The daily palladium. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1904-1905, 1904-02-06
WHITAKER WRIGHT
Gid HIS METHODS
British Financial Promoter De-
MED They Were Unlawful.
oLAssED HIMSELF WITH MORGAN.

Famous syvfndier Was Proud of BE-
ing In the same Rank with Noted
American Financiers What He
Thought of Our Great Industrial
Combfnations-His American Coun-
sells view of His Conviction.
What happened to me might happen
any day TO the men who stand at the
head of any of the great American in
dustrial combinations. said the late
Whitaker Wright, the British promoter
and fnancier, to James Creelman last
March, at the time of his arrest in New
York, says the New York World.
's,rake the United States Steel corpora
ton, with its hundreds of millions Of
stock. Suppose that the greatest en-
terprise in the world should fail and its
stock shrink $5O0,00O.00O in value.
Would the people who lost their money
then have J.. Pierpont Morgan arrest
ed? Would he be to blame because
they bought watered stock at more than
it was worth?
..It is fortunate for directors of Amer
lean trusts that they are not under the
companies laws of England. You could
not float your industrials in London 1t
would be impossible to organize COM
panies there on the lines followed IN
America. The laws would prevent it.
There is no difference between what
did in England and what your indus
trial companies are doing in America"
OF all ''get rich quick swindlers that
have brought disaster to thousands
Whitaker Wright was easily the great
est of his kind. He always denied that
his methods were unlawful and prided
himself on being in the same class as j.
Pierpont Morgan and Charles NJ.
Schwab as IA financial promoter
He was born in Cheshire. England, in
1916 His parents, who were in COM
Portable circumstances, gave him a
good education, and he qualified as an
expert mining engineer and showed spe-
cial aptitude as chemist. In 1867,
after his fathers DEATH he came to
America and was employed in mines in
the west as an assayer He removed
to New York in 1880 with a fortune OBJ
tanned as mining prospector.
He returned to England in 1889 and
conducted financial operations on such
a vast scale as to earn for him the
reputa ton of a Monte-Christo. His
lavish expenditures daZZled the British
public, and he was. regarded for
time as the greatest financial genius
of the age. He organized company
after company. He formed the London
and Globe Finance corporation, linn
fol- 10
of mining corporations in which he
| was interested In December, 1900,
/ this corporation failed and carried ruin
/ &c many homes in Great Britain and
crippled several prominent business
/ houses Many members of the London
stock exchange were ruined by the fail
ure. Thirteen banking and brokerage
firms failed as result of the collapse
of his company.
Wright came to America again in
March, 1908, and on March IA was ar
rested as he was leaving the boat He
had booked as NJ. Andreoni. The ar
rest was made on a criminal charge
in connection with the conduct of the
London and Globe Finance corpora
ton, limited. EXtraditfon proceedings
resulted in his starting back to Eng
land in the custody of two English de-
tectives.
81 am very deeply shocked by the
tragic death following SO closely his
conviction" said Samuel Untermyer,
who was his counsel during his fight
! against eXtradition, land l cannot help
thinking him entirely a victim of mis-
fortune. His conviction under the cir
cumstances- is a good illustration of the
difference in the criminal law of Great
Britain and the United States. Eng
land and Germany hold those RESPONSE
BILE for the conduct of corporations to
a much stricter accountability than we
do.
'Ir. Wright would not have been
convicted in America. Many men who
now hold their heads high in the finan-
cial district of this city (New York;
would be panic stricken if the same
laws that govern finance in Great
Britain We're suddenly to apply here.
If such laws did obtain, investors here
would be much safer"