Elly Kadoorie

Who was Elly Kadoorie?

Eleazer Silas Kadoorie, known as Sir Elly Kadoorie, was philanthropist and member of a wealthy family that had large business interests in the Far East. His brother was Sir Ellis Kadoorie, and his sons are Sir Lawrence Kadoorie and Sir Horace Kadoorie. His family were originally Iraqi Jews from Baghdad who later migrated to Bombay, India in the mid-eighteenth century.

Elly Kadoorie arrived in Shanghai from Bombay in 1880 as an employee of the Sephardi Jewish firm David Sassoon & Sons. Within a few years he had accumulated large sums of money and had gone into business on his own account, with companies in both Shanghai and Hong Kong. He became the largest shareholder when CLP was restructured in early 20th century. Over the next two decades, the Kadoorie brothers made their fortunes, achieving success in banking, rubber plantations, electric power utilities and real estate, and gaining a major share-holding in Hong Kong Hotels Limited.

Kadoorie and other members of his family were interned in the Stanley Internment Camp in Hong Kong in January 1942. They were released two months later and allowed to move back to Shanghai. Though son Lawrence Kadoorie and his family were later interned in Shanghai's Chapei internment camp in 1943, Sir Elly was exempted from internment on medical grounds. Sir Elly Kadoorie eventually died in Shanghai on August 2, 1944.