Chapter 3

CHARLES EDWARD BARING YOUNG

Charles Edward baring Young had had a very privileged upbringing. His family were not among the aristocracy, but were firmly rooted in the upper class. Alfred F Jarvis ('Charles Baring Young of Daylesford`, Church Book Room Press, London, 1950) has enlarged comprehensively on the Founder's ancestry and illustrious relations and, to make his case more thoroughly, has added in the end-papers a folded and extendable family tree. More simply, it can be stated that the Youngs were respectable men of 'naval, literary and merchant stock` (op. cit. p.1) who had married into money. The Barings were one of the richest international banking firms in Europe, comparable with the Rothschilds, until their alarming collapse in Austria in 1873 nearly brought down the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Thereafter, they operated as a private bank, without High Street outlets, until Nick Leeson succeeded in dragging the whole firm into disaster by his wild speculation on the stock market in the 1990s. But in the 1880s, so far as the Founder was concerned, the bank was sound and his capital secure: he was a wealthy man.

Charles Edward Baring Young 1850 - 1928

The Youngs drew attention to their ancestry by incorporating their surnames with their own. It was a harmless affectation, which they shared with many other families in their social class. Children were christened with a liberal sprinkling of Winthrops, Lloyds, Mackworths, Hiltons and, of course, Barings. It was in fact Charles Edward Baring Young's grandfather, Sir Samuel Young Bart. (1766-1826), who had married Emily Baring (1775 - 1847), the daughter of Charles Baring of Exeter (1742-1829). But Baring was a name to command respect: the family were exceptionally wealthy financiers, and Baring Brothers, dating from the early years of the eighteenth century, was accepted as one of the soundest international banks of the age. Sir Samuel gave the additional name, Baring, to his second son, Charles Baring Young (1801-1882), who passed it on to his elder son, Charles Edward Baring Young, although by that time - 1843 - the Baring connection was already become a little remote. No matter; throughout his life he was to be known as Baring Young.

Sir Samuel Young was the son of Admiral Sir George Young, Kt., (1732-1810) whose second wife, Anne Battie, brought him the impressive family home of Formosa Place at Cookham, Berks. Sir Samuel (born on 23 rd February 1766) made his reputation and fortune in the service of the East India Company in the Presidencies of Calcutta and, later, Madras. It was at Calcutta that his second son, Charles Baring, was born on 7 th November 1801. He received his baronetcy ("of Formosa Place") on 24 th November 1813 and died on 14 th December 1826, having fathered at least nine children by his wife, Emily Baring. The eldest of these nine children, Captain Sir George Young, R.N., inherited Formosa Place and the baronetcy in 1826. (The other children were Charles Baring 1801-1882, Henry 1803-1881, Horatio Beauman 1805-1879, William Jackson 1809-1848, Edward Lloyd 1819 - 1827, Emily who died unmarried on 3 rd February 1848, Lucia who married the Revd Charles Lawrence in 1839 and Caroline Louisa who married the Revd Josiah Webster Harden in 1846.) At least three of these siblings - Charles Baring, Henry and William Jackson, followed in the father's footsteps in the service of the East India Company, which, by one of those curiosities of British imperial history, managed to combine the profits of trade with the government of that vast area that, in 1876, would become the Indian Empire. The name of the Youngs` mansion - Formosa Place - was itself a reminder of the East Indies connection, for Formosa is now known as Taiwan.

Charles Baring Young also made an advantageous marriage in 1843 to Elizabeth Winthrop (1811-1897), another family name to conjure with. Not only were the Winthrops descended from the famous seventeenth century Governor of Massachusetts, but, more significantly, Elizabeth's paternal grandfather, Benjamin Winthrop (1737-1809) had been Governor of the Bank of England, and her maternal grandfather, Gamaliel Lloyd, had been Mayor of Leeds in 1779. Gamaliel Lloyd - with his strange Welsh/Jewish name - is slightly out of place amongst these members of the gentry and minor aristocracy: he was a merchant of Leeds ('beyond Woodhouse Bar`), and a partner in the firm of Lloyd and Cattaneo. He joined Leeds Council in 1771, was chosen as an Alderman in 1775, and became the 123 rd Mayor of Leeds (a post annually elected for one year only) on 29 th September 1778. He was 'ousted` from his mayoralty on 3 rd June 1779, because he had moved to Hampstead, Middlesex, and had thereby ceased to be an inhabitant of Leeds. Horace Cattaneo died in 1792. If there is any substance in the assertion that Charles Baring Young had Jewish ancestry, it may have been because of his descent from Gamaliel Lloyd, although, apart from his forename, there is no evidence that Lloyd was a Jew.

Despite all these illustrious connections, relationships within the Young family were fairly restricted. In his will in 1881, Charles Baring Young did remember his sister, Caroline Louisa Harden, by leaving her £3000, and the two children of his other sister, Lucia Lawrence, by leaving them £100 apiece. The only really close relation ship was between Charles Baring Young and the children of his younger brother, Horatio Beauman Young, who inherited £7000 between them. The friendship between these two branches of the Young family was to continue into the next generation: of all the family it was Charles Edward Baring Young's cousin, Alan Rowley Young, who was most closely associated with his work, was a frequent visitor to Daylesford, and pioneered the scheme of emigration to Canada.

Following the social custom of the day, the Youngs had their town house and their country seat. The country residence was Oak Hill, a mansion in East Barnet, which was then still part of rural Hertfordshire. Most of the time they chose to spend at their London home where they held a long leasehold on 12, Hyde Park Terrace, a very prestigious address. Charles Baring Young was already in his forties when he married Elizabeth Winthrop, who was ten years younger. Charles and Elizabeth Young had five children, born between 1845 and 1852. Their eldest daughter, Emily, died young at the age of eleven. Next came Caroline Susan, born in 1847, who married her first cousin, William Frederick Lawrence; then Margaret Lucia, born in 1848, who never married. Charles Edward Baring was their fourth child, born in 1850. Last, born two years later, was Arthur William Young.

Charles Edward Baring Young was born on 19 th March 1850. His education was privileged. He was sent to a boarding Preparatory School at the age of nine, proceeded to Eton when he was thirteen, then to Trinity College, Cambridge, at eighteen, and finally to the Inner Temple. Unlike his great predecessor, Lord Shaftesbury, who in similar circumstances was bitterly unhappy as a child, there is no evidence that Charles Baring Young's childhood was anything but happy; but then there is little evidence about those years at all. Alf Jarvis has shown how he came under the influence of good Christian men - teachers like the Revd Cowley Powles and his friend Charles Kingsley, the Revd James Leigh Joyner, and fellow pupils like Quintin Hogg.

There is something slightly unusual about his association with Quintin Hogg. Hogg left Eton at the age of eighteen in the same year that Baring Young (five years younger) entered the school, but continued to visit regularly to speak at a House Prayer Meeting consisting of about sixteen boys. Alf Jarvis (op. cit. p.13) records that Quintin Hogg gave Baring Young a small book of hymns in 1865 inscribed ' Charles Edward Baring Young from his affectionate Quintin Hogg 1865.` The inference is that Quintin Hogg may have been instrumental in Charles Baring Young's conversion. Certainly he was to play a decisive part in Baring Young's career.   Left: Quintin Hogg 1845 - 1903

Such an education was traditional and normal for boys from his background, and he will have accepted it unquestioningly, although today we might rightly be concerned at sending a child to a boarding school at such an early age. On the other hand, the experience of having to fend for himself in a closed community of many boys will have been formative when he came to conceive his own great plan for the Homes where most boys were admitted at about the age of eight.

He had his homes - the town house and the country house - and his extended family relationships with the great and the good. He belonged to the right clubs and the right political party. He went on the Grand Tour. In one way only did he differ from the other young men of his class and generation - and even here only in degree: he came from an austere, almost narrowly puritanical background. Even this would have been socially acceptable, except that, in his case, the evangelical party line was accompanied by genuine religious commitment.

The one great event that is absent from the records, and indeed seems never to have been mentioned by the Founder, was when and how he committed himself to the Lord Jesus Christ as his Saviour. He may well have grown up in such a firmly religious home that he never at any time doubted that he was a believing Christian, but surely there must have been some occasion in his life when, for the first time, he realised what Jesus had done for him, and, by giving thanks to God, consciously made that commitment that changed the whole course of his life. We cannot doubt that such an event occurred, although it may not have been in childhood but perhaps when he was a teenager at Eton. It is most probable that he was led to Christ through his friend, Quintin Hogg, who had been converted through the American evangelist, D. L. Moody, in 1872 and, later, arranged a 'mission` to Eton College in June 1875 in the face of serious disapproval from the college authorities. But Charles's firm adherence to the Evangelical faith, and every word and action throughout his life, indicate that he had indeed been soundly converted. This was the transforming force in his life, leading him ultimately to turn away from the sort of legal or political career for which he would otherwise have been destined. It was not until 1892 that he finally turned his back on the sleazy world of politics, but thereafter he devoted his whole life, single-heartedly, to the work to which he believed he had been called: the love of God and of his neighbour. No account of the Kingham Hill Homes would be intelligible without this understanding.

There is one curious myth about the Founder that, in the interest of accuracy, needs to be corrected. A former Bursar on the Hill, pointing to the portrait in the School Hall, asserted to me repeatedly that the Founder was a Jew. Others, too, have hinted at an alleged Jewish origin for the Baring family. It would be no discredit to the Barings if they had indeed been Jewish, but it is worth pointing out that the family traces its ancestry to Franz Baring (1522-1589), a Carmelite monk from West Friesland, who converted to Protestantism, and became the Lutheran Superintendent-General in Lauenburg. The family moved to England in 1717 when John Baring was apprenticed to a cloth manufacturer in Exeter. There is no evidence for any Jewish connections whatever unless, perhaps, through his maternal great-grandfather, Gamaliel Lloyd, who had been Mayor of Leeds.

We have a pleasing vignette of the Young family in residence at 12, Hyde Park Terrace, from the census return of 1881. Here, the head of the family was Charles Baring Young, a "Gentleman", aged 79. He had been born in Calcutta when his father was working with the East India Company, and no doubt the household was frequently reminded of their close links with India and the Far East. All his four surviving children, Caroline, Margaret, Charles and Arthur, aged between 28 and 33, were living at home, and all were as yet unmarried. Charles Edward Baring Young, a barrister, was the only member of the family whose occupation was given, although it is likely that he did not practise. After these members of the Young family came a list of nine resident servants, all of whom were comparatively young. The Housekeeper, Eliza Rogers, aged 36, came from Suffolk; the Butler, George Potter, 32, from Kent. Elizabeth Young's personal Lady's Maid, Margaret Elkins who, at 37, was the oldest of the servants, was a Londoner. The two housemaids, Kate Collins (29) and Jane Joyce (19) came from Wiltshire and Southgate respectively. The two footmen, Walter Withay (20) and Thomas Marsh (19) were from Hackney and Slough. The kitchen maid, Louisa Green (22) came from St John's Wood, and the scullery maid, Eliza Miller (19) from Hackney. There might also have been some non-resident servants: there is no coachman named, nor any gardener, and Charles Young may well have employed a private secretary.

This constituted the accepted establishment required by a wealthy family, in which "upstairs and downstairs" were sharply distinguished. Perhaps only when he was completing the census return did Charles Young become aware of the surnames of some of his servants, and the Christian names of others. In such an environment, it is likely that eyebrows were discreetly raised over Charles Edward Baring Young's activities amongst London working boys.

Alf Jarvis explains how Charles Baring Young was first involved in the London Working Boys' Homes by his older friend, Quintin Hogg. By 1883, when he was aged twenty-eight, he was appointed Treasurer of the Homes and made frequent visits to them. By 1887 there were eight Homes housing about 350 boys aged thirteen to seventeen, and every year there was a gathering or re-union of former residents at the Homes which must have given Charles Baring Young the idea for the 'Gathering of the Clans` which became such a memorable annual feature of Kingham Hill. Once a year, also, all the boys were invited for a day's outing and picnic at Oakhill, the north London house and estate that he owned. From 14 th to 16 th July 1888, three hundred and twenty boys from the eight Homes for Working Boys came down for the weekend to Daylesford and Kingham Hill: accommodation must have placed a heavy burden on Durham and Clyde Houses, but the latter was presumably better placed to receive them as it was not officially opened until two days later.

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