Sunday, June 30, 2013

DID BARINGS BUILD AMERICA?

Far from being anti-American, Barings were very intimately involved in the growth of the United States of America, despite having extensive close links to The British East India Company, slavery and the opium trade. They insured slave ships carrying slaves, and owned a plantation in St Croix.

Before the Declaration of Independence was signed Barings were developing business links with Thomas Willing, who despite his opposition to independence, became the President of the Bank of North America and the first President of the Bank of the United States. Two of his granddaughters married into the Baring family. One married Alexander Baring.

Alexander Baring negotiated and financed The Louisiana Purchase. At the time Louisiana covered the whole of the middle of what is now the USA. It was massive! The purchase virtually doubled the size of the USA. This is what Aaron Burr attempted to steal with Andrew Jackson. Alexander also financed the USA during the 1812 war with the British, a war which was declared by the USA in retaliation for the British seizing American merchant ships and the impressment of American sailors. Alexander was attributed with negotiating peace.

Barings were the agents in Europe for the United States Government and the first and second Bank of the United States for the best part of the 19th Century, and could easily have let the USA crash if the British government had ordered them to do so. But no such order was ever given, or if it was it was ignored.

Barings financed the annexation of Texas from Mexico, and the purchase of Alaska from Russia. These are not tiny plots of land with space for just a few houses. Louisiana, Alaska and Texas were very, very significant pieces of land.

But, get this. During the Civil War Barings financed the purchase by the United States Federal Government, i.e. Lincoln and the north, of Ironclads, which were the new military ships of their day, as well as arms!
Barings as a house unequivocally supported the North and deplored the British government's policy of non-intervention. So much might have been expected of a staunch New Englander like Joshua Bates, but Thomas Baring was a little less enthusiastic. 'People in this country look upon you as a friend of the country', Samuel Ward assured him, '...I was applied to lately for your autograph to go in an album containing autographs of "our friends in Europe".' Benjamin Moran, at the American Legation, noted with approval a speech that Baring made in the House of Commons in May 1864: The man is a gentleman...It is mortifying to me that while he is loyal to us, the only citizen of the United States belonging to his firm, Mr Russell Sturgis, is a rebel sympathizer.' Sturgis was indeed a considerable embarrassment to his colleagues. While Samuel Ward deplored the fact that he 'did not take the view of American affairs natural for a Northern man', he thought Sturgis' 'personal friendliness and efficiency' would make up for this. The American Government took the matter more seriously. 'The man's disloyalty has caused the Government to think seriously of transferring its business to some other House', recorded Moran. The minister, Charles Adams, formally called on Sturgis to express his displeasure.

...On the whole, though, Barings proved loyal friends of the Federal government. William Aspinwall visited London to buy ironclads for the Northern government and paid a rousing tribute to Barings' role in the transaction. 'These gentlemen unhesitatingly authorized us to draw on them, at sight, for a very large amount - some millions - and on terms at once liberal and most considerate as to the time of the reimbursement by our Government, thus showing a most exceptional degree of confidence and sympathy at a period when the public feeling in London was almost universally in favour of the South...From motives of delicacy, no public mention has been made of this honourable act, which certainly no other house in Europe could have or would have done.' In August 1861 Barings advanced $500,000 so that George Schuyler could purchase arms for the American government even though the documents he produced did not authorize any such activity. By the time the proper authorization was received in October the amount had risen to $634,000.

With so creditable a record Barings had reason to feel a little aggrieved when they lost the agency of the United States government in 1871. It was by no means the first time such a setback had seemed possible since they had recaptured it from Rothschilds in 1843. Rothschilds, Peabody, Rothschilds again, and Brown Brothers each in turn thought that the prize was theirs. Yet as late as 1869 the Secretary to the Navy had gratuitously assured Barings that 'we have every reason to be satisfied with the transactions that have taken place between yourselves and the Government, and hope the feeling may long continue'.

...'Though we should of course be proud to be once more the agents of the United States Government', Barings told Ward, 'we can quite understand the difficulty which the existing cabinet would have in appointing us.' They were right, and not only for the existing cabinet. Morton, Rose and Co. were appointed. The days were past when a British bank could represent the American government in London.

[source : The Sixth Great Power : Barings, 1762 - 1929, p213-215]

All this under the noses of the British Government!?

The EIR/LPAC crowd lump Barings in with the Hofjuden, calling them opium runners, etc.

Yes, Barings owned a slave plantation, and directed The British East India Company through Francis, and even The Bank of England through Alexander.

But can anyone explain why The United States of America would conclude so much very important business with Barings, and why it is being covered up?

No comments: