New Orleans daily crescent. [volume] ([New Orleans, La.]) 1851-1866, 1859-11-02

not leave Us in doubt as to the party we should ss.
pouse, as every man had to be on one siae OF Tue
1.-THE The hank was re.instated and its issues stood
HIGHER. ID n believed, in the Eastern and North
western cities than those of any other Dank IN the
State, and were receivable generany on al my
great lines of travel throughout the East and
Northwest But the same spirit which had origi-
nalIy sought to fasten odium upon the Doctor for
the failure of the bank in lS4I still existed and fol-
lowed him. The mails between Memphis and the
great marts of trade north and east were con-
stantly loaded with malicious statements, which
provoked newspaper articles; and thus, without
any ostensible reason, the bank was dscredited in
New York in August 1854, by John Thompson, a
publisher of a reporter and bank-note detector.
Every species and variety of slanderons rumor that
the friends of the fallen parties could concoct to
the prejudice of the bank and the Doctor were
kept in constant motion. A large amount of the
bills receivable of the bank were protested, and
the payment of its means to meet the crisis was
withheld As the best he could do under the cir
cumstances, and to convince all that nothing but
fair dealing influenced either him or the bank, ne
had lists of his own real estate made OUT amount
ing to $435 900, and prices affixed to them by gen
tlemen Of fortune, and of high and unimpeachable
character, who knew the property and were good
judges of its value. This he offered, IN q pupic
card, to the creditors Of the bank IN S Sraer aaa'
W, CLARK, or at the clearinghouse at Memphis
This offer, voluntarily made, was of course for a
limited period of time, as no prudent man would
take his property out OF the market ana pace u
applied were thus paid. large portion OF the
outstanding issues have been provided for and al
ready removed from circulation, and all will be- in
due time, and the bank wound up. AT least, we
learn that such is the policy of the Doctor and Of
those who are largely interested with him.
AT present the Doctor is engaged with his own
business and that of the bank. He has an immense
quantity of real estate in Tennessee, Arkansas,
Sr a md
to nav all of his own creditors, and those, Also of
the bank When he shall have achieved these OBJ
jects he will have, in all likely probability,
princey estate left for the use of himself and
acquainted with his affairs, than 100000 We per-
sonaly know that his estate is very large and that
his ruling desire is to pay every iablityto admin
lister his estate instead Of leaving it to others,
who might, through errors of Judgment, but more
probably through bad faith, squander it, to the
great loss of his family.
His misplaced confidence in men, and his ever
ready and generous disposition to assist his friends
when beset with difficulties, at former period of
his life-and we strongly suspect that he has not
yet bee ONE the reverse in character-greatly en-
barrassed his finances. In this wise he has lost
probably, not less than 100000; but he never
complains, and the friend must be intimate who
ever hears him speak of or allude to such matters.
He has operated largely, particularly in real es-
tate and by it he has sustained himself amidst all
his losses Almost all large estates in this country
have been made from real property; and, with
reference to it, his Judgment perhaps has never
erred; and we think it probable if few more
wears shall elapse before he closes his liabilities,
he may have left for himself an estate worth one
million of dollars, so great is the rate at which real
estate increases in value at the South.
Since the failure of the Farmers and Merchants
Bank in 1S47 his life has been truly eyentful, and
his powers and resources appear to have kept pace
with the increasing number and magnitude OF his
difficulties. The ruggedness of his course and the
ma nj n
sions for the proudest of his achievements and the
most magnanimous displays of his sympathy and
generosity. He has never quailed before an enemy,
ceased his efforts until victory crowned them,
crowed over the fallen enemy, or compromised
with error.
In the above narration Of DR.. Fowlkes' battle
for the Farmers and Merchants Bank, are admi-
rably brought out his strong points of character
in illustration of the type of temperament in which
DIR. Powell classes him. His fight for the Southern
Pacific Railroad was but repetition of that ire
mendous struggle in which he took the whole re-
sponsibility of a broken and dishonored bank on
his shoulders and fought it through its apparently r
remediable difficulties with an ndomitable courage
and perseverance scarcely to be appreciated by
those whose capacities for understanding are infe-
rior to his own vast executive powers. All will
remember his bank campaign, for it attracted
scarcely less general attention than the Pacific
Railroad episode Of his life. The press had been
influenced against him, and he established paper
of his own, thus bringing to bear the most power
full enginery of success in the conflict, and this
success he triumphantly attained despite all the
difficulties with which he had to contend, an idea
of the magnitude of which may be gathered from
the extracts quoted.
We need scarcely refer to his championship of
the Southern Pacific Railroad, for its history has
just ceased to be current, and all are familiar with
it. Had his biography been written in 1859, in
stead Of 1855, the author could have commanded
material for citing yet more powerfully and COLI
yncingly the characteristics indicative of the man.
Thousands and tens Of thousands of our citizens
have read the newspaper accounts of his extraor-
binary, untiring, and nally successful exertons in
behalf Of the road, and scarcely a less number
will personally remember him as, night after night
during the protracted session of the company in
this city last winter, he stood before the people,
feeble and emaciated in body, but with seemingly
electric quickness of mind. eloquenty meeting and
rebutting every accusation, adding argument to
argument, and fearlessly lashing the enemies of
the road and his personal reyilers with the most
whitening and telling sarcasm and invective, for
unable to assail him with truthful logic they had
forced him to meet them with the same weapons
which they had arrayed against himself, and that
they found themselves overmastered in this, as in
that the result has proved, and all who heard him
know. He resuscitated and saved the road, has
vacated his post of honor and usefulness, and the
esteem and admiration of the stockholders and of
all true friends Of the progress and development of
the South, and particularly this Southwest, are his
reward