Back Story - October 2007

Community Comments

When gold was discovered in California in 1848, thousands of Americans began heading west to strike it rich. With the railroad not yet connecting California to the rest of the country, would-be ’49ers had the choice of two modes of travel: overland via stagecoach or by sea around South America.

Some shipping companies carried passengers from New York to Panama, where they took stagecoaches across the peninsula and boarded ships waiting on the Pacific Ocean to complete the journey. Wall Street tycoon Cornelius Vanderbilt figured he could get paying passengers there quicker by ferrying them across Central America’s largest freshwater lake, Lake Nicaragua. His Accessory Transit Co., run by Charles Morgan and Cornelius Garrison, was granted an exclusive charter by the Nicaraguan government.

Enter William Walker. A sometime doctor, lawyer and newspaper chief — he edited the Sacramento Democratic State Journal, among others — Walker is best known as a “filibuster,” 19th century adventurers who invaded or aided revolutions in other countries to gain money or power.

Hatching a plot to take over Nicaragua, Walker told Morgan and Garrison that if they gave him $20,000 and supported his overthrow of the Nicaraguan government, he’d revoke Vanderbilt’s Accessory Transit charter and issue a new one for a company they, not Vanderbilt, would own. They did, he did, and Vanderbilt, furious, wrote Morgan and Garrison a menacingly concise letter. “Gentlemen: You have undertaken to cheat me. I won’t sue you, for the law is too slow. I’ll ruin you.”

Vanderbilt also succeeded in bringing down the Walker regime in Nicaragua. Undeterred, Walker went on in 1860 to attempt an invasion of Honduras, where he was captured by the Honduran army and executed by firing squad. He was 36 years old. Upon his death at age 82, Cornelius Vanderbilt was the wealthiest man in the United States.

• Share
  • Digg This
  • del.icio.us
  • Newsvine
  • Facebook
  • Reddit
  • Furl It
  • !Y My Web
  • Google
• Email
• Print

Recommend This

Community Comments