Elihu Yale | |
---|---|
President of Fort St. George | |
In office 25 July 1687 – 3 October 1692 | |
Preceded by | William Gyfford |
Succeeded by | Nathaniel Higginson |
In office 8 August 1684 – 26 January 1685 | |
Preceded by | William Gyfford (Agent) |
Succeeded by | William Gyfford |
Personal details | |
Born | Boston, Colony of Massachusetts, British America | 5 April 1649
Died | 8 July 1721 London, England | (aged 72)
Signature | |
Elihu Yale (5 April 1649 – 8 July 1721) was a British-American colonial administrator, and philanthropist. Although born in Boston, Massachusetts, he only lived in America as a child, spending the rest of his life in England, Wales, and India. He became a clerk for the East India Company at Fort St. George (later Madras), and eventually rose to the Presidency of the settlement. He was later removed from the post under charges of corruption for self-dealing and had to pay a fine.[1] In 1699, he returned to Britain with a considerable fortune, around £200,000, mostly made by selling diamonds, and spent his time and wealth in philanthropy and art collecting.[2][3][4] He is best remembered as the primary benefactor of Yale College (now Yale University), which was named in his honor, following a donation of books, portrait, and textiles under the request of Rev. Cotton Mather, a Harvard graduate. He had no male heir, and no descendants of his have survived past his grandchildren.[5]
Born in Boston, Massachusetts, to David Yale (1613–1690), a wealthy Boston merchant and attorney to Robert Rich, 2nd Earl of Warwick, and Ursula Knight; he was the grandson of Ann Yale (born Lloyd), daughter of Bishop George Lloyd. After the death of her first husband, Thomas Yale Sr. (1587–1619), son of Chancellor David Yale, she remarried to Governor Theophilus Eaton, Ambassador to the court of Denmark. Governor Eaton was the co-founder of two of the Thirteen British Colonies, which are represented on the Flag of the United States, mainly through the Massachusetts Bay Colony and the New Haven Colony, and was the brother of Nathaniel Eaton, Harvard's first Headmaster and President designate, at the founding of Harvard in 1636.
His son, Samuel Eaton, the uncle of Elihu, was implied in the foundation of Harvard as well, being one of the seven founders of the Harvard Corporation, the governing board and charter that incorporated Harvard in 1650. It was they, along with Elihu's uncle and aunt, Thomas Yale Jr., and Anne Yale, Jr., who brought the reconstituted Eaton/Yale family to America, while other members of the family stayed in England. Their estates in Wales were Plas-yn-Yale and Plas Grono, and Elihu's brother was London merchant Thomas Yale, later Ambassador to the King of Siam for the East India Company.[6]
Elihu's father, David Yale, would later come from London to New Haven Colony with his stepfather, Theophilus Eaton, in 1639. He moved to Boston in 1641 and met and married Elihu Yale's mother, Ursula, in 1643.[7] In 1652, at the age of three, Elihu Yale left New England, never to return, as David Yale took his family back to London. While documentation of this period is sparse, a letter suggests that David Yale remained a successful merchant and settled his family in the Hanseatic merchant district "Steelyard Court". In 1662, at the age of thirteen, Elihu Yale entered the private school of William Dugard, but Dugard died a few months after Elihu Yale enrolled.[8] Elihu Yale likely lived through the Great Plague of London and the Great Fire of London.[9]
In 1670, at the age of 21, Elihu Yale became a clerk for the East India Company and served an apprenticeship in London in the Leadenhall Street office. It is possible that Elihu Yale had business training in his father's merchant counting house, and his father's connections helped him get the job. The following year in 1671, Yale was one of twenty men chosen as "Writers" in India. Elihu Yale was bonded for £500 with the help of his father and his brother David.[10] For 20 years Yale served the East India Company. In 1684, he became the first president of Fort St George, the company's post at Madras (now Chennai), India. He succeeded a number of agents from Sir Andrew Cogan to William Gyfford. Yale was instrumental in the development of the Government General Hospital, housed at Fort St George.[11] Yale also oversaw the acquisition of the strategically important Fort St. David. Yale amassed a fortune while working for the company, largely through secret contracts with Madras merchants, against the East India Company's directive. By 1692, his repeated flouting of East India Company regulations and growing embarrassment at his illegal profiteering resulted in his being relieved of the post of governor.[12]
Elihu Yale was re-appointed as President of Madras of Fort St George on 26 July, 1687. During that year, following a personal dispute with the King of Siam, Gov. Yale commanded the Anglo-Siamese War against King Narai the Great and his chief minister, Constantine Phaulkon, who were scheming with Louis XIV of Versailles to increase French influence in the region.[13] He sent warships and sought retaliation against Englishmen who changed sides.[13] During this time, his brother Thomas Yale became Ambassador to the King of Siam, and brought back a letter from the Emperor of Japan to be delivered to King Charles II of England.[6][14] Elihu would entertain at his house the French Ambassador and musketeer, Count Claude de Forbin, drinking to the health of the royal families of England and France.[15]
He then implemented an order which required the English at Fort St George to make all attempts at procurement of the town of Santhome on lease. To this effect, Chinna Venkatadri was sent to negotiate with the local governor on 4 August 1687. The mission was successful and Venkatadri assumed sovereignty over Santhome for a period of three years. Notwithstanding the vehement protests of the Portuguese inhabitants of Santhome, the English gained absolute control over all lands up to St Thomas Mount for a period of three years.[citation needed]
In September 1687, the Mughal Emperor Aurangazeb took Golconda after the Siege of Golconda, defeating Sultan Abul Hasan Qutb Shah.[16] The Mughals took the Sultan of Golconda prisoner and annexed the state. The newly designated Mughal Subedar of the province immediately sent a letter to the British authorities at Fort St George demanding that the English at Madras acknowledge the overlordship of the Mughal Emperor. The English complied willingly. Yale sent a letter to general Mahabat Khan and complied with the ceremonial performances of Prince Muhammad Kam Bakhsh and prime minister Asad Khan.[17] Aurangazeb guaranteed the independence of Madras, but in return demanded that the English supply troops in the event of a war against the Marathas. It was around this time that Yale's three-year-old son David Yale died and was interred in the Madras cemetery.[citation needed]
The records of this period mention a flourishing slave trade in Madras.[18] After English merchants began to kidnap young children and deport them to distant parts of the world, the administration of Fort St George stepped in and introduced laws to curb the practice. On 2 February 1688, Elihu Yale decreed that slaves should be examined by the judges of the choultry before being transported. Transportation of young children, in particular, was made unlawful.[19] During his tenure as President of Madras, Yale ordered a minimum of 10 slaves sent on every ship going to Europe, and on a month in 1687, Fort St George exported at least 665 slaves.[18] Beyond this, the nature of Yale's involvement in the slave trade remains disputed.
A blog post by a Yale history Ph.D. candidate and manager of the Yale Slavery and Abolition Portal notes that he permitted a law that at least ten slaves should be carried on every ship bound for Europe and in his capacity as judge he also on several occasions sentenced so-called "black criminals" to whipping and enslavement.[18][20] On the other hand, according to Steven Pincus, a former Yale professor of history and current professor at the University of Chicago, Yale was never a slave trader and never owned slaves, and in fact opposed the slave trade during his time as President of Madras.[21]
During Yale's presidency, a plan for setting up a corporation in Madras was conceived by Sir Josiah Child, the Governor of the East India Company, in a letter addressed to the factors at Madras on 28 September 1687. Three months later, Child and his deputy had an audience with King James II of England, and as per the ensuing discussions, a charter was issued by the King on 30 December 1687 which established the Corporation of Madras. The corporation was established to restrain the powers of Gov. Yale, and became the oldest corporation in India, and second oldest municipal body in the world after the City of London.[22][23][24] The charter came into effect on 29 September 1688, and a Corporation was established comprising a Mayor, 12 Aldermen, 60-100 Burgesses and sergeants. Nathaniel Higginson, who was then the second member of the Council of Fort St George, took office as the Mayor of Madras.[citation needed]
In August 1689, a French fleet appeared near the coast of Ceylon compelling the Governor of Pulicat Lawrence Pitt who was on high seas to seek protection within the bastions of Fort St George. Throughout the year 1690, French naval ships from Pondicherry ravaged the coast in order to drive the English and the Dutch out of the East Indies but were unsuccessful. They eventually withdrew from their enterprise when faced with heavy losses. It was also during this time that the English purchased the town of Tegnapatnam from the Marathas.[citation needed]
As president of Fort St George, Yale purchased territory for private purposes with East India Company funds, including a fort at Devanampattinam (now Cuddalore). Yale imposed high taxes for the maintenance of the colonial garrison and town, resulting in an unpopular regime and several revolts by Indians, brutally quelled by garrison soldiers. Yale was also notorious for arresting and trying Indians on his own private authority, his successors accused him of corruption and unusual deaths of several of the council members when he was governor and, on one occasion, he was accused of ordering the hanging of one of his stable grooms "for riding a favourite horse of his without his permission".[12]
Charges of corruption were brought against Elihu Yale in the last years of his presidency. He was eventually removed in 1692 and replaced with Nathaniel Higginson as the President of Madras.
Yale returned to Britain in 1699, with a fortune that amounted to £200,000, mostly made by selling diamonds from the Golconda mines and the Kollur mines, in Southern India.[2][25][26] Notable diamonds from these mines included the Orlov Diamond, belonging to Prince Grigory Orlov and Catherine the Great, the Black Orlov, belonging to Russian princesses, the Hope Diamond, belonging to Louis XIV and Thomas Hope, the Wittelsbach-Graff Diamond, belonging to the Habsburgs and Wittelsbachs, and many others.
Along with Sir Jean Chardin and Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, the traveling merchant of Louis XIV of Versailles, Yale was among the most important European diamond traders in the world, as nearly all diamonds came from India during that period.[27] In relation to GDP, his fortune amounted to 1/4 % of the United Kingdom's GDP at the time, which translates to nearly 6 billion British pounds in 2021 money.[28][29][30] He kept doing business with his friends Governor Thomas Pitt, grandfather of the Prime Minister of Britain, and Sir Charles Cotterell, during the era where London became the international trading centre of diamonds, dislodging Portugal and the Netherlands.[31][32]
He spent the rest of his life at Plas Grono on the Erddig estate, a mansion in Wrexham, Wales, bought by his father, and at his main London residence in Queen's Square. Initially named "Devonshire Square", neighbors included the Duke of Powis at Powis House, Lord Chancellor Bathurst, Queen Anne and her son, Prince William, Duke of Gloucester, artists Charles Burney and Jonathan Richardson, and others.[33][34]
He had four houses in London as well as several coach houses and stables to store his vast art collection of more than 10,000 items consisting of 7,000 paintings, jewels, pictures, books, watches, swords, and other items.[35][26] A famous object of his collection was one of the Jewels of Mary, Queen of Scots as well as a painting from Dutch painter Adriaen van der Werff, who painted for the Medici family.[36] Other notable artists whose works were part of his collection were Bruegel, Van Dyck, Dürer, Rubens and Rembrandt.[37]
He also leased Latimer House from his son-in-law, Lord James Cavendish, son of the 1st Duke of Devonshire, to accommodate his daughter Ursula.[38] Elihu was later elected High Sheriff of Denbighshire in Wales, and became a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1717, under the then President, Sir Isaac Newton.[39] Yale's candidature was introduced by Sir Hans Sloan, founder of the British Museum, and compeer of Voltaire and Benjamin Franklin.[40][14] In the same year, Yale was asked by Isaac Newton to deal with the donations from the estate of Dr. Thomas Paget.[14]
After Jacques de Paiva's[41] death in 1687, a Portuguese Jewish diamond merchant and mines owner, Elihu Yale fell in love with his widow Hieronima de Paiva and brought her to live with him, causing quite a scandal within Madras’s colonial society. Elihu Yale and Hieromima de Paiva had a son. The son died in South Africa.[41]
Elihu Yale was previously married to Catherine Elford in 1680, widow of Joseph Hynmers, second-in-command of Fort St George, India as Deputy Governor for the East India Company.[42][43] Her father was wealthy Levant merchant Walter Elford, son of Turkey merchant Walter Sr., the step-nephew of Admiral Sir Francis Drake of Buckland Abbey, the explorer, and the half-brother of Sir Francis Drake, the MP.[44][45][46]
Walter Elford Sr. was among the pioneers of the English Coffee Houses on Exchange Alley, next to the Royal Exchange, owning the Great Coffee House (Turk's Head) until the Great Fire of London, and was featured in Samuel Pepys's diaries.[47][48][49][50] Catherine Elford's maternal grandfather was merchant Richard Chambers, Alderman and Sheriff of the City of London, family of Sir Amyas Bampfylde of Poltimore House and Barrington Court.[51][52][53]
Their wedding took place at St Mary's Church, at Fort St George, where Yale was a vestryman and treasurer. The marriage was the first registered at the church.[54] They had 4 children together.[55]
David Yale (died 1687) died young.[56]
Katherine Yale (died 1715) married Dudley North of Glemham Hall, son of Sir Dudley North of Camden Place, and grandson of Dudley North, 4th Baron North of Kirtling Tower.[57] He was a cousin of Francis North, 1st Earl of Guilford of Wroxton Abbey and a grandson of Anne Montagu of Boughton House, member of the Ducal House of Montagu.
Their daughter Anne North would marry Nicholas Herbert, member of the Ducal House of Herbert, son of the 8th Earl of Pembroke, Thomas Herbert of Wilton House and his first wife, Margaret Sawyer of Highclere Castle while one of their sons, William Dudley North, would marry Lady Barbara Herbert, daughter of Thomas and his second wife, Barbara Herbert, Countess of Pembroke. Nicholas's only daughter, Barbara, would marry the 2nd Earl of Aldborough, Edward Stratford, member of the House of Stratford.[58]
Anne Yale (died 1734), married Lord James Cavendish of Staveley Hall, member of the Ducal House of Cavendish, son of William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Devonshire of Chatsworth House and Lady Mary Butler, member of the Ducal House of Butler and daughter of James Butler, 1st Duke of Ormonde of Kilkenny Castle.[57]
James was also a grandson of Countess Elizabeth Cecil of Hatfield House, member of the Salisbury's House of Cecil, a great-grandson of Countess Catherine Howard of Audley End House, member of the Ducal House of Howard, and a nephew of John Cecil, 5th Earl of Exeter of Burghley House, member of the Exeter's House of Cecil.
Ursula Yale (died 1721), died childless at Latimer House, the house was rented by Elihu Yale from his son-in-law Lord James Cavendish, husband of Anne Yale, and is buried in the small church on the estate, St Mary Magdalene.[56]
Yale died on 8 July 1721 in London. No descendants of his have survived past his grandchildren.[59] His body was buried in the churchyard of the parish church of St Giles' Church, Wrexham, Wales.[60] His tomb is inscribed with these lines:
Born in America, in Europe bred
In Africa travell'd and in Asia wed
Where long he liv'd and thriv'd; In London dead
Much good, some ill, he did; so hope all's even
And that his soul thro' mercy's gone to Heaven
You that survive and read this tale, take care
For this most certain exit to prepare
Where blest in peace, the actions of the just
Smell sweet and blossom in the silent dust.
In Boston, Massachusetts, a tablet to Yale was erected in 1927 at Scollay Square, near the site of Yale's birth. Yale president Arthur Twining Hadley penned the inscription, which reads: "On Pemberton Hill, 255 Feet North of This Spot, Was Born on April Fifth 1649 Elihu Yale, Governor of Madras, Whose Permanent Memorial in His Native Land is the College That Bears His Name."[61]
At his death, with no proper will, his heirs-at-law inherited the Plas Grono estate and sold it to Sir George Wynne of Leswood Hall, designed by Francis Smith, an architect of Aston Hall and Sutton Scarsdale Hall.[62]
In 1718, Cotton Mather contacted Yale and asked for his help. Mather represented a small institution of learning that had been founded in 1701 in Old Saybrook, Connecticut, as the Collegiate School of Connecticut, which needed money for a new building. In 1717, Sir Isaac Newton sent to the college a copy of his book Principia, on Newton's laws of motion and Newton's law of universal gravitation, and in 1718, Elihu Yale sent Mather 417 books, a portrait of King George I of Britain, and nine bales of goods.[63][64] These last were sold by the school for £800.[65] In gratitude, officials named the new building Yale; eventually the entire institution became Yale College.[66]
Yale was also a vestryman and treasurer of St Mary's Church at Fort St George. On 6 October 1968, the 250th anniversary of the naming of Yale College for Elihu Yale, the classmates of Chester Bowles, then the American ambassador to India and a graduate of Yale (1924), donated money for lasting improvements to the church and erected a plaque to commemorate the occasion. In 1970, a portrait of him, Elihu Yale seated at table with the Second Duke of Devonshire and Lord James Cavendish, later renamed Elihu Yale with Members of his Family and an Enslaved Child, was donated to the Yale Center for British Art from Chatsworth House.[citation needed] A portrait, painted during the 18th century, was also given to Yale University by U.S President Dwight D. Eisenhower.[67]
On 5 April 1999, Yale University recognised the 350th anniversary of Yale's birthday.[66] An article that year in American Heritage magazine by the writer John Steele Gordon rated Elihu Yale the "most overrated philanthropist" in American history, arguing that the college that became Yale University was successful largely because of the generosity of a man named Jeremiah Dummer, but that the trustees of the school did not want it known by the name "Dummer College".[68] Of Yale's donation to the college, totalling just under $1500,[69] Gordon suggested that "never has so much immortality been purchased for so paltry a [...] sum."[70]
In her article for The Atlantic about Skull and Bones, a secret society at Yale University, Alexandra Robbins alleges that Yale's headstone was stolen years ago from its proper setting in Wrexham. She further alleges that the tombstone is now displayed in a glass case in a room with purple walls.[71]
One of Elihu Yale's responsibilities as president of Fort St George was overseeing its slave trade.[72] In 2016, Elizabeth Kuebler-Wolf wrote in the Journal of Global History that Yale enslaved one or two people as household servants, citing Hiram Bingham's 1939 book Elihu Yale.[73] In 2021, the Associated Press wrote that there is no evidence that Yale had enslaved anyone, although his relatives in New Haven likely did.[74]
In 2014, Yale history graduate student Joseph Yannielli argued that he benefited from the trade because it was among his responsibilities as president,[75] and wrote of Yale: "On two separate occasions, he sentenced “black Criminalls” accused of burglary to suffer whipping, branding, and foreign enslavement", citing "Records of Fort St. George: Diary and Consultation Book of 1688 (Madras: Superintendent Government Press, 1916), 30, 137; Records of Fort St. George: Diary and Consultation Book of 1689 (Madras: Superintendent Government Press, 1916), 99." He added that although Yale "probably did not own any of these people – the majority were held as the property of the East India Company – he certainly profited both directly and indirectly from their sale".[76] In 2020 Yale University initiated its Yale and Slavery Research Project to explore the university's historic links with slavery and colonialism. The project was led by David W. Blight, director of the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition, and published its findings stating that "much of his growing wealth derived from the lucrative trade in cloth, silks, precious jewels, and other commodities, yet this commerce was inseparable from the slave trade."[18]
Professor Yanelli at Birmingham University writes that "Elihu Yale was an active and successful slave trader" and that he "participated in a meeting that ordered a minimum of 10 slaves sent on every outbound European ship."[77]
See also: Family tree of Welsh monarchs |
The ancestry of the Yale family can be traced back from Chancellor Thomas Yale, born 1525, to many Royal and noble houses of Britain as descendants of the Royal House of Mathrafal, the Royal House of Aberffraw, the Royal House of Plantagenet, the Princely House of Powys Fadog, the Tudors of Penmynydd and many others.[80] For the House of Mathrafal, and Powys Fadog, it was through Tudur ap Gruffudd, Lord of Gwyddelwern and brother of the last native Prince of Wales, Owain Glyndŵr, while for the House of Aberffraw, and the Tudors of Penmynydd, it was through Elen Ferch Tomos, the mother of Owain. From these families they inherited Lordships and estates, such as Plas yn Iâl (Yale).[81][82][83][84][85][86]
The Coat of arms of the Yales came originally in the family from Osborn Fitzgerald, Lord of Ynys-m-Maengwyn and Corsygedol, of which they were the direct descendants, and was used to create the coat of arms of Yale College.[87][88][89][90] Osborn Fitzgerald was a member of the House of Fitzgerald through the Earls of Desmond.[91] He made the trip from Ireland to Wales during the thirteenth century with Gruffydd ab Ednyved Vychan, son of Seneschal Ednyfed Fychan, and was granted Lordships by the Prince of North Wales, Llywelyn the Great.[92] He was the progenitor of many houses in Wales, including the House of Yale, co-representative of the Sovereign Dynasties of Powys, North Wales, and South Wales, having inherited the claims of Owain Glyndwr, Prince of Wales.[93][94][95]
The House of Yale is, on the paternal side, a cadet branch of the Royal House of Mathrafal, through the Princes of Powys Fadog, and a cadet branch of the Fitzgerald dynasty, through the Merioneth House of Corsygedol.[83][96][97][98][99] Their Fitzgerald ancestor was lord Gerald of Windsor, son of baron Walter FitzOtho, 1st Governor of Windsor Castle for William the Conqueror, and were cousins of the Tudors through Tudur ap Gruffudd and Owain Glyndwr of the Mathrafal dynasty.[100][101]
The family estate at Plas yn Iâl ("Iâl" is anglicised as "Yale"), North Wales, of which the family took the name, was inherited from Baron Elissau ab Gruffydd, a member of the Royal House of Mathrafal and descendant of the Royal House of Plantagenet, when he married Margaret, the heiress of Plas yn Yale, in the Lordship of Bromfield and Yale.[90][83][102][103] Her ancestor, Lord Mostyn, was granted the estate by the Prince of Wales, Owain Gwynedd, for his services at the Battle of Crogen in 1165.[104] Elissau ab Gruffydd was the grandfather of Chancellor Thomas Yale, who was the first to adopt definitively the Yale surname, and had, as his ancestor, Prince Gruffudd Fychan I, the Lord of Yale.[90][103] The estate was originally called Allt Llwyn Ddraig, which means Dragon's Grove Hill.[83][105][106][107]