Haym Solomon
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Haym Solomon (or Salomon) (1740–1785) was a prime financier of the American side during the American Revolutionary War against the United Kingdom. A Jew, he was born in Leszno (Lissa), Poland, the son of a rabbi. He died in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
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[edit] Life and accomplishments
Solomon was an astute merchant and banker and succeeded in accumulating a huge fortune, which he subsequently devoted to the use of the American government during the American Revolution. For example, he negotiated all of the war aid from France and Holland, endorsing and selling bills to American merchants.
He was the paymaster-general of the French military forces in the early years of the United States. It is asserted that more than $10,000 which he advanced was never repaid. He 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 in addition to what he had lent to statesmen and others while performing public duties and trusts. Jacob Bader Marcus wrote in Early American Jewry that the sum owed to Solomon was $800,000. That amount in 1785 is equivalent in purchasing power to about US$22 million in 2005 dollars. [1]
Solomon came to New York in 1772 and joined the Sons of Liberty. He was a brilliant financier and one of George Washington's personal friends. In 1776 he was captured and sentenced to death by the British, but he used his knowledge of German to convince his Hessian jailer to let him out and desert to the American forces. He then escaped penniless to Philadelphia. It was during this period of incarceration where he contracted tuberculosis.
During the American Revolution, Solomon went to France and raised an additional £3.5 million from the Sassoon and Rothschild banking houses and families. He spoke eight languages. When Solomon was in France, he passed himself off as a French diplomat.
Despite his business acumen, he died penniless.
[edit] Historical legends
- Solomon supposedly wrote the first draft of the United States Constitution, according to some historians.
- Some claim that he designed The Great Seal of the United States, which is why it has what some believe resembles a Star of David above the eagle's head design. He believed the United States would become a world power.
- At war's end, many in the Continental Congress were desperately poor, and Solomon too died completely bankrupt.
- It is often said that Solomon loaned hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Revolutionary government, which never repaid him. «In fact, the money merely passed through his bank accounts».[2]
[edit] Jewish pride
Solomon was involved in Jewish community affairs, being a member of Mikveh Israel Congregation in Philadelphia, and in 1782, made the largest individual contribution towards the construction of its main building. In 1783, Solomon and other prominent Jews appealed to the Pennsylvania Council of Censors urging them to 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."
[edit] Early death
The following obituary was printed in the Independent Gazetteer:
- "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 ."
The gravesite of Haym Solomon is at Mikveh Israel Cemetery, located on the 800-block of Spruce Street, in Philadelphia. It is unmarked, but he has two plaque memorials there. The east wall has a marble tablet that was installed by his great-grandson, William Solomon, and a granite memorial is set inside the gate of the cemetery.
[edit] Honors, testimonials and memorials
In 1893, a bill was presented before the 52nd United States Congress ordering a gold medal struck in recognition of Solomon's contributions to the United States. In 1941, the writer Howard Fast wrote a book Haym Solomon Son of Liberty. In 1941, the George Washington-Robert Morris-Haym Solomon Memorial 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 World War II the United States liberty ship SS Haym Solomon was named in his honor.
[edit] Footnotes
- ^ Economic History Services
- ^ Can History be Open Source? Wikipedia and the Future of the Past, by Roy Ronsezweig, in The Journal of American History Volume 93, Number 1 (June, 2006): 117-46. The sentence is between note 30 and 31 (free available HTML version of the article doesn't report original article page numbers).
[edit] References
- Laurens R. Schwartz, Jews and the American Revolution: Haym Solomon and Others (Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Co., 1987).
- Hart, Charles Spencer. General Washington's Son of Israel and Other Forgotten Heroes of History. ISBN 0-8369-1296-9.
- Russell, Charles Edward. Haym Solomon and the Revolution. ISBN 0-7812-5827-8.
- Amler, Jane Frances. Haym Solomon: Patriot Banker of the American Revolution. ISBN 0-8239-6629-1
