The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1902-12-29
ROMANCES OF 4 BANK.
CHECKERED CAREER OF ENG
LANDS FINANCIAL CONCERN.

The Worlds Money Ccnter-OPposition
TO 1t I'm the limo OF William HI
How a Woman Prevented 1t From
Bringing Ruin Upon a Rival.
The Bank of England-that rambling.
ramshackle, loose-jointed structure of
gray stone, blackened by centuries of
London smoke, London CRIME and Lon
don SCOT, and forming an almost COM
plete square from Threadneedle street
in the south to Coleman street in the
north--does not at first sight seem a
likely place for romance, and yet it's
history teens with stories of love, ha-
tired, ambition, rascality and adven-
ture
William Paterson, who at one time of
his life had controlled every privateer
that ran the Spanish main-a grim,
black-muZZled ScOtchman-Was the
founder of the bank He laid the foun-
datiOn of his fortune in the buying and
selling of slaves and the clearing Of
one hundred thousand pounds as his
share of the gold found on the sunken
Spanish galleOn. 1t was with this one
hundred thousand pounds and the pro-
fit derived from his buccaneering expe-
ditiOn that Paterson, banished to HoI-
land by James II, and the implaCable
enemy of all the Stuarts, found part of
the money for the Prince of Oranges
he
Concurrently with the advent of Will
liam III on the throne of EInglnd the
first plans for the foundation of ma
tional bank were made, and those who
know of the inside history of those
times doubt not that William III was
indeed the moving spirit of the scheme,
and that Paterson was his official tool
and mouthpiece at the weekly meet
fngs or famous gatherings of financiers
known as the Wednesday club.
Vain was it for the Jacobite of that
day to denounce the bank as revolu-
tionary institution, through which all
the wealth of the nation would go into
the hands of the sovereign. The only
concession that the tory indictments
were able to obtain from the govern
ment was law that remains in force
to this day-that the bank should not
lend money to the king or the govern
ment except by consent of both houses
of Parliament.
Blood red in the annals of the bank
lives the story of Charles Walter God
frey, partner of Paterson. Crossing
the channel in the teeth of a fierce
storm and laden with sixty thousand
pounds (three hundred thousand dol
lars) in drafts for the aid of King Will
liam. at that time besieging Namur
against the forces of the fourteenth
Louis, Godfrey insisted on his right to
deliver the warrant for the money into
the hands of the king, who was then in
the trenches under a hot fire. And as,
with humble obedience, he handed the
paper to his taciturn majesty, saying in
response to the kings gruff remon-
STRANGE, Am I then more exposed to
danger than you, sir?" a cannon ball
swept his head away.
Over the massive fireplace in the di-
rectors' room stood some years ago
three rusty specimens of the old BROWN
Bess, together with a number of rough
ly shaped bullets. In these relics is
embodied a picture of that dreadful
night in the November of 1880 when the
mob of Gordon rioters marched down
from Newgate, setting fire to every
Catholic chapel on the line of march
and advancing with a force of five
thousand upon the bank.
Then was it that the clerks. armed
with muskets. remembered that they
were unprovided with shot. Before
them lay rows of leaden inkstands,
mutely suggesting the possibilities of a
new use. In less than half an hour the
inkstands had been melted and turned
into bullets.
The muskets were loaded. At every
window of the bank stood two marks
men, their guns trained on the crowd
below. Yet the mob came on, never
hating, never hesitating, until they
were within ten years of the bank
gates, and then, sharp and clear above
the pandemonium of yelling, was heard
the order to fire.
From these windows poured deadly
volley. and when the smoke finally
cleared away two hundred and fifty ri
oters lay still or writing in the agony
of mortal wounds on the open space
now covered by the esplanade of the
Royal Exchange.
The attacking army Wavered,
stopped, broke line and fled, and the
Gordon riots were at an end.
In the early days of George II it was
the custom of all banks to- give a re-
ceipt in payment of a deposit, the re-
ceipts being passed from hand to hand
and serving the same purpose as the
check of to-day.
The growing power of Childs', pri-
vate bank, which at that time had the
backing of half the English nobility,
had become a matter of serious alarm
to the Bank of England, whose notes
were at discount Of ten per cent.