A Counterfeiter's Paradise

by Ben Tarnoff

  175–176, Not all celebrations

  There are two images of Upham. The first is an engraving by David Scattergood, from a photograph by Gilbert & Bacon, included as the frontispiece to Samuel Curtis Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, Together with Scenes in El Dorado, in the Years 1849–’50 (New York: Arno, 1973 [1878]). The second is a group portrait taken in 1877 of the Associated Pioneers of the Territorial Days of California, held by the Robert B. Honeyman Jr. Collection of Early Californian and Western American Pictorial Material, the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. Physical description of Upham: from his 1879 passport application, accessed through an online database on Ancestry.com, U.S. Passport Applications, 1795–1925, drawn from microfilm records housed at the National Archives. Philadelphia celebration: Philadelphia Inquirer, February 24, 1862, and North American and United States Gazette, February 24, 1862. “a blaze of glory…”: North American and United States Gazette, February 24, 1862. For views of the facade of 403 Chestnut Street, see the images taken from Philadelphia business directories reproduced by the Philadelphia Architects and Buildings Project, http://www.philadelphiabuildings.org.

  176, On Monday morning

  Upham’s home and work addresses: McElroy’s Philadelphia City Directory for 1862 (Philadelphia: E. C. & J. Biddle, A. McElroy, 1862), available on microfilm at the Philadelphia City Archives. Upham discusses how he started printing reproductions (significantly, he doesn’t use the word “counterfeits”) of Confederate notes in a letter dated October 12, 1874, to author William Lee, who includes it in The Currency of the Confederate States of America, a Description of the Various Notes, Their Dates of Issue, Varieties, Series, Sub-Series, Letters, Numbers, Etc.; Accompanied with Photographs of the Distinct Varieties of Each Issue (Washington, DC: Published by the author, 1875), pp. 24–25. The Inquirer’s history: J. Thomas Scharf and Thompson Westcott, History of Philadelphia, 1609–1884, vol. 3 (Philadelphia: L. H. Everts, 1884), pp. 1992–1994.

  176–177, The answer was

  The $5 bill was printed by the Southern Bank Note Company at New Orleans and belonged to the September 2, 1861, issue of Confederate notes. The original had been engraved in steel, but the Inquirer had to reproduce it in woodcut, causing the quality to deteriorate; see Brent Hughes, The Saga of Sam Upham: “Yankee Scoundrel,” rev. ed. (Inman, SC: Published by the author, 1988), p. 8.

  177, The note promised

  “Those who entertain…”: Philadelphia Inquirer, February 24, 1862. I’m grateful to Marc D. Weidenmier and George B. Tremmel for clarification on this point.

  177, Upham wasted no time

  Story of Upham’s first print run: from his letter to William Lee, reproduced in The Currency of the Confederate States of America, pp. 24–25. It’s unclear exactly when Upham began his facsimile trade. While the $5 note appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer on February 24, 1862, he claims in his 1874 letter to Lee that he didn’t begin printing facsimiles until March 12, 1862. Since twelve years had passed, his memory may be mistaken on this point. The Inquirer building: Scharf and Westcott, History of Philadelphia, 1609–1884, vol. 3, p. 1993.

  178, Ever since the

  There was a thriving trade in patriotic envelopes in the early years of the war. The Print Department of the Library Company of Philadelphia has thousands of these items in its “Civil War Envelope Collection, 1861–1865,” with a wide assortment printed by Upham, including “A full length drawing of Jeff. Davis…”

  178, After the success

  Upham’s letter to William Lee describes him finding the note in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, although Upham misremembers when the bill appeared: it ran in the January 11, 1862, edition.

  179, Now with two

  “a curiosity…worth preserving”: Philadelphia Inquirer, February 24, 1862.

  180, Upham was born

  Upham’s birth and childhood: F. K. Upham, Upham Genealogy: The Descendants of John Upham of Massachusetts (Albany, NY: J. Munsell’s Sons, 1892), pp. 349–351. Upham’s parents: ibid., pp. 240–241. Upham recalls his childhood home near the Green Mountains in S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, p. 54. Upham’s uncle William: F. K. Upham, Upham Genealogy, pp. 235–240, and Walter Hill Crockett, Vermont: The Green Mountain State, vol. 3 (New York: Century History Company, 1921), pp. 332–333, 381–384. “He had gotten nothing…”: William H. Seward, The Works of William H. Seward, vol. 1, ed. George E. Baker (New York: Redfield, 1853), p. 388.

  180–181, Few families traced

  John Upham: Albert G. Upham, Family History: Notices on the Life of John Upham (Concord, NH: Asa McFarland, 1845), pp. 5–20. John Upham’s descendants: F. K. Upham, Upham Genealogy. Charles Wentworth Upham: ibid., pp. 201–218. Dispute between Charles Wentworth Upham and Nathaniel Hawthorne: Bryan F. Le Beau, “Foreword,” Charles Wentworth Upham, Salem Witchcraft (Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, 2000), pp. xxvi–xxviii.

  181, Samuel was a seventh-generation

  The population of Montpelier in 1820 was 2,308, according to the federal census. State House: Abby Maria Hemenway and Eliakim Persons Walton, The History of the Town of Montpelier (Montpelier: A. M. Hemenway, 1882), p. 285. Early settlement of Montpelier: Daniel Pierce Thompson, History of the Town of Montpelier (Montpelier: E. P. Walton, 1860), pp. 38–58, 74–83.

  181–182, Montpelier’s unhurried pace

  Montpelier’s early manufacturing and founding of bank: Hemenway and Walton, The History of the Town of Montpelier, pp. 274–277, 281. History of town jail: Thompson, History of the Town of Montpelier, p. 108. Counterfeiting trade between Canada and the northern United States: Stephen Mihm, A Nation of Counterfeiters: Capitalists, Con Men, and the Making of the United States (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007), pp. 66–102.

  182, At the age

  Upham’s early life: F. K. Upham, Upham Genealogy, pp. 349–351. Heady era of Wall Street: Charles R. Geisst, Wall Street: A History: From Its Beginnings to the Fall of Enron (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004 [1997]), pp. 35–47. Slum life in New York: Luc Sante, Low Life: Lures and Snares of Old New York (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2003 [1991]), pp. 23–30.

  182–183, It wasn’t until

  Upham’s marriage: F. K. Upham, Upham Genealogy, p. 349. His wife’s name is given as Ann Eliza Bancroft in Raymond Finley Hughes, Hughes Family of Cape May County, New Jersey, 1650–1950 (Salem, MA: published by the author, 1950), p. 80, and in Paul Sturtevant Howe, Mayflower Pilgrim Descendants in Cape May County, New Jersey (Cape May, NJ: Albert R. Hand, 1921), p. 171. The Paul Sturtevant Howe genealogy says she was born in Fishing Creek, New Jersey, on April 22, 1829. Upham’s daughter Marion was born on April 8, 1848, according to F. K. Upham, Upham Genealogy, p. 351.

  183, On February 2, 1849

  All descriptions of life aboard the Osceola are drawn from S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, pp. 23–217; a sketch of the Osceola in a gale appears on p. 113. The ship sailed 19,308 miles from Philadelphia to San Francisco, according to Upham’s final tally on p. 217. See also Charles R. Schultz, Forty-niners’Round the Horn (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina, 1999).

  183, The richer travelers

  “Have been a rolling-stone…”: S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, pp. 33–34.

  183–184, The romance had been

  Marshall’s discovery and origins of the gold rush: H. W. Brands, The Age of Gold: The California Gold Rush and the New American Dream (New York: Doubleday, 2002), pp. 1–24, 69–72. “whose banks and bottoms…”: New York Herald, September 17, 1848. “abundance of gold”: from President Polk’s 1848 State of the Union address, quoted in Brands, The Age of Gold, p. 70.

  184, Polk’s announcement officially

  Gold rush: Brands, The Age of Gold, pp. 43–71. “infection”: quoted ibid., p. 44. “fever”: quoted ibid., p. 43.

  184–185, While global in scale

  “industry, prod
uctive labor…”: Boston Courier, quoted ibid., p. 71.

  185, When gold fever

  Packing for the trip and boarding the Osceola: S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, pp. ix–xi, 23.

  186, In the book’s

  “a narration of facts …”: ibid., p. x.

  186, Life on the Osceola

  Four months after departing, Upham had already gained fifteen pounds. “[W]ith the roaring…”: ibid., p. 115.

  186–187, Although he faithfully

  I’m grateful to Elizabeth Sinclair, a genealogist in Texas, for providing me with a photograph of a painting of Captain James Fairfowl.

  187–188, They learned that

  “idle, indolent…”: S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, p. 157.

  188, It took the Osceola

  The Osceola left Talcahuano harbor on May 27, 1849, and passed through the Golden Gate on August 5, 1849. “queer place”: ibid., p. 221. Population of San Francisco in summer of 1849: Frank Soulé, John H. Gihon, and James Nisbet, The Annals of San Francisco (New York: D. Appleton, 1854), p. 226. San Francisco in 1849: ibid., pp. 243–263; Brands, The Age of Gold, pp. 247–256; and S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, pp. 218–226, 265–268. “rivers of mud”: ibid., p. 268.

  188–189, Upham pitched his tent

  “A graduate of Yale…”: S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, p. 226.

  189, The successful prospectors

  “Those who had expected…”: ibid., p. 250. Upham’s short-lived mining career: ibid., pp. 229–253.

  189, When Upham returned

  “The saw and hammer…”: ibid., p. 257. Population growth: Soulé, Gihon, and Nisbet, The Annals of San Francisco, p. 244. “I had a vision…”: S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, p. 259.

  190, While he clearly had

  The Pacific News: S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, pp. 259–261, 385–390. Copies of the Pacific News are available on microfilm in the Newspaper & Current Periodical Reading Room at the Library of Congress.

  190, Living and working

  The Plaza: Soulé, Gihon, and Nisbet, The Annals of San Francisco, pp. 259, 271–272, 279–280; Zoeth Skinner Eldredge, The Beginnings of San Francisco, from the Expedition of Anza, 1774, to the City Charter of April 15, 1850, vol. 2 (San Francisco: Published by the author, 1912), p. 598; and S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, p. 257. On p. 271, Upham notes that the first theatrical performance in San Francisco took place in January 1850, in Washington Hall opposite the Plaza.

  190–191, Upham loved newspapers

  The Sacramento Transcript: S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, pp. 275–278, 390–391. The newspaper was located on Second Street, between J and K streets. Copies of the Transcript are available on microfilm in the Newspaper & Current Periodical Reading Room at the Library of Congress. Squatter war: ibid., pp. 333–351.

  191, Upham had come

  “almost magical”: ibid., p. 307. “We sincerely wish…”: from the farewell to Upham printed in the Transcript, reproduced ibid., pp. 352–353.

  191, William Lewis Herndon

  Herndon’s life: Normand E. Klare, The Final Voyage of the Central America, 1857: The Saga of a Gold Rush Steamship, the Tragedy of Her Loss in a Hurricane, and the Treasure Which Is Now Recovered (Spokane, WA: Arthur H. Clark Company, 1992), pp. 29–36. The storm: ibid., pp. 63–119.

  191–192, Herndon, a slim man

  “human beings…”: quoted ibid. p. 114. See also Gary Kinder, Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue Sea (New York: Grove, 1998).

  192, Four hundred and thirty-five

  Body count: Klare, The Final Voyage of the Central America, p. 247. The image in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper appeared on the front page of the October 3, 1857, issue. Public response to disaster: Klare, The Final Voyage of the Central America, pp. 146–147; financial fallout from the loss of gold discussed on pp. 195–202. According to the New York Herald, September 19, 1857, the news of the shipwreck caused alarm on Wall Street on the morning of September 18, 1857, but the panic had mostly abated by the afternoon.

  192–193, To get from California

  Gold’s route: Klare, The Final Voyage of the Central America, pp. 39–62. Upham’s return to Philadelphia: S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, pp. 354–380. “manly, vigorous…”: ibid., p. 308. America in 1857: George Washington Van Vleck, The Panic of 1857: An Analytical Study (New York: Columbia University Press, 1943), pp. 1–21, and Kenneth M. Stampp, America in 1857: A Nation on the Brink (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992 [1990]), pp. 15–45.

  193, On August 24, 1857

  Origins of the Panic: Bray Hammond, Banks and Politics in America: From the Revolution to the Civil War (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991 [1957]), pp. 707–712; Van Vleck, The Panic of 1857, pp. 60–73; and James L. Huston, The Panic of 1857 and the Coming of the Civil War (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1987), pp. 14–18.

  193–194, This contraction of credit

  The Panic taking Americans by surprise: Huston, The Panic of 1857, pp. 14–19. Widespread suffering: Van Vleck, The Panic of 1857, pp. 74–77, and Stampp, America in 1857, pp. 224–228. Protests in New York: Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace, Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 849–850.

  194, Decades of laissez-faire

  Country’s transformation in the years before 1857: Hammond, Banks and Politics in America, pp. 671–673, 698–709. Period of growth before the Panic: Van Vleck, The Panic of 1857, pp. 29–37, and Stampp, America in 1857, pp. 214–215.

  195, Underwriting these ventures

  Rapid growth of the banking sector: Stampp, America in 1857, p. 217. Thompson’s Bank Note Reporter was quite popular: by 1855, it had a circulation of 100,000, according to Mihm, in A Nation of Counterfeiters, p. 239; on p. 3, Mihm estimates that by the 1850s, more than ten thousand different kinds of paper were circulating.

  195, Counterfeiters had always

  Transformation of banknote printing: Mihm, A Nation of Counterfeiters, pp. 262–304.

  195–196, This made banknote

  Impact of the new technology on counterfeiting: Mihm, A Nation of Counterfeiters, pp. 277–304, and David R. Johnson, Illegal Tender: Counterfeiting and the Secret Service in Nineteenth-Century America (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1995), pp. 9–13, 43–44.

  196, Since New York City

  Moneymaking underworld of lower Manhattan: Johnson, Illegal Tender, pp. 7–17, 43–45, 60–64, and Mihm, A Nation of Counterfeiters, pp. 209–235. Population of New York in 1857: Stampp, America in 1857, p. 40.

  196–197, While the 1850s

  Westward movement of slaveholders: Van Vleck, The Panic of 1857, pp. 30–33. Sectional tensions of the 1850s: Stampp, America in 1857, pp. 110–143.

  197–198, When Upham returned

  Upham’s first son, Samuel Zenas, was born on August 9, 1851, followed by Charles Henry on January 15, 1856, according to F. K. Upham, Upham Genealogy, p. 351. The Sunday Mercury: Scharf and Westcott, History of Philadelphia, 1609–1884, vol. 3, p. 2022. Copies of the Mercury are available in bound volumes at the Newspaper and Current Periodical Reading Room at the Library of Congress. “A Night in the Life of a Physician” appeared in the March 12, 1854, edition; “Interior of a Persian Harem,” on February 26, 1854.

  198, Upham’s newspaper catered

  Advertisements from the Mercury’s back page are taken from the February 5, 1854, edition. Transformation of Philadelphia: Russell F. Weigley, “The Border City in Civil War, 1854–1865,” Philadelphia: A 300-Year History, ed. Russell F. Weigley, Nicholas B. Wainwright, and Edwin Wolf, 2nd (New York: W. W. Norton, 1982), pp. 366–381. “[N]ever plead guilty…”: Sunday Mercury, March 19, 1854.

  198, Philadelphians had strong

  Moo
d in Philadelphia prior to Fort Sumter: Weigley, “The Border City in Civil War, 1854–1865,” pp. 383–394.

  198–199, Fort Sumter sparked

  Impact of Fort Sumter on Philadelphia: ibid., pp. 394–396. “appear to be well treated”: S. C. Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, p. 89.

  199, The North faced

  Stunted state of the federal government: Hammond, Banks and Politics in America, pp. 718–720; Bray Hammond, Sovereignty and an Empty Purse: Banks and Politics in the Civil War (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1970), pp. 18–26; Mihm, A Nation of Counterfeiters, p. 309; and Frederick J. Blue, Salmon P. Chase: A Life in Politics (Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1987), p. 143.

  199, Chase had no

  Chase’s early life and career as a lawyer and politician: Blue, Salmon P. Chase, pp. 1–40, 61–133, and Hammond, Sovereignty and an Empty Purse, p. 33.

  200, The law suited

  Cincinnati lynch mob: Blue, Salmon P. Chase, pp. 28–30. Chase’s views on slavery: ibid., pp. 45–46. His opinion of Jackson: ibid., pp. 11–12, 40–41. At his inaugural address as governor of Ohio in 1856, Chase announced that coin provided “the best practicable currency,” quoted ibid., p. 150.

  200, After Fort Sumter

  Chase’s heavy work schedule: ibid., pp. 137–138, 207.

  200–201, Chase presented his

  Chase’s measures: Hammond, Sovereignty and an Empty Purse, pp. 37–47; Blue, Salmon P. Chase, pp. 144–145; and Mihm, A Nation of Counterfeiters, pp. 310–311.

  201–202, A hundred miles

  Memminger’s physical appearance: Henry D. Capers, The Life and Times of C. G. Memminger (Richmond: Everett Waddey, 1893), pp. 23–24. For a photograph of Memminger, see Judith Ann Benner, Fraudulent Finance: Counterfeiting and the Confederate States: 1861–1865 (Hillsboro, TX: Hill Junior College Press, 1970), p. 40. The Confederate Treasury occupied the Richmond customhouse, which was designed by Ammi B. Young, the same architect who had overseen the recent expansion of the Treasury in Washington. The other non-native-born member of Davis’s cabinet was Judah P. Benjamin, born a British subject in the West Indies.