The death in Paris on July 7 of Amschel Rothschild, a member of the Rothschild banking family, was officially declared by a London coroner as suicide last week. The 41-year old banker, regarded as a possible future chairman of the British merchant bank N. M. Rothschild, was found dead, hanging from the girdle of his dressing gown, in his room in the Hotel Bristol. Amschel Rothschild, a loving father with GBP30 million in land and personal holdings (about HK$360 million), killed himself after urging wealthy friends to support the Samaritans. Had the pressures of family business become intolerable for a man regarded as the natural heir to the Rothschild banking empire, that was famously called 'the sixth great power of Europe'? He passed his final moments in solitude, reflecting perhaps on recent deaths among family and friends, business problems and friction in his marriage. Taking the cord from his bathrobe, he attached one end to a towel rail and tied a knot. He wrapped the rest of the cord around his neck, tied it again and strangled himself. The sight that greeted his Algerian maid when she came in to turn down the bed sheets would rock the financial world and throw Europe's oldest banking dynasty into a crisis. 'He was a very private individual. There was always a sense in which you never really knew him,' one friend said. Amschel Rothschild was born into a world of exquisite privilege and expectation. Over two centuries, his family had built up a reputation as one of the most brilliant and successful in the world. It was a genetic inheritance of which Amschel was acutely aware, and which, ultimately, he found too heavy a burden. His father, Victor, in the words of the family's biographer Derek Wilson, was 'one of the more remarkable members of the dynasty and certainly one of the more complex'. A brilliant scholar, he took a triple first at Cambridge and worked for military intelligence during the war, testing Churchill's cigars, among other tasks. Amschel's mother, Tessa, was also clever and brave. She was made a military MBE for her war exploits. Originally a Jewish family from Frankfurt, the Rothschilds by the beginning of the 19th century had established themselves as the most powerful commercial family in Europe. The founder of its fortunes, Mayer Amschel Rothschild, sent his sons to Paris, Naples, Vienna and London to create one of the first international banks; the London branch, N. M. Rothschild, was founded by Nathan in 1810. As bankers, they dabbled in politics and war as much as commerce. Nathan found the money to fight the battle of Waterloo, his successors financed the Suez Canal and later bankrolled Cecil Rhodes' empire-building in southern Africa. It was against men of this stature that Amschel would eventually have to measure himself. His early life, however, did not mark him out as being made of the same mettle as his legendary ancestors. Whereas most of the British Rothschilds have been educated at Harrow, and then at either Oxford or Cambridge, Amschel went to Leys school in Cambridge and then to the City University in London. His great passion in life, as it had been for his father, appeared to be racing. At 13, Amschel became a fanatical motorbike scrambler. Later he raced Formula 3 cars, and collected old and fast vehicles. For the first decade after he left university, Amschel devoted himself to his Suffolk farm. He married well, wedding Anita Guinness in 1981. Together, the couple united two great commercial dynasties and, though they were both quiet individuals, they entertained frequently. Within four years, they had three children: Kate, Alice and James. To outsiders in the mid-1980s, Amschel appeared an affluent and contented gentleman farmer. He was not a man of whom great things were expected, nor did he appear to aspire to greatness himself. The last Rothschild to commit suicide was Charles, Amschel's grandfather, who killed himself after a long illness in 1923. There are dark parallels between Amschel's life and that of his grandfather. Amschel's father was determined that a Rothschild should take over the running of the family bank, which for more than a decade has been run by his cousin, Sir Evelyn de Rothschild, 64. At first Jacob, Victor's son by his first marriage, and Amschel's stepbrother, seemed the most natural inheritor. A flamboyant businessman, Jacob has always struck outsiders as the one member of the current generation who carried the family tradition most successfully. But after arguments with Sir Evelyn, Jacob quit the bank in 1980 and went on to create successful companies in finance and insurance. In 1987, nearing his death and worried about the bank's future, Victor persuaded Amschel to take up the mantle. 'He was a reluctant banker,' said one friend. 'He was always happier as a farmer.' Buckling under his father's thumb, however, Amschel joined the bank, working in various departments, including a spell as a personal assistant to Sir Evelyn. In 1990, he was made chief executive of Rothschild Asset Management, the arm of the business that manages money for pension funds and wealthy investors. But the early 1990s were not a happy time for the clan. If, a century ago, the Rothschilds were the sixth greatest power in Europe, by 1996 they were no longer even the sixth most important bank in the City of London. Compared with its rivals, Rothschilds has stagnated; its profits last year were hardly up on the start of the decade, while other banks have boomed. Most experts in the City pin the blame on Sir Evelyn, chiding him for underinvesting in the company. But they also point the finger at the asset management arm, the wing that came under Amschel's personal control. It lost GBP500,000 last year. Amschel's brief was to turn the asset management arm around. Friends said he was on the brink of doing so, but the financial record had made it clear he had failed. It was, some suspect, clear to Amschel as well. Sir Evelyn had once spoken of Amschel as a potential successor, but by this year it was painfully obvious that he would not inherit the family empire. Instead the talk was of hiring an outsider to run the bank, a decision that would have been particularly painful to someone with Amschel's sense of family history. In his personal and professional life, there were signs Amschel was starting to come under intense pressure. In early June, his mother, to whom he was close, died. At the same time, Simon Weinstock, the son of Lord Weinstock and one of Amschel's closest friends, was slowly dying of cancer. Despite the outward appearance of a happy marriage, family members suspect that after 15 years together, Amschel and Anita's relationship had started to turn sour. With hindsight, there were signs that suicide had begun to prey on his mind. Earlier this year he had contacted Chad Varah, founder of the Samaritans. At a lunch arranged by Lord Palumbo, a mutual friend, the two discussed how Amschel could help as a fundraiser. 'We had no suspicion his interest was other than a benevolent one,' Chad Varah said. In May, Amschel followed up his interest at a meeting with Vanda Scott, the director-general of the Samaritans' umbrella organisation, Befrienders International. Four days before his death, Amschel sent a 'round Robin' letter to 20 friends, explaining what a dreadful event a suicide was and how no one could understand the depths of despair. One close friend opened the letter as he read about Amschel's suicide. 'It was utterly devastating, and left me further away than ever from understanding why he did it,' he said. By the time he flew into Paris, Amschel was a man close to the end of the line. He was in France for a management meeting of the asset management business, to finalise plans to merge the British business he ran with Rothschild businesses in other parts of the world. It is unclear whether Amschel would have emerged from the reorganisation with a role at the company. He decided not to wait to find out. But with no note, the reason why a man seemingly blessed with so much chose to end his life will remain a mystery. The Times
