Edgar Speyer
Encyclopedia
Sir Edgar Speyer, 1st Baronet (7 September 1862 – 16 February 1932) was an American-born financier and philanthropist. He became a British subject in 1892 and was chairman of Speyer Brothers, the British branch of his family's international finance house, and a partner in the German and American branches. He was chairman of the Underground Electric Railways Company of London
(UERL, forerunner of the London Underground
) from 1906 to 1915, a period during which the company opened three underground railway lines, electrified a fourth and took over two more.
Speyer was a supporter of the musical arts and a friend of several leading composers, including Edward Elgar
, Richard Strauss
and Claude Debussy
. He was chairman of the Classical Music Society for ten years, and he largely funded the Promenade Concerts
between 1902 and 1914. His non-musical charitable activities included being honorary treasurer of the fund for Captain Scott's Antarctic expedition
. For his philanthropy he was made a baronet
in 1906 and a Privy Counsellor in 1909.
After the start of the World War I
, he became the subject of anti-German attacks in the Press. In 1915, Speyer offered to resign from the Privy Council and to relinquish his baronetcy, but the Prime Minister turned down the offer. He resigned as chairman of the UERL and went to the United States. In 1921, the British government investigated accusations that Speyer had traded with the enemy during the war, and had participated in other wartime conduct incompatible with his status as a British subject. Speyer denied the charges, but his naturalisation was revoked and he was struck off the list of members of the Privy Council.
, the second son of German Jewish parents, Gustavus Speyer and Sophia Speyer (née Rubino) from Frankfurt. His father was an international banker with businesses in Frankfurt, New York and London. Speyer was educated at the Realgymnasium in Frankfurt. On 10 February 1902, in Hamburg, Speyer married the American violinist Leonora von Stosch
. They had met at a concert held by Maude Valerie White
at which Leonora performed. They had three daughters: Pamela, Leonora, and Vivien Claire.
with Europe and the United States, and the financing of railway projects. On 29 February 1892, Speyer became a naturalised
British citizen.
Speyer Brothers' involvement in railway finance brought Speyer into contact with American Charles Yerkes
in 1900. In Chicago, Yerkes had led the development of the city's urban transport system, and he went to London to capitalise on the emerging opportunities for new deep-level underground "tube" railways there. He and Speyer headed a consortium of international investors involved in the construction of three of London’s underground railways and the electrification
of a fourth.
With Yerkes as chairman, the Underground Electric Railways Company of London
(UERL) was established in 1902 with a capitalisation
of £5 million, the majority of share
s sold to overseas investors. Further share issues followed, which, by 1903, raised a total of £18 million (£ today) to be used across all of the UERL's projects. Yerkes died in December 1905, and Speyer took his place as chairman of the UERL. By 1907, the three new railways had opened and the electrification works had been completed. Despite the UERL's engineering success in carrying out the works in such a short time, the company was in a difficult financial position. The preliminary estimates of passenger numbers proved to be over-optimistic and revenues were not covering operating costs. After bailing out the company, Speyer, with Managing Director Albert Stanley
, struggled for a number of years to restore its finances. This was finally achieved with the purchase of the London General Omnibus Company
in 1912, as its profits could be used to offset losses elsewhere in the group. In November 1912, Speyer further consolidated the UERL's control of London's underground railways when he negotiated the purchase of London's two other main tube railways, the City and South London Railway and the Central London Railway
.
, that he had rebuilt as a single residence at the cost of £150,000 (approximately £ today). The rebuilding work was carried out by Detmar Blow
and Fernand Billery in 1910 and 1911; the architects gave the house a "Beaux-Arts" style portland stone
façade and lavish interiors including 11 bedrooms and a large music room. Speyer also had a large country house built in 1908, in the fashionable Edwardian resort of Overstrand
on the Norfolk
coast. The house was named "Sea Marge" (meaning land that borders the sea) and was designed in the Mock Tudor
style, surrounded by gardens. To decorate his homes, Speyer collected works of art, furniture and decorative items from across Europe. He also commissioned art works, including his wife's portrait, painted by John Singer Sargent
in 1907, and his own portrait, painted by William Orpen
, which was exhibited at the Royal Academy
in 1914.
Speyer was a music lover and patron of the arts, frequently holding concerts in his home. He was friends with composers Edward Elgar, Edvard Grieg
, Richard Strauss, Claude Debussy and Percy Grainger
, and with the German cellist and composer Hugo Becker
. Speyer owned violins by Stradivarius
and Giuseppe Guarneri
, used by his wife in public and private performances. He was chairman of the Classical Concert Society until 1912 and (following financial problems experienced by Robert Newman
) held the position of chairman of the Queen's Hall Concert board
from 1902 to 1914, paying £2,000 per year (£ today) to underwrite the Promenade Concerts. Speyer increased rehearsal time for the Queen's Hall Orchestra and was involved in the challenge to the deputy system then operating, stopping musicians from sending under-prepared substitutes to perform in their places. He was described by Bird as "the sole monetary force which kept the Queen's Hall Orchestra afloat". Speyer's control of the Queen's Hall enabled him to attract musicians and composers to perform modern new works at his concerts including Strauss, whom he brought to London to conduct the first English performance of A Hero's Life, and Arnold Schoenberg
, whose Five Orchestral Pieces
received its première in 1912. Becker dedicated Three Pieces for Cello with Piano Accompaniment to Speyer in recognition of their friendship, and Strauss dedicated his opera Salome
to him.
Speyer also contributed £2,500 to the foundation of Whitechapel Art Gallery where he was a trustee for 15 years. He was chairman of the Nervous Diseases Research Fund, president of Poplar Hospital, and sat on the board of the King Edward's Hospital Fund
, to which he donated £25,000 in 1902 (£ today). In December 1904, having read of the loss in a newspaper article, Speyer donated £5,700 to replace all of the funds lost by investors in the failure of a penny savings bank
at Needham Market
, Suffolk
. From 1909, Speyer was honorary treasurer of the fund raised to finance Robert Falcon Scott
's 1910 British Antarctic Expedition
to which he donated £1,000 of the £40,000 that was required. Speyer was prepared to take personal responsibility for a share of the liabilities of the expedition, although the money raised from public donations was sufficient.
Mount Speyer (78°52′00″S, 160°42′00″E) in Antarctica is named in his honour. One of Scott's last letters was written to Speyer. It was found when Scott's body was recovered from his last camp after his unsuccessful return from the South Pole.
On 14 July 1906, Speyer was created a baronet
. Politically, Speyer was a Liberal
. He was a member of the Reform Club
, and a friend of H. H. Asquith
, by whose recommendation he was made a Privy Counsellor (PC) in 1909. In 1911, he was awarded the Order of the Crown
, 2nd class by Kaiser Wilhelm II.
The end of the 19th century and the first decade of the 20th century saw rising anti-German sentiment in Britain. As the naval arms race between Britain and Germany escalated, distrust of Germans and those of German origin was stirred-up by press warnings of the rising military threat from Germany. This was developed further in popular magazines such as the National Review
and in novels such as Erskine Childers'
The Riddle of the Sands
and invasion novels
such as William Le Queux
's The Invasion of 1910
.
Following the British declaration of war with Germany on 4 August 1914, Speyer resigned as a partner of the Frankfurt branch of the bank. After a Royal Proclamation on 11 September 1914 requiring British subjects to have no links with companies doing business with Germany, Speyer resigned as a partner of the American bank. Nonetheless, suspicions regarding Speyer's German parentage led to a hate campaign against him. Crowds gathered outside his home and jeered visitors. Accusations of his disloyalty and treachery appeared in the Press, and he was accused of signalling to German submarines from his Norfolk house. Lady Speyer was ostracised from societies and associations of which she had formerly been a member. Speyer was asked to resign from the board of the Poplar Hospital due to threats of substantial reductions in donations if he remained. The couple was asked to remove their children from school as other parents were threatening to remove theirs.
Speyer ignored a call to write one of the "loyalty letters" that Sir Arthur Pinero
proposed be provided by prominent naturalised citizens of German origin. Instead, on 17 May 1915, Speyer wrote to Asquith, then Prime Minister, asking him to accept his resignation as a Privy Counsellor and to revoke his baronetcy, stating:
He resigned as chairman of the UERL and from the boards of the King Edward's Hospital Fund, the Poplar Hospital and the Whitechapel Art Gallery.
It is doubtful whether it was possible for Speyer to resign from the Privy Council or as a baronet, there being no normal mechanism to do so, but the Prime Minister's response was supportive: "I have known you long, and well enough to estimate at their true value these baseless and malignant imputations upon your loyalty to the British Crown. The King is not prepared to take any step such as you suggest in regard to the marks of distinction which you have received in recognition of public services and philanthropic munificence." On 26 May 1915, Speyer and his family left for America.
In June 1915, Sir George Makgill
, Secretary of the Anti-German Union
, applied for permission from the High Court to issue quo warranto
writ
s against Speyer and Sir Ernest Cassel
, a German-born Privy Counsellor, requiring them to prove their right to hold that position. Makgill's claim was that the Act of Settlement 1701
prevented a person born outside Britain or its dominion
s from being a Privy Counsellor. In December 1915, Lord Chief Justice Lord Reading
rejected the application on the grounds that the relevant sections of the Act of Settlement had been repealed by later legislation.
, who condemned "the brutal and insolent German manner in which Sir Edgar Speyer had resigned his dignity". Lord Curzon
announced that the Home Office was examining his membership of the council. Speyer again offered the Prime Minister, then David Lloyd George
, his resignation from the council, but received no response.
Following an investigation into Speyer's wartime conduct held in camera
by the Home Office's Certificates of Naturalisation (Revocation) Committee, Speyer's naturalisation was revoked by an order dated 1 December 1921. On 13 December 1921 an order was issued by King George V
for Speyer to be struck off the list of the Privy Council. The next person to be struck off the list was Elliot Morley
in 2011, though others resigned in the intervening period.
The committee decided that Speyer had "shown himself by act and speech to be disaffected and disloyal to His Majesty; and [had]... unlawfully communicated with subjects of an enemy State and associated with a business which was to his knowledge carried on in such manner as to assist the enemy in such war." The committee's final opinion was "that the continuance of Sir Edgar Speyer's certificate is not conducive to the public good." Lady Speyer and the couple's children also lost their British nationality.
The report of the committee was published on 7 January 1922. The committee had considered nine issues in making its decision:
On 7 January 1922, Speyer's partners published a letter supporting Speyer and rejecting the implications of his correspondence with his German relatives, stating that he was "incapable of any act of treachery against the country of his adoption". Two days later, Speyer also issued a statement responding to the report and rebutting the committee's interpretation of the facts. He stated that he had been advised of the committee's investigation in 1919 and, after considerable delay by the Home Office, had persuaded it to carry out an investigation in America into allegations made against his conduct there. These investigations, he stated, had demonstrated that the allegations were false, but, after he returned to Britain for the formal hearing in 1921, a further series of allegations were presented regarding his business transactions. Speyer stated that the issues involved were of a trivial nature and were similar to those encountered by other British banks which had traded without censure. He stated that "the whole thing is neither more nor less than the culmination of years of political persecution. The Home Secretary simply dared not give me the vindication to which I was entitled." He challenged the government to publish the evidence presented, and "to point to a strip of material evidence that would induce any fairminded man to support the monstrous conclusions of this report".
In January 1920, Speyer Brothers sold its shareholding in the UERL for approximately £1 million ( today). A month later, Speyer put the Grosvenor Street house up for sale although it did not reach its reserve price
at auction. On 1 April 1922, Speyer and his remaining partner in the London bank dissolved
Speyer Brothers. The Grosvenor Street house was eventually sold in early 1923 and became the American Women's club. Speyer rejoined the surviving American and German branches of the family bank and continued to live in New York. In 1929, he lived in Washington Square. He died on 16 February 1932 in Berlin, after having travelled there for an operation on his nose. He had continued to hold his baronetcy, although it became extinct with his death as he had no male heirs.
After his death, Speyer's UK estate was assessed at £3,362 19s 1d and his US estate at $245,287, approximately £ and $ today.
, Piccadilly
and Bakerloo
lines. After Speyer's funding of the Promenade Concerts ended, they were taken over by music publishers Chappell & Co.
and, in 1927, by the BBC
. The characters of Sir Hermann and Lady Aline Gurtner in E F Benson
's 1919 novel Robin Linnet were based on Sir Edgar and Lady Leonora. Leanne Langley suggests that the character of Appleton, a villainous stockbroker, in John Buchan's The Thirty-Nine Steps
may have been based on Speyer.
After the American Women's club moved out, his London home served as the Japanese Embassy for some years and is now the offices of stockbrokers Killik & Co. It is a Grade II* listed building. The Norfolk house was sold after his death and became a hotel and, for a period, a nursing home. It is currently operated as a hotel and is listed Grade II. After the Speyers returned to America, Lady Leonora began writing poetry and won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
in 1927. She died in 1956.
Underground Electric Railways Company of London
The Underground Electric Railways Company of London Limited , known operationally as The Underground for much of its existence, was established in 1902. It was the holding company for the three deep-level "tube"A "tube" railway is an underground railway constructed in a circular tunnel by the use...
(UERL, forerunner of the London Underground
London Underground
The London Underground is a rapid transit system serving a large part of Greater London and some parts of Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire and Essex in England...
) from 1906 to 1915, a period during which the company opened three underground railway lines, electrified a fourth and took over two more.
Speyer was a supporter of the musical arts and a friend of several leading composers, including Edward Elgar
Edward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet OM, GCVO was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestral works including the Enigma Variations, the Pomp and Circumstance Marches, concertos...
, Richard Strauss
Richard Strauss
Richard Georg Strauss was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, which include Der Rosenkavalier and Salome; his Lieder, especially his Four Last Songs; and his tone poems and orchestral works, such as Death and Transfiguration, Till...
and Claude Debussy
Claude Debussy
Claude-Achille Debussy was a French composer. Along with Maurice Ravel, he was one of the most prominent figures working within the field of impressionist music, though he himself intensely disliked the term when applied to his compositions...
. He was chairman of the Classical Music Society for ten years, and he largely funded the Promenade Concerts
The Proms
The Proms, more formally known as The BBC Proms, or The Henry Wood Promenade Concerts presented by the BBC, is an eight-week summer season of daily orchestral classical music concerts and other events held annually, predominantly in the Royal Albert Hall in London...
between 1902 and 1914. His non-musical charitable activities included being honorary treasurer of the fund for Captain Scott's Antarctic expedition
Terra Nova Expedition
The Terra Nova Expedition , officially the British Antarctic Expedition 1910, was led by Robert Falcon Scott with the objective of being the first to reach the geographical South Pole. Scott and four companions attained the pole on 17 January 1912, to find that a Norwegian team led by Roald...
. For his philanthropy he was made a baronet
Baronet
A baronet or the rare female equivalent, a baronetess , is the holder of a hereditary baronetcy awarded by the British Crown...
in 1906 and a Privy Counsellor in 1909.
After the start of the World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, he became the subject of anti-German attacks in the Press. In 1915, Speyer offered to resign from the Privy Council and to relinquish his baronetcy, but the Prime Minister turned down the offer. He resigned as chairman of the UERL and went to the United States. In 1921, the British government investigated accusations that Speyer had traded with the enemy during the war, and had participated in other wartime conduct incompatible with his status as a British subject. Speyer denied the charges, but his naturalisation was revoked and he was struck off the list of members of the Privy Council.
Family
Speyer was born on 7 September 1862 in New YorkNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, the second son of German Jewish parents, Gustavus Speyer and Sophia Speyer (née Rubino) from Frankfurt. His father was an international banker with businesses in Frankfurt, New York and London. Speyer was educated at the Realgymnasium in Frankfurt. On 10 February 1902, in Hamburg, Speyer married the American violinist Leonora von Stosch
Leonora Speyer
Leonora Speyer, Lady Speyer was an American poet and violinist.-Life:She was born in Washington, D.C., the daughter of Count Ferdinand von Stosch of Mantze in Silesia, who fought for the Union....
. They had met at a concert held by Maude Valerie White
Maude Valerie White
Maude Valérie White was a French-born English composer who became one of the most successful songwriters of the Victorian period.-Early years:...
at which Leonora performed. They had three daughters: Pamela, Leonora, and Vivien Claire.
Financier
In 1884, Speyer became a partner in each of his father's businesses. He headed the Frankfurt office before taking control of the London office, Speyer Brothers, in 1887. His older brother, James, headed the New York company. The firm specialised in arbitrageArbitrage
In economics and finance, arbitrage is the practice of taking advantage of a price difference between two or more markets: striking a combination of matching deals that capitalize upon the imbalance, the profit being the difference between the market prices...
with Europe and the United States, and the financing of railway projects. On 29 February 1892, Speyer became a naturalised
Naturalization
Naturalization is the acquisition of citizenship and nationality by somebody who was not a citizen of that country at the time of birth....
British citizen.
Charles Yerkes
Charles Tyson Yerkes was an American financier, born in Philadelphia. He played a major part in developing mass-transit systems in Chicago and London.-Philadelphia:...
in 1900. In Chicago, Yerkes had led the development of the city's urban transport system, and he went to London to capitalise on the emerging opportunities for new deep-level underground "tube" railways there. He and Speyer headed a consortium of international investors involved in the construction of three of London’s underground railways and the electrification
Electrification
Electrification originally referred to the build out of the electrical generating and distribution systems which occurred in the United States, England and other countries from the mid 1880's until around 1940 and is in progress in developing countries. This also included the change over from line...
of a fourth.
With Yerkes as chairman, the Underground Electric Railways Company of London
Underground Electric Railways Company of London
The Underground Electric Railways Company of London Limited , known operationally as The Underground for much of its existence, was established in 1902. It was the holding company for the three deep-level "tube"A "tube" railway is an underground railway constructed in a circular tunnel by the use...
(UERL) was established in 1902 with a capitalisation
Market capitalization
Market capitalization is a measurement of the value of the ownership interest that shareholders hold in a business enterprise. It is equal to the share price times the number of shares outstanding of a publicly traded company...
of £5 million, the majority of share
Share (finance)
A joint stock company divides its capital into units of equal denomination. Each unit is called a share. These units are offered for sale to raise capital. This is termed as issuing shares. A person who buys share/shares of the company is called a shareholder, and by acquiring share or shares in...
s sold to overseas investors. Further share issues followed, which, by 1903, raised a total of £18 million (£ today) to be used across all of the UERL's projects. Yerkes died in December 1905, and Speyer took his place as chairman of the UERL. By 1907, the three new railways had opened and the electrification works had been completed. Despite the UERL's engineering success in carrying out the works in such a short time, the company was in a difficult financial position. The preliminary estimates of passenger numbers proved to be over-optimistic and revenues were not covering operating costs. After bailing out the company, Speyer, with Managing Director Albert Stanley
Albert Stanley, 1st Baron Ashfield
Albert Henry Stanley, 1st Baron Ashfield, PC, TD , born Albert Henry Knattriess, was a British-American who was managing director, then chairman of the Underground Electric Railways Company of London from 1910 to 1933 and chairman of the London Passenger Transport Board from 1933 to 1947.Although...
, struggled for a number of years to restore its finances. This was finally achieved with the purchase of the London General Omnibus Company
London General Omnibus Company
The London General Omnibus Company or LGOC, was the principal bus operator in London between 1855 and 1933. It was also, for a short period between 1909 and 1912, a motor bus manufacturer.- Overview :...
in 1912, as its profits could be used to offset losses elsewhere in the group. In November 1912, Speyer further consolidated the UERL's control of London's underground railways when he negotiated the purchase of London's two other main tube railways, the City and South London Railway and the Central London Railway
Central London Railway
The Central London Railway , also known as the Twopenny Tube, was a deep-level, underground "tube" railway that opened in London in 1900...
.
Philanthropist and patron
As head of the London arm of the family businesses, Speyer became wealthy. He owned a pair of neighbouring houses at 44 and 46 Grosvenor Street, MayfairMayfair
Mayfair is an area of central London, within the City of Westminster.-History:Mayfair is named after the annual fortnight-long May Fair that took place on the site that is Shepherd Market today...
, that he had rebuilt as a single residence at the cost of £150,000 (approximately £ today). The rebuilding work was carried out by Detmar Blow
Detmar Blow
Detmar Jellings Blow was a British architect of the early 20th century, who designed principally in the arts and crafts style. His clients belonged chiefly to the British aristocracy, and later he became estates manager to the Duke of Westminster...
and Fernand Billery in 1910 and 1911; the architects gave the house a "Beaux-Arts" style portland stone
Portland stone
Portland stone is a limestone from the Tithonian stage of the Jurassic period quarried on the Isle of Portland, Dorset. The quarries consist of beds of white-grey limestone separated by chert beds. It has been used extensively as a building stone throughout the British Isles, notably in major...
façade and lavish interiors including 11 bedrooms and a large music room. Speyer also had a large country house built in 1908, in the fashionable Edwardian resort of Overstrand
Overstrand
Overstrand is a village on the north coast of Norfolk in England, two miles east of Cromer. It was once a modest fishing station, with all or part of the fishing station being known as Beck Hythe...
on the Norfolk
Norfolk
Norfolk is a low-lying county in the East of England. It has borders with Lincolnshire to the west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and Suffolk to the south. Its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea coast and to the north-west the county is bordered by The Wash. The county...
coast. The house was named "Sea Marge" (meaning land that borders the sea) and was designed in the Mock Tudor
Tudorbethan architecture
The Tudor Revival architecture of the 20th century , first manifested itself in domestic architecture beginning in the United Kingdom in the mid to late 19th century based on a revival of aspects of Tudor style. It later became an influence in some other countries, especially the British colonies...
style, surrounded by gardens. To decorate his homes, Speyer collected works of art, furniture and decorative items from across Europe. He also commissioned art works, including his wife's portrait, painted by John Singer Sargent
John Singer Sargent
John Singer Sargent was an American artist, considered the "leading portrait painter of his generation" for his evocations of Edwardian era luxury. During his career, he created roughly 900 oil paintings and more than 2,000 watercolors, as well as countless sketches and charcoal drawings...
in 1907, and his own portrait, painted by William Orpen
William Orpen
Major Sir William Newenham Montague Orpen, KBE, RA, RHA was an Irish portrait painter, who worked mainly in London...
, which was exhibited at the Royal Academy
Royal Academy
The Royal Academy of Arts is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly, London. The Royal Academy of Arts has a unique position in being an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects whose purpose is to promote the creation, enjoyment and...
in 1914.
Edvard Grieg
Edvard Hagerup Grieg was a Norwegian composer and pianist. He is best known for his Piano Concerto in A minor, for his incidental music to Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt , and for his collection of piano miniatures Lyric Pieces.-Biography:Edvard Hagerup Grieg was born in...
, Richard Strauss, Claude Debussy and Percy Grainger
Percy Grainger
George Percy Aldridge Grainger , known as Percy Grainger, was an Australian-born composer, arranger and pianist. In the course of a long and innovative career he played a prominent role in the revival of interest in British folk music in the early years of the 20th century. He also made many...
, and with the German cellist and composer Hugo Becker
Hugo Becker
for french actor see Hugo BeckerHugo Becker was a prominent German cellist, cello teacher, and composer. He studied at a young age with Alfredo Piatti, and later Friedrich Grützmacher in Dresden.He was born in 1863 in Strasbourg; his father Jean Becker was a famous violinist...
. Speyer owned violins by Stradivarius
Stradivarius
The name Stradivarius is associated with violins built by members of the Stradivari family, particularly Antonio Stradivari. According to their reputation, the quality of their sound has defied attempts to explain or reproduce, though this belief is controversial...
and Giuseppe Guarneri
Giuseppe Guarneri
Bartolomeo Giuseppe Antonio Guarneri, del Gesù was an Italian luthier from the Guarneri house of Cremona. He rivals Antonio Stradivari with regard to the respect and reverence accorded his instruments, and he has been called the finest violin maker of the Amati line...
, used by his wife in public and private performances. He was chairman of the Classical Concert Society until 1912 and (following financial problems experienced by Robert Newman
Robert Newman (impresario)
Robert Newman was an English businessman and musical impresario. He is most celebrated as the founder of the series of classical music concerts that are now known as The Proms....
) held the position of chairman of the Queen's Hall Concert board
Queen's Hall
The Queen's Hall was a concert hall in Langham Place, London, opened in 1893. Designed by the architect T.E. Knightley, it had room for an audience of about 2,500 people. It became London's principal concert venue. From 1895 until 1941, it was the home of the promenade concerts founded by Robert...
from 1902 to 1914, paying £2,000 per year (£ today) to underwrite the Promenade Concerts. Speyer increased rehearsal time for the Queen's Hall Orchestra and was involved in the challenge to the deputy system then operating, stopping musicians from sending under-prepared substitutes to perform in their places. He was described by Bird as "the sole monetary force which kept the Queen's Hall Orchestra afloat". Speyer's control of the Queen's Hall enabled him to attract musicians and composers to perform modern new works at his concerts including Strauss, whom he brought to London to conduct the first English performance of A Hero's Life, and Arnold Schoenberg
Arnold Schoenberg
Arnold Schoenberg was an Austrian composer, associated with the expressionist movement in German poetry and art, and leader of the Second Viennese School...
, whose Five Orchestral Pieces
Five Pieces for Orchestra
The Five Pieces for Orchestra Op. 16 was composed by Arnold Schoenberg in 1909. The titles of the pieces, reluctantly added by the composer after the work's completion upon the request of his publisher, are as follows:...
received its première in 1912. Becker dedicated Three Pieces for Cello with Piano Accompaniment to Speyer in recognition of their friendship, and Strauss dedicated his opera Salome
Salome (opera)
Salome is an opera in one act by Richard Strauss to a German libretto by the composer, based on Hedwig Lachmann’s German translation of the French play Salomé by Oscar Wilde. Strauss dedicated the opera to his friend Sir Edgar Speyer....
to him.
Speyer also contributed £2,500 to the foundation of Whitechapel Art Gallery where he was a trustee for 15 years. He was chairman of the Nervous Diseases Research Fund, president of Poplar Hospital, and sat on the board of the King Edward's Hospital Fund
King's Fund
The King's Fund is a charitable foundation in England. Founded as the Prince of Wales Hospital Fund for London in 1897, the fund changed its name in 1902 to King Edward's Hospital Fund after the accession to the throne of King Edward VII...
, to which he donated £25,000 in 1902 (£ today). In December 1904, having read of the loss in a newspaper article, Speyer donated £5,700 to replace all of the funds lost by investors in the failure of a penny savings bank
Savings bank
A savings bank is a financial institution whose primary purpose is accepting savings deposits. It may also perform some other functions.In Europe, savings banks originated in the 19th or sometimes even the 18th century. Their original objective was to provide easily accessible savings products to...
at Needham Market
Needham Market
Needham Market is a town in Suffolk, England. It initially grew around the wool combing industry, until the onset of the plague, which swept the town from 1663 to 1665. To prevent the spread of the disease, the town was chained at either end, which succeeded in its task but at the cost of...
, Suffolk
Suffolk
Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...
. From 1909, Speyer was honorary treasurer of the fund raised to finance Robert Falcon Scott
Robert Falcon Scott
Captain Robert Falcon Scott, CVO was a Royal Navy officer and explorer who led two expeditions to the Antarctic regions: the Discovery Expedition, 1901–04, and the ill-fated Terra Nova Expedition, 1910–13...
's 1910 British Antarctic Expedition
Terra Nova Expedition
The Terra Nova Expedition , officially the British Antarctic Expedition 1910, was led by Robert Falcon Scott with the objective of being the first to reach the geographical South Pole. Scott and four companions attained the pole on 17 January 1912, to find that a Norwegian team led by Roald...
to which he donated £1,000 of the £40,000 that was required. Speyer was prepared to take personal responsibility for a share of the liabilities of the expedition, although the money raised from public donations was sufficient.
Mount Speyer (78°52′00″S, 160°42′00″E) in Antarctica is named in his honour. One of Scott's last letters was written to Speyer. It was found when Scott's body was recovered from his last camp after his unsuccessful return from the South Pole.
On 14 July 1906, Speyer was created a baronet
Baronet
A baronet or the rare female equivalent, a baronetess , is the holder of a hereditary baronetcy awarded by the British Crown...
. Politically, Speyer was a Liberal
Liberal Party (UK)
The Liberal Party was one of the two major political parties of the United Kingdom during the 19th and early 20th centuries. It was a third party of negligible importance throughout the latter half of the 20th Century, before merging with the Social Democratic Party in 1988 to form the present day...
. He was a member of the Reform Club
Reform Club
The Reform Club is a gentlemen's club on the south side of Pall Mall, in central London. Originally for men only, it changed to include the admission of women in 1981. In 2011 the subscription for membership of the Reform Club as a full UK member is £1,344.00, with a one-off entrance fee of £875.00...
, and a friend of H. H. Asquith
H. H. Asquith
Herbert Henry Asquith, 1st Earl of Oxford and Asquith, KG, PC, KC served as the Liberal Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1908 to 1916...
, by whose recommendation he was made a Privy Counsellor (PC) in 1909. In 1911, he was awarded the Order of the Crown
Order of the Crown (Prussia)
The Order of the Crown was Prussia's lowest ranking order of chivalry. Instituted in 1861 as an award equal in rank to the Order of the Red Eagle, it could only be awarded to commissioned officers , but there was a medal associated with the order which could be earned by non-commissioned officers...
, 2nd class by Kaiser Wilhelm II.
Anti-German pressure
National Review (London)
The National Review was founded in 1883 by the English writers Alfred Austin and William Courthope.It was launched as a platform for the views of the British Conservative Party, its masthead incorporating a quotation of the former Conservative Prime Minister, Benjamin Disraeli:Under editor Leopold...
and in novels such as Erskine Childers'
Robert Erskine Childers
Robert Erskine Childers DSC , universally known as Erskine Childers, was the author of the influential novel Riddle of the Sands and an Irish nationalist who smuggled guns to Ireland in his sailing yacht Asgard. He was executed by the authorities of the nascent Irish Free State during the Irish...
The Riddle of the Sands
The Riddle of the Sands
The Riddle of the Sands: A Record of Secret Service is a 1903 novel by Erskine Childers. It is an early example of the espionage novel, with a strong underlying theme of militarism...
and invasion novels
Invasion literature
Invasion literature was a historical literary genre most notable between 1871 and the First World War . The genre first became recognizable starting in Britain in 1871 with The Battle of Dorking, a fictional account of an invasion of England by Germany...
such as William Le Queux
William Le Queux
William Tufnell Le Queux was an Anglo-French journalist and writer. He was also a diplomat , a traveller , a flying buff who officiated at the first British air meeting at Doncaster in 1909, and a wireless pioneer who broadcast music from his own station long...
's The Invasion of 1910
The Invasion of 1910
The Invasion of 1910 is a 1906 novel written mainly by William Le Queux . It is one of the more famous examples of Invasion literature and is an example of pre-World War I Germanophobia, as it preached the need to prepare for war with Germany.-Background:The novel was originally commissioned by...
.
Following the British declaration of war with Germany on 4 August 1914, Speyer resigned as a partner of the Frankfurt branch of the bank. After a Royal Proclamation on 11 September 1914 requiring British subjects to have no links with companies doing business with Germany, Speyer resigned as a partner of the American bank. Nonetheless, suspicions regarding Speyer's German parentage led to a hate campaign against him. Crowds gathered outside his home and jeered visitors. Accusations of his disloyalty and treachery appeared in the Press, and he was accused of signalling to German submarines from his Norfolk house. Lady Speyer was ostracised from societies and associations of which she had formerly been a member. Speyer was asked to resign from the board of the Poplar Hospital due to threats of substantial reductions in donations if he remained. The couple was asked to remove their children from school as other parents were threatening to remove theirs.
Speyer ignored a call to write one of the "loyalty letters" that Sir Arthur Pinero
Arthur Wing Pinero
Sir Arthur Wing Pinero was an English actor and later an important dramatist and stage director.-Biography:...
proposed be provided by prominent naturalised citizens of German origin. Instead, on 17 May 1915, Speyer wrote to Asquith, then Prime Minister, asking him to accept his resignation as a Privy Counsellor and to revoke his baronetcy, stating:
Nothing is harder to bear than a sense of injustice that finds no vent in expression.
For the last nine months I have kept silence and treated with disdain the charges of disloyalty and suggestions of treachery made against me in the Press and elsewhere. But I can keep silence no longer, for these charges and suggestion have now been repeated by public men who have not scrupled to use their position to inflame the overstrained feelings of the people.
I am not a man who can be driven or drummed by threats or abuse into an attitude of justification. But I consider it due to my honour as a loyal British subject and my personal dignity as a man to retire all my public positions.
I therefore write to ask you to accept my resignation as a Privy Councillor and to revoke my baronetcy.
He resigned as chairman of the UERL and from the boards of the King Edward's Hospital Fund, the Poplar Hospital and the Whitechapel Art Gallery.
It is doubtful whether it was possible for Speyer to resign from the Privy Council or as a baronet, there being no normal mechanism to do so, but the Prime Minister's response was supportive: "I have known you long, and well enough to estimate at their true value these baseless and malignant imputations upon your loyalty to the British Crown. The King is not prepared to take any step such as you suggest in regard to the marks of distinction which you have received in recognition of public services and philanthropic munificence." On 26 May 1915, Speyer and his family left for America.
In June 1915, Sir George Makgill
George Makgill
Sir George Makgill, 11th Baronet was a Scottish novelist and right-wing propagandist.George Makgill was the son of Captain John Makgill and Margaret Isabella Haldane, sister of Lord Haldane. Educated privately, Makgill lived for several years in New Zealand where his father had a station at Waiuku...
, Secretary of the Anti-German Union
British Empire Union
The British Empire Union was created in the United Kingdom during World War I, in 1916, after changing its name from the Anti-German Union, which had been founded in 1915...
, applied for permission from the High Court to issue quo warranto
Quo warranto
Quo warranto is a prerogative writ requiring the person to whom it is directed to show what authority they have for exercising some right or power they claim to hold.-History:...
writ
Writ
In common law, a writ is a formal written order issued by a body with administrative or judicial jurisdiction; in modern usage, this body is generally a court...
s against Speyer and Sir Ernest Cassel
Ernest Cassel
Sir Ernest Joseph Cassel, GCB, GCMG, GCVO, PC was a German-born British merchant banker and capitalist.-Biography:...
, a German-born Privy Counsellor, requiring them to prove their right to hold that position. Makgill's claim was that the Act of Settlement 1701
Act of Settlement 1701
The Act of Settlement is an act of the Parliament of England that was passed in 1701 to settle the succession to the English throne on the Electress Sophia of Hanover and her Protestant heirs. The act was later extended to Scotland, as a result of the Treaty of Union , enacted in the Acts of Union...
prevented a person born outside Britain or its dominion
Dominion
A dominion, often Dominion, refers to one of a group of autonomous polities that were nominally under British sovereignty, constituting the British Empire and British Commonwealth, beginning in the latter part of the 19th century. They have included Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Newfoundland,...
s from being a Privy Counsellor. In December 1915, Lord Chief Justice Lord Reading
Rufus Isaacs, 1st Marquess of Reading
Rufus Isaacs, 1st Marquess of Reading, GCB, GCSI, GCIE, GCVO, PC, KC , was an English lawyer, jurist and politician...
rejected the application on the grounds that the relevant sections of the Act of Settlement had been repealed by later legislation.
Revocation of naturalisation
On 2 August 1918, in a House of Lords debate on the Denaturalisation Bill, the subject of Speyer's membership of the Privy Council was brought up by Lord LincolnshireRobert Wynn Carrington, 1st Marquess of Lincolnshire
Charles Robert Wynn-Carrington, 1st Marquess of Lincolnshire KG, GCMG, PC, DL, JP , known as the Lord Carrington from 1868 to 1895 and as the Earl Carrington from 1895 to 1912, was a British Liberal politician and aristocrat.-Background and education:Born at Whitehall, London, Lincolnshire was the...
, who condemned "the brutal and insolent German manner in which Sir Edgar Speyer had resigned his dignity". Lord Curzon
George Curzon, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston
George Nathaniel Curzon, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston, KG, GCSI, GCIE, PC , known as The Lord Curzon of Kedleston between 1898 and 1911 and as The Earl Curzon of Kedleston between 1911 and 1921, was a British Conservative statesman who was Viceroy of India and Foreign Secretary...
announced that the Home Office was examining his membership of the council. Speyer again offered the Prime Minister, then David Lloyd George
David Lloyd George
David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor OM, PC was a British Liberal politician and statesman...
, his resignation from the council, but received no response.
Following an investigation into Speyer's wartime conduct held in camera
In camera
In camera is a legal term meaning "in private". It is also sometimes termed in chambers or in curia.In camera describes court cases that the public and press are not admitted to...
by the Home Office's Certificates of Naturalisation (Revocation) Committee, Speyer's naturalisation was revoked by an order dated 1 December 1921. On 13 December 1921 an order was issued by King George V
George V of the United Kingdom
George V was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 through the First World War until his death in 1936....
for Speyer to be struck off the list of the Privy Council. The next person to be struck off the list was Elliot Morley
Elliot Morley
Elliot Anthony Morley is a former Labour Party politician, who was the Member of Parliament for Glanford and Scunthorpe from 1987 to 1997 and then Scunthorpe from 1997 to 2010. In 2009, he was accused by The Daily Telegraph of continuing to claim parliamentary expenses for a mortgage that had...
in 2011, though others resigned in the intervening period.
The committee decided that Speyer had "shown himself by act and speech to be disaffected and disloyal to His Majesty; and [had]... unlawfully communicated with subjects of an enemy State and associated with a business which was to his knowledge carried on in such manner as to assist the enemy in such war." The committee's final opinion was "that the continuance of Sir Edgar Speyer's certificate is not conducive to the public good." Lady Speyer and the couple's children also lost their British nationality.
The report of the committee was published on 7 January 1922. The committee had considered nine issues in making its decision:
- Retirement from Speyer & Co. – it was decided that Speyer had been slow and reluctant to resign as a partner of the American bank of which he was still in partnership with his German brother-in-law, Edward Beit von Speyer.
- Association with enemy traffic – Speyer Brothers had continued to trade jointly with a Dutch firm, Teixeira de Mattos Brothers, between February and June 1915. As they were based in a neutral country, Teixeira had continued to trade with German businesses. The committee calculated that Speyer Brothers had made £1,000 by these trades, despite an inspection of the company's accounts showing no trade with Germany. It concluded that "Sir Edgar Speyer seems to have preferred his private financial interests to the prompt discharge of his duty to the State."
- Communication with enemy subjects – Speyer had continued to correspond with his German brother-in-law throughout the war.
- Evasion of the censorship – in his correspondence with his brother-in-law, Speyer had used various means including aliases and intermediaries to avoid the censor inspecting his letters.
- Proposed return to Berlin – the contents of intercepted letters from Edward Beit von Speyer suggested that Speyer had proposed living in Germany after the war. Speyer denied this and stated that the meaning of the letters had been misconstrued in the absence of his side of the correspondence being before the committee.
- Association with Muck – while living in America Speyer had become friendly with Karl MuckKarl MuckKarl Muck was a German-born conductor of classical music. He based his activities principally in Europe and mostly in opera. His American career comprised two stints at the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He endured a public outcry in 1917 that questioned whether his loyalties lay with Germany or the...
, the German conductor of the Boston Symphony OrchestraBoston Symphony OrchestraThe Boston Symphony Orchestra is an orchestra based in Boston, Massachusetts. It is one of the five American orchestras commonly referred to as the "Big Five". Founded in 1881, the BSO plays most of its concerts at Boston's Symphony Hall and in the summer performs at the Tanglewood Music Center...
, who remained strongly pro-German even after the United States entered the war. Unknown to Speyer, who stated that their friendship was based on a shared love of music, Muck was suspected of being a German agent. - Association with Koren – in America, Speyer was friendly with John Koren, an American statistician who represented the United States on the International Prisons Commission. In 1916, Speyer had funded a fact-finding trip by Koren to Europe, during which Koren visited Germany and met Speyer's sister and friends. Although the committee considered the trip strange, they drew no inference of disloyalty from the events.
- The Boston Journal – in April 1917, on the advice of John Koren, Speyer had provided a loan to The Boston JournalThe Boston JournalThe Boston Journal was a daily newspaper published in Boston, Massachusetts from 1833 until October 1917 when it was merged with the Boston Herald....
newspaper to prevent it from going out of business. The newspaper had printed some articles of a pro-German nature and the committee thought it imprudent but not disloyal of Speyer to have lent the money. - Paying money to enemy subjects – some of Speyer's friends had made claims at the Frankfurt bank for payment of sums due to them that were in the hands of Speyer in London. Speyer had authorised the payments, although this was not allowed by the wartime regulations. The committee commented that in similar circumstances it had shown leniency to others doing the same thing, and would not have attached great importance to the matter if it had stood alone.
On 7 January 1922, Speyer's partners published a letter supporting Speyer and rejecting the implications of his correspondence with his German relatives, stating that he was "incapable of any act of treachery against the country of his adoption". Two days later, Speyer also issued a statement responding to the report and rebutting the committee's interpretation of the facts. He stated that he had been advised of the committee's investigation in 1919 and, after considerable delay by the Home Office, had persuaded it to carry out an investigation in America into allegations made against his conduct there. These investigations, he stated, had demonstrated that the allegations were false, but, after he returned to Britain for the formal hearing in 1921, a further series of allegations were presented regarding his business transactions. Speyer stated that the issues involved were of a trivial nature and were similar to those encountered by other British banks which had traded without censure. He stated that "the whole thing is neither more nor less than the culmination of years of political persecution. The Home Secretary simply dared not give me the vindication to which I was entitled." He challenged the government to publish the evidence presented, and "to point to a strip of material evidence that would induce any fairminded man to support the monstrous conclusions of this report".
Final years
Reservation price
In microeconomics, the reservation price is the highest price a buyer is willing to pay for goods or a service; or; the smallest price at which a seller is willing to sell a good or service...
at auction. On 1 April 1922, Speyer and his remaining partner in the London bank dissolved
Dissolution (law)
In law, dissolution has multiple meanings.Dissolution is the last stage of liquidation, the process by which a company is brought to an end, and the assets and property of the company redistributed....
Speyer Brothers. The Grosvenor Street house was eventually sold in early 1923 and became the American Women's club. Speyer rejoined the surviving American and German branches of the family bank and continued to live in New York. In 1929, he lived in Washington Square. He died on 16 February 1932 in Berlin, after having travelled there for an operation on his nose. He had continued to hold his baronetcy, although it became extinct with his death as he had no male heirs.
After his death, Speyer's UK estate was assessed at £3,362 19s 1d and his US estate at $245,287, approximately £ and $ today.
Legacy
Speyer's two principal legacies are the three deep-level tube lines of the London Underground, and the Promenade Concerts. The former might not have been built without the finance he raised with Yerkes, and would have struggled without his chairmanship. The latter may have failed in the early 20th century without his financial support. The tube lines now form the central sections of the Underground's NorthernNorthern Line
The Northern line is a London Underground line. It is coloured black on the Tube map.For most of its length it is a deep-level tube line. The line carries 206,734,000 passengers per year. This is the highest number of any line on the London Underground system, but the Northern line is unique in...
, Piccadilly
Piccadilly Line
The Piccadilly line is a line of the London Underground, coloured dark blue on the Tube map. It is the fifth busiest line on the Underground network judged by the number of passengers transported per year. It is mainly a deep-level line, running from the north to the west of London via Zone 1, with...
and Bakerloo
Bakerloo Line
The Bakerloo line is a line of the London Underground, coloured brown on the Tube map. It runs partly on the surface and partly at deep level, from Elephant and Castle in the south-east to Harrow & Wealdstone in the north-west of London. The line serves 25 stations, of which 15 are underground...
lines. After Speyer's funding of the Promenade Concerts ended, they were taken over by music publishers Chappell & Co.
Chappell & Co.
Chappell & Co. was an English company that published music and manufactured pianos.-History:It was founded in 1810 by Samuel Chappell in partnership with music professors Francis Tatton Latour and Johann Baptist Cramer. Cramer was also a well-known London composer, teacher and pianist...
and, in 1927, by the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
. The characters of Sir Hermann and Lady Aline Gurtner in E F Benson
Edward Frederic Benson
Edward Frederic Benson was an English novelist, biographer, memoirist and short story writer, known professionally as E.F. Benson. His friends called him Fred.-Life:E.F...
's 1919 novel Robin Linnet were based on Sir Edgar and Lady Leonora. Leanne Langley suggests that the character of Appleton, a villainous stockbroker, in John Buchan's The Thirty-Nine Steps
The Thirty-nine Steps
The Thirty-Nine Steps is an adventure novel by the Scottish author John Buchan. It first appeared as a serial in Blackwood's Magazine in August and September 1915 before being published in book form in October that year by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh...
may have been based on Speyer.
After the American Women's club moved out, his London home served as the Japanese Embassy for some years and is now the offices of stockbrokers Killik & Co. It is a Grade II* listed building. The Norfolk house was sold after his death and became a hotel and, for a period, a nursing home. It is currently operated as a hotel and is listed Grade II. After the Speyers returned to America, Lady Leonora began writing poetry and won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
The Pulitzer Prize in Poetry has been presented since 1922 for a distinguished volume of original verse by an American author. However, special citations for poetry were presented in 1918 and 1919.-Winners:...
in 1927. She died in 1956.