Banks of New York City (except the Chemical Bank)

Bank Information

Episode Type: Suspension → Reopening
Bank Type: state
Start Date: October 1, 1837*
Location: New York, New York (40.714, -74.006)

Metadata

Model: gpt-5-mini
Short Digest: ef44413f

Response Measures

None

Description

Article recounts the 1837 panic when about the middle of October all New York City banks except the Chemical suspended specie payments. No individual run on a single bank is described; this is a systemic suspension during a financial panic (they historically later resumed specie payments). Bank name refers collectively to NYC banks rather than a single chartered institution.

Events (1)

1. October 1, 1837* Suspension

Cause: Macro News
Cause Details: Systemic financial panic triggered by failure of the Ohio Life and Trust Company (wider speculative collapse) leading New York banks to suspend specie payments.
Newspaper Excerpt: About the middle of October, or less than two months after the wreck of the Ohio Trust company, all the banks of New York city except the Chemical suspended specie payments.
Source: newspapers

Newspaper Articles (1)

1. June 28, 1893 The Waco Evening News Waco, TX

Article from The Waco Evening News, June 28, 1893

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Article Text

stopped selling lands except for cash, speculation ceased and emash took shortly to place bard the went the occurred after presidency Martin This Van in 1837. Bu the banks the I9D On specie 10th in payments, New of May york and that city the year suspen- banks the all every losses ded of The United nearly States in New followed other York city this city course. in alone 300 in by two failures months. exceeded Over $100,000,000 business houses in that place went down in a few weeks, while in Boston, Phila. delphia, New Orleans, St. Louis and other business centers especially in Boston and New Orleans, the damage was correspondingly great. Six states-Arkansas, Illinois, Loisana, Maryland, Michigan, and Pennsylvania-and the territory of Florida suspended the payments of interest, and the state of Miesissippi repudiated its entire debt. This was the most disasterous financial convulsion which the United States have ever known. "Without a dollar of national debt," said John Quincy Adams, referring to the calamity, "we are in the midst of national bankruptcy. * The immediate eause of the panic 1857 was the failure of the Ohio Life and Trust company, of Cinclnnati, an institution whose credit at that time stood especially high. The ultimate causes, however, were the excessive speculation in lands and railways, and general overproduction in manufactured goods. Gold had been discorved in California eight or nine years earlier, which added largely to the country's wealth and resources. This created a frenzy in speculation which, as has already been said, manifested itself in many directions, and at length stretched public credit to the breaking point. The failure of the Ohio institu. tion took place on August 24. It had borrowed largely on call in New York, and loaned the funds in directions which rendered them una vailable for the time being. Its liabilities were about $7,000,000 This wrecked several banks and business houses, and the ruin soon became general. For a year or two the scenes of disaster and distress experienced in 1837 were repeated. The strong and the weak went down together into ruin. Concerns whose assets largely exceeded their liabilities were unable to meet engagements of comparatively trifling amounts. About the middle of October, or less than two months after the wreck of the Ohio Trust company, all the banks of New York city except the Chemical suspended specie payments. The Chemical bank which had gone safely through the panic in 1837, The State bank of Indiana and some