The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-09-30
A FORTRESS OF RICHES.
HOW THE MILLIONS or THE NEW
YORK SUB-TREASURY ARE
PROTECTED.

New York. Sept. 3-Many a fine cracks
man has taken a surreputious trip into the
Wall street district and gazed with jeal-
Gus but admiring eyes upon the white
stone building OF the sub-treasury, where
hundreds upon hundreds of millions of
good dollars are stored all the time.
What pleasant dreams must have drift
ed through the mind of the gentlemen
eracksman as he thought Of all these
things. How nice IL would be on a dark,
rainy night to wallow in this ocean OF
gold, silver and bank notes. How gredily
packages of hundred and thousand dollar
bank notes would be stuffed into capacious
pockets. He would walk in a poor man
and walk out a millionaire Henceforth
he would be one Of the kings of Wall
street.
A happy vision a golden myth. And the
gentleman cracksman knew it, Behind
those walls. within a few yards of him.
he knew there was enough money to make
a thousand men rich. But he also knew
that there was no power within him that
could bring these riches within touching
distance. Like all other cracksmen, skilled
in his business. he knew something about
the defenses of the sub-treasury, and with
~-+e"N
just as easily try to capture the rock of
Gibraltar single-handed.
1t is the boast Of the sub-treasury peo-
pie that half a dozen Of the finest cracks
men on earth could work undisturbed all
night on the building, with the most i'm
proved burglar tools known to the craft,
and they would be no nearer their goal
in the morning than they were the even
ing before But the treasury officials do
not depend upon the architectural strength
of the building for defending the riches II
holds. The sub-treasury is really a great
fortress. 1t could hold at bay mon OF
10000 people, and, if they came near
enough, blow them into atoms.
A tour of this building is an interesting
work, and when it is over the visitor rear
ICES the utter hopelessness Of any attempt
to rob or mob it.
Fifty years ago work on the building
was commenced and not a stick Of wood
was put in the structure To set nre 10
it is an impossibility. The architect was
j. Frazee, and the building was the prize
of his life. He used TO go down town TWO
or three times week, a lew years age
and gaze at il with admiration. If any
one complimented the old man upon the
work, his delight was beautiful to see. AZ
would make him talk, too, and he would
tell how each of the great Corinthian col
umns was laboriously drawn down Broad
way behind dozen oxen and followed by
half the population of the city.
The walls are of granite, eight feet
thick The floors are of marble and steel;
the interior walls are of iron and stone;
the arches and ceiling are Of SOLID ma
sorry; the window castings are IRON
sheathed; the stairways are of iron ana
the roof is of granite; so solid ana dell
cately curved that projectile from one
Of the huge tWeVe-inch guns in the mod
ern battleship would strike it and bound
away in some other direction.
The building was erected when the im-
plements of warfare were very crude,
cnmnnrnN with those of TODAY. vet II
could withstand a modern assault with
more success than perhaps any other builc-
ing, not excepting the treasury at WASH
ington, whose weakness has more thaIs
once been criticised.
Some years ago an English writer haG
this to say about the subtreasnry DuliG-
ing: THE officials of the subtreasury
seem to have lively apprehensions thac
some day Outcast New York may rise IN
it's rage and misery on the remaining
fourth of opulence and ease. Their bas-
tile of wealth is always ready to resist;
assault by a forlorn hope. It's bullet-proof
doors, hand grenades and gatling guns
are regarded as matters OF course. such
precautions are common at every store
houses of riches in the city. Not only can
the safe deposit cellars be flooded in the
event of fire, but every passage of them
can he filed at a moments notice with
scalding steam to reDel mob
The water and steam were pleasant
fancy of the English writer They DO not
exist there at least in the way described.
No mob sould get near enough to the
treasury to make water and steam OF any
use These are the reasons: The granite
roof is studded with armOred turrets,
strong enough TO Withstand a hail-stOrm
of bullets, and built like the turrets on the
monitors in the navy. Portfolios pierce
the walls of the turretS. Some are just
large enough to hold the muZzle of a
rifle and give the marksman space to draw
a sight on the surrounding objects, while
others are large enough for the nose of
the Calling and Maxim rapid fire guns.
Up in the third stiry, through numer-
Gus walls and iron doors and up winding
iron starways, is the arsenal. An old
colored man. who fought in the navy and
on land is the king of this room. He is a
shrewd, intelligent fellow, and has picked
up a wonderful knowledge of firearms. He
follows all the new inventions carefully
and If they are worthy, induces the Off
Gals to Introduce them into his arsenal.
In this way the defensive and offensive
equipments are kept strictly up to GATE.
He spends most of his time cleaning and
oiling the 100 45-caliber repeating rifles;
the 100 45-caliber revolvers, and the rapid
fire guns, and keeping the ammunition
nicely creased. He also inspects the hand
grenades, some of them three-pounders,
and others five-pounders.
This old cOlored man is confident that
the sub-treasury could stand off mob of
100, 900 men. The work is matter of per-
petual excitement to him, and he goes
about II as if he expected a fearful attack
to say that if the emergency arises, where
the use of arms will be necessary, those
in the SUD treasury Will ne IOunQ TO be
in fine working order. Fifteen hundred
hand grenades are scattered about va
rious parts of the building, and il would
only take one of them to wreck a good
sized structure.
Each one of the many narrow windows
can be used as a miniature fortress.
They all have recesses three feet deep.
and are fitted with shutters of one-quar-
ter inch boiler iron. The windows are
about four feet square, large enough to
two marksmen, who can
sit in the recess and do great execution
with their rifles through the portfolios.
Every other window is fitted with a bon
net attachment. By detaching a pin the
bonnet swings outward so that it extends
several feet outside the sill. Two men
can sit inside. and either shoot with RI
fes through the portfolios. or
drop hand grenades through a
hole in the bottom upon any belligerent in
dividuals who may gather below
In the rooms above the porches on the
Wall street and Pine street sides of the
building are dozens of holes about eight
inches In diameter. They look harmless
when you glance up at them
from the stone steps below, but each one
Of these holes is the center of fearful
arsenal Grouped about them are boxes
holding dozens Of pear-shaped grenades.
Should any riOtous mob strive to ascend
the granite steps leading to the entrance
doors one grenade loaded with its five
pounds of bullets, dropped through one
of the holes would scatter the assailants
in little pieces towards all points Of the