The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt (135 page)

25
NYTr
, March 8, 1855. Croffut, 108, quotes Wardell as saying, “In dictating a letter to a clerk I never saw his equal.”

26
David Herbert Donald,
Lincoln
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995), 154–61.

27
NYT
, March 9, 1855.

28
Circular
, April 5, 1855;
National Era
, April 5, 1855; Butler, 211–2. Vanderbilt exchanged another ship, the
Granada
, for the
North Star;
see
NYT
, February 7, 1856. On Torrance, see RGD, NYC, 341:167.

29
James Maurice to Jefferson Davis, February 7, 1855, James Maurice to General Joseph G. Totten, February 15, 1855, George W. Vanderbilt to Jefferson Davis, February 19, 1855, entry 214, reel 200, U.S. Military Academy Application Papers, Microfilm Publication M688, NA. See also George W. Cullum,
Biographical Register of the Officers and Cadets of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, NY
., vol. 2 (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1891), 766–7; George W. Vanderbilt's index number is 1885.

30
NYT
, March 24, 1855;
NYW
, December 20, 1877.

31
NYH
, March 16, 1855;
NYT
, March 16, 17, 1855.

32
NYW
, November 14, 1877;
NYT
, April 4, 1855.

33
NYT
, January 18, May 29, August 7, 1855.

34
NYT
, November 30, 1852, March 29, April 18, 1854.

35
NYH
, March 4, 5, June 2, 1855.

36
NYH
, April 17, 1855.

37
LW Dictation.

38
The notion of a highly partisan and politically engaged public has been challenged by Glenn C. Altschuler and Stuart M. Blumin,
Rude Republic: Americans and Their Politics in the Nineteenth Century
(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2000), who find that ordinary life was filled with ordinary life, not politics. In particular, they argue that the rise of mass politics alienated the wealthier and better educated voters—that “respectable people” found politics to be a “dirty trade,” 84–5. This corrective is well taken, but clearly politics remained an important part of the culture in which CV was situated.

39
NYT
, April 26, May 1, 1855, February 7, 1856.

40
Circular
, April 5, 1855;
National Era
, April 5, 1855;
BE
, April 13, 1855;
NYH
, May 17, 1855;
SA
, June 23, 1855.

41
LT
, August 1, 1855;
SA
, May 19, 1855.

42
Butler, 215–20;
Littell's Living Age
, May 15, 1858;
MM
, September 1858; Ridgely-Nevitt, 128–39, I56–7, 163.

43
NYTr
, September 13, October 15, November 21, 1855;
NYT
, November 21, 1855;
Littell's Living Age
, December 8, 1855.

44
NYH
, November 28, 30, 1855.

45
JoC
, November 22, 1855;
NYTr
, November 27, 1855.

46
Even the extremely elitist George Templeton Strong deemed Marshall O. Roberts an example of “decent, well-bred men;” Strong, 3:424.

47
NYTr
, December 17, 24, 1855;
NYH
, December 24, 1855;
NYT
, February 7, 1856. Aspinwall apparently had been unhappy with how Pacific Mail had been run in 1855, and wished to make reforms of his own;
NYT
, July 19, 1855. On November 6, 1855, the Mercantile Agency (which estimated Aspinwall's estate at about $2 million) noted that he was not thought to be actively engaged in business, though he did maintain a large interest in Pacific Mail.

48
NYTr
, November 29, 1855;
NYT
, November 29, 1855; Citizens of Granada, Nicaragua, “Petition to General William Walker to Commute Death Sentence of General Ponciano Corral,” November 7, 1855, Papers Concerning the Filibuster War, BL; entry for November 8, 1855, Diary, John Hill Wheeler Papers, LOC; Manning, 4:487: Burns, 199. Accessory Transit agent Joseph Scott noted that Walker dismissed the Nicaraguans from the service after his victory, SctDP; Burns, 199–200. Walker himself admitted Corral's popularity; see William Walker,
The War in Nicaragua
(Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1985, orig. pub. 1860), 134–40. For a very useful discussion of the historiography of Walker in Nicaragua, see Ralph Lee Woodward Jr., “William Walker and the History of Nicaragua in the Nineteenth Century,”
Latin American Research Review
15, no. 1 (1980): 237–40. Woodward, however, writes in error that the completion of the Panama Railroad made the Nicaragua route uncompetitive. As already shown, it was highly competitive, both in the perceptions of businessmen involved in the California trade and in such objective measurements as speed of passage, economy of operation, and number of passengers.

49
Robert E. May,
The Southern Dream of Caribbean Empire: 1854–1861
(Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1989), 79; Commodore Hiram Paulding to James C. Dobbin, January 22, 1856, roll 96: Home Squadron, June 30, 1855, to December 17, 1856, Letters Received from the Secretary of the Navy from Commanding Officers of Squadrons, 1841–1886, Microfilm Publication M89, NA. See also H. W. Brands,
The Age of Gold: The California Gold Rush and the New American Dream
(New York: Doubleday, 2002), 383–4. For a full biography of Walker, see Albert Z. Carr,
The World and William Walker
(Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1963). As May notes, 81n., Carr's book “is sparsely annotated, and much of Carr's psychological interpretation seems intuitive to the extreme.” Stephen Dando-Collins's
Tycoon's War: How Cornelius Vanderbilt Invaded a Country to Overthrow America's Most Famous Military Adventurer
(New York: Da Capo, 2008) is likewise unreliable, with some fictionalized scenes.

50
Robert E. May,
Manifest Destiny's Underworld: Filibustering in Antebellum America
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2002), 1–16; McPherson, 103–16; May,
Southern Dream
, 79–85, 119–21; Carr, 1–11, 36, 56, 63–4. May argues effectively that, despite enthusiasm for territorial expansion, U.S. presidents did not condone filibustering, and actively opposed it. See, for example, “The Slave Power Conspiracy Revisited: United States Presidents and Filibustering, 1848–1861,” in David W. Blight and Brooks D. Simpson, eds.,
Union and Emancipation: Essays on Politics and Race in the Civil War Era
(Kent: Kent State University Press, 1997), 7–28. On the broader cultural significance of filibustering, see May's article, “Young American Males and Filibustering in the Age of Manifest Destiny: The United States Army as a Cultural Mirror,”
JAH
, December 1991, 857–86. I am indebted to Professor Lisandro Perez of Florida International University for information on the Cubans of New York and their role in filibustering expeditions. The literature on filibustering is extensive. In addition to May's important books, see, for example, Amy S. Greenberg,
Manifest Manhood and the Antebellum American Empire
(New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), which depicts filibustering as the result of a crisis of masculinity in America; and William O. Scroggs,
Filibusters and Financiers: The Story of William Walker and his Associates
(New York: Macmillan Company, 1916), an account that remains highly influential. Philip S. Foner,
Business and Slavery: The New York Merchants and the Irrepressible Conflict
(Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1941), 121, notes the enthusiasm for seizing Cuba in the business community, led by August Belmont.

51
McPherson, 103–16; Manning, 4:267–8, 424; Hiram Paulding to My Dear Cal, January 19, 1856, Hiram Paulding Papers, LOC.

52
Walker, 27; C. W. Doubleday,
Reminiscences of the “Filibuster” War in Nicaragua
(New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1886), 164.

53
Walker, 106–27; HED 103, 34th Cong., 1st sess., vol. 11; SED 68, 34th Cong., 1st sess., vol. 13; Burns, 197–8; Carr, 1–36. As will be discussed, newspapers at the time assumed that the ATC deliberately aided Walker; direct evidence, however, shows that Walker coerced the company at every step, starting with the commandeering of
La Virgen
to capture Granada. See, for example, SctDP. On Walker's early military blundering, see Doubleday, 120–30;
National Era
, August 2, 1855. Walker, 51–65, managed to convince himself that he was a genius despite his failures.

54
Walker, 149–50, quote on 151–2. On Walker's reaction to CKG's failure to respond, see Deposition of Parker H. French, ATC Lawsuit. On French, see Deposition of Parker H. French, ATC Lawsuit;
NYT
, December 18, 26, 1855; May,
Southern Dream
, 98n. Joseph Scott witnessed Law's sale of rifles to French in New York; SctDP.

55
Deposition of Edmund Randolph, Deposition of Alexander P. Crittenden, Mac-Donald Lawsuit; Deposition of Parker H. French, ATC Lawsuit; May,
Southern Dream
, 98; May,
Manifest
, 121. See also
AltaC
, October 21, 1855. Walker, 146, supports the account given here, writing, “Before leaving San Francisco Walker had tried to ascertain the wishes of the Transit Company concerning the introduction of Americans into Nicaragua.… The agent of the company in California stated that his principals had instructed him to have nothing to do with such enterprises as he supposed Walker to contemplate.” Commodore Paulding would report that Accessory Transit remained neutral, writing, “The Transit Company acted in good faith pursuing their business with a singleness of purpose.… Their impunity in conducting their business depended upon their acquiescence when there was power to command obedience;” Commodore Hiram Paulding to James C. Dobbin, January 22, 1856, roll 96: Home Squadron, June 30, 1855, to December 17, 1856, Letters Received by the Secretary of the Navy from Commanding Officers of Squadrons, 1841–1886, Microfilm Publication M89, NA. Note, too, that when one naval officer traveled to Granada in May to consult with the Conservative government about preventing Walker's landing in Nicaragua, Accessory Transit provided him with free passage on a lake steamboat; Commander T. Baily to James C. Dobbin, May 28, 1855, Letter Books of U.S. Naval Officers, March 1778 to July 1908: Correspondence of Rear Admiral William Mervine, July 1836 to August 1868, vol. 3, entry 603(15), RG 45, NA.