When the Civil War ended in 1865, a Philadelphia shopkeeper named Samuel Curtis Upham boasted that he had done as much as General George B. McClellan to defeat the Confederacy. Just who was this merchant of stationery and perfume to make such an outrageous claim?

On Monday, February 24, 1862, the City of Philadelphia was like a soldier with a two-day hangover: It just couldn't shake off Saturday night with its wild celebration of George Washington's birthday. Even Mayor Alexander Henry had joined in, encouraging the citizenry to enjoy the party. By six o'clock in the evening the liquor at the Continental Hotel was flowing as freely as the toasts: to the memory of George Washington, father of the country; to Governor Curtin; to the 27,350 men Philadelphia had already sent to the War; to General McClennan; to the press; and, finally, "to woman - to her arms only do we surrender." 1

But now it was Monday morning: back to work. In his shop on Chestnut Street, Samuel Curtis Upham set out a stack of daily newspapers. Sure enough, there on the front page of The Philadelphia Inquirer was a story describing the revelries of Saturday night - and something else. Upham picked up a paper for a closer look.

"We present this morning a representation of a FIVE DOLLAR NOTE issued by the so-called Confederate State of America, at Richmond," The Inquirer announced. "The paper upon which the note is printed is of very good quality, and the engraving similar to that of the American Bank Note Company. The resemblance is so great as to be remarkable. The attention of the reader is called to the time of payment, being six months after the ratification of a treaty of peace between THE CONFEDERATE STATES and THE UNITED STATES. They are fundable in eight per cent stock or bonds of the Confederate States of America. They are also receivable in payment of all dues except export duties. As a curiosity, this engraving of the note will be worth preserving." 2

Worth preserving, indeed. Upham inspected the engraving, the first "secesh" money he had ever seen. Samuel Upham was not a man to pass up a chance to make money. And that, he saw at once, was quite literally what this was. 3

Upham wasted no time in visiting The Inquirer's office at Third Street and Carter's Alley, where he convinced publisher William Harding to sell him the electroplate of the Confederate note. Stopping at a nearby printer, Upham ordered 3,000 copies on French letter paper and returned to his shop. A few days later a sign went up in the window at 403 Chestnut Street, advertising "Rebel notes for sale." As a counterfeiter, Samuel Upham had just gone into business. 4

Samuel Curtis Upham was not born to questionable endeavors. The son of Samuel Upham and Sally Hatch, Samuel Curtis Upham was born in Montpelier, Vermont on February 2, 1819. Samuel's father is remembered as "hard-working, industrious man, in early life a blacksmith, in later years a farmer; he was a zealous Methodist, and to the day of his death, bore the sobriquet of 'Honest Sam Upham.'" 5

Samuel Curtis did not follow his father into blacksmithing or farming. Instead, he left Vermont at the age of twenty for the allure of the big city, finding employment as a clerk in New York. At twenty-three he joined the Navy, attaining the rank of master's mate during his three years of service. After his discharge, Samuel took a job in Philadelphia, working as a bookkeeper for a lumber business. He met a young woman named Anne Bancroft, married her and fathered a daughter whom he named Marion, after his sister. Samuel settled into domestic life. 6

But once again, he must have felt his old restlessness. One month before his thirtieth birthday, Samuel hopped a ship on its way to Rio de Janeiro and Talcahuana with a final destination of San Francisco. The Osceola arrived on August 5, 1849, just in time for the gold rush. In California, Samuel tried his luck as a Calaveras gold miner. When prospecting proved less profitable than he had hoped, Samuel moved once more. This time it was Sacramento that promised a fresh start. Samuel created the Sacramento Transcript, the first daily paper published in California outside of San Francisco. But before long Samuel grew homesick, and in the fall of 1850 he sold his interest in the Sacramento Transcript for $10,000 and returned to Philadelphia. Samuel recorded his adventures in Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn, which he published in 1878. 7

Back in Philadelphia, Upham accepted his role as husband and father. In 1851 Anne gave birth to a boy, Samuel Zenas and in 1856 another boy, Charles Henry. Upham opened a small shop on Chestnut Street for stationery and toiletries. When the war came, Upham supported the Union by selling patriotic envelopes and novelty items that ridiculed the Confederacy.

Upham's first printing of 3,000 copies of five-dollar Confederate "fac-simile" notes sold out at a penny a piece. Encouraged by this success, Upham obtained an electroplate of a ten-dollar Confederate note, which had appeared in the January 11, 1862 edition of Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper. On the bottom margin of these notes Upham printed a disclaimer: "Fac-simile Confederate Note - Sold wholesale and retail by S.C. Upham 403 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia." Once trimmed of this inscription, Upham's notes could be passed easily in the South. They quickly became the Confederate note of choice for cotton smugglers. 8

An enterprising businessman, Upham began advertising his "mementos of the Rebellion" in newspapers like the New York Tribune, Harper's Weekly, Louisville Journal and, of course, The Philadelphia Inquirer. At the same time he offered to pay "three times the value in gold" for genuine Confederate notes or stamps, which he could duplicate.

By May 1862 Upham was advertising twelve different types of Confederate notes, shinplasters and postage stamps and claimed to have sold more than 80,000 during the previous month. His price had increased: notes were now selling for five cents each.

Something else had changed. While Upham's earlier notes had been printed on letter stock, they now appeared on fine quality banknote paper. Where Upham obtained this paper remains a matter of speculation.

One story suggests that secret service agents, authorized by Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, provided Upham with English paper, confiscated by the Union blockade. If this story is true, one of the agents who visited Upham may have been Lafayette Baker. In 1862 Baker was assigned by Stanton to head the Secret Service out of Washington. For reasons of safety, Baker's wife returned to her parents' home in Philadelphia. In February 1862, at the same time that Upham was producing his first counterfeits, Baker was arresting a prominent Philadelphia doctor who had attempted to ship medical supplies and arms to the Confederates.

In his personal journal for the year 1862, Baker notes in March that he is being sent to Manassas. His next entry is for November, by which time he is back in Washington, investigating corruption at the Treasury Department. Did Baker visit Upham in Philadelphia at some point during those seven missing months? If so, it would provide an explanation for the rare banknote paper in Upham's stock. 9

However he received the paper, by the summer of 1862 Upham was turning out a product superior to the original. By now the Confederacy had become aware of Upham's first issues, which had used printed signatures and serial numbers. Confederate Secretary of the Treasury C.G. Memminger reported, "Organized plans seem to be in operation for introducing counterfeits among us by means of prisoners and traitors; and printed advertisements have been found, stating that the counterfeit notes, in any quantity, will be forwarded by mail from Chestnut street, in Philadelphia, to the order of any purchaser." 10

The Confederate Congress responded by passing legislation imposing death for the crime of counterfeiting. Upham bragged that a reward of $10,000 had been placed on his body, delivered to the Confederates living or dead.

To enhance his counterfeiting business, Upham was soon offering buyers the option of purchasing notes without signatures and serial numbers, so as to better deceive Confederate Treasury officials. One broadside described "$5 (two kinds), $10, $20 (two kinds), $50 and $100 Rebel Notes, printed from NEW PLATES, on best quality bank-note and bond paper, with numbers blank and signature omitted if preferred."

Upham's success was noticed not only by the Confederacy but by other merchants as well. Upham complained bitterly about other printers, among them W. E. Hilton of New York, who followed him into the counterfeiting business. "An individual in New York and a 'shyster' in this city, lacking the brains to originate an idea or the liberality to pay for a respectable drawing or engraving, have recently gotten up 'shocking bad' copies of several of my FAC-SIMILIE REBEL NOTES and SHINPLASTERS, which they are endeavoring to foist upon the public."

Upham reduced his prices and continued to outsell the competition. By August of 1863 Upham claimed to have sold more than a million facsimiles. Ironically, Upham's success in debasing the South's economy helped to put him out of the counterfeiting business. By that point in the war, even genuine Confederate currency was becoming worthless. Upham was forced to abandon his facsimile enterprise and return to the world of stationery and perfume, trinkets and "Upham's Hair Dye, Best in the World, only 50 cents a box."

When he died of stomach cancer in 1885, Upham left an estate valued at a few thousand dollars. If Upham's figures are to be believed, he sold between $10,000 and $50,000 worth of counterfeit notes during the fifteen months he operated his facsimile business. That sum was attained at great expense to the Southern cause. What became of it remains a mystery. 11

An original Confederate bill

And Upham's counterfeit

Notes

1. John Thomas Scharf and Thompson Westcott, History of Philadelphia (L.H. Everts & Co., 1884,) 793-4.

2. The Philadelphia Inquirer, February 24, 1862.

3. Brent Hughes, "The Shopkeeper Who Shook the South." Bank Note Reporter, (December 1995), 4.

4. Arlie R. Slabaugh, Confederate States Paper Money, 9th ed., (Krause Publications, 1998), 105.

5. F. K. Upham, The Descendants of John Upham, of Massachusetts (Albany, NY, 1892), 241.

6. Ibid, 349-50.

7. Samuel Curtis Upham, Notes of a Voyage to California via Cape Horn (Philadelphia, 1878).

8. Robert S. Larkin, "Upham's 'Fac-similes,' a Peek at Private Papers of C.S.A.'s Most Wanted Man." Bank Note Reporter, (November 1988).

9. General L.C. Baker, The History of the United States Secret Service, (Philadelphia, 1867), 127-147.

10. Brent Hughes, "The Shopkeeper Who Shook the South." Bank Note Reporter, (December 1995), 4.

11. Robert S. Larkin, "Upham's 'Fac-similes,' a Peek at Private Papers of C.S.A.'s Most Wanted Man." Bank Note Reporter, (November 1988).

Author's note: Thanks to the late Brent Hughes, "Mr. Confederate," for sharing his insights into Samuel C. Upham with me. Since this article was written, additional research on photographic counterfeits of Confederate notes has been published by George Tremmel in the May/June 2002 issue of Paper Money.

About the Author

         Priscilla Rhoades is a writer of short stories, poetry and features whose work has appeared in The San Francisco Bay Guardian, The Long Beach Press-Telegram, The Iowa Review, The Beloit Poetry Journal, In Posse Review, and other publications. She holds a B. A. degree in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University and has done graduate work there on women's history. Priscilla's special interests are the era of the War Between the States and late 19th century England.
         A transplanted Californian, she now lives on two acres in the mountains of western North Carolina.
 

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