the world of private banking
the world of private banking
the world of private banking
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26<br />
THE WORLD OF PRIVAtE BANKING<br />
<strong>the</strong>m ‘blows where it hurts’. 100 Their fa<strong>the</strong>r’s classic advice on this subject – much<br />
repeated down <strong>the</strong> generations – was ‘If you can’t make yourself loved, make<br />
yourself feared’. 101 James in particular never lost his competitive edge. ‘[M]y heart<br />
breaks when I see how everyone is trying to push us out <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> business deal.’ he<br />
wrote to his nephews in 1844. ‘The stone on <strong>the</strong> wall is envious and is an enemy<br />
<strong>of</strong> us.’ 102 His campaign against <strong>the</strong> Pereire bro<strong>the</strong>rs after <strong>the</strong>y broke with him and<br />
set up <strong>the</strong> Crédit Mobilier was relentless, and ultimately successful.<br />
One <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> crucial ways in which <strong>the</strong> Rothschilds consistently outdid <strong>the</strong>ir<br />
rivals was by having superior political and financial intelligence. In this period,<br />
postal services were slow and insecure: letters sent from Paris to Frankfurt usually<br />
took just 48 hours in 1814; but mail from London could take up to a week to<br />
reach Frankfurt, and <strong>the</strong> service from Paris to Berlin took nine days in 1817. 103<br />
Compulsive correspondents as <strong>the</strong>y were, <strong>the</strong> bro<strong>the</strong>rs were always trying to find<br />
ways <strong>of</strong> speeding <strong>the</strong> postal service up. So anxious was Amschel to have up-todate<br />
exchange rates from London in June 1814 that he asked Nathan to send his<br />
letters by more than one route – via Paris and Amsterdam as well as Dunkirk<br />
– and to use colour-coded envelopes so that his contact at <strong>the</strong> post <strong>of</strong>fice could<br />
tell at a glance whe<strong>the</strong>r <strong>the</strong> exchange rate was rising (blue) or falling (red). 104<br />
Increasingly, however, <strong>the</strong>y dispensed with <strong>the</strong> post, relying instead on <strong>the</strong>ir own<br />
<strong>private</strong> couriers, including agents at Dover who were authorized to charter boats<br />
for Rothschild business. 105 In 1815, Nathan famously got <strong>the</strong> news <strong>of</strong> Napoleon’s<br />
defeat first, thanks to <strong>the</strong> speed with which a Rothschild courier was able to relay<br />
<strong>the</strong> fifth and conclusive extraordinary bulletin (issued in Brussels during <strong>the</strong> night<br />
<strong>of</strong> 18/19 June) via Dunkirk and Deal to reach New Court roughly 24 hours later.<br />
This was at least thirty-six hours before Major Henry Percy delivered Wellington’s<br />
<strong>of</strong>ficial despatch to <strong>the</strong> Cabinet. 106 By <strong>the</strong> mid-1820s, such couriers were being<br />
sent regularly: in December 1825 alone, <strong>the</strong> Paris house sent 18 couriers to<br />
Calais (and hence to London), three to Saarbrücken, one to Brussels and one to<br />
100<br />
RAL, XI/109/0/3/4, Carl, Frankfurt, to Salomon, 29 June 1814; RAL, T29/63,<br />
XI/109/0/3/5, Amschel, Frankfurt, to Salomon, 29 June; RAL, XI/109/0/3/7, Carl, Frankfurt,<br />
to Salomon, 30 June; RAL, T30, XI/109/2/3/26/1, Amschel to James, Paris, 26 Jan.; RAL,<br />
T30, XI/109/2/3/49, Amschel, Frankfurt, to Carl and Nathan, 31 Aug.<br />
101<br />
RAL, T27/216, James, Paris, to Salomon and Nathan, 8 March 1817.<br />
102<br />
RAL, X1/109J/J/45, James, Paris, to his nephews, London, 18 March 1844.<br />
103<br />
RAL, T29/181; XI/109/0/7/21, Carl, Frankfurt, to Salomon, 23 Aug. 1814; RAL,<br />
T63/28/1, XI/109/8, Carl, Berlin, to his bro<strong>the</strong>rs, 4 Nov. 1817.<br />
104<br />
RAL, XI/109/0/2/1, Amschel, Frankfurt, to Nathan, London, 19 June 1814; RAL,<br />
XI/109/0/2/5, Amschel to Salomon, 29 June.<br />
105<br />
RAL, T5/29, Braun, [James’s clerk in] Paris, to James, London, 13 Sept. 1813.<br />
Cf. L. Wolf, ‘Rothschildiana’, in idem, Essays in Jewish History, ed. by C. Roth (London,<br />
1934), pp. 266f.<br />
106<br />
Wolf, ‘Rothschildiana’, pp. 281ff.; Corti, Rise, p. 137; Lord [Victor] Rothschild,<br />
The Shadow <strong>of</strong> a Great Man (London, 1982), pp. 135–7.