Junius Spencer Morgan

Junius Spencer Morgan becomes a partner, with George Peabody, in the English banking house of George Peabody & Co., started with financing from the Rothschilds.

Morgan had begun his business career in 1829 by entering the employ of Alfred Welles of Boston, and later entered the the dry-goods business.

George Peabody had established the Peabody Donation Fund, which continues to this day as the Peabody Trust, in April 1862 to provide housing of a decent quality for the "artisans and labouring poor of London".

The trust's first dwellings, designed by H.A. Darbishire in a Jacobethan style, are opened in Commercial Street, Spitalfields in February 1864.

Peabody was born in South Danvers (now Peabody), Massachusetts.

His family had Puritan antecedents in the state, but was poor, and as one of eight children George had suffered some deprivations during his upbringing: these factors influence his later philanthropic tendencies.

His birthplace at 205 Washington Street in Peabody is now the George Peabody House Museum, a museum dedicated to preserving his life and legacy.

While serving as a volunteer in the War of 1812, Peabody had met Elisha Riggs, who, in 1814, had provided financial backing for what became the wholesale dry goods firm of Riggs, Peabody & Co., specializing in importing dry goods from Britain.

In 1816, he had moved to Baltimore, where he would live for the next twenty years.

Branches had been opened in New York and Philadelphia in 1822.

Riggs had retired in 1829, and the firm had become Peabody, Riggs & Co., with Peabody as senior partner.

Peabody had first visited the UK in 1827 to purchase wares, and to negotiate the sale of American cotton in Lancashire.

He had subsequently opened a branch office in Liverpool, and British business began to play an increasingly important role in his affairs.

He appears to have had some help in establishing himself from William and James Brown, sons of another successful Baltimore businessman, the Irishman Alexander Brown, who had managed their father's Liverpool office, opened in 1810.

In 1835, Peabody had founded the banking firm of George Peabody & Co. in London to meet the increasing demand for securities issued by the American railroads, and – although Peabody had continued to deal in dry goods and other commodities – he has increasingly focused his attentions on merchant banking.

The bank has risen to become the premier American house in London.

Peabody frequently entertains and provides letters of introduction for American businessmen visiting London, and has become known for the Anglo-American dinners he hosts in honor of American diplomats and other worthies, and in celebration of the Fourth of July.

In 1851, when the US Congress had refused to support the American section at the Great Exhibition at the Crystal Palace, Peabody had advanced £3000 to improve the exhibit and uphold the reputation of the United States.

Peabody is the acknowledged father of modern philanthropy, having established the practice that will later be followed by Johns Hopkins, Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller and Bill Gates.

In the United States, his philanthropy largely takes the form of educational initiatives.

In Britain, it takes the form of providing housing for the poor.

Peabody's philanthropy is recognized and on July 10, 1862 he had been made a Freeman of the City of London, the motion being proposed by Charles Reed in recognition of his financial contribution to London's poor.

He had thus become the first of only two Americans (the other being Dwight D. Eisenhower) to have received the award.

Peabody, Morgan and Co. now takes the name J.S. Morgan & Co. and is appointed the financial representatives in England of the United States government during the American Civil War.

The former UK merchant bank Morgan Grenfell (now part of Deutsche Bank), international universal bank JPMorgan Chase and investment bank Morgan Stanley can all trace their roots to Peabody's bank

Junius Spencer Morgan was born on April 14, 1813 in Holyoke, Massachusetts.

The Morgan name is traced to Carmarthen, Wales, and the first known Morgan family ancestral is Bleddri, third son of Demetae chieftain Cadivor-fawr and his wife Elen.

Miles Morgan, ancestor to the Morgan family in America, had emigrated from Bristol, England to Boston in 1636.

Morgan had begun his business career in 1829 by entering the employ of Alfred Welles of Boston.

He had inherited wealth from his father, Joseph Morgan, and showed great business ability.

He was soon invited to become a partner in the house of J. M. Beebe & Co., one of the largest retail stores in Boston and one of the largest dry goods importing and jobbing house in the country.

In 1836, Morgan had married Juliet Pierpont (1816–1884).

He had contributed money to his church and to Trinity College, Hartford.

He was in the dry goods business from about 1836 to 1853.

After some years, he had met George Peabody.

Shortly after the meeting, in 1854, Morgan had entered Peabody's prosperous firm, George Peabody & Co. as a partner.

During the run on the banks of 1857, Peabody had had to ask the Bank of England for a loan of eight hundred thousand pounds: although rivals had tried to force the bank out of business, it had managed to emerge with its credit intact.

Following this crisis, Peabody began to retire from active business, and in 1864 retires fully (taking with him much of his capital, amounting to over ten million dollars, or two million pounds).

Junius Morgan, in his most famous transaction, arranges for the loan of fifty million dollars to France to fund their effort in the Franco-Prussian War.

J. P. Morgan partners with the Drexels of Philadelphia to form the New York firm of Drexel, Morgan & Company in 1871.

Anthony J. Drexel becomes Pierpont's mentor at the request of Junius Morgan.

John Pierpont Morgan was born and raised in Hartford, Connecticut, to Junius Spencer Morgan (1813–1890) and Juliet Pierpont (1816–1884) of Boston, Massachusetts.

Pierpont, as he preferred to be known, had had a varied education due in part to interference by his father.

Pierpont had transferred to the Hartford Public School  in the fall of 1848, then to the Episcopal Academy in Cheshire, Connecticut, (now called Cheshire Academy), boarding with the principal.

In September 1851, Morgan passed the entrance exam for the English High School of Boston, a school specializing in mathematics to prepare young men for careers in commerce.

Illness that is to become more common as his life progresses struck in the spring of 1852; rheumatic fever left him in so much pain that he could not walk.

Junius had sent Pierpont to the Azores in order for him to recover.

After convalescing for almost a year, Pierpont had returned to the English High School in Boston to resume his studies.

After graduating, his father had sent him to Bellerive, a school near the Swiss village of Vevey.

When Morgan had attained fluency in French, his father sent him to the University of Göttingen in order to improve his German.

Attaining a passable level of German within six months and also a degree in art history, Morgan had traveled back to London via Wiesbaden, with his education complete.

Morgan had gone into banking in 1857 at his father's London branch, moving to New York City in 1858 where he worked at the banking house of Duncan, Sherman & Company, the American representatives of George Peabody & Company.

From 1860 to 1864, as J. Pierpont Morgan & Company, he had acted as agent in New York for his father's firm.

By 1864, he was a member of the firm of Dabney, Morgan, and Company.