Lords of Finance

5 “In 1931, men and women”: Toynbee, Survey of International Affairs, 1.

5 “Unless drastic measures are taken”: “Ein’ Feste Burg.” Time, July 27, 1931, and Howe, World Diary, 111.

5 It was rumored: Taylor, English History, 290.

5 “the wisest man”: Letter from Lamont to Norman, December 4, 1946, cited in Schuker, The End of French Predominance in Europe, 291.

5 “might have stepped out”: Snowden, Philip, “The Governor of the Bank of England,” The Banker, February 1926.

6 “Everyone I meet”: Hassall, Edward Marsh, 570.

9 “second rate people,” “the Jew is always a Jew”: Chernow, The House of Morgan, 215, 310.

11 The pound sterling: There were 480 grains to a troy ounce, a measure of weight some 10 percent greater than a conventional ounce.

13 The totality of gold: The total amount of gold mined until 1913 was calculated to be 750 million ounces, or 22,500 tons. See Triffin. The Evolution of the International Monetary System, Table 17, 79. Because a cubic foot of gold is estimated to weigh about half a ton, this would amount to 45,000 cubic feet, equivalent to a cube with sides of about 35 feet.

13 “You came to tell us”: Bryan, The First Battle: A Story of the Campaign of 1896, 199-206.

1: PROLOGUE

19 “What an extraordinary episode”: Keynes, Collected Writings: The Economic Consequences, 2: 6.

20 “a magnificent stupid honesty”: Wells, The Work, Wealth, and Happiness of Mankind, 398.

21 Even Kaiser Wilhelm: “Successful War No Advantage to Victor Says Angell,” New York Times, June 15, 1913.

21 In February 1912: Committee of Imperial Defense, Testimony of Sir John H. Luscombe, Chairman of Lloyds, Report and Proceedings of the Standing Sub-Committee for the Committee of Imperial Defense on Trading with the Enemy, 1912, paragraphs 120-143.

21 “new economic factors,” “commercial disaster”: Esher, Journals and Letters, 211-28 and 229-261, quoted in Tuchman, Guns of August, 10.

2: A STRANGE AND LONELY MAN

23 “Anybody who goes”: Samuel Goldwyn quote from Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, 695

23 “feeling far from well”: Letter to Caroline Brown from Boyle, Montagu Norman, 98.

27 “I feel a different person”: Clay, Lord Norman, 44.

28 He would end up embracing: Boyle, Montagu Norman, 87.

29 “with tears in his eyes”: McEwen, The Riddell Diaries, 85.

30 “the coming conflict”: Geiss, July 1914: The Outbreak of the First World War, Document 162.

30 “acute anxiety”: Wilson and Hammerton, The Great War, 26.

30 “stood nervously fingering their notes”: “London Exchange Closes Its Doors.” New York Times, August 1, 1914.

31 “although many hundreds of people,” “traditionally phlegmatic and cool”: Times, August 1, 1914.

31 Nevertheless, just in case: “English Bank Act to Be Suspended.” New York Times, August 2, 1914.

31 “in case of an outbreak”: Memorandum by Sir Felix Shuster, director of the Union Bank of London, circulated to the Clearing Bankers’ Gold Reserves Committee quoted in Kynaston, The City of London: Golden Years, 588.

32 “European prospects very gloomy”: Clay, Lord Norman, 81.

32 “Financiers in a fright”: Lloyd George, War Memoirs, 111.