Girard was now sixty-two years old, but age did not deter him from a new enterprise. A bank had long been needed in Philadelphia, and to take advantage of the opportunity, Girard established a banking institution with a capital of over a million dollars, which was called Stephen Girard’s Bank. The cost of the war which was being fought with Great Britain was a severe strain on the finances of the United States, and at the close of the year 1812 it became necessary for the Treasury to borrow money or the nation would become bankrupt. Sixteen million dollars was all that was required, but the loan was a failure, and less than four millions was subscribed. In April a new offering of the loan was prepared, but again the effort to float it ended in failure. In all only $5,838,000 was subscribed. More than ten million dollars must still be borrowed.
Now came an opportunity for Girard to repay to the United States the debt of gratitude for all that his citizenship had brought him. To the United States he owed his all, for in this free and fearless country he had been enabled to amass his great fortune. With two other men of means, Girard came forward and offered to subscribe for the entire balance of the loan. The offer was promptly accepted, and a situation of great embarrassment to the country was avoided.
With the defeat of Napoleon at Leipsic in 1813, and his abdication in 1814, Great Britain found herself free to conduct a more strenuous attack on the United States, and for a time matters went badly with the youthful nation. A British raid on the city of Washington resulted in the burning of the Capitol, the President’s house, and other public buildings; and this was followed in September by a raid on Baltimore, which, however, resulted in failure. Great panic was caused by these actions, and for a time banking was demoralized and business practically suspended. But on Christmas Eve, 1814, a treaty of peace was signed at Ghent, and once more Girard promptly resumed his world-wide trading, and once more the Stars and Stripes blew free from halyards.
Girard suffered two severe losses by reason of the war, in the loss of his ship Good Friends and in a ransom of $180,000 which he was required to pay for his ship Montesquieu and cargo, captured while returning from Canton, China. But in spite of this, so greatly had his wealth increased, that he now paid more than a hundredth part of the total taxes of the city of Philadelphia and his commercial capital was sufficient to enable him to sell goods on credit and to carry on a maritime business throughout the world without aid of discount. “All this,” he has stated, “do I owe principally to my close attention to business, and to the resources which this fine country affords to all active or industrious men.”
In the years which followed, Girard found declining profit in European cargoes brought to Philadelphia, and in 1821 he began to trade heavily with the Far East. Two of his ships, the Voltaire and the Montesquieu, were wrecked during this period; but Girard was as good a loser as a gainer, and pocketed his losses with small comment. Out of his fleet only four ships remained. Girard was now an old man, markets were bad owing to the panic in England and on the Continent, and the prospect for continuous profitable trading seemed ominous. It was only natural that he should turn from the sea.
Speculation in land had proved to be as fascinating as his speculations in ships and cargoes. Girard began to buy land, and soon his total holdings amounted in all to 200,370 acres. In March 1830 he purchased for $30,000 certain tracts of Pennsylvania coal lands which have to-day a fabulous value. But the land which chiefly held his interest was those few acres of his farm. “At my age the sole amusement which I enjoy is to be in the country constantly busy in attending to the work of the farm generally.” The peace and happiness of this final episode made a happy ending of Girard’s long, useful, and successful life.
“The accumulation of money interested him but little. He had now entered on his eighty-first year. His will was made and his great wealth dedicated to the good of posterity. He was under no incentive to labor for its increase. Yet in his bank, in his counting-house, on his farm, he continued to toil as of old from the sheer love of work.”
At the time of his death in 1831, Girard had for fifty-five years been a resident of Philadelphia, and for practically his entire mature life a citizen of the United States. His funeral was of “immense extent”; the streets were thronged by people assembled to pay “a last tribute of respect to a great public benefactor.”
The estate left by Girard amounted to almost seven million dollars, an amount which, in consideration of the times, would compare with the greatest fortunes of the present day. By the terms of his will, although there were many large charitable bequests, the bulk of the fortune was bequeathed to the city of Philadelphia, to be used in building and maintaining a school “to provide for such a number of poor male white orphan children ... a better education as well as a more comfortable maintenance than they usually receive from the application of the public funds.”
Certain other provisions have kept alive the memory of the testator’s downrightness and individuality. In a paragraph of the will, Girard enjoined and required that “no ecclesiastic, missionary, or minister of any sect whatsoever shall ever hold or exercise any station or duty whatever in the said college, nor shall any such person ever be admitted for any purpose, or as a visitor, within the premises appropriated to the purposes of the said college. In making this restriction, I do not mean to cast any reflection upon any sect or person whatever; but as there is such a multitude of sects, and such diversity of opinion among them, I desire to keep the tender minds of the orphans, who are to derive advantage from this bequest, free from the excitements which clashing doctrines and sectarian controversy are apt to produce.”