Co urts' Coutts' : The History of a Banking House. By
Ralph M. Robinson. (Murray. 15s.) Tax histories of banks, published from time to time to celebrate centenaries, are always impersonal and often severely technical. But the history of Coutts' Bank is a happy exception to the rule. The firm has always cultivated the personal side of finance, and it has been guided by able men of strong' individuality, maintaining the tradition's of Thomas COutts. Indeed, the fact that Mr. Robinson has been permitted to study the ,bank'S archives and give par- ticulars of its partners and its distinguished customers is in itself significant. Banking in general seems an inhuman subject, like the higher mathematics ; but the story of Coutts' is intensely human, and even romantic. A London 'goldsmith, George Middleton, and his partner, JOhn Campbell, had a shop in St. Martin'S Lane in 1690. In 1754 a young Edinburgh merehant, laines Cciutts, carne to London, married the niece of George Campbell, sole Partner in 'the firm; arid was taken into partnership. James
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Coutts, on Campbell's death in 1761, took in his younger brother Thomas, and the firm becanm Coutts & Coutts. Thomas Coutts, 'wh6 married his brother's nursemaid, soon assumed the lead. In 1775 James was persuaded by Lord Chatham and other influential customers -to sell out; and Thomas Coutts became the sole owner of the business. His second marriage to the young actress, Harriet Mellon, in 1814, when he was seventy-eight, excited much comment but did not affect his bank.
Much of Mr. Robinson's book is devoted to selections from Thomas Coutts' correspondence with the great men and women of his time. It is clear that they found in him a sagacious and kindly friend. Georgians, Duchess of Devonshire, plagued -him for an overdraft.-- Wellington asked him to advise'about the purchase of an estate. Haydon thanked him for a timely loan. The more one knows of Thomas Coutts; the more one' respects him.
When Coutts- died in '1821, he left his' widow a half-Share in the bank and over f.50,000 a year. She was very generons to her ste0-daughters, though ihe'never earned their gratitude. She married the piling Duke" of St; Albans in 1827 and died in 1837, leaving her 'fortune and her half-share in Coutts' to Angela, the youngest daughter of Sir Francis Burdett and Sophia Coutts, with the proviso that, should she marry a foreigner, her interest in the Nish:less should paSs to one of her sisters. Angela Burdett-Coutts (1814-1906), whose untiring -zeal for many good causes "iviin 'her the friendship of Queen 'Victoria and the' title of Baroness, married in 1881 • Mr. Ashmead-Bartlett, an American by birth who had been educated in England and had acted as her secretary. There- upon the Baroness's sister, Mrs. Money, claimed the Coutts' inheritance. By a friendly compromise the Baroness retained two-fifths of -the income, with her houses hi Piccadilly and at Highgate, for life ; at her death the whole property passed to her poet-nepheir, Mr. Francis Money-Coutts, now Lord Latyrrier. it is noted that, while the Baroness had no share in the actual management of the bank, 'she provided lunch tree of cost for the whole staff ' for many years—a custom Which, so far as we know, no ordinary banking company has ever imitated. Mr. Robinson continues the story to the present day, and reminds us that in 1919 the bank was affiliated to the National Provincial Bank, while retaining its identity and preserving its age-long traditions.
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