In an earlier post, the writer Gertrude Atherton wrote of the inconvenience of being cashless. She was luckier than most, as she had a New York banker to help her out of a desperate situation. Unfortunately, not everyone had her resources, not even someone as affluent as Eleanor Watkins , wife of prominent San Francisco physician James T. Watkins. She wrote a lengthy letter to relatives in Virginia a week after the quake:

Two telegrams came today – one from Aunt Virginia for $500 and one from the Bank of Marion telling me to draw on the Bank of California for $300. You are all very generous. We do not want to tax your generosity any more than we must, and we simply cannot say what we shall need. Neither of these telegrams is available in cash just now. In the first place, all the banks are burned, and the vaults may not be opened for weeks, lest their contents burst into a blaze. This happened to one vault which was opened today. In the second place, the Governor has declared legal holiday for a month, at least, and no California Bank can pay out any money. This is to prevent a run of the Banks, protesting of notes, and other legal complications, until a little order is brought out of our chaos. This lack of ready money is one of the people’s chief troubles. The others are lack of water, and lack of the necessities of life which cannot be bought here...

The only way to transmit money, as yet, is to send currency by Wells Fargo, or to send post-office order, which the post-office authorities will pay. This, I believe is different from a postal note, which is limited to twenty dollars... This is an unprecedented situation, and there are no rules to go by. Each day has new developments, and no day is like the last.