Deseret evening news. [volume] (Great Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1867-1920, 1897-06-15
A MONEY KING DEAD.
Barney Barnato Commits Suicide by
Drowning.
lie JUMPED INTO THE OCEAN.
A Sketch Of the Career Of the Most
Remarkable Flnancier Of t
The Century.

LONDON, June 14..-A special dis
match from Funohai, Island OF Ma
deira, says that on the arrival there
today OF the British steamship Scot,
which left Table Bay (Capetown) on
June 2nd for South ampton, II was an.
nounced that Barney Barnato, tho
South African diamond king, who
was among the passsngers, had COM
mitteu suicide by leapins overheard.
His badly was recovered.
The late Barney Barnato was in
many respects the most remarkable
.p.cu,ator of the century. OF all the
Enpiisbmen who have taken part in
Inc DEVELOPMENT OF South Africa, two
univ have secured Ii worl0-wIde repu-
iatiop, These are Cecil Rhodes anu
Barnstt Isaacs, more often aud less
respt cttuIiy styled Barney. Barnato
was an assumed name, q sort Of stage
name, for he began his lie Ia South
Africa by exhibiting trick donkey
some twenty five years ago. He was
then about 20 years OF age.
Barney BarDaio WAS an English
Jew, and illustrated in IN exIraordi-
nary way the financial genius OF bic
race, Up to the point where his for
tunes began to decline he made money
by LEAPS and bounds, nnu In 1890,
when his good fortune was al lie
zenith, It was estimated that no con-
troilsd interests worth In the neigh
borhood OF el00,00D,OO0, 1t was the
fashion to cal him the richest man In
tue world. Al thai time he was Wiz
tually the king Of the II moon money
market, In the autumn Of 1885, when
the boom,in Kaffirs, the shares OF the
comparatively new geld mines OF the
Trassvaal, South Africa, was af lis
height, every man, woman and child
in London with money to invest in
vested 1t In Ksfflrs. For months 1t
wss the controlling passion in London
anu 1t was most rampant In Paris and
Berlin. The shares went 10 unneari-
of figures, and fortunes were mRue In
day.
The center OF this tremendous imam.
cisl outpurst was Barney Barnato,and
he was conservatively estimated al
that time as worth between SlOO,O0O
600 and $3.50, 1000. Among ms as
tets was u oaog originally capitalized
at $l2, 500, 900. In very few months
us capital STOCK rose Ia value to $780,
000, 900.
Barnsto was born In London. Little
is know as to his early life, except that
he received his instruction from prI-
yate tutor instead Of attending the
public schools. He was younger son
snd ut the sgs OF 70 went to South
Africa, th,n much more unknows
territory than 1t IL now, scsntliy popu-
lated by EngIishmen. the Kimberly
diamond mines were Just begiu ning 10
he productive. With his lew pounds
OF capital he began uealiDg In uis-
monds in small way. He was clever
anu pushing. Everything he touched
he maue successful. In hve years he
had earned enough in the retail safe oil
diamOnus TO purchase shares 10 the
mines from which his merchandise
came. Before another five years hau
elapsed his holIings a, KimosrIy hau
become very large, when the
Transvaai guild FIELDS We're discovered
he had profits to invest IN them.
IL 1855 Bsrnalo was utfiDite
money power in South A rtos, and
began to be spoken Of as tne rival VI
Cecil Rhodes. Unlike In tempera.
ment. the two men started cut to be
opponents, but IN 1883 they reached
the conclusion simultaneously that
their respective interests could be best
promoted by combining iorces anu the
Debeers consolidated mines were the
result, one OF the mt 81 valuable pieces
Of pruL erty inland IN the world.
Barnato repeatedly and vthemently
denied the etory that no began life la
South Africa by exhibiting a trick
donkey, nut there arc many African.
uers entirely familiar with mis- career
In that part VI the world who have Nh per-
sistsntiy and repeatedly affirmed this
10 be the fact. There 10 no truth, how
ever, In the story that he was ever .
clown or juggler in wandering show.
He used 10 say that the only founda.
ton for this report was the fact that