Sir Maurice Abbot

Maurice Abbot was a prominent merchant, governor of the East India Company and Lord Mayor of London.

He was born in Guildford in a family of cloth worker and was apprenticed in the drapery business becoming liveryman of the Drapers' Company. Through dealings in various commodities such as cloth, indigo, spices and jewellry, Abbot ammased a large fortune in a short time.

He was very active in public affairs. In 1621 he was elected MP for Kingston upon Hull. In 1639 he was virtually governor of London during the king’s absence due to fighting with the Scots. That same year he was appointed Lord Mayor of London. A royalist, Abbot provided a loan to the king and instead gained lucrative contracts to collect customs and take a cut. For this privilege he paid £12,000 plus a loan to the king of £20,000.

As a shrewd businessman, Abbot had interests in the English East India and Levant Companies, a company to exploit the discovery of the Northwest Passage and another for colonization of Virginia in America.

Owing a substantial political power, he made one of his brothers Archbishop of Canterbury and another a Bishop of Salisbury.

He died in 1642, worth at least £200,000 or £6.3bn in today’s terms.