The playboy black sheep of the banking dynasty committed the unforgiveable sin of losing money... and then snubbed his mother and father on his wedding day RIFT OF THE ROTHSCHILDS
THE FIRST “important strength of the family is unity” declared octogenarian financier Sir Evelyn de Rothschild, when asked to pronounce on the resilience of the great banking dynasty whose name is synonymous with enormous wealth. In reality of course, most of us realise that huge riches do not automatically equate with increased happiness – witness the travails of Getty, Onassis or, more recently, the marital discord of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.
The Rothschilds have, to be fair, managed to survive relatively unscathed from internecine squabbles since the family coffers first began to swell under the direction of businessman Mayer Amschel Rothschild, who set up a bank in Frankfurt in the 1760s.
But the death earlier this month of Serena Rothschild, the 81-year-old wife of Lord (Jacob) Rothschild, is a reminder of a recent conflict within the gilded family which saw mother and father pitted against their only son in a disagreement over his lifestyle.
Such was the enmity between Nathaniel Rothschild (known as Nat) and his parents that the 47-year-old entrepreneur did not invite them to his wedding two years ago to model Loretta Basey. Neither Jacob nor Serena attended the ceremony at the Swiss ski resort of Klosters or the wedding party held a week later in Wiltshire.
Speculation at the time that Loretta’s glamour career – with multiple Page Three appearances to her name – had not met with Lord and Lady Rothschild’s approval were unfounded, with sources insisting Loretta’s past did not bother her prospective in-laws.
What seemed to cause them more concern was their only son’s perceived lack of care over investments. In short, this family schism was all down to money.
Nat had experienced a tricky few years, with several questionable investments, including millions spent on a disastrous stake in the Indonesian coal market, causing him to drop (according to the Sunday Times Rich List) from being worth an estimated £1billion, down to £170million in just three years.
Nat found himself shamed by some of his own relatives for the way he had purportedly allowed the family’s most precious asset – its name – to be dragged through the full glare of a public row over mismanagement and missing millions during his entanglement in Indonesia.
“Jacob was very concerned with Nat’s handling of investments – he felt his behaviour was risking the family name – and the two fell out,” says a family source. “No one should underestimate the degree of tenacious protection exercised by senior family members to protect the Rothschild reputation.”
Jacob Rothschild, 82, a wise and generous philanthropist to whom Princess Diana often turned to for advice, was said to be bitterly disappointed at his son’s dwindling reputation. He had hoped that tensions between himself and Nat were a thing of the past.
Previously those tensions were not about finance but over personal issues such as Nat’s unfettered hedonism at Oxford, and incidents such as an escort girl’s story that she was asked to provide strippers and drugs at a party he hosted at Waddesdon Manor, the magnificent family seat in Buckinghamshire (now run by the National Trust).
Indeed, almost from the start of his gilded life, it appeared that Nat was a libertine set to self-destruct.
A friend at Eton remembers him as “a rather scruffy and unpredictable boy with a rebellious streak, whom you would never have tipped to make a big success of his life”.
While at Oxford, Nat soon became infamous for his excesses, revelling in his membership of the Bullingdon Club, the notorious all-male drinking society whose members have famously included David Cameron, George Osborne and Boris Johnson. He once pushed a portable builders’ lavatory down a steep hill – with a friend still inside.
AN OXFORD contemporary at Wadham College remembers: “He was a playboy who was a babe magnet – at parties, the prettiest girls would flock to him like bees to honey. That’s what the name Rothschild does for you, it seems to be a very powerful aphrodisiac.”
When Nat embarked on a romance with Kate Moss’s friend, model Annabelle Neilson, his family must have cast a jaded eye over his latest choice, whom he had met on a beach in India. They were even more horrified when, aged just 23, he eloped with Annabelle to Las Vegas, and married her.
“It was a huge shock to Jacob and Serena,” says a close family friend. “Marrying Annabelle was incredibly impetuous – and as they predicted, it ended in tears.”
The couple divorced after three years and Neilson received a generous financial settlement in return for rescinding the dynastic name and signing a confidentiality agreement. After years of addiction problems, she was found dead last year in her London home from a heart attack, aged 49.
When Nat embarked on a career in the City it upset Jacob that his son seemed to revel in his flashy entrepreneurial style, so different from the Rothschilds’ usual discreet and understated methods. He felt deeply uncomfortable at Nat’s use of the most revered name in global finance to attract investment into speculative activities.
Yet Nat is now a success, on his own terms. He is chairman of a business advising investors in emerging markets and is happily married with homes in Switzerland, New York and London. Family friends hope the death of his mother Serena may, at least, bring about reconciliation between Nat and his father.
Adam Helliker’s diary returns next week