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COUTTS, THOMAS, who long
moved at the head of the monied and banking interest of the metropolis,
was the fourth and youngest son of John Coutts, originally of Dundee,
and afterwards of Edinburgh, where he held the office of chief
magistrate in 1743. The mother of Mr Coutts was a daughter of Sir John
Stuart of Allanbank, in Berwickshire, who was the maternal grandson of
Miss Grizel Cochrane, daughter of Sir John Cochrane, the associate of
Russell and Sidney, in their project for liberating Britain from the
tyranny of the last Stuarts. Of this lady, great-great-grandmother to Mr
Coutts, the following anecdote has been related by her relation, the
late earl of Dundonald.
"Sir John Cochrane
being engaged in Argyle’s rebellion against James the Second, was
taken prisoner after a desperate resistance, and condemned to be hanged.
His daughter having noticed that the death warrant was expected from
London, attired herself in men’s clothes, and twice attacked and
robbed the mails (betwixt Berwick and Belford,) which conveyed the death
warrants; thus by delaying the execution, giving time to Sir John
Cochrane’s father, the earl of Dundonald, to make interest with father
Petre, (a Jesuit,) king James’s confessor, who, for the sum of five
thousand pounds, agreed to intercede with his royal master in behalf of
Sir John Cochrane, and to procure his pardon, which was effected."
Mr Coutts was born about
the year 1731. His father carried on the business of a general merchant,
and established the bank which has since attained such distinguished
respectability under the auspices of Sir William Forbes and his
descendants. An elder son, James, entered into partnership with a
banking house in St Mary Axe, London, which corresponded with that of
John Coutts and Co., Edinburgh. Subsequently, Thomas Coutts, the subject
of the present memoir, entered also into that house. He then became
partner with his brother of a banking house in the Strand, which had
long been carried on under the title of Middleton and Campbell; and,
finally, on the death of his brother, in 1778, he became the sole
manager of this extensive concern.
Mr Coutts possessed the
accomplishments and manners of a gentleman; plain but fashionable in his
dress; sedate in his deportment; punctual and indefatigable in business
even to a very advanced age. His great ambition through life was to
establish his character as a man of business, and he certainly obtained
such a reputation in this respect as few men have enjoyed. Instances are
related of his refusing to overlook a single penny in accounts even with
those friends to whom he was in the habit of dispensing his hospitality
with the most liberal hand. With such qualifications, and blessed with
length of days beyond the usual span of human life, it is not surprising
that he acquired immense wealth, and placed himself at the head of that
important class to which he belonged. Nor was he exclusively a man of
business: he enjoyed the society of literary men in a high degree, and
was distinguished for his taste in theatricals. He was also a liberal
dispenser of his wealth to the poor.
Mr Coutts was twice
married:—first to Susan Starkie, a female servant of his brother,
James, by whom he had three daughters—Susan, married, in 1796, to
George Augustus, third earl of Guildford; Frances, married, in 1800, to
John, first marquis of Bute; and Sophia, married, in 1793, to Sir
Francis Burdett, bart. About three months after the decease of his first
wife, which took place in 1815, he married Harriet Mellon, an actress of
some distinction in her profession, whom he constituted, at his death, sole
legatee of his immense property, consisting of personals in the
diocese of Canterbury, sworn under £600,000, besides considerable real
estates in lands, houses, &c., and the banking establishment in the
Strand. This lady has since become, by marriage, Duchess of St Albans,
and, by her acts of beneficiance, has proved herself not unworthy of the
great fortune which she has acquired. Mr Coutts’ death took place at
his house in Piccadilly, February 24th, 1822, about the
ninetieth year of his age. |
