the world of private banking

18
THE WORLD OF PRIVAtE BANKING
you as general-in-chief, with ourselves as lieutenants-general.’ 63 There continued
to be occasional rows; but for all their differences, the brothers did stick together,
albeit under Nathan’s self-consciously Napoleonic leadership rather than on the
basis of an idealized fraternal harmony.
Perhaps the greatest challenge for any family firm is to ‘bring on’ the next
generation. Fortunately, most of the second generation inherited their parents’
fertility: although Amschel failed to produce any children whatsoever, his brothers
produced no fewer than 13 male heirs. Yet it is striking that Nathan and his brothers
did not follow their father’s example by establishing at least some of their sons in
new financial centres. The plan for a ‘sixth house’ on the other side of the Atlantic
remained no more than a pipe-dream; probably the biggest mistake the Rothschilds
made. The best explanation for this is that the five brothers trusted five of their
sons enough to groom them as their successors, but the others insufficiently to give
them the major responsibility of setting up a new house.
The integration of the next generation required fairly regular revision of the
partnership contract. In 1825, Salomon’s son Anselm was admitted as a sleeping
partner and in 1828 he became a ‘real Associé’. By 1836, Nathan felt his eldest son
Lionel was ready to become a partner on the same footing as Anselm, and it was
as much to agree the terms of Lionel’s elevation as to celebrate his marriage that
the brothers met in Frankfurt that year. However, before the new contract could be
signed, Nathan became ill with a rectal abscess and, after a few weeks of wretched
medical treatment, died. It was a fraught and uncertain moment in the history of
the firm; but ‘the commanding general’ had just enough energy left for a final
exercise of his domineering will. Salomon described how ‘three days before his
death he told me all his thoughts and wishes with regard to the will which he then
drew up, and which I then had written out in accordance with his intentions’. 64 In
effect, his three sons were to inherit his share in the partnership and to manage it
collectively. Above all, they were to maintain ‘unity, true love and firm unity’ – a
conscious echo of his own father’s last words. 65
It has often been assumed that James, who had many things in common with
his deceased brother, simply stepped into Nathan’s shoes as senior partner. The
reality is rather different. As in the past, the older Rothschilds sought to counteract
the firm’s centrifugal tendencies by appealing to the hallowed principle of fraternal
‘concordia’: ‘In what has our strength been until now?’ remonstrated James in
a letter to his nephews of 1839. ‘Only in that people knew that one place will
support the other. . . [A]s you well know, the well-being of our family is closer to
my heart than anything else.’ 66 ‘Let us do business again in peace and in harmony
63
RAL, T29/159, XI/109/0/6/11, Salomon, Paris, to Nathan and Salomon Cohen, 17
Aug. 1814; RAL, T29/181, XI/109/0/8/7, Salomon to Nathan, London, undated, c. end of Aug.;
RAL, XI/109/9/4/6, XI/109/10/1/6, Salomon to Nathan, London, undated, c. early 1818.
64
Corti, Reign, pp. 150–2.
65
CPHDCM, 637/1/7/70–72, Anhang, 30 July 1836.
66
RAL, X1/109J/J/39, James, Nice, to his brothers and nephews, 16 March 1839.