Year: 1873




Forty years ago the brokers and spec
ulators knew very little of "corners," !"
such MS have rendered the operations of
these gentry in New York and Chicago
notorious in these latter days. Stocks,
grain, and provisions were bought and
sold them in quite a primitive fashion
according to our present ideas. But,
notwithstanding their Ignorance of the
improved facilities for making money
which these latter days have developed,
our fathers at times conducted financial
schemes so daring and startling as to
evidence they were not unworthy pro-
genitors of the brilliant geniuses of this
day. One of these, Il desperate and
reckless effort, made during the fore part
of Gen. Jackson's Administration, to
gain control of the then United States
Bank, for the aid its funds would afford
about election times, was entirely worthy
of the best of our present party man.
ayers.


The first effort was made upon the
Branch Bank at Portsmouth, N. H., of
which the celebrated jeremiah Mason
was President but the result was so
hopeless that the tactics were changed
and so great hue and cry was finally
commenced upon the bank, as monster
of political corruption and public dan
ger. This aroused the bank-for it's
charter would expire, if not renewed, in
some five or six years. This new ele-
ment OF controversy speedily drew in all
the adherents of the respective parties
and in a short time the entire nation was
hotly by the ears upon subject that
nobody thought about at all until the
politicians cried aloud over it.


From insinuations, the assailants of
the bank soon proceeded to specific
charges ; and finally they came out with
the astounding assertion that the bank
was positively insolvent, and they made
the confiding "old hero" honestly be-
lieve this was so. A charge so grave
only added to the fury of the contest, as
might well be supposed but the story
was stronger meat than the public mind
was yet ready to digest. In this state of
the struggle the idea was conceived of
breaking one of the branches of the
bank, OF which there We're twelve. If
the attacking party could do this, they
might feel certain that the adversary
would fall under the shock. Such an
effort was full of danger. A discovery
and an exposure of a plot 80 diabolical
would have overwhelmed its originators,
and swamped the party But it was not
time, nor were the managers in mood.
to sickle at means, or hesitate ovsr dan
gers. The agent chosen to do the work
was New York broker, whose name we
will call Clark. For the valuable con-
sideration which the job would net to
his purse, he readily undertook it-in n
general business way, of course. The
branch selected to be assailed was the
Savannah Bank. This was not SO diff
cult task, either, as might be supposed;
Tor that bank was at very remote quar-
ter in those days, and it's business was
comparatively small. Usually the amount
OF specie i'll it's vaults was only from
eight to twelve thousand dollars. To
secure far more than the sum of its bills
was easy; and as every bank was liable
to pay specie for every bill presented,
and was broken bank if it failed to do
so on demand, it appeared to be an as
sured work that the Savannah branch
would be broken. True, even if the
matter proved success, the scandalous
means and the malignant motive would
be plainly exposed and everywhere de-
nounced among intelligent and business
men. But the great mass of voters
would only see and hear that the bank
had failed and one part being proved
to be rotten, the whole concern would
be regarded as in like condition. The