At the time of the gold panic, Gould and Fisk were interested in the business of railway transportation from the West to the seaboard, and Mr. Fisk made a statement which sets forth the theory on which he and Gould professed to act. Fisk said: "The whole movement was based upon a desire on our part to employ our men and work our power getting surplus crops moved East and receiving for ourselves that portion of the transportation properly belonging to our road. That was the beginning of the movement, and the further operations were based upon the promise of what Corbin said the Government would do."
From the testimony of Jay Gould and James Fisk, Jr., as it appeared in the printed report, we are able to comprehend the characteristics of the two men. Gould was cool and collected from beginning to end, with no indication in his statements that the events of the 24th of September had in any particular disturbed him in temper or nerve or confidence in his ability to meet the exigencies of the situation. On the other hand, the testimony of Fisk indicated the absence of the qualities ascribed to Gould, and during his examination he failed to maintain even ordinary equanimity of temper. He interfered with the proceedings, and delivered this address to the committee: "I must state that I must ask you gentlemen to summon witnesses whose names I shall give you. My men are starving. When the newspapers told you we were keeping away from this committee, I say to you that there is no man in this country who wants to come before you as bad as Jim Fisk, Jr. I have thirty or forty thousand wives and children to feed with the money disbursed from our office. We have no money to pay them, and I know what has brought them to this condition."
Another extract from Fisk's testimony gives a graphic view of his condition when the crash came: "I went down to the neighborhood of Wall Street Friday morning. When I got back to our office you can imagine I was in no enviable state of mind, and the moment I got up street that afternoon I started right round to old Corbin's to rake him out. I went into the room, and sent word that Mr. Fisk wanted to see him in the dining-room. I was too mad to say anything civil, and when he came into the room, said I, 'Do you know what you have done here, you and your people?' He began to wring his hands, and 'Oh,' he says, 'this is a horrible position. Are you ruined?' I said I didn't know whether I was or not; and I asked him again if he knew what had happened. He had been crying, and said he had just heard; that he had been sure everything was all right; but that something had occurred entirely different from what he had anticipated. Said I, 'That don't amount to anything. We know that gold ought not to be at thirty-one, and that it would not be but for such performances as you have had this last week; you know —— well it would not if you had not failed.' I knew that somebody had run a saw right into us, and said I, 'This whole —— thing has turned out just as I told you it would.' I considered the whole party a pack of cowards; and I expected that, when we came to clear our hands, they would sock it right into us. I said to him, 'I don't know whether you have lied or not, and I don't know what ought to be done with you.'
"He was on the other side of the table, weeping and wailing, and I was gnashing my teeth. 'Now,' he says, 'you must quiet yourself.' I told him I didn't want to be quiet; I had no desire to ever be quiet again. He says, 'But, my dear sir, you will lose your reason.' Says I, 'Speyers has already lost his reason; reason has gone out of everybody but me.'"
My part and my interest in the events of Black Friday came to an end with an effort to ascertain the authorship of an anonymous communication, written in red ink, that I received the 6th day of October. It was postmarked at New York, the 5th of October, 1869. (A reduced facsimile of the communication is shown below.) An attempt was made through the police and the secret service system to trace the authorship of the superscription. The attempt was ineffectual.
[Facsimile]
If gold does not sell at 150 within 15 days I am a ruined man. You
will be the cause of my ruin! Your life will be in danger.
Wilkes Booth.
It appears in the review that Mr. Gould originated the scheme of advancing the price of gold and that Mr. Fisk was his principal coadjutor. It also appears that Mr. Fisk entered into the arrangement upon the basis of friendship for Mr. Gould, and not in consequence of an opinion on his part that the scheme was a wise one. Mr. Gould had two main purposes in view: first, the profit that he might realize from an advance in gold; and, second, the advantage that might accrue to the railroad with which he was connected through an increase of its business in the transportation of products from the West. As set forth in Mr. Gould's letter, he entertained the opinion, which rested upon satisfactory business grounds, that an advance in the price of gold would stimulate the sale of Western products, increase the business of transportation over the railways, and aid us in the payment of liabilities abroad. If the price of gold had not been advanced beyond a premium of forty or perhaps forty-five per cent, all these results might have been realized, without detriment to the public, while Mr. Gould and his associates would have realized large profits. When the price had advanced to forty or forty-five per cent, Mr. Gould or his associates made calls upon those who were under contracts to deliver gold to make their margins good or else to produce the gold. These demands created a panic, and the parties who had agreed to deliver gold entered the market, and bidding against each other, they carried the price beyond the point that Mr. Gould had contemplated.
XXXVI AN HISTORIC SALE OF UNITED STATES BONDS IN ENGLAND
If there should be any considerable interest in the history of the funding system of the United States, the interest would be due to a sale of bonds some thirty years ago and certain incidents which could not have been anticipated, which arose from the execution of the trust.
In the month of July, 1868, a bill for funding the national debt which had passed the Senate of the United States was reported, without amendments, to the House of Representatives by the Committee on Ways and Means.