The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt (126 page)

42
Burrows & Wallace, 567–9; Walter Licht,
Working for the Railroad: The Organization of Work in the Nineteenth Century
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983), 9;
James Guyon and CV v. Moulton Bullock, James W. Otis, and Jonathan Prescott Hall
, March 16, 1838, file BM 1404-G,
CV v. John Martineau and Eliza, His Wife, and Anna B. Cook, Executrix of Richard M. Cook, Deceased
, September 13, 1839, file D CH 100-V,
CV v. John W. DeGrauw and Jane, His Wife, Walter N. DeGrauw, John J. Stephens, and Others
, May 30, 1839, file D CH 104-V, Court of Chancery, NYCC. I speculate that he made other loans since these are only known because the borrowers defaulted; repaid loans do not appear in surviving records.

43
Sellers, 344; Hone, 228; North, 198–201. Temin sharply disputes the impact of Jackson's policies, though they undoubtedly contributed to the atmosphere of uncertainty.

44
NYS
, November 13, 1877;
NYT
, November 14, 1877; JWR to CV, January 24, 1837, RWG.

45
Nestor Houghton v. CV
, August 10, 1837, file BM V016-H,
James Guyon and CV v. Moulton Bullock, James W. Otis, and Jonathan Prescott Hall
, March 16, 1838, file BM 1404-G,
CV v. John Martineau and Eliza, His Wife, and Anna B. Cook, Executrix of Richard M. Cook, Deceased
, September 13, 1839, file D CH 100-V
CV v. John W. DeGrauw and Jane, His Wife, Walter N. DeGrauw, John J. Stephens, and Others
, May 30, 1839, file D CH 104-V, Court of Chancery, NYCC; Hone, 247.

46
ProvJ
, March 17, 20, 22, 1837;
EP
, March 21, 1837;
NYH
, April 1, 1837; Hone, 250.

47
Strong, 1:16–7.

48
NYH
, April 1, 1837; Hone, 256; Taylor, 341–5.

49
The
New York Courier and Enquirer
noted, as quoted in the
ProvJ
, May 13, 1837, “The banks
will not
discount under present circumstances freely to good and safe men. They are afraid of each other.… Nearly every transaction is for cash.” CV accumulated specie because it appears that passengers largely paid in coin. In part, this was because of his low fares—most banknotes were for denominations higher than a dollar (though “shinplasters,” small-denomination banknotes, did proliferate during the panic). Comstock, it should be noted, complained that the Transportation Company's clerks were accepting too much “bad money” (WmC to COH, July 17, 1841, fol. vol. 2, CFP), but coin seems to have been demanded in most cases.
NYH
, June 13, 1845, observed that “railroad tickets… must be paid in specie.”

50
For Allen's new office, see an ad in
NYH
, July 1, 1837. For details on his management of daily routine, see a lawsuit filed by a merchant who regularly shipped goods to customers in Connecticut by way of the
Cleopatra, Joseph Tobey v. CV
, October 15, 1839, file 1839–1291, Superior Court, NYCC.

51
NYT
, February 6, 1910; LW Dictation.

52
NYH
, July 1, 1837;
EP
, July 15, 1837.

53
JoC
, October 25, 1837;
Norfolk Herald
quoted in
JoC
, November 30, 1837. Phillpot Woolfe was fare collector for the Staten Island Ferry in 1838; testifying in court in 1847 about Oorandates Mauran, the company president, he said, “We always understood him to be the general agent as well as the president. That is what we call ‘Commodore.’ His word was will there.” See
Oliver Vanderbilt v. the Richmond Turnpike Company
, July 17, 1848, file 1848–1238, Superior Court, NYCC. JWR to
CV
, January 24, 1837, RWG. Elihu Bunker, a pioneer in the steamboat trade, was given the title “Commodore” in the press;
ProvJ
, June 15, 1836; Moses Beach,
Wealth and Pedigree of the Wealthy Citizens of New York City
, 3rd ed. (New York: New York Sun, 1842), 5.

Five
Sole Control

1
NYS
, March 9, 1878;
NYTr
, June 26, 1878;
NYT
, March 9, 1878. The descriptions of WHV and CJV appear in the
NYS
, November 15, 1877.

2
Alfred D. Chandler Jr., “Patterns of American Railroad Finance, 1830–50,”
BHR
28, no. 3 (September 1954): 248–63; Stonington Reports, 12, 22; WGM, Memorandum of Interview with CV in Relation to Steamers, November 14, 1840, fold. 1, box 3, WDLP; Edward Chase Kirkland,
Men, Cities, and Transportation: A Study in New England History, 1820–1900
, vol. 1 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1948), 246–8, 258. On early stockholder anxiety over the company's debts, see Alexander Hamilton to WDL, January 1, 1838, fold. 2, box 2, WDLP. Hone took the Stonington soon after its opening, and highly approved of it; Hone, 358. Lane, who has a weakness for repeating unsubstantiated anecdotes, includes the claim that CV hated railroads, 58–9, 73, following Croffut, 71.

3
EP
, January 22, 1840;
JoC
, November 30, 1837.

4
NYS
, November 13, 1877, December 9, 1885;
NYW
, November 14, 15, 1877; LW Dictation.

5
NYTr
, December 9, 1885; Morrison, 54; Clifford Browder,
The Money Game in Old New York
(Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1986), 42–4. Two letters clearly show that Drew had become a dominant figure in the Hudson River monopoly: Jonas C. Heartt [Toy] to CtP, September 10, 1840, CtP to Jonas C. Heart, September 12, 1840, fold. 8, box 2, WDLP. I am making a judgment that CV and Drew made an agreement to invest in each other's businesses based on evidence relating to numerous shared enterprises over the next three decades, as will be shown below.

6
NR
, November 2, 1833;
New York Courier and Enquirer
quoted in
ProvJ
, May 13, 1837;
New-Yorker
, March 31, 1838;
NYS
, December 9, 1885;
NYTr
, December 9, 1885. For detailed examples of the sort of financial transactions that Drew, Robinson & Co. engaged in, see
Daniel Drew v. Bates Cooke
, September 8, 1840, file BM 1233-D, Court of Chancery (a case involving Drew's demand that the state of New York's safety fund sell bonds in order to redeem notes of the Millers' Bank),
Isaac Schuyler v. Daniel Drew, Nelson Robinson & Co
., October 27, 1841, file BM S-476, Court of Chancery,
Isaac Spencer Jr. v. Daniel Drew, Nelson Robinson, Robert W. Kelley, and Daniel B. Allen
, March 20, 1848, file 1848-#951A, Court of Common Pleas, NYCC. CVs investment in the People's Line, and the relationship between the various steamboat proprietors on the Hudson, is detailed in
Curtis Peck v. Daniel Drew
, January 7, 1850, file PL-1850-P-3, Supreme Court Pleadings, NYCC. When the People's Line reorganized as a joint-stock association in 1843, CV held $11,500 out of $360,000 in the company's shares; Drew owned $108,500. Though this case does not confirm CVs earlier involvement, circumstantial evidence points to his participation as early as 1838. For additional commentary on William's place in Drew, Robinson & Co., see a letter from CJV to CV, August 25, 1874, quoted in
New York Sunday News
, January 6, 1878, Vanderbilt Will Trial Case Clippings, NYPL.

7
Boston Advertiser and Patriot
, quoted in
Maine Farmer
, July 31, 1838; Frederick Gardiner to Charles Gill, September 6, 1838, Rare Book and Manuscript Collections, Carl A. Kroch Library, Cornell University.

8
CtP to WDL, March 26, 30, April 1, 4, 1838, fold. 2, box 2, WDLP.

9
Entry for Courtland Palmer in James Grant Wilson and John Fiske, eds.,
Appleton's Cyclopedia of American Biography
(New York: D. Appleton, 1887–89); CtP to WDL, April 18, 22, 26, May 3, 1838, fold. 2, box 2, WDLP; LW Dictation; Stonington Reports, 13.

10
CtP to WDL, January 9, 1839 (misdated 1838), June 6, 1838, fold. 2, CtP to WDL, November 22, 1838, fold. 3, box 2, CtP to WDL, August 13, 28, September 5, October 1, 22, 1838, Richard M. Blatchford to WDL, December 15, 1838, fold. 4, box 2, CtP to WDL, February 11, 1839, Joseph Cowperthwait to WDL, January 10, 1839, fold. 5, box 2, CtP to WDL, July 16, 1839, fold. 6, box 2, WDLP; Stonington Reports, 15–7;
EP
, January 20, 21, 1840.

11
CtP to COH, July 28, 1841, fold. 5, box 3, WDLP; WmC to COH, July 31, 1841, fol. vol. 2, CFP The full sentence reads, “I had no confidence in him at the time the
Lexington
was purchased, and so stated.”

12
Richmond Turnpike Company v. Oliver Vanderbilt
, July 24, 1841, file BM 4–42, Court of Chancery, and
Oliver Vanderbilt v. the Richmond Turnpike Company
, July 17, 1848, file 1848-#1238, Superior Court, NYCC. These sources provide the quotations and incidents in the paragraphs that follow.

13
Enrollment No. 387, Port of New York Certificates of Enrolment [sic], vol. 12150, October 4, 1819, to February 26, 1820, Bureau of Marine Inspection and Navigation, RG 41, NA
NYH
, January 3, 1839;
Richmond Turnpike Company v. Oliver Vanderbilt
, July 24, 1841, file BM 4–42, Court of Chancery, and
Oliver Vanderbilt v. the Richmond Turnpike Company
, July 17, 1848, file 1848-#1238, Superior Court, NYCC;
Petition of C Vanderbilt for Confirmation of Letters Patent, Issued April 3, 1816
(New York: S. S. Chatterton, 1852), NYPL.

14
ProvJ
, November 3, 1837; Hone, 261;
BE
, April 21, 1842;
NR
, May 17, 1845; John Ashworth,
“Agrarians” and “Aristocrats”: Party Political Ideology in the United States, 1837–1846
(New Jersey: Humanities Press, 1983), 151–65. The key work to consult in regard to this point is Gunn, 112–3, 141.

15
Richmond Turnpike Company v. Oliver Vanderbilt
, July 24, 1841, file BM 4–42, Court of Chancery, NYCC;
Richmond Turnpike Company v. Oliver Vanderbilt
, July 11, 1842, file L.J.-1842-N-66, Supreme Court Law Judgments, NYCC;
Petition of C Vanderbilt
. On Westervelt, see RGD, NYC, 544:13.

16
NYT
, January 4, 1882.

17
Hone, 403.