CHAPTER VIII — MAGNIFICENT BROTHERS (1880-1901)

 

‘Whenever I want to know an historic fact,’ said Disraeli, ‘I always ask Natty.’ Dark, bearded, forty-year-old Nathaniel Mayer headed the new triumvirate of English brothers who ushered in the 1880s. Although Natty lacked the soaring intelligence of his rough, unsociable grandfather, he had a strong personality and the authoritative air of a man who is not accustomed to being contradicted.

It was fitting that this Rothschild, whose self-confidence seemed to symbolize the impregnability of Victorian England, should have become the first Jewish peer. The sparkling personality of Queen Victoria’s dear departed and much mourned Prime Minister, Mr Disraeli, had modified the Royal view about Jews and peerages: and when Mr Gladstone gave another gentle prod Her Majesty assented. In 1885 Nathaniel Mayer placed his hand on the Old Testament and repeated the oath, head covered, then took his seat in the House of Lords.

Jews all over the world were thrilled at what they regarded as a triumph over prejudice, a step towards social equality. Yet when onlookers saw the portly frame of Lord Rothschild emerging from his brougham at New Court, social equality was not the first phrase that sprang to mind. ‘King of the Jews’ seemed more apt a description. Indeed, a story went the rounds that a Polish Jewish immigrant, who was spending the Day of Atonement at an East End synagogue, suddenly heard someone whisper: ‘The Lord has come!’ He prostrated himself before the Messiah: then saw the famous top hat of Lord Rothschild.

Natty shared the Partners’ Room at New Court with his two brothers, blond, aesthetic Alfred and gentle, sports-loving Leo. But only the most important people in the land were ushered into the triple presence, for here callers were expected to relax and chat and have a glass of wine. Lesser mortals were shown into an ante-room and sometimes terrorized by a visit from Lord Rothschild himself, always watch in hand.

By the 1880s the Rothschilds had become an institution and people looked upon their idiosyncrasies as an integral part of the Victorian landscape. Richer than any family before them, they were famous for their huge, over-furnished houses glowering in red damask and silk against an intimidating background of heavily carved mahogany. They were also famous for living in clusters. Not only did they rub shoulders in the Vale of Aylesbury, but in London they reconstructed a fairy-tale version of the Frankfurt ghetto. They owned four houses on Piccadilly, another three ‘a diamond’s throw away’. Natty lived at 148 Piccadilly, Hannah Rosebery at 107, Ferdinand at 143, his sister, Alice, at 142. Around the corner Anthony’s widow, Louise, lived at 19 Grosvenor Gate, Leo at 5 Hamilton Place and Alfred at 1 Seamore Place.

Rothschilds were also famous for employing the best cooks and serving the best wine; for their adherence to the Jewish faith; their racehorses; their mania for collecting objets d’art; and their clannishness when it came to marriage. Sons-in-law who did not bear the Rothschild name were still excluded from the Partners’ Rooms of the family banks.

It was thought that Natty had done the right thing by marrying Emma Louise, daughter of Frankfurt’s Mayer Carl. Not only was Emma Louise the product of two Rothschilds but so was Natty himself, son of Lionel of London and Charlotte of Naples. The relationships were all nicely confused with Emma Louise’s mother a sister of Natty’s father, and Emma Louise’s father a brother of Natty’s mother.

Alfred and Leo, Natty’s younger brothers, were more original. Alfred declined to marry at all, remaining throughout his life England’s most eligible bachelor, while Leo found himself a beautiful Italian Jewess, Maria Perugia, a sister of Mrs Arthur Sassoon. The wedding took place in 1881 with the Prince of Wales fighting his way through a blizzard to reach the Central Synagogue on Great Portland Street. Apparently it was the first time that a member of the Royal family had attended a Jewish service and the Prince not only signed the register but afterwards asked to be shown one of the Scrolls of the Law, used for reading lessons, complete with ornamental appurtenances. Of course Mr Disraeli was present at the reception. He had not missed a Rothschild wedding for years. But perhaps on this occasion he had some premonition that his death was not far off, for he wrote a nostalgic letter to Leo, indelicate, some people thought, because he referred to the probable consequences of the union by declaring: ‘In my opinion there cannot be too many Rothschilds.’

The first Lord Rothschild lived at 148 Piccadilly and Tring Park, both of which he had inherited from his father. At weekends he entertained important people, and occasionally the children of his friends. ‘We have a very interesting party here,’ wrote the twenty-one-year-old Winston Churchill to his mother from Tring in 1896. ‘Mr. and Mrs. Asquith — Mr. Balfour, the Recorder and Mr. Underdown who has great railway interests in Cuba, several ladies — ugly and dull — Hubert Howard and myself. Lord Rothschild is in excellent spirits and very interesting and full of information. Altogether, as you may imagine, I appreciate meeting such clever people and listening to their conversation very much indeed …’[100]

Natty was brusque and humourless and did not suffer fools gladly. He never hesitated to contradict anyone whom he thought was talking nonsense, and some people bracketed him with Lord Randolph Churchill and Sir Michael Hicks-Beach as one of the three rudest men in England. He had an explosive temper, and, although he was immensely generous, resented guests who ‘took advantage’ of him. When Lady Figall, for instance, plucked one of his famous musk roses without asking, he upbraided her in front of the entire dinner table. Although he tried to make amends by placing an enormous bouquet of roses in her carriage when she left, she did not return to Tring in a hurry. But perhaps she was not asked.

Natty’s bluntness was always to the point. When people suggested that he must have a secret formula for making money he invariably replied: ‘Yes. By selling too soon.’ This was no idle rejoinder, for extreme caution was the guide-line of his life. Occasionally he reminded people of his grandfather’s observation that although it took a great deal of wit to make money it took twice as much to keep it.

Lord Rothschild not only kept it but increased it by the simple expedient of reducing the bank’s activity to a near standstill. He did not search for new business, only safe investments. Frank Harris, the writer, tells how he ran into Lord Rothschild in a restaurant, dining with his university friend, Sir Charles Dilke. Harris had just come from Lord Revelstoke, the head of Barings, who had held his guests spell-bound by recounting how his bank had netted a cool million pounds by floating Guinness Breweries as a limited liability company. Harris repeated the story and asked Lord Rothschild what he thought of such a tremendous deal. ‘The Guinness promotion was offered to us first but we refused it,’ the latter replied. ‘That must cause you some regret,’ exclaimed Harris. ‘… Even Rothschilds must think a million worth putting into their pockets.’ ‘I don’t look at it that way,’ retorted Lord Rothschild. ‘I go to the bank every morning and when I say “no” I return home at night without a worry. But when I say “yes” it’s like putting your finger into a machine — the whirring wheels may drag your whole body in after the finger.’[101]

Lord Rothschild’s point was duly emphasized when ugly rumours began to sweep the City that Barings had over-extended itself in promoting the Argentine ‘boom’. Lord Revelstoke had flung restraint to the winds and, without consulting his partners, had pledged millions of the firm’s money to mushroom developments.

His final investment was £10,000,000 for a port, which money he hoped to raise by public subscription. But the bonds were not sold and in November 1890 Lidderdale, the Governor of the Bank of England, was informed that Barings had reached the end of its resources. Lord Goshen, who visited the Bank on 10 November, wrote in his diary that he found Lidderdale ‘in a dreadful state of anxiety’. Four days later a broker burst into the Governor’s room unannounced. ‘Can’t you do something or say something to relieve people’s minds: they have made up their minds that something awful is up and they are talking of the very highest names,’ — he leaned forward, his eyes staring, ‘the very highest.’[102]

The public was oblivious to the crisis, and hummed the catchy tune from Gilbert and Sullivan’s Iolanthe:

The shares were a penny And ever so many

Were taken by Rothschild and Baring.

On this occasion the names of Rothschild and Baring were bracketed together behind closed doors in a very different context. The Chancellor of the Exchequer sent for the Governor of the Bank of England and the two men finally decided to pass the hat around the City. The key figure was Lord Rothschild, as other bankers would follow his lead. Would Rothschild rescue Baring? Or did the family memory stretch back to the days after Waterloo when Baring had prevented Rothschild from taking part in the great French loan? 

Natty may not have forgotten, but he forgave. He headed an emergency committee to raise the necessary money and not only donated £500,000 himself but, through his cousins in Paris, persuaded the Bank of France to put up £3,000,000. Gold from Russia, a payment from the Bank of England, subscriptions from a dozen merchant banks, and the total amount came to £17,000,000, enough to prevent a crisis. ‘When you thank the Bank of England,’ said the Governor, a few weeks later, ‘it is very important to bear in mind the willing and cheerful aid that we have received from others, in the first place from Lord Rothschild, whose influence with the Bank of France was of such assistance to us … [in rendering] … the aid we were enabled to give.’[103]

The very fact that Natty was renowned for his caution meant that on the comparatively rare occasions when his firm launched an enterprise the issue was apt to be over-subscribed. Indeed, in 1889, when Rothschilds offered the public shares in Burma Ruby Mines there was such a crowd in St Swithin’s Lane that His Lordship’s carriage could not enter. His driver and footman got out, and tried to clear a path for His Lordship on foot but the crush was so great there was no hope of reaching a door. Finally a ladder was lowered from the first floor and Lord Rothschild, complete with top hat and cane, climbed into the bank through a window. After that the firm lapsed into its customary inactivity.

But the first Lord Rothschild was not cautious when it came to spending money. Each year N. M. Rothschild & Sons headed the list of donors to charity, and legion were the hospitals and schools and museums that benefited. Natty’s gifts were far from perfunctory. This rather aloof, awesome man had a deep sympathy for ordinary men and women. He derived pleasure from giving pleasure, and if he was looked upon as a public figure, it was because he served the public in a very direct way.

For instance, he not only presented the Metropolitan Police with a handsome cheque every Christmas but made it known that a hungry policeman could always get a four-course meal at 148 Piccadilly. Through the years hundreds of bobbies, particularly those on night duty, availed themselves of Rothschild hospitality. As a result Rothschild carriages, with their dark blue hoods and thin yellow line around the body, always were given right of way. And so was the pet goat belonging to ‘Mr Alfred’, who lived at Seamore Place; this disdainful animal roamed Piccadilly at will, quite indifferent to carriages and motor cars, and quite oblivious of the astonishment of passers-by.

If the police benefited from Rothschild largesse, the employees at New Court frequently doubled their basic salaries by annual bonuses known as ‘touchings’. The Partners seemed to revel in giving presents, not only at Christmas and birthdays but for silver weddings and long years of service, which were recognized by the equivalent number of sovereigns. Occasionally members of the senior staff were given boxes of cigars, sent to London by the French bank. ‘“What do you think of these cigars?” one of the New Court employees asked another. “Just right.” “How do you mean ‘just right’?” “If they were any better Paris would not have sent them; any worse and we would not have smoked them. Just right.”’[104]

The three brothers sat behind three desks in the same thickly carpeted, richly ornamented office, known reverently as ‘The Room’. The panelled walls were hung with ancestral portraits and framed curiosities, including a receipt for the £2,000,000 paid to Wellington’s army. The upper half of the door leading into the room from executive quarters was made of glass. When a senior Rothschild employee wished to see a partner he never knocked. He just stood silently outside the door waiting to be summoned; and sometimes he waited for a long time. One head of department estimated that he spent nearly a year of his life waiting outside the door.

Despite the fact that the three brothers shared the breath-taking inner sanctum, Natty was the only bona-fide banker. Indeed, the brothers seemed to reflect perfectly the Rothschild muses. Natty stood for finance, Alfred for the arts, Leo for sport.

Leo had no intellectual pretensions but was famous for his kindness. He lived at 5 Hamilton Place, now a club, Les Ambassadeurs; at Gunnersbury Park, inherited from his father; at Ascott, inherited from his uncle; and at Newmarket in a house which he bought himself. Like his Uncle Mayer, he had a passion for breeding and racing, and Newmarket became his spiritual home.

In 1896 his celebrated horse, St Frusquin, put him at the top of winning owners with £46,766 to his credit. But although this champion was a favourite for the Derby it was beaten by a neck by the Prince of Wales’s Persimmon. Some people insisted that this was a glaring example of Leo’s generosity. Whatever the explanation, Mrs Leo maintained an unflagging pride in St Frusquin, commissioning Fabergé, the Russian court jeweller, to cast a model of the horse in silver, which she gave to her husband as a birthday present.

Leo’s happiest moment was his election to the Jockey Club in 1891. But, ironically enough, his greatest claim to fame was not the speed of his horses but the speed of his motor cars. He was one of the first men to buy an automobile and chafed at a speed limit fixed at fourteen miles per hour; he badgered everyone in authority until he got the limit increased to twenty miles in 1902. Two years later he was instrumental in forming an Automobile Association which, when it received Edward VII’s blessing in 1907, changed its name to the Royal Automobile Club.

Although ‘Mr Leo’ usually deferred to his elder brothers on matters of finance, at New Court he was the most loved of the partners. A Rothschild employee, Ronald Palin, wrote:

… he devoted himself to the welfare of the clerks, not so much as a duty or in a spirit of noblesse oblige as because it was his character to do so … One man suffering from a chest complaint was sent by Leopold to Australia for six months; another, distraught by the death of his wife, was given a trip by sea around the world.[105]

The devotion to Leopold was such that after he had been unwell the clerks gathered at the window of the bank to watch his arrival and to gauge his health. ‘Ah, the darling, I think he is looking a little better today,’ exclaimed one. Another contemporary composed a ditty which no one thought in the least extravagant: Of men like you

Earth holds but few

An angelwith

A revenue

The consternation can be imagined when an attempt was made upon his life as his car turned in at New Court. A demented Jewish student ran towards him pointing a revolver. A detective employed by the firm, Charles Berg, struck the youth’s hand, the bullet went wild and embedded itself in Berg’s neck. Luckily the wound was not fatal. Leopold offered Berg a pension for life but the latter preferred to stay with the firm as a courier.

*

Although Alfred yawned at the mention of horse-flesh and combustion engines he employed both forms of energy to transport his guests from station to country house and back again. The most magnificent of all the brothers, Alfred also was the most eccentric and the least Rothschild in appearance. With his slender frame, blue eyes, fair hair and exquisite side whiskers, he was the dilettante par excellence. He loved music, clothes, furniture, paintings, beautiful women and, above all, luxury. He never went to the office on Fridays; on this day an employee from the bank turned up at Seamore Place with Mr Alfred’s week-end spending money — £1000 in cash. At New Court he had a mink foot-warmer; and when his motor car met his country guests at the station it was always followed by a second car in order to eliminate the annoyance of a possible break-down.

He was regarded as the greatest expert on French eighteenth-century pictures in England; yet his eye failed him when it came to houses. He decided to emulate cousin Ferdinand and build a French chateau in Buckinghamshire; but whereas Ferdy’s Waddesdon Manor excited wonder, Alfred’s Halton House, near Wendover, created deep despair. ‘An exaggerated nightmare of gorgeousness and senseless and ill-applied magnificence,’ pronounced Algernon West. ‘I have seldom seen anything more terribly vulgar,’ wrote Eustace Balbour. ‘Outside it is a combination of a French château and a gambling house. Inside it is badly planned, gaudily decorated … O, but the hideousness of everything, the showiness! the sense of lavish wealth thrust up your nose! the coarse mouldings, the heavy gildings always in the wrong place, the colour of the silk hangings! Eye hath not seen nor pen can write the ghastly coarseness of the sight!’[106]

The hospitality was as lavish as the decoration — but no one complained of this. The nearest station was at Tring, some miles away. In order that he should be ready to receive his guests, Mr Alfred posted men at intervals along the road who signalled ahead with lanterns as the carriage progressed. When the visitors departed their broughams were packed with hot-house flowers and fruit, and delicacies of every kind. The only complaint of the guests was that they found it difficult to sleep at night due to the heavy tread of the night watchman employed to keep an eye on their host’s priceless treasures.

A story that has appeared in every book about the Rothschilds and has been attributed to each in turn was, in fact, first told by Prime Minister Asquith after a visit to Waddesdon. But it might just as easily have been Halton, for nowhere was Rothschild hospitality more thorough. It began as soon as the curtains were drawn in the morning. A powdered footman followed by an underling with a trolley would query politely: ‘Tea, coffee or a peach off the wall, Sir?’

‘Tea, please.’

‘China tea, Indian tea, or Ceylon tea, Sir?’

‘China, if you please.’

‘Lemon, milk or cream, Sir?’

‘Milk, please.’

‘Jersey, Hereford or Shorthorn, Sir?’[107]

Alfred gave a house-warming party in 1884 attended by the Prince of Wales and all the most fashionable people of the day. ‘He exhibited a number of Japanese dogs,’ wrote Lady Warwick, ‘which had been taught to perform. Great confusion was aroused by the fact, that, although the chief little dog performed, it was not according to the programme.’

Soon Halton had its own orchestra and the host an ivory baton banded by a circlet of diamonds which he used in his role as a conductor. He adored music and through the years induced such celebrities as Patti, Niccolini, Melba, Liszt and de Reszke to sing and play for him.

In the famous white drawing-room at Seamore Place [wrote Lady Warwick], I have heard the greatest artistes in the world, who were paid royal fees to entertain a handful of his friends. Unfortunately he [Alfred] could not share in the hospitality that he lavished upon those he esteemed, for he suffered from some obscure form of dyspepsia which no doctor could cure. Many a time I have seen him sit at the head of the table, exercising all the graces of a host, while he himself took neither food nor wine.

He used to ride every morning in the park, followed by his brougham. Park-keepers soon learnt how generous the millionaire was; they used to put stones on the road by which he would enter, then, when he came in sight, they would hasten to remove them — a courtesy which was invariably rewarded. He was shrewd enough to know just how the stones got there, but this childish device amused him, so he pretended ignorance.[108]

Alfred, of course, had a permanent box at Covent Garden but his enthusiasm was not confined to music. He took over the Gaiety Theatre when it was in financial trouble and ran it in partnership with Henry Tennant during its great years. As a result, of course, he met all the most beautiful actresses and was greatly envied by his men friends. Sometimes he arranged what he called ‘adoration’ dinners, inviting one particularly alluring star to dine alone with himself and three or four gentlemen. Before the evening was over he always drew his guest of honour aside, whispering: ‘What shall I give you, beautiful lady?’, and then presented her with a charming bibelot. However, this well-established routine was almost shattered when Mrs Langtry was the chief guest. When he asked: ‘And what shall I give you, beautiful lady?’ she picked up a priceless enamelled and be-diamonded Louis XVI snuff-box, the gem of a collection lying on a table, and said calmly, ‘Oh, this will do.’ ‘He had a weak heart,’ she wrote later, ‘and for a moment I thought I had stopped it. When he got his breath he promised me something much prettier and out came one of the well-known gift-boxes.’[109]

Some people thought that the aesthete went too far when he assembled ponies and dogs and hoops and produced his own circus. He bought a very long whip, adorned himself in a blue frock coat and lavender kid gloves and took over the role of ring master. However Alfred never allowed his idiosyncrasies to interfere with his banking life and turned up regularly, if tardily, at New Court. He adored grandeur and towards the end of his life the ceremony with which he was conveyed from his house in Mayfair to New Court was hardly excelled by the Royal family.

A policeman, seeing him leave, [wrote Ronald Palin] would signal to another at the end of the street and the word was passed along the route. Traffic was held up where necessary so that his progress should not be impeded and if there were an obstruction the driver would not hesitate to avoid it by passing islands on the wrong side.

At New Court the man at the gate, warned by telephone, was on the alert to spot either partner’s car as soon as it turned into St. Swithin’s Lane from Cannon Street and at his whistle all the six or seven couriers on duty lined up in the courtyard. At that time a fire engine manned by two men was stationed permanently in the yard and the firemen would fall in too. When the car drove in under the archway the firemen sprang to attention and saluted, and the couriers raised their bowler hats with almost military precision and one of them stepped forward to open the car door.[110]

Nevertheless Mr Alfred’s erratic working hours caused the staff uneasy moments. He usually arrived at New Court at 2 p.m., lunched between 3.30 and 4 p.m., and when his brothers departed at 5 o’clock curled up on the leather-covered sofa and took a nap. As the staff could not leave until all the letters were signed, and as the letters required the signature of a partner, and as the only partner was asleep, the problem seemed insoluble until an eye lit on Kelly’s Dictionary, a volume weighing a good ten pounds. The book was dropped outside the door of The Room, with a force that made the dust rise from the carpet and produced the desired result.

Alfred was not only a partner at New Court but a Director of the Bank of England, an appointment he had been given in 1868 because the Governor felt it would not be a bad thing to keep in close touch with the Rothschilds. The relationship came to an abrupt end in 1889, however, over a slightly unorthodox situation. Alfred had paid a very high price for a French eighteenth-century painting after being assured by the dealer that he, too, had been forced to pay an excessive sum for it and was making only a marginal profit. A day or two later Alfred discovered that the dealer had an account with the Bank of England. He could not resist taking a peep to see what, in fact, the man had given for the painting. He was outraged when he discovered that he had been charged a price ‘out of all proportion to decency!’ He spread the story about London and, not surprisingly, got the sack from Threadneedle Street.

*

If Alfred was the most extravagant Rothschild, cousin Ferdinand of Vienna, who had become a naturalized Englishman, was the most interesting. ‘He was a delicate man, all intellect,’ wrote Lady Warwick, ‘with unerring taste in art, and a princely conception of hospitality. I thought of him as a reincarnation of Lorenzo the Magnificent.’ When Natty became a peer ‘Ferdy’ took his place as MP for Aylesbury; and at his astonishing Waddesdon Manor, still the marvel of the age, entertained everyone from the Empress Frederick to the Shah of Persia. Of course he entertained in London as well; once, when he gave a ball at which both the Prince of Wales and the Crown Prince Rudolph of Austria were present, he offered twelve of the lady guests dresses from Doucet in Paris. However, rich men have their idiosyncrasies and when greedy Lily Langry offended once again — this time by ordering a petticoat to go with her gown — she promptly received a bill for it with a message that Baron Ferdinand had not authorized it. Mrs Langtry claimed that the Crown Prince Rudolph chose her as a partner for the Cotillion; yet another shock was in store for her.

As the evening was warm [she wrote], and he danced with great zest, the natural consequence was that he got very hot, which caused a friend of mine, whose soubriquet was ‘Mrs. Sloper’, to whisper: ‘Take care of your dress; there are marks on it. Make him put on his gloves.’ This I proceeded to do on the first opportunity, calling attention to the finger marks around the waist in support of my request. And what do you think the young man’s delicate reply was? ‘C’est vous qui suez [sweats], Madame.’[111]

Like Alfred, Ferdinand spared no expense to create the right atmosphere. Once Lady Warwick arrived in a thunderstorm and was dismayed to find that the masses of red geraniums had been beaten down by the storm. She happened to arise very early next morning and looked out to see an army of gardeners at work, taking out the damaged plants and putting in new ones, which had been brought from the glass-houses in pots … After breakfast that morning I went into the grounds, the gardens had been completely transformed![112]

Waddesdon was filled with visitors every weekend. In 1884 Ferdy’s cousin, Constance, Lady Battersea, listed a dozen guests ‘and last but not least H.R.H. with a youthful equerry … The Christy Minstrels and a Hungarian Band performed alternately and gave great satisfaction, particularly the latter. But the house itself with all its wonders, pictures, objets d’art, and magnificent couches and satin cushions and palms and photos of crowned heads with autograph signatures was a never-ending source of pleasure. Lady Lane said it was seraphic …’ But sightseeing was not exclusively an indoor sport, for Baron Ferdinand also had a zoo. ‘We used to go and feed the ostriches with bread,’ wrote Lady Warwick. ‘… He had aviaries, too, filled with lovely birds. Naturally he wished to adorn the hill on which the Manor stood, but he did it in such a fashion as to enable him to enjoy its full beauty during his lifetime — to do this he transplanted full-grown forest trees. As a frequent visitor I saw these trees take root though some were of enormous size when taken from their original home.’[113]

Finally Queen Victoria’s curiosity could stand it no longer. That she should be almost the only member of the Royal family who had not seen the wonders of Waddesdon was too much; and in 1890 she asked Baron Ferdinand if she might pay him a visit. She was not disappointed in what she saw: only disconcerted when Lord Hartington, the future Duke of Devonshire, absent-mindedly shook her hand instead of kissing it. However, she recovered her composure after a ride through the grounds in a Bath chair pulled by a pony. ‘The host was as delightful,’ she wrote, ‘as the place was beautiful.’

This episode broke the ice between Her Majesty and the Rothschilds. When the Queen spent a few weeks in Grasse, in the south of France the following year, she paid a visit to Ferdinand’s sister, Alice, who had a marvellous house in the neighbourhood. Indeed, she took such a fancy to the garden that she scarcely allowed a day to pass without calling. Alice was so flattered that she renamed her house the Villa Victoria, and built a road for the Queen’s convenience. Her cousin, Constance Battersea, was a member of Princess Louise’s party and described the goings on in letters to her mother. ‘As a surprise to the Queen’, she wrote, ‘she [Alice] has just ordered another mountain road to be levelled and widened, and this to be done in three days, which means, building up small walls, picking out huge stones, covering the smaller ones which macadam and turning a stream …’

Nevertheless Constance Battersea was filled with admiration for Alice’s powers of organization. ‘She is quite wonderful. She is on her legs from morning to night, walks miles up and down hill, and gives her orders to the Inspector of Police, the Royal coachmen, her foremen, and workmen, in the voice, with the manner of Napoleon.’[114]

However, Alice’s tyrannical nature was not confined to the workmen. The pride and joy of her life was her garden, and when she saw the Queen walking on a newly planted flower-bed she was outraged. ‘Come off at once!’ she exploded. The Queen did as she was told and henceforth referred to Alice as ‘The All Powerful’. The friendship survived and so did the nickname. ‘Alice … reigns absolutely,’ Constance wrote in her journal. ‘There is nothing constitutional about this monarchy. No wonder the Queen has named her “The All Powerful” …’[115]

Alice moved to England to look after her bachelor brother and not only bought Eythrope, near Waddesdon, but also took the imposing mansion next door to Ferdinand on Piccadilly. Rothschild Row had become a formidable enclave; but it was not until bus conductors began to point out the houses to their passengers that the Row was recognized as one of the sights of London. The interest of the busmen sprang from the fact that Ferdy organized large shoots at Waddesdon but never knew what to do with all the dead birds. Even after generously supplying his friends there were thousands left over. Finally he and his cousin Leo, who also had shooting parties at neighbouring Wing, concocted a plan. At Christmas every bus driver and conductor who passed the Rothschild doors in Piccadilly were given a brace of pheasants. This practice became an institution, and soon the whips of all the drivers, and the bell cords of all the conductors, were decorated with blue and amber ribbons — the Rothschild racing colours. And when, at the end of the century, Ferdy died, the drivers paid their tribute by entwining mourning streamers with the rest.

*

As usual politically the French Rothschilds had the thin edge of the wedge. While the English Rothschilds entertained a glittering society and pursued adventure in the hunting field, the French Rothschilds found themselves in a mounting storm of anti-Semitism which culminated in the Dreyfus Case.

Just as in Britain, a triumvirate of brothers ran the French House: Alphonse, Gustave and Edmond. Although the two eldest were the most effective bankers, Edmond, fifteen years younger than Alphonse, and only thirty-five when the 1880s slid into being, was the Rothschild earmarked for posterity.

Edmond’s life work lay in financing and encouraging colonies of destitute Jews to settle on the rocky soil of Palestine and in teaching them how to ‘make the desert bloom’. Although a return to Zion in a political sense was not part of his original purpose, his persistence paved the way for the future state of Israel.

Edmond inherited his interest in Palestine from his father, the famous Baron James, and from his tutor the famous Albert Cohen. Palestine was part of the Turkish Empire and when the Crimean War broke out in 1853, provoked by Tsar Nicholas I who insisted that the Sultan acknowledge Russia’s authority over the ‘Holy Places’, the Jewish community of Jerusalem was reduced to semi-starvation. This tiny enclave of a few hundred religious fanatics was almost wholly dependent on outside aid, and the war cut them off from their supporters. Baron James apologized to his eleven-year-old son, Edmond, for depriving him of his tutor and sent Albert Cohen to Jerusalem to see what could be done. On the latter’s recommendation he decided not to distribute alms but to establish an institution. The result was the James Mayer de Rothschild Hospital in Jerusalem.

Young Edmond was fascinated by Cohen’s Palestinian travels and as a young man contributed generously to the Rothschild charities in Jerusalem. Then came 1881 and the assassination of Tsar Alexander II of Russia. When it was discovered that the terrorists who killed the ‘Tsar-Liberator’ had met in the flat of a Jewish girl, Jessica Helfman, terrible pogroms broke out in all parts of Russia. The new Emperor, Alexander III, encouraged the riots as he had been indoctrinated by his anti-Semitic tutor and believed that international Jewry was involved in a plot to end the monarchical system.

The following year the Tsar went one better and published his famous May Laws. Only in exceptional circumstances could a Jew leave the Pale of Settlement; no Jew could hold an administrative post, or become a lawyer, or own land; no books were to be printed in Hebrew and all Jewish schools were to be closed; no Jew could marry a Christian unless he gave up his religion; no Jew could appeal against any sentence of any court; only a small proportion of Jews could attend universities. As a result, during the six months after the publication of these laws, 225,000 destitute Jewish families left Russia for western Europe. The Emperor was delighted. ‘Let them carry their poison where they will,’ he said.

The Chief Rabbi of France, Zadok Kahn, was well acquainted with the characters and incomes of the most important Jews in his community. Consequently, on 28 September 1882 he introduced to Edmond de Rothschild a Russian Rabbi, Samuel Mohilever. The latter was not an ideal advocate as he was unable to speak French and he stammered; yet he had a burning mission. He overcame his difficulties by asking permission to chant his message, which he could do without faltering, and by requesting Kahn to translate his Hebrew song. He began by reminding Edmond that the Lord had chosen another stammerer, Moses, to lead the Jews from Egypt to Israel, and explained that God had done this deliberately to show that a smooth tongue was not important; what mattered was the Voice of the Lord. Would Edmond heed this Voice and help the displaced Jews to settle in Palestine, the homeland from which they had been driven two thousand years earlier?

As Zadok Kahn had anticipated, Edmond was more than receptive. Not only had he been interested in Palestine since boyhood but as he was the most religious member of his family the prospect of resettling the Children of Israel in the land of their forefathers touched his deepest emotions. Being a Rothschild he was also cautious. Would the Jewish people, whose talents seemed to bloom in the field of usury, have the patience and persistence to earn a living by farming? The Baron was not sure and insisted on beginning with an experiment; he would pay for a dozen selected Russian-Jewish farmers to attend an agricultural school in Palestine; and if they did well he would buy land and settle them upon it.

The Baron had found his life’s work. From that time until his death fifty-two years later his Jewish colonies occupied most of his time and attention, and cost him over £6,000,000. He not only formed new colonies but gave money to the sprinkling of Jews already settled in Palestine, who repeatedly faced bankruptcy.

Despite the fact that the Chief Rabbi had brought Mohilever to see the Baron, he (Kahn) was not at all sanguine about the idea of settling Jews in Palestine. The Turks were hostile: the land was barren. The fabulously wealthy Baron Hirsh favoured the Argentine; other Jews spoke of San Domingo: still others the United States, or for that matter, even western Europe. Yet Edmond persisted in his dream of reviving Judaism, a far more elaborate idea than merely extending a helping hand to persecuted Jewry: and it could only be accomplished if the Jews had the tenacity to reclaim the once-fertile earth which the Arabs allowed to lapse into wasteland. ‘I am not a philanthropist,’ he explained repeatedly. ‘There are many unfortunate Jews in Russia and Rumania and we shall not be able to help them. I have gone into this affair as an experiment, to see whether Jews can be settled in the land of Israel …’[116]

For many months the Baron refused to let his name become public and was referred to as ‘the Renowned Benefactor’. His original group of farmers made a success of the agricultural school and he bought them land at Ekron. They paved the way for a dozen colonies in various parts of the country.

The Baron’s money drained swamps, dug wells and built houses. It founded industries ranging from scent factories to glass works, from wine cellars to bottle manufacturers. The Baron established his own administration in Palestine and his overseers dictated to the farmers exactly what crops were to be grown and where. Most of his officials were experts, some of them ‘borrowed* from the great wine-growing estate, Lafite, now the property of his cousins, Alphonse and Gustave. Edmond guaranteed the harvests by buying up the produce at a fixed sum, but he soon learned that the man who holds the purse strings can expect very little but abuse. If the price was too low the immigrants complained of starvation; too high and they hired Arab labour and went abroad on a holiday.

It was impossible to keep the name of the Renowned Benefactor secret and before long everyone knew that the Jewish colonies in Palestine were the focal point of Baron Edmond de Rothschild’s life. Between 1887 and 1899 the Baron made three trips to Palestine, each time on board his palatial yacht, each time accompanied by his wife, a daughter of Baron Willy von Rothschild of Frankfurt. The yacht dropped anchor at Jaffa and the couple visited the primitive farming communities, calling on people in their houses and listening to an endless flow of complaints. Quite unselfconsciously Edmond invited settlers and administrators aboard his yacht, which seemed far more of a Paradise than rocky Palestine. The ship was fitted with a splendid kosher kitchen; one of the cabins was used as a prayer room, and all the cabin doors had mezzuzahs.[117]

On his first trip Edmond tried to buy the Wailing Wall with the intention of transforming the neighbourhood into a Jewish shrine. As compensation he offered to resettle the Arabs on a piece of land of their choosing. Apparently the scheme lapsed, not because of Arab indifference but because of the mysterious opposition of the Jerusalem rabbis.

The rabbis had other obstructions to place in the Baron’s path and in 1888 produced a crisis of the first order by declaring that 1889 must be recognized as a Sabbatical year. According to Jewish law the tilling of Jewish land is forbidden every seventh year; yet it was obvious that if labour ceased for a whole year all the effort and money that had been expended since 1882 would be wasted and the building would have to start from the beginning again.

Although Edmond remonstrated, the rabbis were adamant and for months he was locked in a fierce theological controversy. What infuriated him most of all and aroused unpleasant suspicions was the fact that Samuel Mohilever, the father of the Palestine venture, refused to take up the cudgels on Edmond’s behalf. The Baron composed a letter in German with Hebrew characters which he sent to the Chief Rabbi Kahn with instructions to pass it on to Mohilever. He accused the latter of bad faith and ingratitude, then said: Now comes the Sabbatical year. I understand and respect all religious beliefs … but the Sabbatical year was merely an excuse for the Ekron colonists not to work. For there are things that were permitted by the most pious rabbis who lived in the days when Palestine was a Jewish land … I felt that rebellion was preparing and I therefore had Rabbi Mohilever informed about it. What did this rabbi do — he who is responsible for this? He did not reply, not one word …

Herr Ober Rabbiner, do you know what I think? I will tell you the truth. These Ekron colonists want to take the land away from me and the houses away from me and then to scoff at me. But this will never happen. Let Rabbi Samuel know that I will send the colonists of Ekron and all their families back to him [in Russia] and then we will see what he will do with them. And besides travelling expenses I will not give them a cent …’[118]

In the end Edmond solved the insoluble as far as the Sabbatical year was concerned by proposing an ingenious plan. If all the Jewish land in Palestine was sold, for one year only, to people of other faiths, settlers would remain blameless in the eyes of God when they tilled the soil. The rabbis of Jerusalem inveighed fiercely against this ‘fraud upon the Eternal’. But Edmond managed to enlist the allegiance of the Rabbi Isaac Elchonon, Spector of Kovno, Lithuania, famous as the greatest orthodox authority in the world. And Elchonon proclaimed that under the Baron’s safeguard the soil of Zion could be worked.

Throughout the 1880s, at the same time as Edmond was building up his Palestine colonies, the virus of Jew-baiting spread to France.

Ironically Edmond’s banking brothers, Alphonse and Gustave, fanned the flames by the financial measures which they took to crush their anti-Semitic opponents. 

The family were the first to be attacked. The battle began in 1876 when a right-wing deputy, Bonteaux, talked about ‘a financial system sucked dry by the Hebrews, especially the Rothschilds’. In 1880 he published a prospectus announcing his intention of ‘grouping and transforming into a powerful lever the capital of Catholics …’ With the blessing of Pope Leo XIII he persuaded the ‘faithful’ to part with their money and raised 4,000,000 francs with which he launched an anti-Jewish bank, the Union Générale.

The shares rose from 500 to 2000 francs within a few months, which encouraged Bonteaux to try and spread his wings. He allied himself with the Austrian Landerbank, a rival of the Rothschild Kreditanstalt, but apparently was not aware of the tactics that the Rothschilds employed against hostile agencies. Once again the family quietly bought up a large packet of Union Generale shares, then dumped the lot. Between 5 and 20 January 1882, quotations dropped from 3000 points to 900. Under Bonteaux’s amateurish management the bank had extended itself so recklessly that it could not meet its commitments and was forced into liquidation.

The fact that thousands of Catholics had lost their savings did not help the cause of the Semites and ‘the Jewish question’ began to be discussed with mounting emotion. Extreme Catholics declared that the Jew was an alien who not only conspired against Christendom, but against France itself.

At this point Édouard Drumont made his entry. This gentleman, unknown to the general public, had worked for the Pereire brothers who had organized the Crédit Mobilier Bank in the hope of smashing the Rothschilds. Instead they had perished and now Drumont sought revenge on their behalf. In 1886 he published a two-volume book La France Juive, whose theme was the evil power of Jewish finance, with the Rothschilds as central characters. Although Drumont’s former employer, Isaac Pereire, was also a Jew, the author declared that he was blameless and exceptional, a socialist who had worked for the common man.

The book was widely read and in 1889 its author formed the National Anti-Semitic League to fight ‘the clandestine and merciless conspiracy’ of Jewish finance which ‘jeopardizes daily the welfare, honour and security of France’. Not content with this, three years later he founded a newspaper La Libre Parole which began a campaign to drive Jews out of the army. As a result two Jewish officers challenged Drumont and one of his most virulent supporters, the Marquis de Mores, to duels. The Marquis killed his opponent. He was charged with foul play but was acquitted in court.

Two years later, in 1894, Captain Alfred Dreyfus was arrested, tried, and convicted of having betrayed military secrets to Germany. This stiff, reserved, thirty-six-year-old artillery officer was not liked by his colleagues: furthermore he was a Jew. Although material proof of his guilt could not be found, two of his brother officers made up for it by helpful fabrication. When Dreyfus was condemned, Drumont’s newspaper explained his motives as public revenge for slights received, and the desire of his race for the ruin of France. The ceremony of Dreyfus’ degradation took place on the parade ground. ‘A mort! A mort les Juifs!’ the crowd shouted.

The Paris correspondent of the Vienna Neue Freie Presse, Theodor Herzl, was among the throng. That such a thing could happen in France was a traumatic experience for him. ‘Where was heard the cry against the Jews?’ he asked in anguish. ‘… In republican, modem, civilized France, a hundred years after the Declaration of the Rights of Man.’ The shock crystallized half-formed ideas in Herzl’s head; he went home and wrote Der Judenstaat, the first sentence of which established its aim: ‘restoration of the Jewish state’.[119] Eighteen months later he organized the first Zionist Congress, composed of two hundred delegates from fifteen countries.

The Rothschilds became Herzl’s primary target. If he could persuade this powerful family to back Zionism — the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine — half his work would be accomplished. But the Rothschilds were not sympathetic. Indeed, their approach was diametrically opposed to Zionism. As a family they had demonstrated more conclusively than any other that Jews could integrate themselves in whatever country they chose to live. Baron Edmond, who had settled thousands of destitute Jews in Palestine, was the only member of the family who might listen.

I had expected to find him much older [wrote Herzl]. He looks like an ageing youth, is given to quick and nervous movements, has a light brown beard just turning grey, a long nose and an unpleasantly large mouth. A red neck-tie set off his white waistcoat, which hung loosely about his lank frame … I began: ‘A colony’ is a little state, a state is a big ‘colony’. You desire a little state, I propose to set up a big ‘colony’. And once again, as so often before, I unfolded the whole plan. He listened at times with surprise; one or twice I read admiration in his eyes.

But he does not believe in Turkish promises. And even if he did believe in them, he would not participate in the undertaking. He holds that it would be impossible to control the influx of the masses into Palestine. At the start 15,000 schnorrers [beggars] would pour in and they would have to be fed. For his part, he did not feel equal to it; perhaps I did? He could not undertake such a responsibility …[120]

So Edmond continued to support his colonists and Herzl continued to try and win the backing of the rich and powerful for the Zionist cause. Herzl died in 1904; and years later, in 1919, the Baron admitted that Herzl had been right. ‘When he explained to me his idea of convoking a Congress and starting a public agitation among Jews and non-Jews for the creation of a Jewish state I was frightened,’ he told a Russian émigré, Isaac Naiditch. ‘… First of all it was difficult on account of the possible repercussions in the attitude of the Turkish government towards our efforts. Besides, I thought it was harmful to the welfare of Jews all over the world, since the anti-Semitics would raise the cry that the Jews ought to be made to go to their own country … But history has shown that it was Herzl who was right and not I …’[121]

*

While France resounded to threats against the Jews, snobbish, implacable, anti-Semitic Austria relaxed its restrictions — at least as far as the Rothschilds were concerned. The Habsburg court prided itself on its exclusiveness, only admitting those persons who possessed sixteen ‘quarterings’, which meant noble lineage on both sides of the family for generations. Now, in 1887, the Emperor Franz Joseph announced that the Rothschilds were Hoffähig — acceptable in the highest circles — which meant that they could attend the innumerable dry-as-dust levies, receptions and balls given by the Emperor.

In Vienna S. M. von Rothschild und Söhne was represented by Salomon’s grandsons, the two brothers of Ferdy and Alice, now the richest men in Austria. As Albert, the youngest, was the only one interested in banking, his father, Anselm, appointed him his successor as head of the firm. Outwardly Albert had nothing to worry about. Not only was he banker-in-chief to a firmly entrenched government but, through the Kreditanstalt — the Rothschild subsidiary invented as a weapon against the Crédit Mobilier — held controlling interest in innumerable industries ranging from coal to railways; and when, in 1881, he converted the famous six-per-cent Gold Loan to Hungary the bank was recognized as the greatest financial force in the empire.

Yet Albert never took his luck for granted. He could not rid his memory of the revolutionary days of 1848. Barely four years old at the time, he still remembered being bundled out of his cot in the middle of the night and hurried out of Vienna, past excited mobs, to the safety of the country. When he finally built his great town house on the Prince Eugenstrasse he constructed it in such a way that it could not be easily attacked from the street. It was surrounded by a stone wall seven feet high, on top of which was a massive iron fence measuring another eight feet. Its size and impregnability prompted wits to nickname it ‘the Albert Memorial’.

His brother Nathaniel, on the other hand, constructed a far more elegant mansion in the Theresianumgasse. Nathaniel had the same flair as Ferdinand, not only collecting ornaments of great beauty, but of unusual historical interest; ‘among his most prized possessions was a dagger with a rich gilt handle which had once belonged to Wallenstein and a toilet-box in a rosewood case which Napoleon I left behind in his carriage after the Battle of Waterloo’.

These young men dutifully reflected the family traditions. Although they had inherited five large estates from their father, among them castles at Schillersdorf and Beneschau, and a magnificent schloss at Enzesfeld[122] — each insisted on creating a house of his own. Like their English and French cousins, they introduced the blue and amber racing colours to the Vienna racecourse and won the Derby three times; they accumulated priceless furniture and silver and gave millions to charities, founding among other things an institute for the blind, an institute for deaf mutes, a general hospital, a neurological clinic, an orphanage, and a wonderful botanical garden, the Hohewarte, that became one of the sights of the capital.

Yet the Habsburg concession, bidding the Rothschilds to Court, was due neither to banking nor to philanthropy. The fact was that Albert’s sister, Julie, married to a Naples Rothschild, Adolph, had become a close friend of Franz Joseph’s wife, the beautiful Empress Elizabeth. Julie and Adolph lived partly in Paris and partly in a fairy-like villa at Pregny on Lake Geneva. Julie’s hobby was horticulture and her conservatories were filled with a staggering array of flowers, arranged according to countries and climates.

The Empress loved Pregny and in September 1898 expressed a desire to pay another visit there. She turned the trip into an escapade, travelling incognito and refusing any special attention. After taking the waters at Nauheim she spent a night in Munich, in the room she had occupied as a girl, and then moved on to Switzerland, staying at the Hôtel Beau Rivage in Geneva. Although Baroness Julie offered the Empress her yacht Elizabeth declined as the fun was to be an ordinary person. Next day, accompanied by a lady in waiting, Countess Sztaray, she took a passenger steamer across Lake Geneva to the Quai du Mont-Blanc.

That evening Elizabeth and Julie dined alone in magnificent state, drinking from precious crystal glasses and eating from old Viennese china while a hidden orchestra played gentle melodies. Afterwards they strolled in the garden which, of course, was not like any other garden ‘a remote, enchanted world where tame miniature porcupines from Java and exotic coloured birds decorated a private park planted with cedars of Lebanon’.

About ten o’clock the Empress departed. But first she signed the Visitor’s Book, which caused her a moment of acute distress. Absent-mindedly she turned the pages back and suddenly caught sight of the signature of her beloved son, the tragic Crown Prince Rudolph, who had died with his mistress in a love pact at the Mayerling hunting lodge. Tears sprang into Elizabeth’s eyes and on the way home she could talk of nothing but death. When Countess Sztaray said she personally had no fear of death, Elizabeth replied: ‘I fear death although I often long for it: the transition and the uncertainty make me tremble, and especially the thought of the terrible struggle which one must undergo before reaching the other side.’

The next morning the two ladies once again set out for the Quai du Mont-Blanc to take the lake steamer, but awaiting the Empress now was an Italian anarchist, Lucheni. He moved into her path, lifted his arm and plunged a dagger into her breast. She died four hours later. The remote Villa Pregny was caught in a blaze of publicity, flashed upon the front page of almost every newspaper in the world, while Baroness Julie went into history books as the last person to entertain the ill-fated Empress of Austria.