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CHAPTER 1
IN THE BEGINNING
THE FAMILY HISTORY OF THE GUINNESSES
After almost three centuries, it must be acknowledged that there exists in the Guinness family a unique set of qualities. These include an astute business sense, appreciation of the efforts of others, inquiring minds, patronage of the arts, theatre, and literature, a scientific approach to agriculture, broadly humanitarian qualities, and, above all, benevolence and a respect for religion.
It has been said that the Guinnesses regarded their wealth as a gift from God and, as such, it was to be used for the benefit of mankind and not squandered. There are reports of the second Arthur Guinness beginning and ending the day with family prayers, and an entire branch of the Guinness family ran missions in the East End of London and traveled as missionaries to the Congo and China.
So, where did it all begin? The name "Guinness" first appeared with Richard Guinness, father of the first Arthur Guinness. Efforts to trace the family back beyond that have been unsuccessful. There are two schools of thought on the more distant origins of the name. Firstly, there was an officer of Cromwell's army called "Ghennis," originally from Cornwall. Over the years, the Ghennis family have made contact with the Guinness family and, although they were received with courtesy, no formal links with them were ever made, or continued.
Secondly, there is a more formal link with the Magennis clan of County Down, believed to be related to the O'Neills. This is the link favored by the Guinness family. The Magennises fought at the Battle of the Boyne on the side of King James-the Catholic side. The Magennis base was in a place called Iveagh in County Down. Many years later, Edward Cecil Guinness took the title "Earl of Iveagh;" the Guinness coat of arms is a derivation of the Magennis coat of arms.
So how can there be a link between the Catholic Magennis clan in County Down in 1690 and the Guinness family, servants to the Protestant Archbishop of Cashel, a hundred years later? We begin with Richard Guinness, father of the first Arthur Guinness. Richard's birth details are unknown, and our first knowledge of this humble man is as steward to Archbishop Arthur Price in Celbridge, County Kildare. The duties of a steward at that time included looking after household provisions-and brewing small amounts of household beer. So, the first brewing Guinness was Richard, who brewed beer as part of his household duties. No doubt he passed his brewing skills on to his first-born and eldest son, Arthur. Richard and his wife, Elizabeth Read, had six children in total: Arthur, Frances, Elizabeth, Benjamin, Richard, and Samuel. The youngest son, Samuel, became a goldsmith and the ancestor of the banking side of the Guinness family.
It is said that the Archbishop of Cashel became renowned as a host, not least for the quality of the dark beer he served to his guests. When he died in 1752, he left £100 to his servant Richard, who used the money to set up a local hostelry in Celbridge called the "Bear and Ragged Staff." Young Arthur was then twenty-seven years old, and the Archbishop also left him £100. Using this legacy, Arthur set up his first brewery-not in Dublin, but in Leixlip, County Kildare. Then, having brewed a beer remarkable for its quality for three years, he left the Leixlip brewery in the hands of his younger brother, Richard, and set out for Dublin.
When Arthur Guinness took on the ailing brewery at St. James's Gate from Mark Rainsford in 1759, he already had a great deal of expertise, both in business and in brewing, and was a mature thirty-four years of age. With the brewery came a nice town house, No. 1 Thomas Street, into which the new Mr. Guinness settled. He quickly became a businessman and a social mover of some note. Within two years, he had met and proposed marriage to Olivia Whitmore, ward of William Lunell and a cousin of the great orator and parliamentarian Henry Grattan. On June 17, 1761, the couple were married; Olivia brought an inheritance of £1,000-a huge sum at the time- to the marriage. Equally important, she was very well-connected in Dublin society.
Obviously believing in the wisdom of large families, Olivia became pregnant twenty-one times over the course of twentysix years, resulting in a family of six sons and four daughters. Their first-born, Elizabeth, later married Frederick Darley, who became Lord Mayor of Dublin in 1809. The second child was a son, Hosea, born in 1765. He took Holy Orders, married a woman named Jane Hart and was the first of a long line of Guinnesses to enter the church. He was for thirty years rector of St. Werburgh's Church, located next to Dublin Castle, and Chancellor of St. Patrick's Cathedral. Hosea's youngest son, Francis Hart Vicesimus Guinness, emigrated first to India and then to New Zealand, where many of his descendants live to this day.
Their third child, born in 1768, was a son, Arthur, later known as Arthur Guinness of Beaumont. He lived in the family home at Beaumont, several miles north of Dublin. In 1794, he married Anne Lee, and they had three sons. Meanwhile, his father (the first Arthur) died at his town house in Gardiner Street aged seventy-eight. His funeral took place on January 23 1803. The funeral cortège traveled from Beaumont, an elegant white Georgian manor house, to the graveyard at Oughterard in County Kildare, where he was laid beside his mother, Elizabeth Read.
The second Arthur took over the business on his father's death; he was assisted by his brother Benjamin and by William Lunell. Arthur was also a director of the Bank of Ireland and in 1820 became its Governor. As early as 1797, he is reported as publicly supporting Daniel O'Connell and the cause of Catholic Emancipation.
Of the three sons of the second Arthur, the eldest, William Smythe Lee Grattan Guinness, went into the church, and the second, Artur Lee, had little interest in the business. The third son, Benjamin Lee Guinness, however, had entered the brewery at age sixteen in 1814 and worked there for forty years, until the death of his father in 1855. The second Arthur is laid to rest in the family vault at Mount Jerome Cemetery in Dublin with the simple inscription: "Arthur Guinness of Beaumont, County Dublin."
Prior to taking over the business in 1855, Benjamin Lee Guinness had been active in business and social circles. He lived at St. Anne's in Clontarf, on the east side of Dublin, and had been elected Lord Mayor of Dublin in 1851. In 1856, he purchased No. 80 St. Stephen's Green as his town house, in the center of Dublin, overlooking the fashionable private park. In 1865, he was elected Conservative MP for Dublin city, a post he held until his death in 1868. Also in 1865, at a cost of £150,000 of his own money, he renovated St. Patrick's Cathedral in Dublin, which was in danger of becoming a ruin. For this and "other public service," he was created a baronet in 1867. He began a huge program of investment in the brewery at St. James's Gate. As a family, the Guinnesses' surroundings were described as opulent, but their lives were sober and their days began and ended with family prayers.
Sir Benjamin Lee Guinness died in London at the age of seventy on May 19, 1868 and the family business was bequeathed to his two sons, Sir Arthur Edward, who inherited his father's baronetcy and parliamentary seat, and Edward Cecil. Included in the terms of Sir Benjamin Lee's will was the stipulation that the family fortune should remain concentrated in the brewery. After some years, Arthur Edward, later to become Lord Ardilaun, sold his interest in the business to his brother, Edward Cecil. This left Arthur Edward free to pursue his real interests: public life and philanthropy. He is reported to have given the impression that he gave money away not to please others but to please himself. He completed the reconstruction of Marsh's Library beside St. Patrick's Cathedral-work which his father had begun-and rebuilt the Coombe Lying-in Hospital. He later became chairman of the Dublin Artisans' Dwelling Company, the first Dublin organization to concern itself with the housing of workers. He purchased from the residents the lovely twenty-two-acre park at St. Stephen's Green, which was overlooked by his brother's town house, and paid to have the park redesigned and a pond installed-and presented it to the citizens of Dublin.
As an aside, members of the Guinness family had a diverse range of business interests. A grandson of Sir Benjamin Lee, through his second son Lee, was Kenelm Lee Guinness, a successful racing motorist who invented a special form of spark plug which he named using his own initials, K.L.G., and which was later manufactured on a commercial scale.
Edward Cecil Guinness, later to be created baronet (1885), baron (1891), viscount (1904) and the first Lord Iveagh (1919), was a remarkable man who had a great concern for people. After 1874, when he had assumed sole proprietorship of the company, he made many changes in the terms of employment of his workers. Among these was, in 1881, the purchase of Kingsbridge Woollen Mills for the purpose of creating employment for the daughters of Guinness workers, thereby indirectly benefiting the family income. Sadly, after about eight years in operation, the mills were closed down due to serious economic difficulties. Around the same time, he modernized the structure of the company, and he launched it on the stock market in 1886.
One of his acquisitions, after taking over the brewery in 1874, was the purchase of Farmleigh, a substantial property overlooking the Phoenix Park. This enabled him and his wife to entertain on a grand scale, in addition to entertaining at his town house at 80 St. Stephen's Green. Living at Farmleigh allowed him to stroll through the park to visit either the Woollen Mills at Kingsbridge or the Brewery at St. James's Gate.
One of the concerns of Edward Cecil was affordable housing, not just for Guinness workers but for all the ordinary workers of the time-the artisans who were the skilled manual workers of Dublin. He divided his time between London and Dublin and was instrumental in setting up the Dublin Artisans' Dwelling Company, along with the Earl of Meath. In Rialto, beside the Brewery, he contracted the Dublin Artisans' Dwelling Company to build a housing scheme in 1883 for renting at affordable prices to Guinness workers.
By far the greatest achievement of Edward Cecil, however, was the establishment in 1890 of the Guinness Trust, a major philanthropic trust to provide affordable housing for the laboring classes-not just Guinness workers-of Dublin and London. The Trust was founded with an endowment of £250,000 (around â‚20 million in today's money): £200,000 of this sum was to provide housing in London, and £50,000 in Dublin. In later years, he was to invest further sums in the Dublin operation.
In 1903, the two funds were separated. The Dublin operation became known as the Iveagh Trust, which went on to construct various buildings that are well known to Dublin people, including the Iveagh Hostel, the Iveagh Baths, the Bull Alley Play Center (known as "the Beano") and housing projects in Crumlin and Rathmines. Another important project was the clearance of a slum area beside St. Patrick's Cathedral and its transformation into a public park. Then, as the clearance had disrupted many small merchants and shopkeepers, he had constructed at the north end of Francis Street the Iveagh Market, where clothes and goods could be displayed and sold in airy, clean locations.
Back in London, Edward Cecil endowed the Lister Institute of Preventive Medicine and, with Sir Ernest Cassel, founded the Radium Institute. In 1921, he established the Chadacre Agricultural Institute near Bury St. Edmunds to provide training in agriculture for the sons of farm laborers. In 1925, he bought Kenwood, a large house on Hampstead Heath, as a gallery to house his ever-increasing art collection. The gallery, now known as the Iveagh Bequest, along with the house and surrounding land, passed by the terms of his will to the London County Council.
In 1873, just before he took over the family business, Edward Cecil had married his second cousin, Adelaide Guinness, known as "Dodo." Adelaide was a great-granddaughter of Samuel Guinness, brother of the first Arthur Guinness, and was, therefore, from the Guinness banking line. Their first child, born in 1874, was a son, Rupert Edward Cecil Lee Guinness, later to become the second Lord Iveagh and chairman of the company until his death in 1967. Their second son was Walter Edward, later to be Lord Moyne, who was assassinated in Cairo while acting as British Consul in 1944. Walter Edward's son, Bryan Guinness, the Second Lord Moyne, later became a popular and colorful vice-chairman of the Guinness board of directors.
While Edward Cecil is remembered in a plaque in the front yard of the Brewery, his son Rupert is commemorated in the theatre built at St. James's Gate in 1951: the Rupert Guinness Hall. Rupert was a quiet, shy person, who, nonetheless, excelled at Cambridge University, both academically and at rowing, winning the Diamond Sculls in 1895. He was an MP from 1908 until his father's death in 1927, when he inherited the title Earl of Iveagh and the chairmanship of the company.
Rupert spent a great deal of time at the family home at Elveden in Surrey and was an enthusiastic farmer who instigated many research projects. He and his wife, Gwendolin Onslow, were regular and hospitable hosts to King Edward, who took part in many enjoyable shooting parties at Elveden. They had five children, Richard, Lady Honor, Arthur Onslow Edward, Lady Patricia and Lady Brigid. Arthur Onslow Edward, born in 1912, became Viscount Elveden. After his death in 1945, the title went to his eldest son, Arthur Francis Benjamin, who was born in 1937.
Thus it was that, in 1967, when Rupert Guinness died, the title Third Earl of Iveagh passed to his grandson, Arthur Francis Benjamin, more commonly known as Benjamin. Benjamin was one of the less fortunate Guinnesses in that, not only did he have to cope with serious illness for most of his life, but he had to deal with the rationalisation of the company during the 1980s. In order to do this, he sought the assistance of Ernest Saunders, a world-renowned marketing executive from the Nestlé Corporation, in 1981.
Benjamin Guinness, Third Earl of Iveagh, married Miranda Smiley in 1962 and they had four children-Emma Lavinia, Louisa Jane, Arthur Edward Rory and Rory Michael Benjamin. In 1992, thirty years after their wedding, Benjamin Guinness died and the title Fourth Earl of Iveagh passed to their eldest son, Arthur Edward-known as Ned Guinness.
The same year, 1992, saw the death also of Bryan Guinness, Lord Moyne and former vice-chairman of the Brewery. Following these deaths there was no longer a Guinness name on the board of the Guinness company.
Although it has virtually disappeared from the boardrooms in Dublin and London, the Guinness name is obviously still in use as a brand name for beer produced at Dublin, London and overseas. Most importantly, the Guinness family maintains a deep and active presence in the multitude of benevolent organizations to which they subscribed over the past two hundred and forty-five years-the Iveagh Trust, the Guinness Trust, the Lister Institute and many others.
THE GUINNESS WIVES
Over a period of almost two hundred and fifty years, the name of Guinness has come to be associated with Irishness, quality, generosity and business acumen, qualities summed up in the company's marketing slogan of the early twentieth century: "Guinness is Good for You." Behind this formidable dynasty lay nine generations of Guinness men with many characteristics in common. They were astute, God-fearing men, generous, with a huge sense of responsibility to their communities. They were clever, some were manipulative, all were studious, energetic, questioning, and superb managers of their business. Yet, throughout the generations there were complex personalities and a continuous streak of shyness.
From what we read, therefore, the Guinness wives were exceptional women of strong character. Olivia Whitmore, the wife of the first Arthur Guinness, was a cousin of the great parliamentarian Henry Grattan. She was also the ward of William Lunnel. Firstly, she must have had great physical strength to have survived twenty-one pregnancies. Most importantly, she contributed to the strong spiritual and religious theme through her eldest son, Hosea, thus beginning the foundations of the Grattan Guinnesses, a dynasty of religious leaders, preachers, missionaries and friends of the underpriveleged people of London, New Zealand, Africa and China. There is no doubt that the great skills in oratory of Henry Grattan lived on in the "Church Guinnesses" many of whom were in great demand as preachers. Indeed, there are still Guinnesses involved in the church in Britain, New Zealand and Australia.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Guinness"
by .
Copyright © 2013 Tony Corcoran.
Excerpted by permission of Skyhorse Publishing.
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