CHAPTER XX

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THE TRUE STORY OF BLACK FRIDAY TOLD FOR THE FIRST TIME.

THE GREAT BLACK FRIDAY SCHEME ORIGINATES IN PATRIOTIC MOTIVES.—ADVISING BOUTWELL AND GRANT TO SELL GOLD.—THE PART JIM FISK PLAYED IN THE SPECULATIVE DRAMA.-“GONE WHERE THE WOODBINE TWINETH.”—A GENERAL STATE OF CHAOS IN WALL STREET.—HOW THE ISRAELITE FAINTED.-“WHAT ISH THE PRISH NOW?”—GOULD THE HEAD CENTRE OF THE PLOT TO “CORNER” GOLD.—HOW HE MANAGED TO DRAW AMPLE MEANS FROM ERIE.—GOULD AND FISK ATTEMPT TO MANIPULATE PRESIDENT GRANT AND COMPROMISE HIM AND HIS FAMILY IN THE PLOT.—SCENES AND INCIDENTS OF THE GREAT SPECULATIVE DRAMA.

In the year 1869 this country was blessed with abundant crops, far in excess of our needs, and it was apparent that great good would result from any method that could be devised to stimulate exports of a part, at least, of the surplus.

Letters poured into Washington by the thousand from leading bankers, merchants and business men, urging that the Treasury Department abstain from selling gold, as had been the practice for some time, so that the premium might, as it otherwise would not, advance to a figure that would send our products out of the country, as the cheapest exportable material in place of coin, which, at its then artificially depressed price, was the cheapest of our products, and at the same time the only one undesirable to part with. So the Government decided to suspend gold sales indefinitely.

Jay Gould and others, being satisfied that this was to be the policy of the Administration, commenced at once buying large amounts of gold, actuated, doubtless, by the purest of patriotic motives, namely, to stimulate cotton and cereal exports. They succeeded in accumulating a considerable amount of gold at prices ranging from 135 to 140, covering a period of three months’ steady buying.

This was the honest foundation on which the great Black Friday speculative deal was erected.

The eruption on Black Friday was really caused by the erratic conduct of James Fisk, Jr., who actively joined the movement on Thursday, the day before, and became wild with enthusiasm on the subject of high gold. He began on Friday, early in the morning, to buy large blocks through his own brokers, William Belden and Albert Speyer, running the price up very rapidly.

The original syndicate consisted of Jay Gould, Arthur Kimber, representing Stern Brothers, of London, and W. S. Woodward, of Rock Island corner notoriety. The two latter, however, sold out their interest to Gould, who directed the deal to the end, with the assistance of several able and wicked partners. Their office was located in Broad street, on the present site of the Drexel Building.

When the excitement arising from the above causes was at its height, I sent a telegram to Secretary Boutwell, and one to President Grant, representing the exact condition of affairs in Wall Street, and urging the sale of gold without delay. I also prevailed upon General Butterfield, the New York Sub Treasurer, and Moses H. Grinnell, the Collector of the Port, to send similar telegrams, which they did, and timely action was taken at once by an order coming to sell $5,000,000. The moral effect of this Government action was to strike terror to the holders of gold, and a general rush was made to sell out, thereby driving down the premium from 160, in less than two hours, to 132. The down grade produced an excitement quite equal to the early furore in the up movement. Albert Speyer had from Fisk a verbal _carte blanche_ order to buy, in million lots, all the gold he could get at 160; while he was thus buying millions upon millions at this figure, on the opposite side, and in other sections of the room, sales were freely made in moderate amounts at 140, 145, 147 and 150, almost simultaneously; and even when 135 was reached, which was soon thereafter, Speyer still kept on bidding 160 for a million at a time, making one of the wildest and most ludicrous spectacles ever witnessed among men not idiots. Fisk afterwards repudiated the contracts made on his account by Speyer & Belden, simply denying having given the orders, and as they were not in writing, they could not well be proven, hence both brokers failed, throwing immense losses upon an innumerable number of others. Quite a noted firm sold Speyer some of his million lots, which they bought back at 140, being satisfied with the profit of 20 per cent.; when they had finished buying, the price instantly broke to 132, and the announcement of Speyer’s failure, which was made before the close of the day, caused them also to fail, as well as half the members of the Gold Room. Owing to the serious complications prevailing and the disaster being so widespread, it was found impossible to continue the clearances through the Gold Bank, and the Governing Committee of the Gold Room were at once convened, and passed a resolution to suspend all dealings in gold for one week, in order to enable the members to adjust their difficulties and differences between themselves privately. The Gold Bank also suspended business in the meantime. While Albert Speyer was vigorously buying and continuing to bid 160 for one million after another, the clique were as actively engaged in selling all the market would take at ten points less, and also busy making private settlements with the shorts.

As the transactions were purely phantom in their nature, the great

## parties in the speculative contest did not really lose much. Contrary to

popular opinion about such transactions, they did, virtually, incur heavy losses, but in one way or another they managed to evade them. Gould’s losses were estimated at over four millions. Fisk’s were equally large, but he repudiated all of them. Others were heavily saddled, however, with the burden which he should have borne.

Importing merchants were among the greatest sufferers, and a large number of them were forced to cover at high figures.

The suspension of the Gold Board caused many important failures. Private settlements were made during a period of sixty days following, in many instances on the basis of a compromise.

When Fisk heard that Secretary Boutwell had ordered gold sold, he exclaimed that it would knock spots out of phantom gold, and send him and others with their long stuff “where the woodbine twineth.” The full effect of the disaster became more fully realized when the Gold Board and Gold Bank suspended and the numerous large failures were announced; then it almost seemed that a general state of chaos reigned, and how to unravel the complications was the problem to be solved. No one that had any connection with gold dealings during the eventful day could positively tell how they actually stood, or how to estimate their losses or gains; such was the uncertainty as to future results, and the doubt as to who was, and who was not, going to pay the differences due. The Board Room was crowded almost to suffocation, and the scene just prior to its close partook of the appearance of Bedlam let loose; in fact, it had not been much different during the entire day. Late in the afternoon, a formidable body of enraged sufferers assembled at the doors of Smith, Gould & Martin’s office, and many and boisterous were the threats that were indulged in against the members of the firm, in consequence of which a police guard was detailed for their protection.

The gold furore brought many Israelites to Wall Street, who since, by their numbers and natural shrewdness, have become quite formidable in our midst.

One of them, being very long of the precious metal, on its break from 160 to 140, fainted; water was soon obtained to bathe his feverish brow, and rubbing was also adopted. When, finally, he had sufficiently recovered to raise his head and open his eyes, looking all around he said: “What ish the prish now?” Upon finding it still lower, he closed his eyes again, and fell into another swoon. He was finally carried from the Gold Room a sick and ruined, but a wiser Hebrew, and is now in the “ole cloe” business on the East side.

This is the history in brief, but the scenes and incidents of that day would furnish material for an interesting volume.

Although I am not much given to the sensational, I have collected a few of the leading events in detail, which I think are worth putting in permanent form, if I may presume that this book itself may happily partake of that character.

The inside history of the conspiracy to put up the price of gold is also full of interesting material, and shows how deeply laid the scheme was to take advantage of the circumstances and of the feeling which existed in favor of stimulating our exports at the time. I shall, therefore, give an epitome of the salient points behind the scenes of the great speculative plot, and the bold attempt made to involve President Grant and his family in the conspiracy.

As I have intimated, Jim Fisk, Jr., or Jim Jubilee Junior, as he was then popularly called, was eventually put forth as the active member of the manipulating coterie. The clique made very good use of him, also, at intervals during the period they were concerting their plans.

Fisk had originally been a peddler in New England, as his father had been. He appeared in Wall Street a few years previous to the great gold conspiracy as one of the confidential men of Daniel Drew. Having shown that he was too sharp for some of the people in the broker’s office where Mr. Drew made his headquarters, he received a polite hint that his presence there was undesirable. Mr. Fisk then opened an office of his own, and united his speculative fortunes with those of Mr. William Belden. The name of the firm was Fisk & Belden. It was of but short duration. It seems that they had difficulty in finding bankers to accommodate them to the extent required, and they closed up the business. But though Fisk failed of success in this instance as a broker, his resources were not by any means exhausted. He made himself generally useful to Mr. Drew, who still adhered to him.

As the result of this friendship and his own smartness, in a short time afterwards Mr. Fisk was elected to the directory of the Erie Railroad Company, and Mr. Drew, who had forwarded his interest in that direction, was left out. This is an instance of the way Fisk made the best use of his friends.

As the result of Fisk’s election to the Erie Board, forty thousand shares of new stock were issued. Bold attempts were made to gobble up other railroads through the same instrumentality. Fuller information on these matters is given in my chapters on Drew, Gould, and the struggle with Vanderbilt.

Fisk began to be considered a universal genius at that time, and had acquired the sobriquet of Prince of Erie. Though he had no money to operate with when he made his debut in Wall Street, soon after this large issue of Erie stock, he began to show signs of wealth very rapidly. He had the reputation of being the fortunate owner of several railroads and steamboats, an opera house, at least one bench of judges, an unlimited number of lawyers and a bevy of ballet girls.

The Head Centre of this gold conspiracy needs no introduction here, as I have attempted to do him ample justice in another chapter. He was also the power behind the throne in Erie as well as in the Gold clique. He pulled the wires while Fisk was the imposing factotum who was exhibited to an admiring public. He managed the courts, the judges and the lawyers, while Fisk got the reputation of doing this fine work, but was simply the mechanical executive. He had made himself solid with the Legislature also, and had acquired a hold on Erie that enabled him to use that property just as he pleased for his own personal benefit, ambition and purposes.

Erie was a mighty power at that time, with a wonderful leverage for raising money. When cash was needed to purchase another railroad, a legislature or a court, all that was necessary was to sell a few hundred thousand of Convertible Bonds and turn them into Erie shares. Mr. Gould was thus fortified with ample means of raising money on call at the time he played the heavy role in the events which culminated in the disaster of Black Friday.

Though the circumstances at that time were all in favor of success in such a plot, it required a mind with great grasp and wonderful powers of generalization to take advantage of all the bearings of the situation, and to utilize everything toward the great end in view. Gould did his work as chief of the conspiracy with rare tact and marvellous sagacity.

A resume of the conspicuous points in the situation and the plot will make this clear.

The supply of gold in the New York market then did not exceed 25 millions. The Government held less than 100 millions, and about one-fourth of this was in the form of special deposits represented by gold certificates, part of which were deposited in the banks and the remainder circulating throughout the country. Gold was then being sold by the Treasury at the rate of a million a month, in accordance with a plan that had been adopted as the best financial policy, both for the administration and the prosperity of the country. This had always a tendency to keep the price down, but on account of the circumstances briefly related in the beginning of this chapter, this policy of selling gold, owing to our commercial relations, was no longer considered for the best interests of the country, and Mr. Boutwell, with his coadjutors in the Treasury, were bound to give ear to the opinions of the bankers and business men in the interest of our export trade.

Although the policy of stopping the sale of gold had been agreed upon in deference to the views of the best financiers of the country, yet Mr. Gould and his fellow strategists thought it was best to make assurance doubly sure on this point, in order that nothing might stand in the way of the great speculative intrigue, to get a “corner” in gold. President Grant was conservative on the subject. The conspirators, therefore, conceived the design of arranging things so that Secretary Boutwell could not depart from this policy, no matter what emergency might arise.

This bold and wicked strategy could only be successful by first getting President Grant convinced that the theory of stopping the gold sales was the only commercial salvation for the country in the then condition of business stagnation and the possible panic threatened. The theory was then to impress him with the necessity of giving Secretary Boutwell an absolute order not to sell gold, and afterwards to fix things so that it would be impossible for the President to revoke that order until the brilliant speculative purposes of the clique in cornering gold should be accomplished.

The scheme was but little short of treason, regarded from a patriotic point of view, and it is very questionable if the perpetrators would have stopped short of this dastardly act, had they not been convinced that their purpose was fully compassed by a method less villainous and shocking. It was considered indispensable by the conspirators, for the consummation of their plans, that Grant should be got out of the way by some means or other. Fortunately for him, and for the honor of the nation, the plan succeeded without the necessity of offering him any violence.

Before explaining how this was done it is necessary to describe briefly a few of the preliminary events which formed a portion of the plot.

It was arranged that General Grant should accompany a party, one beautiful evening in the middle of June, who were going to attend the great Peace Jubilee of Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore in Boston. Jim Fisk did the executive work in the arrangement. There was a fine champagne supper on board the Boston boat, and several gentlemen were present who were thoroughly conversant with financial questions, and could talk glibly on the state of the country. The subject of exports and the policy of stopping the sale of gold were thoroughly discussed. It was a feast of reason, and those who have imagined that it was all flow of soul, on that festive occasion, do very scant justice to the intelligence that was at the bottom of the deep design of the nocturnal excursion, planned by Gould, Fisk & Co. General Grant was an eager listener to all that was said on the most interesting subject of that day, but his mind, it would seem, was not then thoroughly made up that the best policy for the prosperity of the country was to stop the sale of gold. He was undecided on that point, and it required well directed reasons to convince him. Mr. Gould observed this and foresaw what was necessary to be done. The drift of the conversation, when this point was brought clearly out, was very succinctly described by Mr. Gould in his testimony before the Garfield Investigating Committee. He said: “The President was a listener. The other gentlemen were discussing. Some were in favor of Boutwell’s selling gold, and some were opposed to it. After they all interchanged their views, some one asked the President what his views were. He remarked that he thought there was a certain amount of fictitiousness about the prosperity of the country and the bubble might as well be tapped in one way as the other. That was the substance of his remark. He asked me what I thought about it. I remarked that I thought if that policy was carried out it would produce great distress and almost lead to civil war; it would produce strikes among the workmen, and the workshops, to a great extent, would have to be closed; the manufactories would have to stop. I took the ground that the Government ought to let gold alone, and let it find its commercial level; that, in fact, it ought to facilitate an upward movement of gold in the fall. The fall and winter is the only time that we have any interest in. That was all that occurred at that time.”

It may be necessary to observe that I am merely quoting Gould from the report, and am not by any means responsible for his confusion of ideas and grammar.

This is sufficient to show how ably Mr. Gould played his part in attempting to get the President into the proper frame of mind to enable him to endorse a policy so vital to the interests of the country and to the success of the gold clique.

“I took the ground,” says Gould, “that the Government ought to let gold alone and let it find its commercial level.”

This reference to “its commercial level” is rich, coming from the head-centre of the plotters who wanted to put the article up to 200. Then, in another afterthought, he says: “It (the Government) ought to facilitate an upward movement of gold in the fall.”

How artfully insinuating was this suggestion in the interest of our foreign commerce! It showed clearly the power the man possesses of rising to the patriotic height of the occasion. This is a characteristic of Mr. Gould that few people know how to appreciate at its true worth. It has stood out conspicuously in his character in many other exigencies. It reminds one of the unkind but vigorous remark of the famous old English critic, Dr. Samuel Johnson: “Patriotism, Sir,” said the old cynic, “is the last refuge of a scoundrel.”

About the time the above events were transpiring, the Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. H. H. Van Dyck, resigned his office in this city. Mr. Gould’s chief ambition at that time was to name his successor, in order that he might be able to control the Treasury when the time to get a “corner” in gold should be ripe. Mr. Abel R. Corbin came in quite handy at this juncture to help to further the designs of Mr. Gould. He was a man of fair education and considerable experience both in business and politics. He had been a lobbyist in Washington for some years. He was well informed on financial matters, a pretty good writer, and could “talk like a book.” His wife was a sister of Mrs. Grant, and he had good opportunities for reaching the Presidential ear, which he employed to the best advantage.

A gentleman named Robert B. Catherwood, who was married to a step-daughter of Mr. Corbin, was approached by Gould and Corbin on the subject of the assistant-treasuryship. They were anxious that Mr. Catherwood should take the office, and told him he could make a great deal of money in a perfectly legitimate manner if he were once installed.

So Mr. Catherwood stated in his testimony before the Investigating Committee, but he adds, “My ideas differed from theirs in what constituted a legitimate manner, and I declined the office.”

The office then sought another man in the person of General Daniel Butterfield. He received the intimation of his appointment in a very different spirit from Mr. Catherwood, showing that he was fully equal to the occasion. He wrote a letter to Mr. Corbin thanking him kindly for the offer, saying that he was under numerous obligations to him, and expressing a hope that he would be eminently successful in his undertaking. General Butterfield received his commission in due course.

This made perfect another link in the chain of Mr. Gould’s speculative design, as he supposed. It made Corbin “solid” with Gould also, a position which they both highly appreciated. Mr. Gould paid the following tribute of admiration to the true value of Corbin in the enterprise: “He was a very shrewd old gentleman. He saw at a glance the whole case, and said he thought it was the true platform to stand on; that whatever the Government could do legitimately and fairly to facilitate the exportation of breadstuffs and produce good prices for the West, they ought to do so. He was anxious that I should see the President, and communicate to him my views on the subject.” Corbin talked with Grant until he received a positive assurance that Boutwell was not to sell any more gold. At a meeting in Grant’s house, where Gould and Corbin were present, the President said: “Boutwell gave an order to sell gold, and I heard of it, and countermanded the order.”

It was not until Gould had received positive assurance from the President’s own lips, that he considered his scheme perfect. But the links of this strategic chain were now nearly all forged. The bankers and merchants were largely in his favor through commercial necessity, the Sub-Treasury was “fixed,” as he thought, and the Executive fiat had placed the Treasury of the United States itself where it could not spoil the deal if Grant did not change his mind. There were reasons, of course, to apprehend that he would do so in case of an emergency; for he never was privy to the scheme, no matter what his traducers and political enemies may have said.

To ensure perfect safety, then, Grant must be put out of the way temporarily. This was the crowning effort of the conspirators. After the Boston Peace Jubilee, this Cabal spent the remaining part of the summer in maturing its designs. Large enterprises of this nature always require time and patience. I am told that “Billy” Porter, “Sheeny” Mike and other eminent burglars will work assiduously from six to twelve months studying all the ins and outs of a bank or other financial concern before coming to the point of using the “jimmy,” blowing the safe or chloroforming the janitor.

It seemed necessary that all the members of the Cabal should be fully acquainted with the combination to Grant’s purposes as regarded his orders to Boutwell, and that his ideas should remain fixed on the theory of increasing exportation for the country’s safety. Accordingly it was arranged that Jim Fisk should visit the President at Newport, where he was on a visit, some time about the middle of August, a month or so prior to Black Friday. It would seem that Grant at this date was still wavering, and adhering to his policy of selling gold in spite of the order which he had given Boutwell. He may have been suspecting that the anxiety of Gould, Corbin & Co. for the prosperity of the country was not altogether genuine. The necessity of bringing further pressure to bear upon him was therefore clearly manifest.

Referring to the interview at Newport, Fisk said: “I think it was some time in August that General Grant started to go to Newport. I then went down to see him. I had seen him before, but not feeling as thoroughly acquainted as I desired for this purpose, I took a letter of introduction from Mr. Gould, in which it was stated that there were three hundred sail of vessels then on the Mediterranean, from the Black Sea, with grain to supply the Liverpool market. Gold was then about thirty-four. If it continued at that price, we had very little chance of carrying forward the crop during the fall. I know that we felt nervous about it. I talked with General Grant on the subject and endeavored, as far as I could, to convince him that his policy was one that would only bring destruction on us all. He then asked me when we should have an interview, and we agreed upon the time. He said: ‘During that time I will see Mr. Boutwell, or have him there.’”

The President was carefully shadowed after this by the detectives of the clique, and great care was taken to throw men across his path who were fluent talkers on the great financial problem of the day, the absolute necessity of stimulating the export trade and raising the premium upon gold for that patriotic purpose. In this way, President Grant began to think that the opinion of almost everybody he talked with on this subject was on the same side, and must, therefore, be correct.

About the 1st of September it was considered that the opinions of the President had been worked up fairly to the sticking point, and Gould bought $1,500,000 in gold at 132½ for Corbin. Gould, however, was timid in his purchasing at first, as he had heard that a number of operators who were short of gold were making arrangements to give Secretary Boutwell a dinner. On further assurances from Corbin that the President had written Boutwell to sell no gold without consulting him, Gould prepared to go ahead with the execution of his great scheme. Nothing remained to be done in the completion of the plot except to stow away the President in a place of safety until the financial storm should blow over.

Things were so managed that the President was placed in a position that his honor was seriously in danger of being compromised, yet so ably was the matter engineered that he was perfectly unconscious of the designs of the plotters.

He was prevailed upon to go to a then obscure town in Pennsylvania, named Little Washington. The thing was so arranged that his feelings were worked upon to visit that place for the purpose of seeing an old friend who resided there. The town was cut off from telegraphic communication, and the other means of access were not very convenient. There the President was ensconced, to remain for a week or so about the time the Cabal was fully prepared for action.

Sometime about the period of the President’s departure for Little Washington, Fisk bought seven or eight millions of gold. Gould then said to Fisk: “This matter is all fixed up. Butterfield is all right. Corbin has got Butterfield all right, and Corbin has got Grant fixed all right, and in my opinion they are all interested together.”

This was patriotism with a vengeance. Just think of the audacity of it! Gould enters into a scheme to place the President in a position where he could not interfere with the plan of getting a “corner” in gold, and then he turns around and accuses the first Magistrate of the Republic with being privy to a plot that was calculated to create a panic, and cause widespread disaster in business circles, and render him an object of universal contempt.

Gould and Fisk, through Corbin, also attempted to compromise Grant’s family, as well as his private Secretary, General Horace Porter. This intention was fully disclosed through the interview of Fisk with Corbin. Fisk testified: “When I met Corbin he talked very shy about the matter at first, but finally came right out and told me that Mrs. Grant had an interest; that $500,000 in gold had been taken at 31 and 32, which had been sold at 37; that Mr. Corbin held for himself about two millions of gold, $500,000 of which was for Mrs. Grant and $500,000 for Porter. I did not ask whether he was General or not. I remember the name Porter. This was given out very slowly. He let out just as fast as I did when he found that Gould had told me about the same thing. I said: ‘Now, I have had nothing to do with your transactions in one way or the other. We have embarked in a scheme that looks like one of large magnitude. Mr. Gould has lost as the thing stands now. It looks as if it might be a pretty serious business before getting out straight again. The whole success depends on whether the Government will unload on to us or not.’ He said: ‘You need not have the least fear.’ I said: ‘I want to know whether what Mr. Gould told me is true. I want to know whether you have sent this $25,000 to Washington, as he states?’ He then told me that he had sent it, that Mr. Gould had sold $500,000 in gold belonging to Mrs. Grant, which cost 32, for 37 or something in that neighborhood, leaving a balance in her favor of about $27,000, and that a check for $25,000 had been sent. Said I: ‘Mr. Corbin, what can you show me that goes still further than your talk?’ ‘Oh, well,’ the old man said, ‘I can’t show you anything, but,’ said he, ‘this is all right.’ He talked freely and repeated: ‘I tell you it is all right.’ When I went away from there, I had made up my mind that Corbin had told me the truth.”

An attempt was made to prove, before the Garfield Committee, that a package containing $25,000 was sent to Mrs. Grant through the Adams Express Company, but expert testimony failed to decide whether the amount was that or $250, as the two noughts at the extreme right were crowded into the cents column, and it was difficult to determine whether or not a very light “period” was placed between them and the “$250.”

The design of the clique was manifest, however, to implicate the family of the President in some way or other, in order that they might make use of the Executive influence to help accomplish their great speculative purpose. But as the Garfield Committee truly said in its report: “The wicked and cunningly devised attempt of the conspirators to compromise the President of the United States or his family utterly failed.”

The scheme might have succeeded if Fisk had been possessed of the coolness and penetration of his partner, but his impetuosity, anxiety and enthusiasm aroused suspicion and partially spoiled the plot.

Fisk was so eager to be satisfied that Grant was all right that he overdid the thing by urging Corbin to write Grant a letter to stand firm and not to permit the Treasury to sell gold under any consideration. The outcome of this afforded clear proof, if any were wanting, that Grant had no guilty knowledge of the base purposes for which he was being used. Fisk had this letter from Corbin sent by a special messenger from Pittsburgh, who rode twenty-eight miles on horseback, and delivered it in person to the President. He read the letter, and had his suspicions at once aroused. He said laconically to the messenger, “It is satisfactory; there is no answer.” He began to see through the game, and at once desired Mrs. Grant to write to Mrs. Corbin requesting her husband to have nothing more to do with the Gould-Fisk gang.

Mrs. Grant wrote to Mrs. Corbin to say that the President was greatly troubled to learn that her husband had been speculating in Wall Street, and that she should desire him to disconnect himself immediately with the party who were attempting to entrap the President.

Corbin hastened to obey the mandate from Little Washington. He was greatly agitated, but the ruling passion of avarice was strong; in bidding Gould farewell, and before taking his final adieu of the clique, he requested the arch plotter to hand him over his share of the profits. Referring to this incident, Gould said: “I told him I would give $100,000 on account, and that when I sold, if he liked, I would give him the average of my sales. I did not feel like buying any gold of him then.”

This was the denouement of the plot against the President, who immediately hastened to big Washington.

Now, let me again ask the reader to turn his attention for a moment to the concluding scenes in the speculative drama in Wall Street on Black Friday. How the clique tried to manipulate Assistant-Secretary Butterfield was kept as profoundly secret as possible, and as it turned out, he did not have as much power over the events of that great day as was expected. When somebody charged Fisk with tapping the telegraph wires, however, to obtain information from the Government, he replied: “It was only necessary to tap Butterfield to find out all we wanted.”

This was very likely a vain boast of Fisk.

On Wednesday, the 22d September, two days preceding Black Friday, the clique, it is believed, owned several millions more gold than there was in the city outside the vaults of the Sub-Treasury. Belden bought about eight millions of gold on that day, while Smith, Gould, Martin & Co. were also heavy purchasers. The clique held a caucus in the office of William Heath & Co., in Broad street, and concluded that it had gold enough to put the price to 200, if it could carry the gold without lending and compel the “shorts” to purchase. But the idea of finding a market for over thirty millions of gold was also a gigantic problem, and they felt the risk of being ground between the upper and the nether millstones of their scheme.

On the morning of Thursday another council of war was held in the office of Belden & Co., on Broadway. At this meeting, Gould, Fisk, Henry N. Smith and William Belden were present. The proceedings of this meeting were kept a profound secret, but one result of it was that Belden gave his clerk the famous order to put gold to 144 and keep it there. On that day Belden purchased about twenty millions of gold, the price opening at 141½ and closing at 143½.

The chiefs of the Cabal had another private meeting up town that evening. The great question of closing up the transactions on the following day was the chief topic of discussion. These operators held contracts for over $100,000,000 in gold. Gould said that the “short” interest was $250,000,000. The total amount of gold in the city did not exceed $25,000,000, and the difference between this and the aggregate amount of the contracts of the clique was the enormous amount that would have to be settled in the event of a “corner.”

Fisk proposed that the clique show its hand, publish the state of affairs, and offer to settle with the shorts at 150. His plan was rejected by his brother conspirators.

On the morning of the fatal day, Belden and William Heath had an early breakfast together at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, and repaired immediately to their offices. Belden announced that gold was going to 200. “This will be the last day of the Gold Room,” he added. Moved by Belden’s threat, a large number rushed to cover. In the language of Henry N. Smith, “They came on with a rush to settle.” He was settling in the office of Smith, Gould & Martin, at 150 to 145, while Albert Speyer,

## acting as broker for Fisk and Gould, was bidding up to 160 for a million

at a time. It was only when the price came down to 133 that Speyer realized the humorous absurdity of his position. He had then bought 26 millions since morning at 160.

A voracious demand for margins about midday brought the work to a crisis. The scene at the office of Heath was indescribable when Belden went there to see Gould and his confederates, to find out what was to be done next with the frenzied purchasers. An eye-witness thus describes the scene at Heath’s office: “I went outside while Belden went in. I walked up and down the alley-way waiting for him to come out. Deputy sheriffs, or men appearing to be such, began to arrive and to mount guard at Heath’s office to keep out visitors. After waiting a prodigious long time, as it seemed to me, Jay Gould came creeping out of the back door, and looking round sharply to see if he was watched, slunk off through a private rear passage behind the buildings. Presently came Fisk, steaming hot and shouting. He took the wrong direction at first, nearly ran into Broad street, but soon discovered his error, and followed Gould through the rear passage. Then came Belden, with hair disordered and red eyes, as if he had been crying. He called: ‘Which way have they gone?’ and, upon my pointing the direction, he ran after them. The rear passage led into Wall Street. At its exit the conspirators jumped into a carriage and fled the Street.”

They did not fly the Street, however, but went to the Broad street office of Smith, Gould & Martin, where the crowd assembled, evidently with riotous intent, apparently bent upon an application to Judge Lynch for justice; and had any of the gentlemen appeared outside the confines of the front wall, the chances were that the lamp-post near by would have very soon been decorated with a breathless body. To ensure their safety inside, however, a small police force kept guard outside, which made the barricade complete. These gentlemen remained under this shelter until the small hours of the morning, busily endeavoring to find out where they stood in the result of the gold deal, and the more they pondered over it, the greater grew the doubt in their minds whether they were standing on their heads or their heels.

Although the Black Friday “corner” was a temporary calamity, perhaps it was worth all it cost, in teaching us a useful lesson in financial and speculative affairs. In my chapter on “Panics, and How to Prevent Them,” I think I have made several points clear that can be utilized by financiers, speculators and investors to advantage, in ease of an impending panic or “corner.”

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