The Sun.
London, England, 1864-05-03 00:00:00

THE CIVIL WAR IN AMERICA.

(From the Times' Correspondent.)
NEW YORK, April 20.

There has been a panic on the Stock Exchange
since Saturday last. Mr Chase, whom it is the
fashion in Wall-street to call the" Great Bear," has
come and gone, and the panic has come after him.
His object was to bring down the premium on gold.
In this he succeeded, though not to the extent anti-
cipated ; while he accomplished another not set forth
in his programme, and brought down the price of
Government securities and railroad stocks and min■
ing shares of all kinds. The failure of his notable
scheme for regulating the price of gold by the issue
of what he called "gold certificates" for the payment
of Customs' duties had taught the speculators that
the Secretary of the Treasury was not so powerful
as he imagined, and his presence had no more real
effect upon the premium than to bring it within 2
or 3 per cent. of the high level of the last fortnight.
But, if he did not frighten the speculators and stock-
brokers, he alarmed the bankers, who called in their
loans, restricted their advances, and tightened the
money market, and thus led to a crash. The weaker
class of operators could not meet their liabilities
without effecting forced sales of stocks, and rail-
way shares as well as Government securities came
rattling down, burying under their debris some of
the more important and apparently the most pros-
perous of the new firms that have sprung up
with the rapidity of Jonah's gourd, carrying
with them hundreds of weaker brethren who
relied upo❑ them for support, if not for existence.
The "Five-twenties," so long a favourite invest-
ment, declined 11 per cent. the day before yester-
day, and the " Seven-thirties" 31, while the
decline in Railway stocks was still more decisive.
The Illinois Central fell 13, the New York Central
7, the Erie 7, the Hudson River 171, the Burling.
ton and Quincy 16, and others too numerous to men-
tion from 41 to 18 per cent. Gold, which it was the
object of Mr. Chase to pull down to 150 or lower,
stood firm at 170 in the morning, and rose, as the
day wore on, to 1711. Yesterday the violence of
the panic somewhat abated, gold fell to 166, rose
rapidly to 168, and closed at 1691. Some of the
railway shares recovered themselves partially—
among others the Illinois Central, which advanced
6 per cent., the New York Central 61 per cent., and
the Erie 31 on the previous day's prices. Govern-
ment stocks were in less favour, and Five-twenties
suffered a farther decline of 4 per cent., or virtually
stood at a discount of 1 per cent. This morning
gold is at 169, and stocks are generally firm, but
-without any marked improvement in the price of
Government securities.

Great as the panic has been, a worse must follow.
It is but the first faint vibratory movement of the
coming earthquake, which will level with the dust
:many a stately edifice, whirl into the air like dry
leaves the paper securities of a wealth that has no
foundation, consign the millionaires of today to the
penury and obscurity in which they existed before
their countrymen went crazy, reduce thousands of
.now prosperous citizens to ruin, and fill the homes
of honest and industrious men with wailing and
lamentation. The delusion of the multitude is as
great as ever. Men in high places preach and teach
that the country is rich merely because there is
enough paper money afloat to set speculation ram-
pant ; although a million of men who four years
ago were engaged in producing wealth are now
-wholly employed in destroying each other. Mr.
Chase, aware that he cannot for ever go on bor-
rowing or printing waggon loads of inconvere
tibia greenbacks per diem, insists that the country
must be taxed to the extent of 500,000,000 dollars
Viper annum to pay its way, now and for the tuture,
and in order to reduce gold to par and advance
paper to the same honest level. This is a sum
representing with gold at par no less than
£100,000,000 sterling, and, as it would have to be
drained out of the resources of a country not nearly
so populous as Great Britain, which is but scantily
settled for its immense area, and on which the chief
burden of taxation would have to fall upon the in-
habitants of the large cities, all that need be said
is that Mr. Chase's ideas of finance are peculiarly
American. "They jest at scars who never felt a
wound ;" and people who talk with such stupendous
unconcern about a fiscal burden, even of half the
"weight of one hundred millions sterling per an-
num, are in a condition of blissful ignorance. Mr.
Chase does not stand alone in his faith. Yesterday
Mr. Morrill, the author of the famous " Morrill
Tariff," which imposed a duty of about 33 per cent.
on every article of European manufacture imported
into the United States, in proposing to raise that
high rate to 66 per cent., and generally to double
the duties imposed by the Internal Revenue Bill of
last year, which so egregiously disappointed the
expectations of every financier in America, Mr.
Chase included, gave utterance to opinions on the
subject of the taxpaying powers of this people that
were enough to take away the breath of everybody
bat an American in surprise at the Brobdignagian
character of his estimates. "The demands upon
the Treasury he admitted to be unprecedented."
but the resources of the country he affirmed " to be
equal to any possible emergency, good or bad."
"Five hundred millions of dollars per annum were
a trifle." " The people of the United States had
" not only the means to pay every dollar they owed
or ever would owe, but to pay the debt, however
large it might become, principal and interest, in
gold." " The Government was supplied with
more gold than was sufficient for its purposes, and
was actually begging creditors to receive payment
in advance." "If the war were closed in 1865 the
whole debt now and to be in the interval incurred
would be paid off in ten years." "Let us," said this
furiously hopeful financier, " have loans and taxes,
and increase the pay of the soldiers. With the dash
of a general who never fails, we must anticipate
crushing results to the enemy ; and with military
success we shall be victorious over all ills." Mr.
Morrill, in the excitement of his imagination, never
condescended to explain what might happen, pro-
vided " we" should not be favoured with " military
success." But why should he ? Is he not as mad as
the dwellers in the Paradise of Fools ? Or why
should the reason of those who are not fools and the
experience of the whole world be brought to bear
against the delusions of a gentleman so credulous as
to tale° his dreams for facts and his hopes for reali-
ties, and who is so dazzled by the brilliancy of his
own patriotism as to be unable to see for excess of
light that which others who do not gaze upon the
sun with their naked eyes can behold quite plainly ?
For Mr. Morrill there are no shadows. All is light
and glory—illimitable wealth, illimitable power,
and illimitable conquest. Were all bis countrymen
equally blind, the impending financial catastrophe
would be hideous indeed. He, at least, would not
put the break on the wheel when the frantic horses
were dragging the chariot down the hill to the in-
evitable precipice, but would lash and goad them to
renewed speed. This gentleman's name has been
mentioned as Mr. Chase's
successor in the Treasury
department should the latter resign or be dismissed.
The mischief he would do may
be imagined
choice extracts of his speech above quoted,
from the
quoted, in the
purport of which, I had almost forgotten to
mention, he was supported by Mr. Steb-
bins, the chairman of the Board of
Brokers
in this city. But madness rules the hour,
and if Mr. Morrill be not Secretary of the Treasury
it is very generally considered that he deserves to
be.

The war naves is not favourable to the Federal
cause. The operations of General Forrest on the
Mississippi create anxiety, and the repulse of the
forces of General Stone at Pleasant Hill, in Louis-
iana, oa their way to Shrevefort, where the Con-
federate Governor of the State has taken up his
headquarters, is looked upon as still more ominous
of future disaster. The loss is admitted by the Fe-
dorals to amount to 2,000 killed and wounded—.
and stated by the Confederates to be seven times
that number,—showing in either case a desperate
fight, and a severe defeat of the plans of General
Banks in that region. There is no movement as
yet upon the Rapidan by either of the armies.
The Confederates have destroyed and evacuated
Fort Pillow, probably finding it impossible to hold
it without gunboats. There is as yet no confirma-
tion of the reports of the barbarity inflicted upon
the negro soldiers—reports that bore the stamp of
gross exaggeration, if not of positive falsehood, such

as those which declared that women and children
had been massacred ; that one negro had been nailed
upon a plank by his captors and thrown into the
fire, and that five unarmed men had been buried
alive, and had afterwards crawled out of their graves
only to be knocked upon the head by their inhuman
enemy. Mr. Lincoln, in a speech which he made the
night before last at the opening of the Baltimore
Sanitary Fair, alluded to these rumours, and said
that the Government had no direct evidence to
confirm them, though he himself feared that they
were but too true. If they should prove to be
so, he promised that retribution—probably meaning
retaliation—should follow. But how that retribu-

tion (or retaliation) was to be administered, was a
question which he could not then settle. He did not

link it would be right to take the life of prisoners

in Washington, in Fort Delaware, or elsewhere, in
retaliation for acts in which they had not shared,
and asked his audience if it would be right to take
the prisoners captured atiVicksburg and shoot them
for acts of which they were Lilt guilty, and which it
would probably be found were the orders of only a
few individuals, or possibly of only one man. Mr.
Lincoln was right to have his doubts. The Federal
Government cannot and dares not retaliate. The
greater the atrocity of the massacres committed—
provided that any were committed at all—the more
impossible it will be for him or his Government to
carry the threat into execution. To denounce such
acts before the great tribunal of civilisation, and to
call upon the Confederate Government not only to
disavow them but to bring their perpetrators to
punishment, is all that is required. To retaliate
would be, in cold blood, to lower the Federal Go-
vernment to the level of the few individuals, or
possibly of the one man, who in hot blood permitted
or ordered the fiendish barbarity complained of, and
utterly un worthy of the President of the United
States. Even to threaten retaliation as vaguely
and indirectly as he did, was a descent from the
dignity of his position which can only be excused
by remembering that Mr. Lincoln is not a ready
speaker, that he was taken unprepared, and did
not reflect that it is best to say nothing if you have
nothing to say, especially if you be an Emperor, a
King, or a President—or any one else who pos-
sesses great power, and whose lightest words are
severely criticized.

Little is heard in New York of the doings of
Federal Generals in the South. From the little that
is divulged, it would appear, however, that the rule
of General Banks at New Orleans is as rigid as
that of General Butler. The Louisianas are a
conquered people, and they are made to feel it.
In this respect there is no difference between Butler
and Banks. The one was a tyrant without pity,
remorse, or conscience ; and the other is a tyrant
who thinks it possible to be a gentleman. Perhaps
New Orleans has lost rather than gained by the
exchange, for Butler's doings challenged the atten- '
tion of the world, and provoked sympathy for the
unhappy sufferers ; while Banks works more
silently, and without creating the public scandal
which Butler seemed to delight in rather than to
deprecate. But that his administration of the
Government of the unhappy region which has fallen
unier his control is quite as despotic as Butler's,
will be apparent from the story of his treatment of
one of the wealthiest and most respected citizens of
New Orleans, Mr. James D. Denegre, who has had
the misfortune to incur his displeasure. At the
recent election of a civil Governor of Louisiana, the
nominee of the Federal Government and of General
Banks was, of course, chosen. Though General
Banks had deolared that to abstain from voting
would be considered a crime, only 11,000 persons
took the trouble to participate in the election ; and
as there is a force of 'about 20,000 Federal soldiers
in the city and neighbourhood, it may be easily
understood that 11,000 votes may easily have been
procured, without the participation of any of the
citizens, influential or otherwise. On the inaugura•
tion of the Governor so chosen, a Mr. Michael
Hahn, a lawyer in good practice and a native of
Bremen, who emigrated to America in early
life, the military authorities, anxious to give all
possible eclat to the ceremony, invited every in-
habitant of New Orleans whose wealth and social
position were sufficient to render fashionable any
celebration at which he chose to be present. With-
out waiting for the ;acceptance of these gentle-
men or their families, the official papers were
instructed to announce them as supporters of
Governor Hahn, and as having taken part in the
inauguration. Mr. Denegre, forgetful of the fact
that he lived ander a military despotism, and that
he was suspected[of the crime of sympathy with the
Southern Confederacy, wrote the following letter to
the editor of L' -lbeille de la Nouvelle Orleans, a
journal published both in French and English
" New Orleans, March 6th.
_ _

" Sir,—l find my name mentioned in the public prints as
having assisted in the inaugural ceremonies of yesterday.
Although an invited guest I did not attend or participate
therein. But lam still more surprised to find that the old
veterans of 1815, J. B. Planche and Alfred Heiman, were
aim present—the former having been dead for more than
three years, and the other, having been absent since last
spring.

" Yours, &c.,

JAMES D. DENEGRE."

. ,
It was represented to Mr. Denegre, by some of
his friends, that he should have confined himself to
a personal statement, and been discreet enough to
say nothing about the dead Mr. Planche and the
absent Mr. Hennan ; and that in all probability
the military authorities would make his letter the
pretext for visiting upon him the wrath which they
hac:, long been nursing against him, for refusing to
associate with General Banks or his epauletted:sub-
ordinates. Tae sagacity of these gentlemen was
not at fault; and 12 days after publication of his
damaging epistle he received the following :
"headquarters, Provost-Marshal-General, Department of
the Gulf, 201, Carondelet-street, New Orleans, Mfch 18,
"Mr James D. Denegre,

" Sir,—By orders of Major-General commanding,
you are hereby required to leave this department in five
days from this date.

" At the expiration of that time transportation will be
provided to carr# you beyond the lines of the army, and
within the lines controlled by the rebel Government.
" Very respectfully,
" JAMES BROWN, Brigadier General,
" Provost Marshal General, Department of the Gulf."

Mr. Denegr3 immediately sought Brigadier-
General Brown, and represented that if his presence
in New Orleans were considered undesirable he
would exile himself to Havannah or to Europe, and
pledge himself not to return until the expiration of
the war. He was informed that this could not be
allowed, and that he must be forthwith transported
into the Confederate lines. He then begged the
grace of one additional day, in order to be better
able to make arrangements far the comfort of his
wife and family, whom he would leave behind in
the meanwhile, as they had not been commanded
to accompany him. The request was refused, and
at the end of the fifth day he was escortEd by the
military beyond the lines of the Federal army, and
there left to shift for himself as best he might.
Should Mr. Denegre decide to take the oath of alle-
giance to the Confederate Government, he will
doubtless be received with all the cordiality due to
his personal character and the sympathy due to his
sufferings in the cause of the South; but in that
case his house—one of the finest and most luxu-
riously furnished and decorated in New Orleans—
and all the other property he may have left behind,
will be confiscated to the use of the Federals. Mrs.
Denegre will be turned out of possession, and
some military underling will be installed in her
place to admire the pictures and statuary, and
drink the wines of the exile. Should Mr. Denegre
desire to save his property, and refuse to take the
oath, the Confederate authorities will not allow
him to remain on their soil, and he will have to do,
as Mr. Yallandigham did before him, make his way
to one of the Atlantic ports, and run the blockade
to Nassau. From that point he may reach Europe
at his leisure, happy if, having foreseen the coming
storm, he took the precaution months ago, as it is
believed he did,
of exchanging half a million of
Federal greenbacks for Parisian gold, and the
gloomy despotism of his native city for the life and
gaiety of the French capital.

Persons in debt may obtain instant protection against
imprisonment or seizure of their goods, and an entire release
from all debts and liabilities without publicity, by application
to Messrs. Marshall, sollattors of the Court of Bankruptcy.
Charges under .£5 payable by easy instalments, offices—
(established 1830), 12, Hatton-garden. City branch—CI, 3loor-
gate-street, Bank,—ADyr.

Railway and Public Companies in Par-

liament,

Yesterday, in the committee on the new Metro-
politan railways, the opposition of the London and
Brighton Company to the proposed new Battersea
lines of the London and South Western was pro-
ceeded with, and evidence adduced. The com-
mittee will take the clauses of the Metropolitan
Railway Company's additional powers bill and
those of the Midland Railway Company's St. Pan•
cras branch bill this day into consideration. The
committee on the East Norfolk Railway passed
that company's bill, and that of the Great Eastern
Railway for an extension of seven miles for a line
in junction with the company's Loughton line to
point in Epping forest, near Fairmead House,
south of Highbeech•green, and for raising £120,000
as new ordinary or preference capital and £40,000
by mortgage. The next case heard was that of
the Royston and Hitchin Railway, to empower
the Great Northern, who are owners of it, to make
divers branch lines in the district, to raise £160,000
as new ordinary or 4,1,- per cent. preference capital,
and £53,000 by mortgage. Traffic and engineer-
ing evidence occupied the committee on the Bristol
Central Railway and stations, Great Northern
(Lincoln to Bourn), Lancashire and Yorkshire
(Blackburn lines), Wrexham, Mold, and Connah's
Quay. The case for the Dublin Grand Junction
Railway, by which it is proposed to complete the
railway system of the Irish capital, to raise £350,000
and £116,G00 by loan, was opened and evidence
taken. The line will cross the Liffey above King's-
bridge, by a viaduct of one span of 170 feet and
40 feet high. The bill for the Dumfriesshire and
Cumberland Solway Junction Railway also went
into committee, the object, as stated by counsel,
being to construct a line of 20 miles from a junc-
tion with the Caledonian Railway to Seafield, thence
across the Solway Firth by the west of Bowness
to Kirkbridge, and to a junction with the lilary-
port and Carlisle, at an estimated cost of £320,000
and £lO,OOO loan. The bill for the Albert-bridge
and approaches over the 'T hames, between Chelsea
and Fulham, the South Yorkshire Railway, Newry
and Armagh Railway, Wandsworth and Fulham
Bridge, Salisbury Gas, and Liverpool Exchange
were passed in Lord Redesdale's committee.