Joshua Bates

Who was Joshua Bates?

Joshua Bates was an international financier who divided his life between the United States and the United Kingdom.

Bates was born in Commercial St., Weymouth, Massachusetts. Early in his career he worked for William Gray, owner of Gray's Wharf in Charlestown. A merchant and a banker, in 1828 Bates became associated with the great house of Baring Brothers & Co. of London, of which he eventually became the senior partner. He was arbitrator of the commission convened in 1853 to settle the claims of American citizens arising from the War of 1812.

In 1852 he founded the Boston Public Library by giving $50,000 for that purpose, with the provision that the interest of the money should be expended for books of permanent value, and that the city should make adequate provision for at least 100 readers. He afterward gave 30,000 volumes to the institution, the main hall of which is named after him.

Bates married Lucretia Sturgis; their daughter Elizabeth married Belgian Prime Minister Sylvain Van de Weyer; their daughter Eleanor Van de Weyer married Reginald Baliol Brett, 2nd Viscount Esher; and their daughter, Sylvia Brett, married Charles Vyner de Windt Brooke, and became the last Rani of Sarawak. Another Bates' grand-daughter, Alice Emma Sturgis van de Weyer, married the Hon. Charles Brand.