“The undersigned, desiring publicly to express their earnest confidence in the sagacity, fidelity, energy and unfaltering patriotism, so signally displayed by Ulysses S. Grant in securing the restoration of peace at home, upholding national rights abroad, and in maintaining throughout the world the honor of the American name, do hereby invite their fellow citizens to assemble in mass meeting at the Cooper Institute, on Wednesday evening, the 17th of April, 1872.”
This call was chiefly the result of the personal canvass which I had instituted a few weeks previously. I selected the names of the persons to be called on from day to day, and kept these men working the matter up, until I had secured almost all the reputable business firms in the city of New York. The following, whose original signatures I have still in my possession, were prominent in the list:
WILLIAM E. DODGE,
JOHN C. GREEN,
HENRY F. VAIL,
GEORGE T. ADEE,
REV. SAMUEL OSGOOD,
WILLIAM H. FOGG,
BENJAMIN B. SHERMAN,
ROBERT L. STEWART,