ORGANIZATION AND EXPANSION 53
forces with him before the act of incorporation
was passed. Sperry’s experience as paymaster to
Negro troops made him a valuable man and he
now became a soliciting agent for the Freedmen’s
Savings Bank.®
BEGINNING OF EXPANSION
Although there was nothing in the charter that
would authorize the establishment of branch
banks or headquarters outside the District of
Columbia, Alvord’s original plan had contemplated
 extension by branches into all Negro districts.
 The incorporators who were directing the
policy of the bank, perhaps through ignorance,
paid no attention to the will of Congress as expressed
 in the debates over the act of incorporation
 and in the amendments, but proceeded to
expand the system.’
Organization and expansion proceeded rapidly.
The New York headquarters office was established
 on April 4, 1865. On May 16 the New
York branch bank received the first deposits,
and on June 8 its deposits amounted to $700.00.
On June 3 Butler’s military savings bank at Norfolk,
 Virginia, was absorbed with its unclaimed
deposits of soldiers amounting to $7,956.38. The
military savings bank established by General
Saxton at Beaufort, South Carolina, became a
branch of the Freedmen’s Bank on December 14,
. | 8 Douglas Report, pp. 30, 66; Bruce Report, p. 246.
"The Comptroller of the Currency in a report dated February 21,
1873, takes the position that under the charter there was no authority
for the branches.—Sen. Misc. Doc. No. 88, 43 Cong., 2 Sess.
8 Booklet, Freedmen’s Savings Bank, 1872, containing the first report
to the trustees.