SGB Chapter 367

## Chapter 367: The Big Hand in the Financial City

**Chapter 367: The Big Hand in the Financial City**

London, Westminster, 4 Whitehall Street, the Metropolitan Police Headquarters.

Arthur sat at his desk, staring at the report listing the shareholders of the George Wilkinson Company, his gaze fixed for a long time.

To say he was reading the documents wouldn’t be accurate. Arthur was actually savoring them.

Even excluding the other shareholders, the first name on the list alone was enough to keep him occupied for days.

Saying it was the first name wasn’t accurate either. It’s just that in this document sent by the French Embassy, the people listed at the top could be summarized with one name – Lloyd’s of London.

As the most successful insurance company in the world, perhaps even the most successful insurance company in the 300 years from the 19th to the 21st century, Lloyd’s of London had become a golden signboard for the British, and even the world’s shipping industry, starting from the 17th century.

But most people wouldn’t imagine that the founder of this insurance giant, Edward Lloyd, was actually a small individual entrepreneur who ran a coffee shop in the 17th century.

In the beginning, Lloyd’s coffee shop was located on Tower Street near the Thames.

Tower Street was close to the docks in London and was adjacent to important maritime departments like London Customs, the Admiralty, and the Port Authority. Plus, their coffee probably had the taste of the sea, and Mr. Lloyd was a good conversationalist.

So, over time, it became a place for captains, sailors, small loan company owners, and insurance merchants who made their living at the docks to gather, chat, and discuss their get-rich-quick schemes.

Some insurance merchants even set up their offices on the tables of Lloyd’s coffee shop because of the high traffic there. They would sit there, drink afternoon tea, sign insurance policies with clients, and conduct business.

After a few years, Mr. Lloyd, having made some money through running his coffee shop, moved the shop to a more upscale and elegant location where the customers had more spending power – the intersection of Lombard Street and Fenchurch Street, the location of the London Royal Exchange.

As a successful coffee shop owner, Mr. Lloyd’s immediate priority after moving was to attract new customers while retaining his old patrons.

He keenly sensed the insurance brokers’ thirst for the latest news. Because communication conditions were poor at that time, most of the merchants sitting in the shop could only wait silently for news. They were either waiting for merchant ships to arrive or exchanging information and discussing international news. Those whose lives were on the line would come to Lloyd’s every few minutes to inquire about whether a certain captain’s merchant ship had arrived.

To better serve his customers and expand his customer base, Lloyd began to actively instruct his waiters to pay attention to the merchants coming and going, recording the latest shipping information they could glean from them, including shipping information from major seaports and inland ports, international and domestic situations, new trends in the business world, and so on.

And in the evenings, Lloyd would gather this latest information and write it on a bulletin board in the shop for customers to browse.

Not only that, Mr. Lloyd thoughtfully set up a podium in the most prominent location in the coffee shop, specifically for the waiters to read shipping information aloud to the merchants every day. After all, not every insurance merchant was literate. In this era of widespread illiteracy, every industry had those who had stumbled upon a bit of luck and soared.

However, not every insurance merchant frequented Lloyd’s coffee shop every day. Everyone might have some family matters to attend to.

To solve this problem, Mr. Lloyd specifically published a newspaper called “Lloyd’s Shipping News” for those merchants who missed the news to read past information.

In this way, the small Lloyd’s coffee shop slowly became the main trading market for the London insurance industry. By 1719, the amount of maritime insurance transactions completed in the coffee shop reached a staggering 9 million pounds.

“Lloyd’s Shipping News” also evolved into “Lloyd’s Shipping Journal.” The newspaper’s authority in the insurance industry was second only to the “London Gazette,” a British government publication specifically for major political news. Even “The Times” and “The Manchester Guardian” couldn’t compare in this area.

The old customers of Lloyd’s coffee shop spontaneously organized an institution called Lloyd’s Register of Shipping, whose main business was to evaluate the safety rating of ships and register them in “Lloyd’s Register of Ships” for reference by ship owners and insurance merchants.

If only these things existed, the name Lloyd’s wouldn’t be worth writing about.

The reason why Lloyd’s of London is singled out is because in 1771, insurance merchants found that the small Lloyd’s coffee shop was becoming increasingly incapable of supporting the large group of insurance merchants who needed to do business.

Therefore, an old patron of the coffee shop, a Dutch insurance merchant named Van Meer, suggested to everyone that a “New Lloyd’s” office be established as a trading platform for marine insurance.

He issued shares of the new office at 100 pounds each and quickly raised nearly 10,000 pounds in funds. A Russian insurance merchant from St. Petersburg, John Angerstein, proposed that the company should rent office space in the Royal Exchange.

While the merchants were happy with the location of the Royal Exchange, they were unhappy with the way it was rented.

So, they directly bought the office building of the Royal Exchange in full and used it as the trading location for Lloyd’s of London.

The difference between Lloyd’s of London and other insurance companies was that it wasn’t a company in the traditional sense, but more like a public trading platform for individual insurance merchants.

To use a modern concept, Lloyd’s of London was a thoroughbred syndicate-type monopoly organization.

In terms of independence, although the syndicate’s participants remained independent in production and law, they were completely subject to the main office in business and could not act independently.

The syndicate’s members must be highly unified in business. They cannot directly contact the market and can only do business through the syndicate.

If a syndicate member wanted to withdraw, it would require considerable cost, including rebuilding the buying and selling organization and re-establishing contact with the market.

Moreover, withdrawal might be obstructed and ostracized by the syndicate.

Lloyd’s of London was such an insurance syndicate. It was composed of thousands of insurance merchants from all over the world, all of whom conducted independent or joint underwriting through Lloyd’s of London platform.

In Lloyd’s of London’s underwriting business, there might be only a few people underwriting for smaller projects, while larger projects might see hundreds or even thousands of people jointly underwriting.

The unique structure of Lloyd’s of London also led to a rapid growth in its membership since its inception.

Here, as long as you could present proof of assets worth 500 pounds, you could become an insurance partner of Lloyd’s of London.

This unique development model enabled Lloyd’s of London to secure 90% of the British shipping industry and 50% of the world’s shipping industry after more than half a century of changes.

It’s no exaggeration to say that almost all the ships docked at the London docks were insured by Lloyd’s of London.

Furthermore, because of the huge cash flow held by Lloyd’s of London, it was also a force to be reckoned with on the London Stock Exchange. Even in political circles, the bigwigs in London always valued these insurance merchants who supported the maritime empire.

The reason is simple: these people could earn hundreds of millions of pounds for Britain from overseas every year, bringing a steady stream of gold and silver into mainland Britain.

Moreover, after gaining wealth, Lloyd’s of London partners became deeply interested in politics. They liked to sponsor MPs and would even run for office themselves.

As for their political views, apart from other aspects, at least in foreign relations, they, like most businessmen, adhered to the principle of peace.

As everyone knows, wealth inherently dislikes risk. So, except for a few industries, they generally shunned war.

And when it comes to which type of wealth most dislikes war, the answer is undoubtedly these insurance sellers, especially large multinational insurance companies like Lloyd’s of London.

Regardless of who wins in a war between two countries, they basically lose money.

In the list in Arthur’s hand, he found many names familiar, some of which he had even encountered directly when he listened in on the House of Commons that day.

Since the Polish issue arose last year, these MPs closely related to Lloyd’s of London have been urging the Polish and Russian sides to maintain restraint in the House of Commons.

And when the Westminster Union wanted the government to send troops to intervene in the Polish issue, these guys reacted quite fiercely.

Thinking about it now, while Lloyd’s of London didn’t want Poland and Russia to go to war, since it had already become a fait accompli, their top priority now was to coordinate relations between Britain and Russia as much as possible, avoiding further conflict between the two world powers.

After all, Poland being trampled by the Russians wouldn’t have much impact on Lloyd’s of London, but once Russia and Britain clashed, it would be hard for these insurance merchants not to recall the news of merchant ships being sunk at sea every now and then during the Napoleonic Wars.

The Seven Coalitions against France were not only a disaster for France but also a disaster for Lloyd’s of London.

For these insurance brokers, it was a sin to see bright, shiny British pounds go straight into cannon fire!

Arthur couldn’t tell what he felt inside when faced with these “pacifists” with their peculiar views.

If Lloyd’s of London was deeply involved in the assassination in Liverpool, then many problems could be explained.

With the power of these insurance merchants, it would be a piece of cake to find out Arthur’s whereabouts in a port city like Liverpool. It could even be said that it was a miracle that Arthur wasn’t killed in this assassination.

This could only mean that they didn’t intend to make their relationship with the government too strained, nor did they intend to take Arthur’s life. Or perhaps, they had already negotiated with the higher-ups beforehand, and everything was just a warning, just wanting to create some sensational headlines.

After all, if a Scotland Yard inspector really died in Liverpool, wouldn’t the Cabinet lose face if they didn’t give a proper explanation?

Thinking about this, Arthur finally understood why the House of Commons inquiry committee’s investigation was progressing so slowly.

This assassination prompted the Home Office to push for the legislation of the “Municipal Police Act.”

The Foreign Office achieved the goal of suppressing calls for aid to Poland through public opinion, and Lloyd’s of London reduced the potential war risk between Russia and Britain.

The Cabinet also had a legitimate reason to increase scrutiny and isolation of foreign immigrants in cholera prevention, and they could also use this opportunity to crack down on the Liverpool municipal authorities who had been disobeying orders on various issues in recent years.

As for the Russians, they could safely go about cleaning up Poland without worrying about Britain stabbing them in the back. As for the Poles’ ally, the French…

Judging from Talleyrand’s initiative to contact Arthur, a small figure like him, their situation was truly dire. The old cripple didn’t go to his old friend, the Duke of Wellington, but chose to start from Arthur’s level. This itself showed that he was just trying to make a last-ditch effort before things went completely south.

When Arthur thought about this, he suddenly picked up the document and tossed it into the fireplace in the room.

He watched as the paper slowly burned, curled, and turned to ash in the flames. He simply stroked his hair and mumbled, “Sorry, Mr. Talleyrand, I’m afraid I can’t help you this time. But a distinguished figure like you should understand that this is not because I don’t value our friendship, but because this question was a multiple-choice question from the beginning.”

As Arthur spoke, the door to the office was suddenly pushed open.

“Arthur…”

Louis held the documents he had just received, his face a mix of emotions. “Mr. Harrison, he…”

Arthur had a premonition of this. He just poured two glasses of wine and handed one to Louis.

“What’s wrong? Hanging, drowning, jumping off a building? It can’t be the Russians’ old trick, a stroke, can it?”

Louis remained silent for a moment, then replied, “He committed suicide with a letter opener. He also left a handwritten letter before his death, admitting to hiring assassins to go to Liverpool to assassinate you. And the investigation committee also found several remittance slips he gave to the assassins in Harrison’s mansion.”

Upon hearing this, Arthur finished his drink in one gulp. Then, he pulled open the drawer of his desk, which contained four investigation reports he had prepared beforehand. This time, he chose the one at the top.

Arthur handed the document to Louis, instructing him, “There are two copies inside. One goes to Chief Inspector Rowan, and the other, please deliver it to the Home Office, presented to Viscount Melbourne, the Home Secretary.”

Louis didn’t need to look at what was written inside. He fully understood Arthur’s meaning.

But at this moment, he still hoped to fight back. Louis hinted, “According to the internal training manual you compiled, if the victim’s body has more than two fatal stab wounds, and the wounds are scattered and difficult to understand, what’s even more incomprehensible is the handle of the knife…”

“Louis,” Arthur put down his glass and asked, “What’s the full name of the training manual?”

Louis blurted out, “Reporting! ‘Criminal Investigation Manual.'”

“That’s right,” Arthur shrugged. “This is a political crime, not a criminal crime, so the manual is not applicable in this case. As for why Mr. Harrison’s body has multiple fatal stab wounds, I’m inclined to believe that he was a strong individual.”

Hearing Arthur say this, Louis finally stopped insisting.

He sighed and nodded, “Alright, I understand.”

He took the document and turned to leave, but his hand lingered on the doorknob for a long time, feeling increasingly uncomfortable.

How could the Napoleons bear this kind of humiliation?

Just as he was still digesting his emotions, he heard Arthur’s voice coming from behind him.

“Some cases aren’t urgent. Although there’s only one truth, in most cases, people will transform it into multiple forms. A clay figure can’t withstand rain, and the truth can’t withstand investigation. Our path is still long. If they urgently need a truth right now, then give it to them. Next, we just need to wait quietly and see what ultimately surfaces, see what they really want to do.”

Hearing this, Louis suddenly turned to Arthur and asked, “What do you think they want to do?”

“I don’t know,” Arthur held up his wine glass and looked out the window at Whitehall Street. “I just feel like the Whig Party’s disputes seem more concealed and more complex than the Tories’.”

(End of Chapter)