Sir John Ellerman

Finance and Shipping
Wealth: £36.685m
Net National Income: £3. 728bn
% of NNI: 0.98%
£10.877 billion

The son of a corn merchant from Hull who had emigrated from Hamburg in 1850, Ellerman went on to become Britain's greatest financier and ship owner at the turn of the twentieth century.

His father died in 1871, when the young Ellerman was just nine, but after a spell living in France, he moved back to England with his mother. Leaving school in Birmingham at 16, Ellerman was articled to a Birmingham accountancy firm, where he passed his exams with top marks. He was able to move to a leading London accountancy firm and was offered a partnership within two years. But at the age of 24, he started his own firm and soon made his mark in the City, establishing investment trusts and mixing with up and corning young financiers.

At the age of 29, Ellerman made his move into shipping, organising a syndicate to take over the eminent shipping firm, Leyland & Co, whose owner had died suddenly. The financial press predicted disaster, but Ellerman proved to be a shrewd operator. He sold Leyland to J.P. Morgan, the American financier, for between £1m and £2m, some 50% higher than its most recent valuation. He was able to use part of the funds to buy an old, established Liverpool shipowner. Reviving the company, he set a pattern for the next quarter of a century, buying up old, established but sound firms where the management had lost its way.

Ellerman ships played a crucial role in both the Boer War and during the First World War: he was adviser on shipping to the government, placing his ships at the government's disposal. In 1916, he made his last great shipping takeover- of a Hull firm - for around £4.1m. But Ellerman was also extending his interests elsewhere. By 1918, he owned over 70 breweries, and in the early 1920s, he had stakes in 22 collieries.

After the war, he also became a leading London landowner, buying nearly 140 acres of prime real estate in Chelsea, Marylebone and South Kensington from the old aristocratic families. But there was no sentiment here: he re-sold a chunk of South Kensington quickly at a 30% profit.

During the war, Ellerman was sensitive about his German roots but there was little criticism of him in the press. It helped that he had large shareholdings in three national newspapers and owned three influential magazines. Ellerman was easily the richest man in Britain by the 1920s. Predicting the 1929 Depression, he was able to rearrange his portfolio accordingly.

On his death in 1933, he left £36.6m in his will. The Inland Revenue must have been trilled, as he made no attempt to avoid death duties. His fortune represented just under 1% of the national income of the day. In today's terms it would be £10.8bn.