Haym Solomon

For more information on Haym Salomon, visit Britannica.com.

Philadelphia broker Haym Salomon (1740-1785) played a vital role in ensuring that the American colonies' fight to win independence from the British crown continued. During the 1770s, he brokered a number of large financial transactions that kept American soldiers clothed, fed, and armed. It is thought that this Jewish emigrant contributed much of his own assets to the war for independence because he died deeply in debt.

Haym Salomon was born in 1740 to a family of Portuguese Jews. His parents had been driven out of the Iberian peninsula by anti-Semitic laws enacted by the Spanish monarchy, and settled in Lissa (now Leszno), a part of Poland that, at the time, belonged to the kingdom of Prussia. The Jewish villages in the area, however, were sometimes decimated by vicious pogroms: a crime or incident would occur, Jews in the area came under suspicion for it, and then mob violence resulted in widespread incidents of assault, murder, and property destruction. One such conflagration threatened Lissa when Salomon was a young man, and caused him to flee to Holland.

It was probably during the 1760s that Salomon traveled in Europe. By the time he reached the British colonies he had acquired fluency in several languages. It is also thought that he possessed some university education. Salomon returned to Poland around 1770, but likely became involved in Poland's nationalist movement and was forced to flee the country again in 1772. This was the same year that the first of several partitions of Poland occurred, in which its neighbors allied to seize and divide amongst themselves Polish lands and effectively erase the country from the map. Salomon went first to England, and from there sailed to New York, under British control since the 1660s. It was a thriving port, and the center of commercial and shipping interests in North America. Salomon evidently possessed some knowledge of finance and accounting practices. He was able to find a job as a broker and commission agent for ships plying the Atlantic.

Acts of Sedition

During this time Salomon continued his political activism. He was active in a secret group, the Sons of Liberty, which had been established by men with business interests who were opposed to British rule. The Crown's colonial system ensured that a large part of the profits generated in the New World went to the British Exchequer, not the merchants and other colonial businessmen. Under unknown circumstances, Salomon was arrested by the British and charged with spying in September 1776. His multilingual skills caused his captors to station him with a German general named Heister. At the time, the German state of Hesse allowed its soldiers to serve as mercenaries as a revenue-creating measure. These troops, known as Hessians, were in North America to support British rule. As an interpreter for Heister, Salomon was allowed a relatively high degree of freedom. He contributed to the American revolutionary cause by persuading Hessians to switch sides.

After Salomon was released from custody, he married Rachel Franks, the daughter of a prominent merchant, in January 1777. He continued to work underground to sway Hessian allegiance, and was jailed a second time in August 1778 as one of several suspects thought to be planning a fire that would destroy the British royal fleet in New York harbor. The strategy also included a series of arson fires in British warehouses. He was sent to the Provost, an infamous prison, and a death sentence loomed. However, Salomon had hidden several gold guineas on himself, which were used to bribe a jailer and escape to freedom.

Success in Philadelphia

Salomon left British-occupied New York and crossed into New Jersey and then Pennsylvania. At the time, the city of Philadelphia was the center of the independence movement and home to the Continental Congress, the legislative body of the thirteen colonies that had declared their autonomy from Britain in 1776. Salomon spoke before the Second Continental Congress, offering his services and requesting a position, but was turned down. With some borrowed funds, he opened an office as dealer of bills of exchange. His firm on Front Street, near to the Coffee House where Colonial Army officers and members of the Continental Congress often gathered, began to flourish.

The revolutionary cause, in contrast, was in dire financial straits. The colonies were battling against an extremely wealthy enemy, the British Empire. Keeping the American forces supplied with arms, food, and other supplies, was a daunting task. Salomon came to know many leading figures in Philadelphia during this time, and brokered a loan of $400,000 that gave George Washington, head of the Continental Army, funds to pay his soldiers in 1779. It is thought that Salomon may have contributed his own funds to this aid package.

A Key Figure

Salomon became an associate of prominent Philadelphian Robert Morris, a member of Congress with close ties to Benjamin Franklin. Morris brokered many financial transactions that helped the revolutionary cause gather steam early on. By the winter of 1780-81 the colonial government was broke and Morris was appointed superintendent of finance. Salomon entered into more than seventy-five financial transactions with Morris between 1781 and 1784. He was almost the only broker for the sale of bills of exchange - bonds sold to provide funds for the war effort and salaries of top government officeholders. Salomon may have backed many of these with his own assets. Moreover, he was the principal broker for subsidies from France and Holland to help the American independence effort, and turned over his commissions on these transactions to the cause as well. He was also named an agent for merchandise that was seized by privateers loyal to the colonists, which he sold to help finance the war.

Records show that Salomon advanced in specie over $211,000 to Morris when the latter was superintendent of finance, and entered into other transactions with the government to the tune of over $353,000. There were also several promissory notes totaling $92,000. In all, the sum that Salomon advanced to help the war cause was over $658,000, an amount which was later recognized by Congress as valid. Some of these transactions were in specie or on revolutionary paper, and as such declined considerably in value after the war. The loans that Salomon advanced to men such as future presidents James Madison and James Monroe were assumed to have been settled between the parties.

Salomon maintained his Philadelphia brokerage throughout these years, and was also a devout practitioner of his faith. He was active in the city's Congregation Mikveh Israel, and once appeared before the Board of Censors to speak in opposition to a religious oath required of civil servants designed to keep those of the Jewish faith from such jobs. His firm began to experience financial losses after a 1783 recession, and he planned to relocate to New York City in 1785. According to one story, he petitioned the government for repayment, and was sent a sheaf of documents on a Saturday, the Jewish holy day. Salomon would not sign them because of the Sabbath laws against transacting business. On Monday he fell gravely ill. Other sources note that he had not yet tabulated the debts and presented his claim officially. What is certain is that Salomon died on January 6, 1785 in Philadelphia, a death attributed to tuberculosis.

Services Rendered, then Forgotten

When Salomon died at the age of 45, he was a bankrupt man with a wife, three children under the age of seven, and a fourth on the way. His estate was valued at $44,000, but had liabilities of $45,000. Not long after his death, his chief clerk, who could have been crucial to straightening out financial matters regarding the family debt, committed suicide. Attempts were made by his heirs over the next few years to obtain some retribution, but a series of suspect occurrences thwarted these challenges. It was alleged by the government, for instance, that papers concerning the Salomon estate claims were destroyed when government buildings in the District of Columbia were burned by the British in the War of 1812.

Salomon's fourth child, Haym Jr., met with President John Tyler in the early 1840s and reportedly left a sheaf of documents with him for his perusal. The box of papers later disappeared. The younger Salomon then petitioned the Senate Committee on Revolutionary Claims until 1864, when he was in his late seventies. He even offered to settle the claim at a sum of just $100,000. This was quite generous considering that, with interest, the actual amount owed would have spiraled to a debt of grand proportions. At this the Committee once more approved the claim's legitimacy and submitted it to Congress, which again failed to approve the expenditure.

A Shameful Legacy

At some point after the 1860s, a cache of Salomon papers remaining in Congressional archives was discovered to be missing. Many of them concerned financial dealings and bore the signatures of Washington, Jefferson, and other historic figures. They were likely pilfered for the value of these autographs. In 1893, Salomon's heirs petitioned Congress to strike a commemorative medal in honor of their patriotic forebear, with a Congressional appropriation submitted in the amount of $250, but this was also rejected. Future president Woodrow Wilson sat on a committee charged with the task of founding a university in Salomon's honor in 1911, but the project was derailed by World War I.

Salomon, who is buried in the cemetery of Mikveh Israel, was finally commemorated with a Chicago statue by famed sculptor Lorado Taft, and finished by Leonard Crunelle. The heroic memorial depicts Salomon, Morris, and Washington, and was dedicated in 1941 at the corner of Wacker Drive and Wabash Avenue. Known as the Heald Square Monument, it bears the inscription: "Symbol of American tolerance and unity and of the cooperation of people of all races and creeds in the upbuilding of the United States."

Further Reading

Fast, Howard, Haym Salomon: Son of Liberty, Julian Messner, Inc., 1941.

Hart, Charles Spencer, General Washington's Son of Israel and Other Forgotten Heroes of History, Lippincott, 1937.

Russell, Charles Edward, Haym Salomon and the Revolution, Cosmopolitan Book Corp., 1930.

Schwartz, Laurens B., Jews and the American Revolution: Haym Salomon and Others, McFarland and Co., 1987.

The noun has one meaning:

Meaning #1: American financier and Revolutionary patriot who helped fund the army during the American Revolution (1740?-1785)
  Synonym: Salomon

Drawing of Haym Solomon by C. Noar, from NARA.

Haym Solomon (or Salomon) (1740– January 6, 1785) was a Polish Jew who immigrated to New York during the period of the American Revolution, and who became a prime financier of the American side during the American Revolutionary War against Great Britain.

Contents 1 Early years 2 Revolutionary activity 3 Personal life 4 Activity in Jewish community 5 Death and debts 6 Myths and historical legends 7 Honors, testimonials and memorials 8 Footnotes 9 References 9.1 Children's books 10 External links

Early years

The son of a rabbi, Solomon was born in Leszno (Lissa), Poland. In the 1760s, he journeyed throughout western Europe, during which time he acquired a knowledge of finance as well as fluency in several languages. He returned to Poland in 1770 but left two years later during the Partitions of Poland.^[1] After traveling to England, Solomon immigrated to New York City in 1775, where he established himself as a financial broker for merchants engaged in overseas trade.

Revolutionary activity

Sympathizing with the Patriot cause, Solomon joined the New York branch of the Sons of Liberty. In September 1776, he was arrested as a spy but the British pardoned him, only after serving 18 months of his sentence and claims of torture on a British boat, in order to use his abilities as an interpreter for their Hessian mercenaries. Solomon used his position to help prisoners of the British escape and encouraged the Hessians to desert the war effort. In 1778 Solomon was arrested again and sentenced to death, but he managed to escape, whereupon he made his way with his family to the rebel capital in Philadelphia.^[2]

Once resettled, Solomon resumed his activities as a broker. He became the agent to the French consul, as well as the paymaster for the French forces in North America. In 1781, he began working extensively with Robert Morris, the newly appointed Superintendent for Finance for the Thirteen Colonies.^[3] Often working out of the "London Coffee House" in Philadelphia, Solomon sold about $600,000 in Bills of Exchange to his clients, netting about 2.5% per sale. During this period he had to turn to Morris for help when one sale of over $50,000 nearly sent him to prison. Morris used his position and influence to sue the defrauder and saved Solomon from default and disaster.

Solomon negotiated the sale of a majority of the war aid from France and Holland, selling bills of exchange to American merchants. Solomon also personally supported various members of the Continental Congress during their stay in Philadelphia, including James Madison and James Wilson. Acting as the patriot he was, he requested below market interest rates, and he never asked for repayment.^[4]

Personal life

In July 1777, Solomon married Rachael Franks, the daughter of Moses Franks, of a prominent colonial period Jewish family that included loyalist and revolutionary sympathizers. Their first child, a boy named Ezekiel, was born in New York in the summer of 1778; later, in Philadelphia, they had two daughters, Sarah and Deborah. Rachel Salomon bore her fourth child three months after her husband's death and named the baby Haym M. Solomon.

Activity in Jewish community

Solomon was involved in Jewish community affairs, being a member of Congregation Mikveh Israel in Philadelphia, and in 1782, made the largest individual contribution towards the construction of its main building. In 1783, Solomon was among the prominent Jews involved in the successful effort to have the Pennsylvania Council of Censors remove the religious test oath required for office-holding under the State Constitution. In 1784, he answered anti-Semitic slander in the press by stating: "I am a Jew; it is my own nation; I do not despair that we shall obtain every other privilege that we aspire to enjoy along with our fellow-citizens."

Death and debts

Marker at Mikveh Israel Cemetery in Philadelphia.

After a solid career in Philadelphia, he saw opportunity in a different state. Former client Robert Morris tried to help him establish himself in New York. He died shortly after he had decided to move back to city and become an auctioneer there.

His obituary in the Independent Gazetteer read, "Thursday, last, expired, after a lingering illness, Mr. Haym Solomon, an eminent broker of this city, was a native of Poland, and of the Hebrew nation. He was remarkable for his skill and integrity in his profession, and for his generous and humane deportment. His remains were yesterday deposited in the burial ground of the synagogue of this city."^[5]

The gravesite of Haym Solomon Mikveh Israel Cemetery is located in the 800-block of Spruce Street in Philadelphia. Though unmarked, there are two plaque memorials. The east wall has a marble tablet that was installed by his great-grandson, William Solomon, and a granite memorial is set inside the cemetery gate. In 1980, the Haym Solomon Lodge #663 of the fraternal organization B'rith Sholom sponsored a memorial in the Mikvah Israel Cemetery on the north side of Spruce Street between 8th and 9th Streets in Philadelphia. A blue ribbon panel and committee, including Robert S. Whitman, Sidney Bruskin and Marvin Abrams, all lodge past presidents, arranged for the renovation of the walls and walkways of the cemetery. They then arranged for and oversaw the installation of a large, engraved memorial marker of Barre Granite just inside the cemetery gates, inscribed "An American Patriot".^[6]

When Solomon died, it was discovered he had been speculating in various currencies and debt instruments. His family sold them at market rates, which had greatly depreciated because of the weakened state of the American economy in the 1780s. Subsequent generations misunderstood his truly patriotic actions and appealed to Congress for more money, but were turned down twice. A myth grew that he had lent the young United States government about $600,000, and at his death about $400,000 of this amount had not been repaid. This sum was added to what he had actually lent to statesmen and others while performing public duties and trusts. Jacob Rader Marcus wrote in Early American Jewry that the sum owed to Solomon was $800,000. That amount in 1785 is equivalent in today's purchasing power to about $40 billion (using relative share of GDP which indicates purchasing power) in 2005 US dollars.^[7]

Myths and historical legends

Commemorative marker at Mikveh Israel Cemetery

It is said that during the American Revolution, Solomon went to France and raised an additional £3.5 million from the Sassoon and Rothschild banking houses and families. However, David Sassoon had not been born yet, and would later start up his counting house in Bombay, India, not France. Likewise, the Rothschild family had not set up a bank in France yet either. At the time of the Revolutionary war, the Rothschild's patriarch, Mayer Amschel Rothschild, founder of the banking dynasty, was still in Hesse-Kassel (Hesse-Cassel), loyally serving its prince, Wilhelm IX, who aided the British against the Americans by supplying England with his Hessian mercenaries.

Solomon spoke eight languages^[8] Supposedly, when he was in France, he passed himself off as a French diplomat. Unfortunately, it does not conform to known fact. It is true his co-religionist, David Franks, did help Adams negotiate loans from Holland. However, there is nothing in the record to show that Solomon himself went to Europe for this purpose.

Solomon is sometimes alleged to have written the first draft of the United States Constitution^{[citation needed]} but the Philadelphia Convention occurred after his death. Others have claimed that he designed The Great Seal of the United States and that he included the Star of David, a Jewish symbol, above the eagle's head. There is no documentary evidence to support this claim.^[9]

Honors, testimonials and memorials

1975 United States postage stamp featuring Haym Salomon.

In 1893, a bill was presented before the 52nd United States Congress ordering a gold medal be struck in recognition of Solomon's contributions to the United States.

In 1941, the writer Howard Fast wrote a book Haym Salomon, Son of Liberty. That same year the George Washington-Robert Morris-Haym Solomon Memorial by Lorado Taft was erected along Wacker Drive in downtown Chicago.

In 1975 the United States Postal Service issued a commemorative stamp honoring Haym Saloman for his contributions to the cause of the American Revolution. This stamp, like others in the "Contributors to the Cause" series, was printed on the front and the back. On the glue side of the stamp, the following words were printed in pale, green ink:

"Financial Hero—Businessman and broker Haym Solomon was responsible for raising most of the money needed to finance the American Revolution and later to save the new nation from collapse." The Congressional Record of March 25, 1975 reads, "When Morris was appointed Superintendent of Finance, he turned to Solomon for help in raising the money needed to carry on the war and later to save the emerging nation from financial collapse. Solomon advanced direct loans to the government and also gave generously of his own resources to pay the salaries of government officials and army officers. With frequent entries of 'I sent for Haym Solomon,' Morris' diary for the years 1781–84 records some 75 transactions between the two men."

In 1939, Warner Brothers released Sons of Liberty, a short film starring Claude Rains as Solomon. Hollywood film producer John C. W. Shoop, under direction of MorningStar Pictures, is currently in production of a story of the life and times of Haym Salomon called On The Money.^{[citation needed]}

In World War II the United States liberty ship SS Haym Salomon was named in his honor.^[10]

Footnotes

1. ^ Milgram, Shirley. ""Mikveh Israel Cemetery."". USHistory.org. http://www.ushistory.org/mikvehisrael/index.htm. Retrieved 2008-06-26. 
2. ^ "Haym Solomon". National Park Service, US Department of the Interior. http://www.nps.gov/revwar/about_the_revolution/haym_salomom.html. Retrieved 2008-06-26. 
3. ^ Solomon is mentioned nearly seventy-five times in Morris's personal correspondence relating to the financing of the Revolution. Wiernik, Peter. History of the Jews in America. New York: The Jewish Press Publishing Company, 1912. p. 96.
4. ^ Wiernik, Peter. History of the Jews in America. New York: The Jewish Press Publishing Company, 1912. p. 95.
5. ^ cited in http://www.ushistory.org/mikvehisrael/ and http://mycountryonline.com/about/Chaim_Solomon.htm, among other sites.
6. ^ On June 17, 1980 the Philadelphia public was advised of this fact in the Philadelphia Morning Inquirer, complete with a background story and photograph of the event.
7. ^ [1] [Used 1790 - 2005 as the calculator only goes back to 1790...]
8. ^ listed as "French, German, Russian, Italian, and English. And of course he knew Hebrew and Polish." Presumably, given his background of living where Yiddish was taught before Polish, the listed seven, plus Yiddish, tally to eight. Source: first chapter of HAYM SALOMON: American Patriot, by Susan Goldman Rubin, illustrated by David Slonim (Abrams Books, NY, 2007, ISBN 978-0-8109-1087-4).
9. ^ http://www.greatseal.com/symbols/starsflagseal.html
10. ^ The SS Haym Salomon (according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Liberty_ships,_J) is MC Hull# 987, and was launched May 17, 1943. It was sold for private use in 1947 and scrapped in 1971.

References

• Amler, Jane Frances. Haym Solomon: Patriot Banker of the American Revolution. ISBN 0-8239-6629-1
• Hart, Charles Spencer. General Washington's Son of Israel and Other Forgotten Heroes of History. ISBN 0-8369-1296-9.
• Peters, Madison C. Haym Solomon. The Financier of the Revolution. New York: The Trow Press, 1911.
• Russell, Charles Edward. Haym Solomon and the Revolution. ISBN 0-7812-5827-8.
• Schwartz, Laurens R. Jews and the American Revolution: Haym Solomon and Others (Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Co., 1987).
• Wiernik, Peter. History of the Jews in America. New York: The Jewish Press Publishing Company, 1912.

Children's books

HAYM SALOMON: American Patriot, by Susan Goldman Rubin, illustrated by David Slonim. ISBN 0-8109-1087-X (Abrams Books, NY, 2007, ISBN 978-0-8109-1087-4).

External links

Philadelphia portal

• Haym Solomon
• Feldberg, Michael. "Haym Solomon: The Rest of the Story" Jewish World Review, 2001.[2]
• Blythe, Bob. "Haym Solomon." National Park Service, United States Department of the Interior. 2003. [3]
• "HAYM SOLOMON MONUMENT. Jew Who Helped Finance Revolution to be Commemorated." The New York Times, July 26, 1910.[4]
• Haym Solomon Monument information, Queens, New York.[5]
• Currency and Finance in the 18th Century : Bills of Exchange
• Son of Liberty & 1973 Medal
• Sons of the American Revolution
• Haym Solomon honored as Interfaith Hero on ReadTheSpirit.com

This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)