His father died in 1755, John Walter then being seventeen and, boy though he was, he at once succeeded to his father’s business. In it he was diligent and throve well, and he so won the confidence and respect of his brother ‘coal buyers’ that when a larger Coal Exchange was found necessary, in order to accommodate, and keep pace with its increasing business, the whole of the arrangements, plans, and directions were left in his hands. When the building was completed, he was rewarded by his brethren in trade with the position of manager, and afterwards he became Chairman to the Body of Coal Buyers.
He married, and, in 1771, things had gone so prosperously with him that he bought a house with some ground at Battersea Rise, and here he lived, and reared his family of six children, until his bankruptcy, when it was sold. He also took unto himself partners, and was the head of the firm of Walter, Bradley, and Sage. For some time all went well, but competition arose, and the old-fashioned way of doing business could not hold its own against the keenness, and cutting, of the new style. Let us hear him tell his own story.[39]
‘I shall forbear relating the various scenes of business I was engaged in prior to my embarking in Lloyd’s Rooms; sufficient it is to remark that a very extensive trade I entered into at the early age of seventeen, when my father died, rewarded a strong spirit of industry, and, for the first ten or twelve years, with a satisfactory increase of fortune; but a number of inconsiderable dealers, by undermining the fair trader, and other dishonourable practices, reduced the profits, and made them inadequate to the risque and capital employed. It happened unfortunately for me, about that time, some policy brokers, who had large orders for insurances on foreign Indiamen and other adventures, found their way to the Coal Market, a building of which I was the principal planner and manager.
‘I was accustomed, with a few others, to underwrite the vessels particularly employed in that trade, and success attended the step, because the risque was fair, and the premiums adequate. This was my temptation for inclining to their solicitations of frequenting Lloyd’s Rooms.[40] With great reluctance I complain that I quitted a trade where low art and cunning combated the fair principles of commerce, which my mind resisted as my fortune increased; but from the change I had to encounter deception and fraud, in a more dangerous but subtle degree.
‘The misfortunes of the war were of great magnitude to the Underwriters, but they were considerably multiplied by the villainy and depravity of Mankind. In the year 1776, at a time when they received only peace premiums, American privateers swarmed on the seas, drove to desperation by the Boston port act passing at the close of the preceding year, to prohibit their fisheries, and our trade fell a rapid prey before government had notice to apply the least protection. Flushed with success, it increased the number of their armed vessels, and proved such a source of riches as enabled them to open a trade with France, who had, hitherto, been only a silent spectator, and produced the sinews of a war which then unhappily commenced.’
He then details the causes which led to his bankruptcy—how the wars with the French, Spaniards, and Dutch, all of whom had their men-of-war and privateers, which preyed upon our commerce, ruined the underwriters, and continues,
‘In two years only of the war I lost, on a balance, thirty-one thousand pounds, which obliged me, in 1781, to quit the Coal Trade, after carrying it on so many years, when I had returned’ (? turned over) ‘above a Million of money, the profits of which have been sunk as an Underwriter, that I might have the use of my capital employed in it, to pay my unfortunate losses.... Last year, I was obliged to make a sacrifice of my desirable habitation at Battersea Rise, where I had resided ten years, and expended a considerable sum of money, the fruits of many years of industry, before I became acquainted with Lloyd’s Rooms.
‘These reserves, however, proved ineffectual, and I found it necessary, on examining the state of my accounts early in January last, to call my Creditors together; for, though some months preceding I found my fortune rapidly on the decline, I never suspected my being insolvent till that view of my affairs, when I found a balance in my favour of only nine thousand pounds, from which was to be deducted a fourth part owing me by brokers, who, unfortunately for me as well as themselves, were become bankrupts. This surplus, it was clear, would not bear me through known, though unsettled, losses, besides what might arise on unexpired risques. I therefore, without attempting to borrow a shilling from a friend, resorting to false Credit, or using any subterfuge whatever, after depositing what money remained in my hands, the property of others, laid the state of my affairs before my Creditors.
‘This upright conduct made them my friends; they immediately invested me with full power to settle my own affairs, and have acted with liberality and kindness. They were indebted for the early knowledge I gave them of my affairs to the regularity of my accounts; for, had I rested my inquiry till after the broker’s yearly accounts were chequed, in all probability a very trifling dividend would have ensued. Had the merchant been obliged to stand his own risque during the late war, few concerned on the seas would have been able to withstand the magnitude of their losses.
‘The only alleviation to comfort me in this affliction has arose from the consideration that I have acted honourably by all men; that, neither in prosperity nor adversity, have I ever been influenced by mean or mercenary motives in my connections with the world, of which I can give the most satisfactory proofs; that, when in my power, benevolence ever attended my steps; the deserving and needy never resorted to me in vain, nor has gratitude ever been wanting to express any obligations or kindnesses received from those I have had transactions with by every return in my power. I have the further consolation of declaring that, in winding up my affairs, I have acted with the strictest impartiality in every demand both for and against my estate; that I have (unsolicited) attended every meeting at Guildhall to protect it against plunder. A dividend was made as soon as the bankrupt laws would permit, and the surplus laid out in interest for the benefit of the estate, till a fair time is allowed to know what demands may come against it. I am fully convinced that it will not be £15,000 deficient; above double that sum I have left in Lloyd’s Rooms as a profit among the brokers.