Nathan Rothschild, 1st Baron Rothschild

The Right Honourable The Lord Rothschild GCVO PC
Lord Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire
In office 1889–1915
Monarch	Victoria Edward VII George V
Preceded by	The Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
Succeeded by	The Marquess of Lincolnshire
Member of Parliament for Aylesbury
In office 1865–1885 Serving with Samuel George Smith 1865–1880 George W. E. Russell 1880–1885
Preceded by	Thomas Tyringham Bernard Samuel George Smith
Succeeded by	Ferdinand James von Rothschild
Personal details
Born	Nathaniel Mayer Rothschild (1840-11-08)8 November 1840 London, United Kingdom
Died	31 March 1915(1915-03-31) (aged 74) London, United Kingdom
Resting place	Willesden Jewish Cemetery
Nationality	British
Political party	Liberal then Liberal Unionist then Conservative
Spouse(s)	Emma Louise von Rothschild (m. 1867)
Children	Walter Rothschild, 2nd Baron Rothschild Evelina Rothschild-Behrens Charles Rothschild
Parents	Lionel de Rothschild Charlotte von Rothschild
Relatives	Nathan Mayer Rothschild (grandfather) Mayer Amschel Rothschild (great-grandfather)
Residence	148 Piccadilly, London
Education	Trinity College, Cambridge
Occupation	Banker

Nathaniel Mayer Rothschild, 1st Baron Rothschild, Baron de Rothschild,^[1] GCVO, PC (8 November 1840 – 31 March 1915) was a British Jewish banker and politician from the wealthy international Rothschild family.

Early life[edit]

Nathaniel Mayer Rothschild, who was known as "Natty," was the eldest son of Baron Lionel de Rothschild (1808–1879) and Baroness Charlotte de Rothschild (née von Rothschild).

His paternal grandparents were Freiherr (or Baron) Nathan Mayer Rothschild, after whom he was named, and Hannah (née Barent-Cohen) Rothschild, the daughter of Levy Barent Cohen. His maternal grandparents were Freiherr Carl Mayer von Rothschild (1788–1855) and Adelheid Herz (1800–1853). Through both of his grandfathers, who were brothers, he was the great-grandson of Mayer Amschel Rothschild (1744–1812), founder of the dynasty.

In his youth, Rothschild was a Captain in the Buckinghamshire Yeomanry.^[2] Rothschild was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge,^[3] where he was a friend of the Prince of Wales (later Edward VII), but left without taking a degree.

Career[edit]

Rothschild worked as a partner in the London branch of the family bank, N M Rothschild & Sons, and became head of the bank after his father's death in 1879. During his tenure, he also maintained its pre-eminent position in private venture finance and in issuing loans to the governments of the US, Russia and Austria. Following the Rothschilds' funding of the Suez Canal, a close relationship was maintained with Benjamin Disraeli and affairs in Egypt.

Rothschild also funded Cecil Rhodes in the development of the British South Africa Company and the De Beers diamond conglomerate. He later administered Rhodes' estate after Rhodes' death in 1902 and helped to set up the Rhodes Scholarship scheme at the University of Oxford. He was a prominent member of the Round Table movement, created in 1909.

A noted philanthropist, Rothschild was heavily involved with the foundation of the Four Per Cent Industrial Dwellings Company, a model dwellings company whose aim was to provide decent housing, predominantly for the Jews of Spitalfields and Whitechapel.^[4] He also served as a trustee of the London Mosque Fund until his death.^[5] From 1889 until his death, he was Lord Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire and was well known as an agriculturist.^[6]

In the 1902 Coronation Honours list,^[7] he was appointed a Privy Counsellor and was sworn a member of the council at Buckingham Palace on 11 August 1902.^[8] On the same day, he was appointed to the Royal Victorian Order as a Knight Grand Cross (GCVO).^[9][10]

House of Commons[edit]

From 1865 to 1885, Rothschild sat in the House of Commons as Liberal Member of Parliament for Aylesbury. He was elected at least four times before he was permitted to sit in the Commons. As a religious Jew, he was unable to enter public life. Benjamin Disraeli stood for equality for Jews before the law and, when asked to vote the Public Worship Bill, he rejected Tory Protectionism. When Rothschild finally entered the chamber, he moved to the Conservative benches to shake his opponent by the hand. One of the most important consequences for the emancipation of the Jews was that these freedoms were written into the Second Reform Act.

Baron Rothschild[edit]

In 1847, his uncle Anthony Nathan de Rothschild (1810–1876) was created 1st Baronet de Rothschild, of Tring Park. Since Sir Anthony had no male heirs, the baronetcy passed on his death to his nephew Nathan Mayer Rothschild.

In 1885, Rothschild became a member of the House of Lords when he was created Baron Rothschild, of Tring in the County of Hertford, in the Peerage of the United Kingdom.^[11] He also was Baron de Rothschild (Freiherr von Rothschild) in the Austrian Empire, a noble title he had inherited via his father. In 1838, Queen Victoria had authorized the use of this Austrian title in the United Kingdom.^[1]

When he was raised to the peerage by Gladstone,^[6] Rothschild was the first Jewish member of the House of Lords not to have previously converted to Christianity. (Disraeli had been created Earl of Beaconsfield in 1876, but was baptised into Anglicanism at age twelve).

In common with the rest of his family, Rothschild joined the breakaway Liberal Unionist Party, formed in 1886 by Joseph Chamberlain, which ultimately merged into the Conservative Party.^[12]

In 1909, he was famously derided by then Chancellor of the Exchequer, David Lloyd George, over his opposition to the People's Budget, when the latter said, at a meeting at the Holborn Restaurant on 24 June that year: "I really think we are having too much Lord Rothschild. Are we to have all ways of reform, financial and social, blocked, simply by a notice-board; 'No Thoroughfare. By Order of Nathaniel Rothschild'?"^[13] Rothschild recommended the Lords reject the Parliament Bill, which was, however, passed.^[14]

In 1914, after the outbreak of World War I, Rothschild was consulted for economic advice by Lloyd George. At his first invitation to confer at the Treasury, when asked what could be done to raise more money for the war effort, Rothschild reportedly answered: "Tax the rich, and tax them heavily."^[15]

Personal life[edit]

On 16 April 1867, he married Emma Louise von Rothschild (1844–1935), a cousin from the Rothschild banking family of Germany in Frankfurt.^[16] They had three children:

• Lionel Walter Rothschild (1868–1937), who never married but had two mistresses, one of whom bore him a daughter.^[17]
• Evelina Rothschild-Behrens (1873–1947)
• Nathaniel Charles Rothschild (1877–1923), who married Rózsika Edle von Wertheimstein (1870–1940)

He died in London, five days after an operation, on 31 March 1915 and was buried at Willesden Jewish Cemetery.^[18] Following his death, the peerage was inherited by his son, Lionel Walter Rothschild.

In popular culture[edit]

• He appears as a minor character in the historical-mystery novel Stone's Fall by Iain Pears.^{[citation needed]}

Styles of address[edit]

• 1840–1865: Mr Nathan Rothschild
• 1865–1876: Mr Nathan Rothschild MP
• 1876–1885: Sir Nathan Rothschild Bt MP
• 1885–1902: The Right Honourable The Lord Rothschild^[a]
• 1902–1915: The Right Honourable The Lord Rothschild GCVO PC

See also[edit]

• History of the Jews in England

References[edit]

Notes

Sources

• Valynseele, Joseph; Mars, Henri-Claude (2004). Le Sang des Rothschild (in French). Paris: ICC Editions. ISBN 978-2-908003-22-2.
• See also the list of references at Rothschild banking family of England

• Cooper, John (2015). The Unexpected Story of Nathaniel Rothschild. London: Bloomsbury. ISBN 9781472917065.

External links[edit]

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Nathan Rothschild
• Newspaper clippings about Nathan Rothschild, 1st Baron Rothschild in the 20th Century Press Archives of the German National Library of Economics (ZBW)