solidarity offer a rare, unvarnished window into a pivotal moment when America's industrial future was contested step by step along the tracks.

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