The San Francisco call., 1899-08-29

A. T. Stewart had sincere admiration
for General Grant, and when the move
ment me was started to bring him forward as
a candidate for the Presidency no one was
more active In 1t than the merchant mil
uonaire This was another chance lot the
Judge to strut and swell ana run run
things" There were conferences and con-
sultations with leading statesmen ana
Eminent pu1irle lawyers and bankers. There
were dinners and receptions, pupIlc meet
ings and private ones IN coun1Ilhs1 ritf
and club parlors, correspondence with
strong and powerful men all over the
Union The great object in view was 70
harmonic all differences OF OPINION ana
weld together a strong party IN S4t SSupp1nrt
Of the victory of Appomattox AT Irst the
| Democracy thought of putting him in
nomination. 1t was argued tIal 1idlIe4 ne IN bis
J life; that he was an old Democrat Wllh-
| in the highest councils of the Repuplican
! party there was strong oppoSIIIOh "
| the conqueror of the rebell1on; c..
| in turning the tide in favor OF Grant IN
this city. He gave great gunner Is1; parry
| Palace at which were the IoIeulost i tt4 tile4
| of the city. 1t was the hrst tlIne ma
! many of them had met the nrst sololer s9o ot
the republic. The guests OF Mr.. SteWart nI5a,t
| on that occasion were dazzled py d solQtSn 20 t
! dinner service such as few men uloer s tne
rank of royalty ever possesSed. ADUol @
| that dinner service there will be some
thing to say later on. Then foIIowed
great mass-meeting in favor OF I1daIiC IIl az Se
meinsnr4ne rse of The affair, and he was so
| confident that he would be CHOSEN 10 pre-
side that he asked in advance ms m ,S,oL,Id ComIl
| dental cashier, Mr.. Hopkins, II ne WouId
act as one of the secretaries. WillCh Iiie
| newspapers of the time show tnat ne oiu; i
! In all this Grant business Hlft9H M e.+ ma1 'he
| mere messenger and clerk OF stewart;
/ And here we have another illustration
! of the extraordinary fatality that mas at
merchant possessed. Since Htlton's mar
yelous absorption of the Stewart miI1ons
to him and not to his great beneIactor
| has been given the sole credit Tor haVlng
| been instrumental in elevating Grant TO
the Presidency. Only few days ago this
sentence occurred in complimentary
newspaper sketch of the Judge:
"In 1868 he worked hard for the ELECTION
of General Grant to the Presidency"
Yes, but it was as the paid servant OF
stewart. Hilton in all his life never
worked" for anybody unless he was wei
| rewarded for his services. Who was Hill
| ton at this time that he should nave peen
! ton of Republican candidate to the chief
magistracy of the republic?
HIS OWN RATING.
In the first place, he was known as ons
| of the intimate associates of Tweed and
| Peter B. Sweeney and Dick" Connolly
and the rest of the plundering gang; They
| made him a Park Commissioner he was
one of the men upon whom they could de
pend in all their schemes and projects.
He was unknown in the world of trade.
! The only standing he had was that Which
! came from his position as the private
| counsel of A. T. Stewart. He was a mem
! ber of a law firm, but his standing at the
| bar was never rated very high, except by
| himself 1t is ludicrous to speak of Hill
! toms services to General Grant in bring
! ing him forward as Presidential candi-
! date. 1t was Stewart who helped Grant,
! and it was Hilton who did the routine
| drudgery, which was amply paid for in
! Stewards golden checks. Hilton's salary
! at this time must have been about $4,000
! a year, and later on it went up to $50 900.
The tremendous effort Stewart made in
| behalf of General Grant-an effort Grant
! thoroughly understood. and when he be-
came President showed that he appreci-
! ated-was perhaps the most unselfsh act
! faults and failings-hs avarice, his un-
! sympathetic nature, with a heart as cold
as the marble of the great downtown
! store, as hard as the iron of the uptown
/ one, where the name of Hilton is now so
| brazenly Haunted, and as barren of affec-
| ton as the Hampstead Plains, where his
! bones are supposed to lie beneath cathe-
! dral archeS-he was man of the very
Hottest conceptions. The maker out OF
| a slender capital of millions and millions
! of money, gathered and garnered at first
| by the slowest and most painful Of COM
| mercial processes, screwtng here and
! genius to do and to dare great things The
| Grant episode is one of them. And when
| Grant, as President, gave conclusive evil
! dence of the esteem in which he held
! Stewart by sending his name to the Sen
ate as his Secretary of the Treasury, the
most astonished and the most gratifed
man in all the country was Stewart him
self. His confirmation was assured until
some deliver in old and long-forgotten
statutes found that the act of Congress
organizing the Treasury Department stip-
ulated that a man who imported goods for
gain and barter was debarred from hold
ing the great Office. 1t was a bitter blow
to A. T. Stewart.
A GREAT SACRIFICE.
There was one way and one way only
out Of the difficulty that had arisen
Stewart should give up the business with
which his name had been identified for
more than forty years and become re-
tired merchant. It was tremendous sac
rifice to make. The annual profits of the
great stores. retail and Wholesale ran
into the millions-somewhere from two TO
Stewart, in his all-deYouring avaricious-
ness. could never get enough Was it un-
to the sacrifice and surrender of it all?
No one now can tell except Hilton him
self, and it is very certain that the secret
will never be disclosed by him.
The Judge" was playing for great
stakes at that time. Whichever way he
turned there We're millions in full view
millions on which, subsequent events show
he had got his eyes, eyes more avaricious
than even those of Stewart himself.
year was paid about this time to advise
his master, and what was the advice?
That this ambitious old man, 81 years Of
age, should assign the interest of his mil
lions to him and accept the petty salary
of $4,000 a year as a Cabinet officer with.
In the future: Robeson and Belknap and
niflcent play for millions on the part Of
Hilton. The date was 1863. in the early
March days of that year If fortune had
not played Henry Hilton false then he
would have been in the saddle of the
Stewart millions at a. date seven years
anterior to that on which he vaulted into
their control, after the old mans eyes
had been closed forever on Cabinet Of
fees, on, coin and on cotton, on hotels
and on hosiery, on earth and all that
earth contained
When Stewart died he left Hilton 81 .OOO,-
600. But in some way that has never been
explained nearly all of the Stewart mil
lions came into Hilton's possession. He
became the owner of the store at Broad
way and Ninth street He changed the
firm to that of Hilton, Hughes & Den
ming. But the money making power had
vanished with Stewart and Hilton's plans
never prospered. The business failed
finally in 1896.
After Mrs. Stewards death numerous
efforts were made by relatives to deprive
Hilton of the Stewart millions. All failed.
Judge Hilton had much trouble In the
last few years with some of his sons, VINO
were inclined to be wild.