Page:The Wizard of Wall Street and his Wealth.djvu/124

 CHAPTER IX.

CULMINATION OF CONSPIRACY—BLACK FRIDAY.

September is the memorable month of the gold conspiracy in Wall street. Between the 20th of August and the first of September, Gould, in company with Woodward and Kimber, two large speculators, made a pool to raise the premium on gold, and some ten or fifteen millions were bought, but with very little effect on the price.

An event now took place which would have seemed to justify the implicit belief of an Erie treasurer in the corruptibility of all mankind. The unsuspicious President again passed through New York, and came to breakfast at Mr. Corbin's house on the 2d of September. He saw no one but Mr. Corbin while there, and the same evening at ten o'clock, departed for Saratoga. Mr. Gould declared afterward, however, that he was told by Mr. Corbin that the President, in discussing the financial situation, had shown himself a convert to the Erie theory about marketing the crops, and had stopped in the middle of a conversation in which he had expressed his views and written a letter to Secretary Boutwell. In regard to this letter, Secretary Boutwell testified as follows:

"I think on the evening of the 4th of September