Baron Emile Beaumont D'Erlanger (4 June 1866 – 24 July 1939) was a French-born British merchant banker.
Life
He was the second eldest son of
Frédéric Emile d'Erlanger, a banker working in Paris at the French branch of
Emile Erlanger and Company
Emile Erlanger & Co. was a French finance and investment company established by German-born, Parisian banker Baron Frédéric Émile d'Erlanger and was active during and after the period of Reconstruction era of the United States, Reconstruction f ...
and Marguerite Mathilde Slidell (1842–1927). ''(See:
Erlanger family tree).''
His older brother, Baron Raphael Slidell d'Erlanger, who might have been more likely to follow his father into banking, was instead a scientist and professor at Heidelberg. Emile followed the banking route and from his father he was entrusted with presidency of the railway and tramway companies including the
New General Traction Company in England.
In 1891 he became a naturalised British subject.
From 1911 he was chairman of the Channel Tunnel Company (the predecessor of
EuroTunnel) and financed its design.
[Channel tunnel visions, 1850–1945: dreams and nightmares, Keith M. Wilson, Continuum International Publishing Group, 1994]
The company also financed the building of railways in
Rhodesia
Rhodesia (, ), officially from 1970 the Republic of Rhodesia, was an unrecognised state in Southern Africa from 1965 to 1979, equivalent in territory to modern Zimbabwe. Rhodesia was the ''de facto'' successor state to the British colony of S ...
,
Angola and the
Congo
Congo or The Congo may refer to either of two countries that border the Congo River in central Africa:
* Democratic Republic of the Congo, the larger country to the southeast, capital Kinshasa, formerly known as Zaire, sometimes referred to a ...
.
Family
In Paris in 1895 he married
Rose Marie Antoinette Katherine (Kate) Robert d'Aqueria de Rochegude (1874–1959).
She was the daughter of a landowner and shipowner in
Le Havre.
They lived in
Falconwood, Woolwich, near Shooters Hill, south-east London, and also at 139 Piccadilly, the former home of
Lord Byron. Later they moved to America and lived in Beverly Hills. His wife, the Baroness, was a patron of the arts, supporting artists such as
Cecil Beaton,
Romaine Brooks,
and
Sergei Diaghilev.
The couple had five children,
*Robert (called Robin) Emile Frédéric Regis d'Erlanger (1896–1934)
*
Mary Liliane Matilda, called Baba, Baroness d'Erlanger (1901–1945),
*Maria Bianca Muriel Iris d'Erlanger, (1904–1905),
*
Gerard John Regis Leo Baron d'Erlanger (1905–1962), a director of the
British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) and head of the
Air Transport Auxiliary during World War II; his daughter Mary "Minnie" Caroline d'Erlanger married
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill in the Second World War, dur ...
, the grandson of Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill
*Bianca, Baroness d'Erlanger.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Erlanger, Emile Beaumont d'
1866 births
1939 deaths
French bankers
French people of Jewish descent
Barons of France
Austrian nobility
Emile Beaumont
French emigrants to the United Kingdom