Messrs Hoare Bankers: A history of the Hoare banking dynasty

(Hardback)

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Fascinating history of the only remaining 'private' private bank in London Of the many family banks founded in Restoration England, Hoare's Bank is the only one that continues - by adapting to the new circumstances of every generation - as an independent partnership. Three centuries of unaltered ownership provide an engrossing portrait of the world that shaped both it and the Hoare family. As the family became identified with the bank which Richard Hoare founded in 1672, the lives of each generation became interwoven with the institution. Emerging from commonplace beginnings under the control of an assiduous and ambitious man, it developed during the 18th century into an institution with a character and connections that were aristocratic, the family building Stourhead and laying out its world-famous gardens. Among the bank's customers were Catherine of Braganza, Samuel Pepys, John Dryden, Richard 'Beau' Nash, Lord North, Thomas Gainsborough (painter), Eton College, Lord Byron and Jane Austen. With success and wealth came fragmentation as the outside world brought distraction and the size of the family brought rivalry. The 19th century saw neglect followed, inevitably, by impending disaster, but the assertion of sound management in the 1880s re-established the family's determination to remain independent at a time when other banks were being brought up by rivals. This is the history of a family-run business over several generations. It reflects the changing face of England over three centuries through the story of a single family.