William Tetlow Hibbert

1. William Tetlow Hibbert (1792-1881) was the son of William Hibbert (1759-1844) and Elizabeth Greenhalgh of Horwich. William Tetlow’s mother Elizabeth died in 1800. His father William lived at Crescent Grove Southside Clapham Common from 1810 until his death in 1844.

2. In 1821 William Tetlow married Mary Caroline Cure, the daughter of Capel Cure. Mary’s father and brother, both named Capel Cure, were significant Essex land-owners with a property at Blake Hall consisting of 1,058 acres of which they farmed nearly 700 acres themselves. Mary’s brother owned another property called Bobbingworth Hall. When the couple first married they lived at No.37 Great George Street, London. They had three sons; Edward George, Francis Gordon and Robert Henry Hibbert.

3. William Tetlow was a member of three different commercial partnerships; G. W. S. Hibbert (1820-1838), G. W. S. Hibbert & Co. (1820-1838) and Hibbert & Co.(1839-). The first two partnerships involved his uncle George Hibbert M.P. (1757-1837). All three were West India merchant houses, the firms shipped, insured and distributed colonial commodities (particularly sugar). They owned their own ships and were also involved with finance and credit.

4. William Tetlow was a member of the Canada Company’s Provisional Committee established in 1824. The Canada Company was incorporated by an Act of Parliament on July 27, 1825. It was a private chartered land development company which was set up to facilitate the colonisation of Upper Canada. The Canada Company assisted emigrants by providing low cost transport in ships, farming equipment, and cheap land. In 1826 William Tetlow became a Company Director and was rotated off the Court of Directors in 1830. Hibbert Township in Ontario, Canada was opened in 1830 and named after William Tetlow’s family. It covers 41,421 acres (65 sq mi; 168 km2). First settler was Thomas Fox who received 200 acres (0.8 km2) of land from the Company on the condition he open an inn for travellers on the Huron Road.

5. William Tetlow was also involved with the establishment of the Colonial Banking Company of the West Indies as founding subscriber. A Royal Charter to establish the bank was granted on 1 June 1836, and the following May offices were opened across the Caribbean, commencing with offices in Barbados, Trinidad and British Guiana, and continuing later in 1837 with representation in St Lucia, Grenada, Antigua, Dominica, St Kitts, St Vincent, the Danish Virgins and Kingston, Jamaica. The Colonial Bank operated as a virtual monopoly in the Caribbean, with the only serious competition being from the West India Bank in the 1840s. The spread of representation across the Caribbean islands provided a degree of resilience to local economic circumstances, and the Colonial Bank proved to be a commercial success. There were few changes for the Colonial Bank over the first hundred years of its existence. The economy of the West Indies remained based on primary production, with sugar of overwhelming importance, and the Bank's business remained what it had always been - financing agriculture and trade. In most countries it was also banker to the Government. The Colonial Bank was a forerunner of Barclays Bank.

6. Between 1851 and 1867 William Tetlow was a Director of the Royal Exchange Assurance Corporation. The Corporation had begun as a marine insurance company but by the time William Tetlow became a Director, it had branched out to include life, goods, home and fire insurance.

7. From 1850 until his death in 1881 William Tetlow lived at 18 Prince’s Gate, Hyde Park (he had previously bought the lease for Dulwich Hill House in 1834 but sold it in 1850.) Prince's Gate was completed in 1849. The houses were designed by Harvey Lonsdale Elmes and built by John Kelk. Shortly after completion of the terrace, the Crystal Palace was built opposite in Hyde Park to house the Great Exhibition of 1851. The houses were of a size and standard calculated to appeal to wealthy members of the upper and upper-middle classes and drew residents from the ranks of the very rich, including landed aristocrats, merchants, bankers and industrialists.

8. William Tetlow died at Postford House, Chilworth Surrey. He left a personal estate of £165,288 1s 11d.

We are grateful to Sharon O’Connor and Marion Wallace for their assistance with compiling this entry.

1. The Publications of the Harleian Society, Vol.37 (1894). http://archive.org/stream/publicationsofha37harluoft#page/272/mode/2up/search/hibbert [accessed 09/02/2013].

2. 'Bobbingworth: Introduction', A History of the County of Essex: Volume 4: Ongar Hundred (1956), pp. 9-10 available at http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=15528. ‘No. 37 Great George Street', Survey of London: volume 10: St. Margaret, Westminster, part I: Queen Anne’s Gate area (1926), pp. 59-60. [accessed 09/02/2013].

3. London Trade Directories, Institute of Historical Research, Senate House.

4. Robert C. Lee, The Canada Company and the Huron Tract, 1826-1853; Personalities, Profits and Politics (Ontario, Natural Heritage, 2004). Appendix C Huron Tract Township Names and Their Origins http://archive.org/stream/cihm_50560#page/n0/mode/2up [accessed 07/02/2013]. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perth_County,_Ontario [accessed 07/02/2013].

5. Return to an address of the Honourable House of Commons dated 16th December 1837 for copies of the Charters granted to Colonial and Australian Banking Companies, PP 1838 XL; Robert Montgomery Martin, Statistics of the Colonies of the British Empire in the West Indies , South America, North America, Asia, Austral-asia, Africa, and Europe (London: W. H. Allen and Co., 1839), Appendix p.20. Colonial Bank Charter Act 1841, Laws of Barbados http://archive.org/stream/cu31924017514427#page/n41/mode/2up/search/hibbert [accessed 07/02/2013]. http://www.cibcfcib.com/index.php?page=barclay-s-history-in-the-caribbean [accessed 07/02/2013].

6. Glasgow Herald, 22/12/1851. Journal of the Institute of Actuaries, Vol.13 (1866-1867).

7. 'Princes Gate and Ennismore Gardens: The Kingston House Estate: Development by Elger, Kelk and Mayhew from 1845', Survey of London: volume 45: Knightsbridge (2000), pp. 160-170. http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=45935 [accessed 07/02/2013]; Bernard Nurse, 'Lost Houses of Dulwich: Dulwich Hill House and its residents', https://www.dulwichsociety.com/the-journal/winter-2017/lost-houses-of-dulwich-dulwich-hill-house-and-its-residents [accessed 14/07/2023].

8. National Probate Calendar 1881.