Anthony W. Morse.
Anthony W. Morse was once one of the remarkable men of Wall Street. He made $150,000 in speculation, bought a yacht and went to Europe during the war. While in England, he mingled with the aristocracy, and became strongly imbued with the idea that the North would not be successful in the war, and that the National currency would become almost valueless. He thought that the more the National currency depreciated, the more railroad stocks and bonds would advance; in short, that whatever the currency would buy would advance, while the currency itself would become nearly worthless. He therefore became a rampant bull on stocks. He bought almost the whole list, and also did a large business in buying for others whom he succeeded in impressing with his own ideas. He had many followers and made a tremendous inflation. Secretary of the Treasury Chase was advised of this Morse speculation, which might prove prejudicial to the National credit, and he announced that if the inflation was carried any further, he would prick the bubble by selling gold. Anthony W. Morse thereupon personally sent Secretary Chase a dispatch saying that he would take all the gold that the United States Government had to sell. Mr. Chase immediately ordered Assistant Treasurer John J. Cisco to sell $10,000,000 of gold to the highest bidders. The usual notice appeared in the morning newspapers, and a panic at once followed. At 12 o’clock, or two hours after the opening of the Exchange, it was announced from the rostrum that Anthony W. Morse had failed. This terminated the career of Mr. Morse as a large operator and manipulator, and with his downfall the death knell was sounded to his imported theories. He straggled manfully for several years to regain his footing, but his prestige was gone, and he failed in every effort to push his way again to the front. His ill-success soured him. His health failed, and he went to Havana to recuperate. There he died with profanity on his lips, enraged at the failure of all his hopes. He paid the penalty of disloyalty. His friends of the English nobility were largely to blame for all his misfortunes. Their predictions of the success of the South led him on to irretrievable ruin. He did not see that their wish was father to the thought.
Edmund Clarence Stedman