S. J. TILDEN TO ELAM TILDEN
"New York, December 11, 1833. Friday, 2.30 P.M.
"My Dear Father,—The last has been the most calamitous night New York ever saw. The very centre of the commercial part of the city—from Wall Street across William and nearly to Broad, and to Coenties Slip,—all is a mass of smouldering ruins. A concurrence of unfortunate circumstances rendered the fire thus disastrous. The engines had been much disordered, in consequence of the extensive fires on the previous night—the hose, many of them, frozen and unfit for use. The atmosphere was in a state peculiarly calculated to support and extend combustion, the wind blew with great violence, and the weather was so intensely cold as to clog and almost close up with ice the hose. The flames raged through the whole night with uncontrolled violence, impressing every beholder with the utter impotency of human effort to contend with the devouring element. The spectacle was grand and awful beyond conception. I shall not attempt to describe it. All the fires that ever occurred here before were perfectly insignificant in comparison.
"The question is now, not who is injured, but who has escaped? Almost all I know are involved in the common catastrophe. At No. 12, Mr. Hichcock burnt out; Mr. Birch, not even his books and papers saved. Mr. Brown burnt out, and his goods consumed in the street or in the stores to which they were removed. Mr. Starkweather not yet injured, but in imminent danger. Mr. Williams' employees, everything destroyed; and also Mr. Conckling's, I believe. At 14, Mr. Stewart's employees. At 20, Mr. Bronson among the lost; Mr. Soullard, same; Mr. Davis and escaped. Halsted and Baines, $40,000 lost; 20 to 30,000 saved. Hunt and Andrews, Conckling & , &c., &c.
"So vast is the destruction that insurance affords but a very insufficient security. The whole insurance capital of the city will scarce exceed one-half the amount of property consumed in one night! Estimates are very vague and uncertain—the loss, however, can hardly be less than twenty millions of dollars.
"There is not time to write a word more to-day.
"Affectionately yours,
"S. J. Tilden."
"I have business acquaintance with a great many of the sufferers."
Silas Wright took the oath of office as Senator of the United States from the State of New York on the 14th of January, 1833, and in the thirty-seventh year of his age. He is still regarded in his native State as one of the half-dozen wisest statesmen that ever occupied a seat in the Upper House of our national legislature. He was a warm supporter of the administrations of Jackson and Van Buren, and the most eminent victim of New York's successful opposition to the conversion of the Territory of Texas into five more sovereign slave-holding States of the Union. He was also a close friend and constant correspondent of Elam Tilden and of his two elder sons.
The letter which follows reached Mr. S. J. Tilden only a few weeks before he was deprived of the Presidency by the 7-to-6 vote of the Electoral Tribunal of 1876. It connotes Senator Wright's first appearance in the Supreme Court of the United States. Mr. Waddell, to whom Mr. Tilden was indebted for Wright's letter, had been United States marshal during the administration of Mr. Van Buren.