16645. Trust Company of the Republic (New York, NY)

Bank Information

Episode Type
Suspension → Closure
Bank Type
trust company
Start Date
October 1, 1903*
Location
New York, New York (40.714, -74.006)

Metadata

Model
gpt-5-mini
Short Digest
68a22c51

Response Measures

None

Description

Articles describe the Trust Company of the Republic being weakened by unauthorized loans to the Shipbuilding Trust, leading to resignation of its president, receivership proceedings and eventual failure/expiration (bankruptcy). There is no clear contemporaneous description of a depositor run; the sequence is suspension/receivership and closure. Dates are taken from the 1903 coverage (Oct–Dec 1903).

Events (4)
1. October 1, 1903* Suspension
Cause
Bank Specific Adverse Info
Cause Details
Company weakened by president Dresser's unauthorized loans to the Shipbuilding Trust and related misconduct; insolvency and loss of confidence leading to suspension/bankruptcy.
Newspaper Excerpt
When the crisis in the affairs of the Trust Company of the Republic threatened, Mr. Morgan directed ... to take up the various loans ... to avert the serious crash of the Trust Company of the Republic.
Source
newspapers
2. December 1, 1903* Receivership
Newspaper Excerpt
An examination of the statute ... It is learned upon good authority that the report of Receiver Smith will probably be filed at Trenton by Friday of this week, although a little further delay may occur.
Source
newspapers
3. December 23, 1903 Other
Newspaper Excerpt
The letters ... showed the methods pursued in order to compel the French investors to meet the calls ... the underwriting was a 'success.' ... the correspondence began July 1, 1902 ... the subscribers were in default from the 25th, and I have told Oppenheim to notify each one that his individual liability ... will not be limited ... .
Source
newspapers
4. July 11, 1915 Other
Newspaper Excerpt
The directors of the Trust Company of the Republic discovered that their president had made unauthorized loans to the trust. He resigned, and the company was so greatly weakened ... that it expired shortly after ... the company went into bankruptcy.
Source
newspapers

Newspaper Articles (4)
1. October 14, 1903 New-York Tribune New York, NY
Article from New-York Tribune, October 14, 1903

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# MEANING OF NEW-JERSEY ACT. The gist of this act in its present application, according to "a New-Jersey lawyer" quoted in the story, is the six months' provision at the end; that provision, in his opinion, being an effectual barrier to a successful prosecution of the suit contemplated by the receiver against Mr. Schwab, and also the real object of the passage of the law. James E. Degnan, Receiver Smith's assistant, attached no importance to the point thus raised. He said: "An examination of the statute will disclose that it neither refers to nor contemplates actions that may become necessary with reference to unpaid stock in the event of insolvency. The statute referred to provides for an action by the company itself, against any promoter or other person, for the purpose of recovering any gain or profit which such promoter or other person may have taken to himself in dealings with the property of such corporation. But an assessment of stock is an entirely different matter and is provided for by an entirely different section. Such statute will be found in the Corporation Law of New-Jersey under Section 21. Under this section any person who has not been paid full value for his stock in the event of the corporation's insolvency, may be called upon by a receiver of such insolvent concern for an assessment upon such stock sufficient to defray the obligations of such insolvent corporation, not exceeding the par value of the stock." It is learned upon good authority that the report of Receiver Smith will probably be filed at Trenton by Friday of this week, although a little further delay may occur. # MORGAN RUMOR IS DENIED. The story circulated yesterday, to the effect that J. F. Morgan holds a controlling interest in the reorganization scheme of the United States Shipbuilding Company, was emphatically denied by a member of the reorganization committee. The story had it that, when the crisis in the affairs of the Trust Company of the Republic threatened, Mr. Morgan directed George R. Sheldon, treasurer of the North American Company, to take up the various loans made on Shipbuilding bonds and stock by the Trust Company of the Republic. When this was done, so the story went, Mr. Morgan took care of half the loans, to the amount of $2,000,000, and the report referred to is that he still has the bonds, and that Messrs. Wetmore and Sheldon are representing him on the "voting trust." "That story is absolutely false" said the member of the reorganization committee. "Mr. Morgan, up to October of last year, had absolutely no interest in the United States Shipbuilding Company. Then, at our request, he, with several other bankers, came to the rescue to avert the serious crash of the Trust Company of the Republic. Neither he nor any one else has dictated to or directed the reorganizers for one minute. He has no other interest now than any other banker who gave us assistance. His action was entirely philanthropic, and the idea that he has any control is absurd and utterly false. The reorganization committee started this thing, not Mr. Morgan. We have all put our money in it, not for our own interests, but in the interests of the public, to ward off a disaster, and, as usual, the public is kicking us for our pains. "Mr. Morgan has acted in this matter as he has many other times, without any selfish motive, purely to help others out of a hole. The way he is jumped on is a shame. To every move he makes a sinister motive is attached. As far as this thing is concerned, he wouldn't lose a cent if the ship concern and everything connected with it went to pieces."

2. October 23, 1903 The Mitchell Capital Mitchell, SD
Article from The Mitchell Capital, October 23, 1903

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New York Grand Jury to Probe the Morgan-Schwab Shipyards Deal. JEROME IS ON THE TRAIL Kings of "High" Finance Who Worked the "Get-Rich-Quick" Swindle Are in Danger of Indictment and Prison. New York, Oct. 2.-The criminal law is likely to be invoked before the revelations in the get-rich-quick Ship building trust collapse are concluded. District Attorney Jerome will not wait for a complaint, but will take the initiative in proceedings looking to indictment and imprisonment of prominent exponents of "high finance" in Wall street so soon as he satisfies himself that any of the men concerned are technically guilty of obtaining money under false pretenses. The bona fide purchasers of the thirty-year mortgage bonds who have succeeded in /having a receiver appointed made such charges in effect. Since then more astounding admissions have been made on the witness stand than the bondholders had dared allege. The district attorney has been watching the hearings before Referee Olyphant very closely. Mr. Jerome has seen the application of the Shipyard trust made to the New York Stock exchange to have the $45, 000,000 stock and $26,000,000 bond issues listed. It is signed by A. C. Gary as treasurer The financial condition of the corporation is represented in it as most prosperous. Later statements of the corporation, made over the signatures of all the officers, have shown that at the time, instead of there being a profit, there was an actual deficit in the company's treasury Made Victims of Public. Men in the confidence of the district attorney say he feels that no better public service could be performed than the administering of a salutary lesson to certain Wall street manipulators who are held responsible for the recent demoralization of the market. These promoters unloaded ratered capitaliza tion on the market and sold stocks and bonds for five and ten and twenty times their actual value to investors. The same energy of brain and legal machinery will be directed against Wall street men as was shown in the conviction of that prince of common swindlers, "Colonel" Bob Ammon, now a Sing Sing convict. Not all the irregularities in connection with the Shipbuilding Trust have been brought out yet. Lewis Nixon, president of the corporation, will be the first witness before the referee next Wednesday, and it is understood that he will corroborate D. LeRoy Dresser's story about how the Bethlehem Steel plant was unloaded upon the trust by Charles M. Schwab and J. P. Morgan, with such a "string' to the property that its annual profits could not be used to offset the deficit of any single shipvard which might show a loss. Dresser Has More Facts. Mr. Dresser, who was forced out of the presidency of the Trust Company of the Republic and into bankruptcy, is not through with his revelations yet and he will take the stand again. Mr. Dresser yesterday outlined some of his new testimony. He charged that he was duped by some of his own directors when the Wetmore-Sheldon syndicate was formed at the suggestion of J. P Morgan to reorganize the financing of the Shipbuilding trust. 'After my return from Europe," said Mr. Dresser, realized Max Pam's true object. He had, by a great appearance of friendship with Mr. Nixon and for the company, been able to gradually get men favorable to his interests on the board of both the Shipbuilding company and the Bethlehem company to procure his own appointment as chairman of the executive committee and to have his nominee-Mr. Garry, a nephew of ex-Judge Elbert H. Garry, of the United States Steel corporation -made treasurer of the Shipbuilding company. twice warned Mr. Nixon of Pam's plans. It was about February when Pam came out openly 'When it became apparent that I was opposed to Pam's getting control and that I did not approve of the Sheldon syndicate trade, a strenuous effort was made to get me out of the presidency of the Trust Company of the Republic, which position I declined to resign. I was re-elected. This, apparently, interfered with their plans and I was threatened in indirect ways and given to understand that I would yet have to resign. Was Finally Forced Out. "Some quite questionable methods were resorted to, which finally resulted in affecting the credit of my private I business to such an extent that deemed it wise to make an assignment, and then resigned. With me out of the way the Sheldon reorganization plan was brought out, which if carried through places Mr. Schwab's second mortgage of $10,000,000 ahead of the first mortgage and gives him not only absolute control, but the first lien against those who put their money up in good faith. "The principal reason for the great e break in the market for the shipbuilding securities was brought about by the pressure put upon the Trust Company of the Republic by the banks d which had made loans, collateraled by shipbuilding securities and, more esd at pecially, by reason of the price which the Sheldon syndicate purchased f the bonds by taking up these loans and the large bonuses of stock which they were to receive. y "The earnings of the shipbuilding properties for the last year were $3.y 400,000, as per the report of the Shelr don reorganization committee. That is y almost the exact amount given in orign inal statements as to what they would it be. "Mr. Schwab's directors kept out of of the treasury of the Shipbuilding company any of the intebem earnings although they were 32.500.000

3. December 23, 1903 The St. Louis Republic Saint Louis, MO
Article from The St. Louis Republic, December 23, 1903

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all the disclosures that have already been made. The letters had been kept secret for weeks, though the progress of the hearing in the receivership proceedngs, in spite of frequent efforts to have them incorporated in the record of the case. Mr. Guthrie, counsel for Charles M. Schwab and others, was intensely indignant this morning when he learned that all his efforts at secrecy had been futile, and he told the court that the publication of the correspondence amounted to contempt. He demanded an investigation. Reference to these communications was made recently in the shipbuilding hearings before United States Special Examiner R. D. Oliphant, while Charles B. Alexander of the firm of Alexander & Green, attorneys, was undergoing examination. # SHOW METHODS. The letters, it was then said, showed the methods pursued in order to compel the French investors to meet the calls for money on their underwriting after they had been informed through a cablegram sent by the Trust Company of the Republic to its agent, John W. Young, that the underwriting was a "success." This dispatch gave them the idea that they only need be ready to receive their profits as members of the underwriting syndicate. Charles B. Alexander happened to be in Paris at the time and to him fell the duty of removing the false impression and holding the signers of the subscription list to their agreement. His firm is counsel for the trust company here which had charge of the underwriting and the communications between them will fill several columns. The alleged correspondence began July 1, 1902, and in the early stages revolved largely around the investigation set on foot as to the financial responsibility of those whose signatures had been secured in Paris to the underwriting agreement which was then in the care of the Bank de Roma. # SUBSCRIBERS DEPRESSED. Baron Calvet Rogniat and M. Scheyer, a banker, were the heaviest subscribers. While both were much disappointed over the misunderstanding as to the success of the underwriting here, they stood ready to pay their shares. Finally the situation apparently had been explained to the satisfaction of every one and preparations were made for the first call upon the underwriters July 23 for 25 per cent of the subscriptions, to be followed by the second, payable August 1, for the same amount. Then came the exciting portion of the correspondence. The banking-house of Morgan, Hajes & Co. had been selected to receive payments to be cabled at once to the Mercantile Trust Company of New York; but the subscribers had not come forward on July 25, to which day the payments had been postponed, and on July 28 a letter stated that Mr. Alexander had changed his tone with regard to the situation. The writer is quoted: # MANY EXPLANATIONS. "While it may be true that these under-writers were not treated properly by Young in leaving them under the impression for so long a time that all the bonds had been sold, yet that has been well atoned for by the patience and care with which we have in the last week given explanation after explanation to all parties. They are now all in default from the 25th, and I have told Oppenheim to notify each one that his individual liability in case that money is not in New York in time to make the payment will not be limited to the amount of his securities, but that there will be conse-

4. July 11, 1915 New-York Tribune New York, NY
Article from New-York Tribune, July 11, 1915

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Organizer of Shipbuilding Trust Dies Alone in Delta Psi House. UNCLE OF "RICHEST BABY IN WORLD" Wife Divorced Him After Huge Financial Crash and He Wedded an Actress. Daniel Le Roy Dresser. brother of Mrs. George W. Vanderbilt and Mrs. John Nicholas Brown, the mother of the "richest baby in the world," shot himself in the temple with a revolver last night in the library of the Delta Psi fraternity house, at 116th Street and Riverside Drive. He died instantly. "One of the men that Wall Street got the term most often applied to Mr. Dresser in the last few years. At one time he was active in finance. He was one of the organizers of the Shipbuilding Trust and the president of the Trust Company of the Republic, well as running the firm of Dresser & Co., wholesale drygoods house. Then the collapse of the trust brought on the downfall of the Dresser fortune. He was practically ruined, and of late years lived quietly. No one was in the fraternity house when Mr. Dresser took his life. It was his lawyer, C.W. Gould, of 114 West Seventy-ninth Street, who first learned of his death. Later yesterday afternoon Mr. Gould received a registered letter from his client which said: "I am under a nervous strain so great that I cannot stand it any longer." Lawyer Arrives Too Late. Mr. Gould at once took a cab to the Delta Psi house, where he knew that Mr. Dresser was staying. The place was empty, but with William Bainbridge, the steward, he forced an entrance. In the middle of the library floor, fully dressed and with the revolver in his hand, lay the body of his client. He had been dead several hours. The members of the fraternity had all gone home to spend the summer vacation. r. Dresser had been living there several weeks, alone except for a friend or two, who came to see him in the evenings. No one had seen him all yesterday. Bainbridge was the last person to whom Dresser spoke. At 3 yesterday afternoon, when the steward was going out, Dresser followed him to the door and inquired particularly when he would return. Bainbridge says he replied that he would be back at 5 o'clock, and Dresser stood at the door and watched him for a minute or so. Coroner Feinberg, after viewing the body last night, said it had been lifeless for from two to three hours. He told the newspaper men afterward that Dresser's lawyer had asserted there were no family troubles which led to the suicide, but that the dead man had been involved financially, "Any one who has known Dresser for the last six months," the Coroner says Mr. Gould remarked "will understand why he took his own life. It was purely a case of money troubles." Sued for $200,000. April 21 the silk importing firm of Nazawaya & Co., New York, brought suit against Mr. Dresser for the nonpayment of six promissory notes given them by him. The notes totalled $200,000. the silk firm claimed Divorced by his first wife, who was a Miss Elsie Burnham, when his financial crash came, Mr. Dresser, who was in his fifty-seventh year, married secretly on December 22 last Marcia Walther an actress, who had been previously the wife of Spencer Baldwin The couple lived for a time in Newport and then came to New York to open an apartment. While it was being furnished Mrs. Dresser stayed with friends in Brooklyn. and her husband lived at the house of the fraternity into which had been initiated before he was graduated from Columbia, in 1889. Mr. Gould said last night that he did not know Mrs. Dresser's address. Mr. Dresser is survived by, besides the two sisters already mentioned, his first wife, who lives at 44 West Fiftieth Street with his two children, Miss Susan Fish Dresser twenty-three, and Daniel Le Roy Dresser, jr. who has just attained his majority He had two other,sisters, Mrs. George G. Merrill, of Stockbridge d'Osmay, of Paris. Mass., and the Countes3 Played for Big Stakes. In his business career Mr. Dresser He played for big stakes and lost. was one of the organizers of the attempt to float the tremendous scheme for amalgamating all the shipbuilding concerns mendous of the country into a treTo further this scheme the financier poured which into all of the money upon he could lay hand. He taxed the the resources of Dresser Co. in loans to trust. He used his office as president and director of the Trust Company of the Republic to the advantage of the shipbuilding company. It was said he also persuaded his brother-inlaw, George W. Vanderbilt, to invest more than $1,000,000 in the project Then in 1903 the Shipbuilding Trust collapsed. Mr. and with its downfall came Dresser's The directors of the Trust Company of the Republic discovered that their president had made unauthorized loans to the trust. He resigned, and the company was so greatly weakened ward. that it expired shortly after Dresser & Co. also went into bank. ruptcy, and the next few years of Mr. Dresser's life were filled with suits and counter suits brought against him by his creditors. First Wife Took Children. was In 1907 to his other embarrassments wife, brought suit for divorce by his having who charged her husband with used all of her personal property, totalling more than a quarter of a Continued on page 7. column 5