"I have received the news of the death of Jesse Seligman with the shock which comes only with the announcement of the sudden loss of an old and valued friend. My acquaintance with him commenced away back in the sixties; and I dearly learned to value his sturdy honesty, his integrity, untiring industry, and his genial, warm-hearted friendship. Moreover, I was impressed, in those dark days when I first knew him, with his sterling patriotism, he being one of those men of foreign birth who seemed to go beyond those of us of native birth, in the all-consuming zeal and devotion for our common flag. I think that is what particularly attracted me towards Mr. Seligman; and I soon found that he really did understand more fully and completely, perhaps, than many of us did, what the war meant and what the result would be. He was one of those men, too, who, when some were anxious, speaking hesitatingly about the outcome, gave by his courageous faith and heroic example, a grand impulse of which we afterwards saw the results in that impressive tender by the financiers of New York of their credit and their gold to the government in its extremity.
"He had undying faith in General Grant, too, in those dark hours. He was one of the few men in New York who knew him personally, and he never wavered in his confidence in the great commander's ability to carry the war through to a successful issue. Later on we learned the grounds of his faith; for he was probably the oldest acquaintance of General Grant in New York, having become acquainted with him in Watertown, N. Y., where Grant was then stationed as a Second Lieutenant; and he had afterwards renewed the friendship, when General Grant was sent as First Lieutenant to the Pacific Coast, where he found his old friend Seligman one of the argonauts of California.
"It was given to me, in an especially affecting and touching manner, to see some of those traits in Mr. Seligman's inner life and his family surroundings, which made his home one of the most delightful in New York, and gave to him unusual charms in social and friendly intercourse. I saw those qualities displayed in that sad, sad summer of 1881, when General Garfield, stricken with an assassin's bullet, lay on his deathbed, in a cottage at Elberon. Mr. Seligman's summer home was at Long Branch; and, with that thoughtful consideration and tenderness which distinguished the man he showed the official family of the dying President courtesies and kindnesses that were very grateful and which can never be forgotten. A more pleasant family circle than Mr. Seligman's I never met; and I will never cease to remember the charm of that fireside. There, perhaps, Mr. Seligman was seen in the highest display of the beautiful qualities of head and heart that made him not only foremost as a great financier, but as a faithful friend....
... "Of course, I do not need to speak of his genius as a financier. His name and fame in that particular are secure; and his achievements will become traditions in the history of those influences which have made this country the great financial power among the nations of the earth."
Ex-Judge Noah Davis wrote as follows:
"By the death of Jesse Seligman our country loses a loving and faithful citizen and friend. He loved America, though not his native land, with all the ardor of a native, enhanced by a keen and tender sense of gratitude for what it had done for his race and for him and his brothers ever since they became its adopted sons.
"I have never met any foreign-born American citizen more prompt to express warmly and gratefully this sentiment; and yet it will be rare to find one who has so amply and generously repaid it. His gratitude was not confined to words. His deeds preceded his words; and if it had ever been necessary, he would have staked his whole fortune and his life as well, for our country and its institutions.
"I recall an occasion, when he and I left the Union League Club together, at a late hour one evening, and walked arm in arm up the avenue to our homes. I listened as he gave me some happy reminiscences of his busy life. When we reached the street, I stopped to part with him. "No," said he, "I will walk further with you," and he kept on till he reached my home on 50th street. "Now," I said, "it is my turn to walk with you, sir," and we walked slowly back to his own street, where we compromised by his walking half way back with me. In that delightful walk he developed to me his loving nature toward our country, its government and its people. I was chiefly a listener, but a deeply interested and pleased one, for I could see and feel that a pure-hearted and patriotic man was talking from the inmost bosom of a noble and tender nature.
"A few days before General Grant sailed on his tour around the world, the brothers Seligman gave him a farewell dinner at Delmonico's. There were forty or fifty people present. General Grant was then fully relieved from all public cares, and felt that the honors shown him on that occasion were the tribute of pure and disinterested esteem and affection. He talked with me as I sat near him of the services his hosts had rendered the government during the war and to himself during his administration, with a warm sense of what was due to their genuine patriotism. It happened afterwards, and after his return from his Eastern tour, that I met with General Grant in Paris. He spoke on that occasion of that dinner and his great enjoyment of the evening, and gave a warm expression of his esteem for the Seligmans and for their services to the country and himself.
"It was a merited tribute of a noble man to worthy citizens and friends, and I am glad to lay it now where General Grant would have placed it—on the bier of Jesse Seligman, his devoted friend....
... "With all his skill, ability and success in business, with all his love for his country, his devotion to order and good government, his deep and tender attachment to his family and friends, I think his chief virtue was 'Charity,' and that most comprehensive and beautiful word should be inscribed on his tomb.
From General Horace Porter:
"The news of the death of Jesse Seligman has fallen upon many of the most prominent business men in New York with something akin to the quiet of a personal bereavement. Few of our citizens have been more generally known or more highly esteemed. His sudden removal from the company of his friends and from the active walks of business life brings a deep regret to many hearts and recalls the admirable traits which adorned his character. My personal acquaintance with him began a few years after the war. I had before that time heard officers of the army and others speak in admiring terms of him during his sojourn on the Pacific Coast, where he had displayed so much public spirit and such indomitable courage at the time the law-abiding citizens were trying to redeem that community from the domination of the criminal class. I found him displaying the same qualities in the metropolis which had commended him to his fellow-citizens in the West. He had been loyally devoted to the cause of the Union in the great struggle for the preservation of its integrity, and was always an ardent laborer in all great works. He was never known to be anything but fearless in the advocacy of the principles he believed to be right, and always manifested his faith by his works.
"His death removes a foremost figure in our national and business life; and we shall long look for one to take the place of this man, Who by his genius as a financier, his broad liberal charity, and his loving kindness towards suffering humanity, will long be remembered; for Mr. Seligman's life and work have made him one of the benefactors of mankind."
From F. B. Harper, President Mutual Reserve Fund Life Association: