Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1870-01-27
rI1uAYOF THE GOLD CONSPIRACI

the tale reported in the New York Fri
bune gs..
On Friday morning. when I got down 10
the Office of Heath 4 Co., at half-past ten Mr.
Belden brought in one Speyers. whom, i sup
pose you have heard Of He introduced Mr.
Speyers. and said. Mr.. Fisk. Mr.. Speyers
will execute any orders for my account, you
may give him." He then turned to Mr. Spey-
ers and said, Whenever you have executed
these orders, you will report the gold to me.
Gold was then about l43, and | told Speyers
the quicker he got there the quicker he would
get some at that price. Speyers, beng one
of those Roman SaXonans belonging to the
German Order, felt that as soon as he could
fiji Bedens orders he would fill his own gut
with the same kind of stuff. 1t then got to be
about 10 l-2 o'clock. and told Speyers to go
it, and buy all the gold he could. Away he
started, but by the time he got there, gold
had reached 100. Speyers could not see why,
when it had gone up from Is to 20 per cent.
in 30 minutes, it should not reach 800, and
hence he began to load up at 100, and judging
from all appearances he got pretty good
cart-load of it.
During that time there appeared in The
New York Times an article charging the Adj
mnistration with being in direct league with
those who were putting up gold and saying
it was shameful" We read that article 60
ing down town. and | knew at once that it
would be telegraphed to Grant and Boutwell,.
1t was one of those curious articles. which,
when you read made you feel weak in the
knees. 1t was an article, when.you read 1t,
YOU would dwell on it, We made the remark
if it made us feel little weak i'll the knees.
at that time when we read it, what would be
its effect, when it reached Washington, upon
the Hon. George Boutwell, and Honorable En-
of fbp " nrnbHnIV
had never specialized before this time. II we
felt weak. how much weaker would they feel.
As we afterward learned, Mr.. Boutwell,. about
10 IL O'Clock, went over to the Executive
Mansion, and not exceeding over 10 or 10
minutes after he came back. There was IA
thunder clap struck us in the shape of infor-
nation that the Sub-Treasury had received
an order to sell four millions of live gold,
while our sales had been ''short'. would
rather carry forty millions of short gold than
four millions of the real stuff, for the latter is
good deal heavier When the order to sell
struck, Speyers was still picking up gold at
l60. The first thing | knew the clap struck
there, and gold went down to al, but Spey-
ers, feeling that he was on the right track,
continued to take up gold at l60 The next
thing | was Speyers rushing into the
office with his cravat off, and without any
shirt collar, and his hair sticking up straight
what little there was left of it. He did not
have over 10 or Is hairs Said he: milne
Colt! The whole ting ish played out l
have fifty millions at 100, and it ish now sell
ling at l4l. What shall do?' About that
time my own affairs had got little disorgan-
lied, and was not as much interested in Mr..
Speyer's business as l was in my own. told
him, You - fool, you have not any
better sense than to be standing there and
buy gold at 100, when 1t was down to al !;
when you find any amusement in it, suppose
you might as well keep right straight on. "
Speyers went out of the front door. and be-
fore | knew anything of it, he was off again
to bid for more gold at l60, although it had
gone down to al; but his voice had given
out, and he was hoarse that no one could
understand him.
When we started, the thing got pretty hot,
and great many of our friends got warm and
wanted to shake hands with us, but wanted
to shake their fists in our faces about this
time l told Gould, as it was getting very
| hot whore we were, we had better go to some
| milder cline. There was a back door from
| the office, which we took, and on our way up
| town the first thing saw was the accounts on
| the bulletin boards of the freaks of the crazy
| broker Speyers, and that his mind had given
out. 1t was the first thing l heard. We
went up town feeling that we wanted cool
no one knew anything about it. No one
knew whether he was in or ont, for there had
never been any excitement like it. BY that
time had got pretty mad, and when we had
sat down some time in cool place, | said,
Il will start around to that old fellow Cor
bin, and see what he has to say" / went
into his house. and the old man came down.
was pretty mad by this time. When he
came into the door, said: This is a -
pretty piece of business you have put on us
now, amt it? Is this some sharp trick TO
wipe us off the face of the earth" what
have You done? he said II have just
heard it," l told him that l thought he
would have heard 1t from the very rumbling
of the ground. Just look at what has trans
PRED. What. have you done for us after all
your pledges, after giving you a check for
S25, 900, and after drawing another for 500,
600, and after your positively assuring US,
our messengers bearing your letters to Gen.
Grant, that the whole thing was fixed" He
asked, ''What situation are you in said,
~ do not know, but it looks as if we were
ruined. This would not have been so, ifyou
had managed your part as you said you
would. We could not tell whether we were
long or short of gold, as no one knew any
thing about it,. | told him that had come
around to ask him whether the whole thing
| had been a trick from the beginning to
the end. There did not seem to be any Ian
guage strong enough for him to use to sustain
his position. He said that he had all his ar
rangements made in good faith, as he had
promised that no gold should come out. The
old fellow seemed to quiet me down. This
was about o'clock, and l told him would
be up again tonight at about 100 as some
thing had to be done. He wished me to talk
to Mr.. Gould, and if he thought it best he
would go to Washington, and have all the
gold withdrawn from the market. He said
matters could be arranged, at least so as tc
save something, and in that agreed with
him. At l-2 o'clock l told him | should
| like to see Mrs. Corbin, with whom had here
tofore had one interview. She came down
and she was precisely of the same opinion as
Mr. Corbin, that some mistake had occurred
that Boutwell, had sold the gold, probably,
without consulting the President She sale
that Mrs Grant had writton her letter, il
which she stated that she hoped this gold
transaction would be over as soon as possible
as it made her husband nervous. l sale
something had to be done; that We had to ge
| out of this scrape, and into the best possible
shape we can. I said the best thing for hin
l. Al.