Through the Years
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Through the Years Tales from the Hoare’s Bank Archive Volume Two [ I ] Through the Years Tales from the Hoare’s Bank Archive Volume Two [ II ] Pamela Hunter THROUGH THE YEARS Tales from the Hoare’s Bank Archive Volume Two C. Hoare & Co. LONDON · MMXVIII Contents Foreword Simon M. Hoare 7 17 Settlement on the marriage of Richard Colt 33 Festival of the City of London events Hoare and Hon Hester Lyttelton, 1783 40 programme, 1962 82 1 Memo relating to Lord Byron’s loan application, 1813 10 18 Admittance ticket for a Sermon in aid of the 34 ‘Bradbury’ note, 1914 84 Hospitals for the Small Pox and Inoculation, 2 Subscription for Sufferers in the North Seas, 35 Proclamation by Field Marshal Wade, 1745 87 1775 44 1812–14 12 36 Mitcham, Morden & Merton Savings’ Bank 19 Medal commemorating Edward VII’s 3 Gold touch-piece, 1702–14 14 customer account, 1819 90 Coronation visit to the City of London, 37 Richard Hoare’s ‘New Masheen Charet’, 4 Charles Whitley’s Fidelity Bond, 1849 15 1902 46 1732 93 5 Photograph of Frederick Alfred Hoare, 20 Photograph of the Computer Room at 38 Raincliff homestead near Timaru, New Zealand, Lord Mayor of London, 1961 16 37 Fleet Street, 1977 48 c.1890 96 6 Primrose League diploma awarded to Sir Henry 21 Request for a ticket to Boodle’s fête, 1789 50 39 Letter by Harry Hoare written at Mena House, Ainslie Hoare Bt, 1892 18 22 Harry Hoare’s Pocket Game Register, 1887 52 Cairo, 1893 100 7 View of Stourhead garden by Francis Nicholson, 23 Subscription for Sir Walter Scott’s Testimonial, 40 Subscription for the Spitalfields Soup Society, 19th century 20 1832–33 55 1838 103 8 Photograph of Hoare’s Bank on Diamond 24 Account of diamonds sent to Philip Masson 41 Portrait of Henry Hoare jnr by unknown artist, Jubilee Day, 1897 22 at Paris, 1713 58 c.1775 106 9 Royal Toxophilite Society loan account, 25 Letter by Captain Robert FitzRoy of 42 A Calculation of the Great Eclipse of the Sun 1835–36 24 hms Beagle, 1833 60 by William Whiston, 1715 110 10 Sketch for principal elevation of proposed new 26 Photograph of the Eton Ramblers cricket team, 43 Chelsea Election: The Final Contest, 1868 112 banking house by Charles Parker, 1827 26 1912 63 44 Subscription for the Relief of the Sufferers at Waterloo, 1815 115 11 Photograph of the restored façade at 27 Notice relating to King George’s Public Entry 40–43 Fleet Street, 2012 28 into London, 1714 66 45 Receipt note signed by Richard Hoare, 1671 118 12 Letter describing a fire at the Palace of 28 Articles of Partnership for Messrs Hoare Westminster, 1834 30 & Arnold, 1732 69 46 Log book for Yacht Surprise, 1878 121 13 Drawing of Neath Abbey by Sir Richard Colt 29 Subscription for Sufferers at Sidmouth 47 Cheque form marked ‘M’ for Metropolitan, Hoare Bt, 1802 32 by Storm, 1824 72 [1931] 124 14 Advertisement for Staff Restaurants Ltd, 30 Signature of Sir John Goodricke Bt, 1771 74 48 Subscription Fund for the Circassians, 1950s 34 1864 127 31 Portrait of Lady Frances Elizabeth Bruce 15 Surrey Iron Railway Co. share certificate, by William Hoare RA, c.1775 76 Who’s Who at Hoare’s Bank 131 1806 36 32 Caroline Hoare’s journal, describing a train Sources and Abbreviations 132 16 Jane Austen’s bank account, 1816–17 38 crash at Staplehurst, 1865 79 References 133 Foreword Hoare’s Bank has been part of my family’s life risk of fraud. Our enduring philanthropic for nearly 350 years, and as Chairman of the links are also highlighted through some of Museum Committee it is my task to ensure the many subscription accounts opened at that such a long and illustrious history is both Hoare’s over the centuries. preserved and celebrated. To that end, I was Reading Through the Years has sharpened delighted to oversee the compilation of this my awareness of just how unique an second volume of Through the Years: Tales from institution Hoare’s Bank is. It also reaffirms the Hoare’s Bank Archive. how important it is for us to continue Like Through the Years volume one, this adapting to the needs of an ever-changing new collection of tales – 48 in total – explores world without losing sight of the values that the stories behind individual items within have underpinned the bank’s success to date. our historical collections. Reading them I’m Thankfully, however, to paraphrase another reminded once more of the bank’s longevity. erstwhile customer, ‘in essentials I believe Founder Richard Hoare, my eight times Hoare’s is very much what it ever was.’ great grandfather, started his apprenticeship The bank’s 350th anniversary in 2022, in 1665, just days before Pepys noted the and the years and decades beyond it, will plague’s arrival in London and a year before I trust give rise to many more tales. In the the Great Fire devastated much of the city. meantime, I hope you will enjoy these I’m equally struck by the bank’s resilience: glimpses into our past as much as I have. wars, economic highs and lows, political SImon m. HoARe turmoil, even ‘regime change’ – Hoare’s has August 2018 weathered them all. Some of the articles included here shed light on the bank’s working life: the daily routine of our ‘Walk Clerks’ during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, for example, or the installation of our first computer in the 1970s. The former remained unaltered for 150 years, but the latter illustrates just how fast the pace of change has been in a mere fifty. That first computer took up an entire room, boasted an absurdly small memory and necessitated the introduction of customer account numbers and personalised cheque books. Quite an upheaval. Other articles portray events or aspects of life that at first glance seem far removed from the world of banking. Yet the traits they embody – humour, intrigue, tragedy, the twists and turns of fate – are both universal and timeless. Needless to say, our customers have been at the heart of Hoare’s Bank since its inception. This book begins by exploring the bank’s connection with a particularly colourful one: poet Lord Byron. Later we learn about hms Beagle’s epic voyage from her Captain, Robert FitzRoy, and discover how the bank sought to protect its eighteenth century customers from the ever-present [ 7 ] C. Hoare & Co.’s banking house at 37 Fleet Street, London Watercolour by Luke Piper, 2009 1 Memo relating to Lord Byron’s loan application, 1813 Unsurprisingly, Byron’s lawyer was soon exploring the possibility of a bank loan. Byron’s first great narrative poem,Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, was published in March 1812. The Partners’ memoranda book noted in So immediate was its success that Byron ‘awoke one morning and found myself famous.’ Months June 1813 ‘Mr Hanson Junr applies for Two or Three Thousand Pounds for Lord later the poet opened an account at Hoare’s Bank. Although of short duration – four years – Byron … The Purchaser of the Estate that this account covered a tumultuous period in Byron’s life. His Lordship has lately sold, is Tardy in completing the Contract, and in consequence a Bill in Chancery is about to be filed to compel Him to proceed. And which Mr Hanson thinks may be decided in less than George Gordon Byron was born in 1788, the poem that was to become Childe Harold’s subsequent works including The Giaour(1813), six mo[nths] when we should be reimbursed son of a spendthrift army captain known Pilgrimage (Cantos I & II). Regarded by The Bride of Abydos(1813) and The Corsair(1814), the Sum.’1 The Hoares, though, remained as ‘Mad Jack’ Byron and a Scottish heiress, many as semi-autobiographical, a notion which between them sold tens of thousands of unconvinced. ‘Mr Hanson was told that we Catherine Gordon. At the age of ten he Byron later was keen to dispel, Childe Harold’s copies, Byron’s finances remained chaotic, a could not consistently with our Regulations succeeded his great-uncle as 6th Baron Byron Pilgrimage vividly described the adventures of situation exacerbated by his cavalier attitude advance the money.’ of Rochdale. The title though came with few a young would-be pilgrim knight who, fed up towards money. The copyright to Childe Byron’s biggest asset was Newstead Abbey, material benefits; the accompanying estates with the pleasures and excesses of his early Harold’s Pilgrimage was given away to a friend the Nottinghamshire estate he had inherited were mired in debt and there was little ready life, sought fulfilment through reflection and and large sums he could ill afford to spare used with his title back in 1798. At first Byron cash. Byron’s first collection of poems, Hours foreign travel. And in Childe Harold himself, to assist family members, fellow writers and an was determined to retain Newstead, but it of Idleness (1807), published when he was just Byron created a new kind of fictional hero – assortment of political causes. By 1815 Byron yielded little income and the huge mansion nineteen years old, was not well received, moody, mysterious, charismatic, imperfect calculated that he owed £30,000. The bank’s was crumbling into ruin. Eventually Byron although his next work, English Bards and – that persists down to the present day. ledgers hint at the endless juggling required to had to bow to the inevitable and in 1812 Scotch Reviewers (1809), fared better.