By September, 1862, Bullock's funds for ship-building were exhausted and some new method of supply was required.

Temporary relief was found in adopting a suggestion from Lindsay whereby cotton was made the basis for an advance of L60,000, a form of cotton bond being devised which fixed the price of cotton at eightpence the pound.

These bonds were not put on the market but were privately placed by Lindsay & Company with a few buyers for the entire sum, the transaction remaining secret[1050].
In the meantime this same recourse to cotton had occurred to the authorities at Richmond and a plan formulated by which cotton should be purchased by the Government, stored, and certificates issued to be sold abroad, the purchaser being assured of "all facilities of shipment." Spence was to be the authorized agent for the sale of these "cotton certificates," but before any reached him various special agents of the Confederacy had arrived in England by December, 1862, with such certificates in their possession and had disposed of some of them, calling them "cotton warrants." The difficulties which might arise from separate action in the market were at once perceived and following a conference with Mason all cotton obligations were turned to Fraser, Trenholm & Company.

Spence now had in his hands the "money bonds" but no further attempt was made to dispose of these since the "cotton warrants" were considered a better means of raising funds.
It is no doubt true that since all of these efforts involved a governmental guarantee the various "certificates" or "warrants" partook of the nature of a government bond.

Yet up to this point the Richmond authorities, after the first failure to sell "money bonds" abroad were not keen to attempt anything that could be stamped as a foreign "government loan." Their idea was rather that a certain part of the produce of the South was being set aside as the property of those who in England should extend credit to the South.