New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1888-08-19
WALL STREET.
HENRY CLEws's "REMINISCENCES.
7wENTY-EIGHT YEARS IN WALL STREET. n
Henry Clews. Royal svo. PIP XIV, 6s4. New
York: Irving Publishing Company. 1897.

speculative element there, is q continual warfare
The battle is never ending. We scan the news
papers every morning for list OF the killed and
wounded. Now and then fighter with more
than the average Of pluck and shrcwdncss wins an
cpaulet or decoration--that is million, or bet
ter yet, two millions Tomorrow he may tc com
pletely stripped, and left for dead on the field
The story Of this fairy-land where vast fortunes
arc made and unmade almost in q twinklng, is fas
cinatiT. 1t is especially in this country where
we have trick OF getting rich suddenly, and then
getting poor with equal CELEBRITY. Mr.. Henry
Clews, a well-lSnown figure for many years past
in Wall Street, has issued volume of his reminis-
ccnccs, which reflects many of these lights and
shadows. ANY man who can survive twenty-eight
years Of this life and still be- at the end of that
time, Of the marked forces of our great ran-
ciaI centre, must be a strong personality and Mr..
Clewss account of his contemporaries is therefore
likely 10 he interesting not only TO thcnI but to
the world outside. We find some striking illus
trations of the truth Of what we have just been
saying in the way in which the history of the
Street has gone making itself after Mr.. Clcws
stopped recording it. When the book went to
press Mr.. Clews described James X. Keenc no doubt
accurately as being now comparatively poor"
kccnc arose from nil to be worth thirteen millions
lie is now back where he started Yet, before
NiCNSS pOOK rcdcHcS INC puDuc, wan ptiNN" 10
busy with JUNIORS TO the effect that Keene is max
ing millions again. When the later pages were
written, among the wcll-known members OF the
Stock Exchange was Charles Johnes, the king
of board-rcom traders, once a clerk Of Henry
Clcws & Co.. now worth a Million and prince OF
good fellows as bright and quick he is popular
Yet, within only few weeks, poor Johnes has
hccn ccnsig ncd &c a lunaie nsy"ni and is said to
he nearly stripped.
Fierce speculation is an old story. Mr.. Clews
went into the Stock Exchange shortly after the
panic Of 81 1t was IN the early years of his
connection with the Exchange that Anthony Morse
had his brief and astonishing career. lie was a
clerk who had saved 500 by close economy. He
made several millions within a year, and lost
it all within an equal space of time. Al that
time spectators frequently offered 500 week,
or ten times tho cost of membership, for the
privilege Of listening at the keyhoe during the
calls Twenty years before, the members of an
Oxen board, which had been organized after
their failure to force themselves into the regular
association, engaged building next to the
board-room and took the bricks out of the wall
in order that they might see and hear what
was going on"
Some OF these stories Of quick profits and losses
read strangely. Not long ago, Henry y. Smith.
a prominent Spectator, who had lost heavily, |
appeared before the Governing Committee of the |
Stock Exchange TO make application for the extern !
sion Of time his seat and submitted the follow
ing remarkable statement: On January l, $50 /
I worth sl.4O0000. l had sll00,00O in
money, and the balance, $500, 900, in good real
estate. On the following January had lost the
whole amount. and Sl,200,000 in debt, q
million Of which owed to William Heath e. CO.
On one occasion when the Tweed Ring was manip-
ulating Wall Street Mr. Smith drove up to the
Tenth National Bank the ring institution, in
a cab, and drew lis balance thcrefrom. amounting
TO s4,1Oc.OOO lie took it home and kept it there
several days under lock and key. In the mean
time Nj Tweed and his contemporaries withdrew
from circulation the greater portion Of the amount
under their immediate control, making the tic
up, the whole Of nearly twenty millions of
dollars" This was sufficient. at that time TO
make a very stringent money market
kecnc's story, as we have already shown, is as
remarkable any. lie was in California strug-
Cling TO make both ends meet. as a broker. His
doctor told him he must give up work, and adj
viscd long sca-voyagc lie secured his passage
TO the East, and prior to his departure. invested
the few hundred dollars in mining stock, then
selling very low. Communication was not rapid {;
in those days. 1t took ten months for the news
of the dncovcry OF gold to reach the Eastern ,
N,Nt'fS. Alttr StdIS dDsthCr, At'ut IL
fou al out tha: The stocs whic! had cost him
only few hundred dollars was then worth over .
s?1o oon lie JGne, IN tie mining speculation, a
which was then craze. and made money rapidly. n
Seeing the great and rapid advance in the stocks g.
Of the COmstoek mines he reasoned like old Daniel
Drew, that what had gone up high and so Y
fast bound to come down. lie attacked them !,
by selling them Short which took courage >
in the condition of the public mind at that time q
The conflict was bitter. but the stocks II
finally fell with a crash. Keene cleared ~
Il two and half millions in the Bel II
cher and Crown Point mines, and over half h
million in Ophr" lie came to New-York with =,
four millions, and by heavy purchases. before the
rise Of 1870 and 1880, added fully nine millions 81
to them Then he spcculated in everything-in IL
wheat lard, opium and fast horses. At the time nj
bis attempt TO corner wheat failed his losses are
laid 10 have amounted TO seven millions Of dollars,
md he kept on in the vain endeavOr to retrieve Al
himself, but disaster followed disaster, until he II
vas left with nothing During the heyday Of lis u
his lberality extraordinary. Mr.. ~
Jews says there is parallel TO it in the ar ~
hves of Wall Street since the days of the first
meetings Of the brokers in the Tontnc Coffee House. IN
opposite the tree, early in the century" n,
le is said to have made presents of seats In the w
BOARD 10 as many twenty persons. m
There are many stories of rapid growth in for DC
une more wonderful than this though few, per- I'd
aps, more melodramatic The creation of the '"
rst Vanderbilt fortune, the enormous occretions
0 it made by William ii. Vanderbilt, the Gould ai
ortune, and many others, arc far more remark %
BILE. No such examples Of rapid accumulation
ave ever been seen in tho history Of the race u
Tn ssv.r,,, rears sors Mr. C,ows /" tho Com. aG
,odorc arose from nothing financially, TO be the
nd rnfC q 4 h
,ined s75, 900 900 Of that, and nearly trebled it ~
a tenth part Of the time. lie made three times ~
5 much in seven years as his father made in 9,
evenly, or he made much, on an average, every m
NO and half years, his father had done during 20
re three and ten Of his active business and go