This 13 metre (40 feet), grey granite
memorial obelisk was erected in 1861 by the friends of Samuel Gurney. The
inscription, on the plinth of the monument, reads:
In remembrance
of
Samuel Gurney
who died the 5th June 1856
erected by his fellow
parishioners
and friends
1861
When the ear heard him then it blessed him
The monument is Grade II listed and the
entry at the English Heritage website [
visit link
]
tells us:
"Drinking Fountain 1861: J Bell.
Tapering granite obelisk with pointed head on granite plinth bearing quadrant
basins. Inscribed 'In Remembrance of Samuel Gurney'. Four cast-iron lamp columns
with later lanterns stand on four granite plinths at each corner. Founder of
Metropolitan Drinking Fountain and Cattle Trough Association."
The Oxford Dictionary of National
Biography [ visit link
]
tells us:
"Gurney, Samuel (1786–1856), banker and
philanthropist, was born at Earlham Hall, near Norwich, on 18 October 1786, the
second son of John Gurney (1749–1809), Quaker banker, of Norwich, and his wife,
Catherine (1754–1792), daughter of John Bell, merchant, of London. He was the
brother of Joseph John Gurney, Daniel Gurney, Elizabeth Fry, and Louisa Gurney
Hoare.
Samuel Gurney was educated at
Wandsworth, Surrey, and at Hingham, Norfolk. At the age of fourteen he was
placed in the counting-house of his brother-in-law and fellow Quaker, Joseph
Fry, tea merchant and banker, of St Mildred's Court, Poultry, London. On 7 April
1808 he married his third cousin Elizabeth, daughter of James Sheppard of Ham
House, Essex, a handsome residence, which the young couple inherited in 1812,
and his wife, Sarah, fourth daughter of Henry Gurney of Norwich, founder of
Gurney's Bank. Ham House was to be the Gurneys' place of residence during nearly
the whole of their married life; they had nine children, including Samuel Gurney
who also became a philanthropist and banker. In 1874 their grandson John Gurney
gave a large sum towards the City of London Corporation's purchase of Ham House
and its grounds for a public space now known as West Ham Park. The wealth that
came to Samuel Gurney from his father-in-law, as well as that bequeathed to him
by his father, enabled him to negotiate a partnership with the bill-broking firm
of Richardson and Overend in 1807. The firm's business grew rapidly, to the
point where, by the early 1820s, it was the largest bill-broking concern in
London, complementing the discounting of bills with the advance of credit on all
kinds of securities.
In the panic of 1825 the firm, which had
by then become Overend, Gurney & Co., were able to lend money to many houses
to tide over their difficulties. Gurney henceforth became known as ‘the bankers'
banker’, and many firms who had previously dealt with the Bank of England now
commenced depositing their surplus cash in his hands. In 1856 it was calculated
that his house held deposits amounting to £8 million. In his financial dealings
Gurney was entirely representative of the developing network of credit which
helped to propel British industrialization at a crucial phase. His financial
standing was sustained by religious and kinship ties with fellow Quakers, and he
conveyed a sense of trustworthiness and gained a reputation for unimpeachable
integrity.
Gurney played a part in the efforts of
J. J. Gurney, Fowell Buxton, and Elizabeth Fry for the improvement of prison
discipline and the reform of the criminal code. He refused to prosecute a man
who had forged his name, knowing well that death was the punishment for such an
offence. He also promoted the Niger expedition, and in March 1841 entertained
Captain H. D. Trotter (1802–1859), Commander W. Allen (1793–1864), and a large
number of the officers of the expedition at a farewell dinner at Upton. In 1849
he undertook a tour of Ireland, where he made considerable gifts to poor people
still suffering from the effects of the famine. He became treasurer of the
British and Foreign School Society in 1843, and held that post until his death.
Gurney was a generous patron of the infant colony of Liberia, kept up a
correspondence with President Roberts, and for his many gifts was rewarded by
his name being given to a town of Gallenas in 1851. In 1853 he accompanied a
deputation sent to Napoleon III to express a desire for a long continuance of
peace and amity between England and France.
Elizabeth Gurney died at Ham House on 14
February 1855; and in the autumn of that year, his own health having
deteriorated, Samuel took up residence at Nice. Getting worse in the spring of
1856, he started back for England; but he got no further than Paris and died in
a hotel in that city on 5 June 1856. He was buried in the Quaker burial-ground
at Barking on 19 June, when an immense concourse of people attended the funeral.
A 42 foot granite obelisk was erected in his memory in Stratford Broadway,
London, in 1861. Gurney's eldest son, John Gurney of Earlham Hall, did not long
survive him, dying on 23 September 1856.
It was fortunate that Gurney did not
live to see the fate of Overend, Gurney & Co. Less than ten years after his
death, in August 1865, a firm that was an exemplar of Quaker probity was
reorganized as a joint-stock company; its failure on 10 May 1866, with
liabilities of more than £11 million, was one of the great crashes in the
history of the City of London in the nineteenth
century."