If we are to place credibility in current reports, she was forced time and time again to undergo the most violent scenes in interceding for one of their sons, Cornelius Jeremiah. For the nervous disposition and general bad health of this son the father had not much sympathy; but the inexcusable crime to him was that Cornelius showed neither inclination nor capacity to engage in a business career. If Cornelius had gambled on the stock exchange his father would have set him down as an exceedingly enterprising, respectable and promising man. But he preferred to gamble at cards. This rebellious lack of interest in business, joined with dissipation, so enraged the old man that he drove Cornelius from the house and only allowed him access during nearly a score of years at such rare times as the mother succeeded in her tears and pleadings. Worn out with her long life of drudgery, Vanderbilt's wife died in 1868; about a year later the old magnate eloped with a young cousin, Frank A. Crawford, and returning from Canada, announced his marriage, to the unbounded surprise and utter disfavor of his children.
THE OLD MAGNATE'S DEATH.
An end, however, was soon coming to his prolonged life. A few more years of money heaping, and then, on May 10, 1876, he was taken mortally ill. For eight months he lay in bed, his powerful vitality making a vigorous battle for life; two physicians died while in the course of attendance on him; it was not until the morning of January 4, 1877, that the final symptoms of approaching death came over him. When this was seen the group about his bed emotionally sang: "Come, Ye Sinners, Poor and Needy," "Nearer, My God, To Thee," and "Show Ye Pity, Lord." He died with a conventional religious end of which the world made much; all of the property sanctities and ceremonials were duly observed; nothing was lacking in the piety of that affecting deathbed scene. It furnished the text for many a sermon, but while ministerial and journalistic attention was thus eulogistically concentrated upon the loss of America's greatest capitalist, not a reference was made in church or newspaper to the deaths every year of a host of the lowly, slain in the industrial vortex by injury and disease, and too often by suicide and starvation. Except among the lowly themselves this slaughter passed unprotested and unnoticed.
Even as Vanderbilt lay moribund, speculation was busy as to the disposition of his fortune. Who would inherit his aggregation of wealth? The probating of his will soon disclosed that he had virtually entailed it. About $90,000,000 was left to his eldest son, William H., and one-half of the remaining $15,000,000 was bequeathed to the chief heir's four sons. [Footnote: To Cornelius J. Vanderbilt, the Commodore's "wayward" son, only the income derived from $200,000 was bequeathed, upon the condition that he should forfeit even this legacy if he contested the will. Nevertheless, he brought a contest suit. William H. Vanderbilt compromised the suit by giving to his brother the income on $1,000,000. On April 2, 1882, Cornelius J. Vanderbilt shot and killed himself. Croffut gives this highly enlightening account of the compromising of the suit:
"At least two of the sisters had sympathized with 'Cornele's' suit, and had given him aid and comfort, neither of them liking the legatee, and one of them not having been for years on speaking terms with him; but now, in addition to the bequests made to his sisters, William H. voluntarily [sic] added $500,000 to each from his own portion.
"He drove around one evening, and distributed this splendid largess from his carriage, he himself carrying the bonds into each house in his arms and delivering them to each sister in turn. The donation was accompanied by two interesting incidents. In one case the husband said, 'William, I've made a quick calculation here, and I find these bonds don't amount to quite $500,000. They're $150 short, at the price quoted today.' The donor smiled, and sat down and made out his check for the sum to balance.
"In another case, a husband, after counting and receipting for the $500,000, followed the generous visitor out of the door, and said, 'By the way, if you conclude to give the other sisters any more, you'll see that we fare as well as any of them, won't you?' The donor jumped into his carriage and drove off without replying, only saying, with a laugh, to his companions, 'Well, what do you think o' that'"— "The Vanderbilts": 151-152.] A few millions were distributed among the founder's other surviving children, and some comparatively small sums bequeathed to charitable and educational institutions. The Vanderbilt dynasty had begun.
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PERSONALITY OF THE CHIEF HEIR.
At this time William H. Vanderbilt was fifty-six years old. Until 1864 he had been occupied at farming on Staten Island; he lived at first in "a small, square, plain two-story house facing the sea, with a lean-to on one end for a kitchen." The explanation of why the son of a millionaire betook himself to truck farming lay in these facts: The old man despised leisure and luxury, and had a correspondingly strong admiration for "self-made" men. Knowing this, William H. Vanderbilt made a studious policy of standing in with his father, truckling to his every caprice and demand, and proving that he could make an independent living. He is described as a phlegmatic man of dull and slow mental processes, domestic tastes and of kindly disposition to his children. His father (so the chronicles tell) did not think that he "would ever amount to anything," but by infinite plodding, exacting the severest labor from his farm laborers, driving close bargains and turning devious tricks in his dealings, he gradually won the confidence and respect of the old man, who was always pleased with proofs of guile. Croffut gives a number of instances of William's craft and continues: "From his boyhood he had given instant and willing submission to the despotic will of his father, and had made boundless sacrifices to please him. Most men would have burst defiantly away from the repressive control and imperious requirements; but he doubtless thought that for the chance of becoming heir to $100,000,000 he could afford to remain long in the passive attitude of a distrusted prince." (sic.)