June 24, 1861
A Chronological History of the Civil War in America1
- Bank riots in Milwaukee, Wis.2
- Gov. Harris proclaimed Tennessee out of the Union, the vote of the people being—for separation 104,019, and against 47,238.
- A Chronological History of the Civil War in America by Richard Swainson Fisher, New York, Johnson and Ward, 1863
- By 1861, when southern states seceded and the Civil War began, three-quarters of Wisconsin banks were backed by southern bonds. “The southern governments that issued the bonds were unlikely to want to payback the bonds that were held outside their country, like in Wisconsin,” banking historian Richard Sylla explains. As a result, the Wisconsin Bankers’ Association met to discredit dozens of banks—making their notes worthless.
On Friday June 21, the Association discredited 10 additional banks. News of this came down the next day, after many of Milwaukee’s German laborers were paid with these now worthless banknotes. “So you walked into a bar in Milwaukee, let’s say, and you try to buy your beer and the bartender would say, ‘The banker told us not to accept your money.’ So if you got paid in that money a few days before, you might’ve been quite angry,” Sylla says.