Eastern times. [volume] (Bath, Me.) 1846-1857, 1853-02-24
From our correspondent in Mississippi.
mississippi Banking.

II IL
In the hasty sketch sent you of our bank
ing. gave you some anecdotes of Shocco
Jones. The Colonel resembled Fallstaff in
several particulars; as the one was witty him.
sell, and the cause of wit in others, SO the 9TH
er could tell good story, and he is himself
the theme Of many an amusing joke.
During the troubles in Mississippi, some
banks, that were partially protected and in
dulged in their suspension at home, were treat
ed as fraudulent and Ascending or non-resi
dent debtors, whenever the brokers, In New
Orleans, holding their paper, could find any
funds on which to levy an attachment
The cashier of one of the Port Gibson banks
went to New Orleans, and by some means OBJ
tanned several boxes of specie. The brokers
soon had the deputy sherifs on the track
COL Jones being on good terms with the Mis-
sissippi cashier, had the real silver labelled for
himself, and procured some boxes OF brick
bats and had them conspicuously marked with
the name of the Port Gibson bank.
The fnanciers started for Mississippi on the
same boat in charge OF their respective funds,
but before the boat could get away from the
wharf, the boxes containing the brick-bats,
were duly levied upon, and then and there
subject to sale for the debts of the corporation
whose name was emblazoned upon the boxes
aforesaid. ~
Now Col. Jones was not satisfied with doing
the clever thing for his Port Gibson friend, but
by means of these same boxes he impressed S.
S. Prentiss and others on board the boat with
an idea of his financial Importance, SO that they
assisted him in hoaxing the embarrassed bust
ness men of the city of Vicksburg.
No one on board the boat except Shocco and
the cashier understood the joke until long after
the boxes were opened in. New Orleans, and
the Colonel was smoking cigars and playing off
his pranks in another region. All that he
charged his friends for his fnanciering was
good living, decent wardrobe, and proper
accompaniment of Champagne and Havanas.
After the banks suspended specie payment,
silver change was almost unknown except in
the Post Office and as the banks had issued
no bills for less than five dollars, several own
ers of taverns, stores, &C., issued small notes
in current bank notes, when the amount of
FIVE dollars was presented. One barber issued
notes. "good for shave" to the amount of
four dollars ninety-three and three-fourths
cents-but nobody could ever get enough to
call on him for bank bill.
AS noticed in my last, the banking opera
tons here were connected with an extensive
system of drafts upon New Orleans commits
sion merchants. At first these bills were con-
sidered foreign and subjected the parties to
heavy damages when protested-besides many
of these papers bore ten per cent. interest, and
the drawer was charged two and half per
cent for acceptance, and the same per cent. for
advancing the money before the receipt Of cot
ton. Strange as it may now seem, extensive
transactions were carried on with such bills,
and large plantations bought on one, two,
three and four years credit by such acceptance.
Some planters would draw upon two or three
houses in New Orleans for the full value of
their crops and then send their cotton to a
fourth, who had no claim against them.
Where the steam is kept up in this way, Of
course fue will collapse after awhile, and wo
to him who stands near the boilers. AS in 9TH
err explosions, the innocent suffer with the
guilty. Solvent banks and merchants fail as
we'll as those who have inflated the currency
and given fictitious value to property by en-
couraging wild speculations. All pecuniary
transactions are deranged. The man who is in
debt has to give up twice the amount Of prop
erty he expected would discharge his liabili-
ties. Hence years elapse before business re-
turns to healthy state.
In Mississippi, we passed in few years
from an exclusive paper currency to one ex-
clusively metallic. Certain coins passing at
extravagant rates were bought up in New Or
leans and put in circulation here, and it is on
ly within few months that sovereigns have
come down to their par value.
MORAL. One extreme follows another, and
truth is stranger than fiction.