Queen’s financial adviser, Sir Evelyn de Rothschild, dies at 91
SIR Evelyn de Rothschild, a former financial adviser to the Queen, has died aged 91, his family announced yesterday.
A member of the Rothschild banking dynasty, he was widely recognised as one of the leading philanthropists and financiers of his generation and was knighted by Her Majesty in 1989.
His family said: ‘It is with great sorrow that Lady de Rothschild announces the death of her beloved husband, Sir Evelyn de Rothschild, after a short illness. [He] passed away peacefully at his home in London with his loved ones by his side.
‘The family appreciates thoughts and prayers at this very sad time.’
Dedicating his life to the family’s bank after his father retired in 1961, Sir Evelyn served as chief executive and chairman from 1976 to 2003 and, under his watch, its assets swelled from £40million to £4.6billion. He was also chairman of The Economist magazine from 1972 to 1989.
In later life, he turned to philanthropy, steering the Eranda Rothschild Foundation, which has donated over £73million to medical research, education and the arts. And in 2002, he founded conservation charity Elephant Family, with Mark Shand, the Queen Consort’s brother.
A keen horse owner, Sir Evelyn is best known for his thoroughbred Crystal Ocean, which won at Ascot in 2018.
When I met Sir evelyn de Rothschild, then aged 86, in his short- lived gourmet chocolate shop in Belgravia, he regaled me with his latest big idea: no tax for the over-90s.
‘Once you reach the age of 70, the rate of tax should be reduced every five years. Then when you reach the age of 90 you should pay no tax at all. They should reduce the taxes on old people so they can be self-sufficient and live in their own homes.’
Perhaps it was tongue in cheek, perhaps not.
Sir evelyn, who has died peacefully at home at the age of 91, would have been eligible for the tax break himself, in the unlikely event it had made it into any chancellor’s Budget speech.
He didn’t need the money, of course: rse: A colossus of a financier, he was a multi-billionaire.
He was also a chocoholic and d confided he had set up his exquisite, and costly, confectioner to compensate for his childhood deprivation - of sweets during the war.
The shop closed down in the e pandemic, but it was little more e than a bagatelle in a legendary y financial empire.
Born in London in 1931, the only y son of Anthony de Rothschild and d Yvonne Cahen d’Anvers, Sir r evelyn was destined from birth for r the family bank.
After harrow and an economics s degree at Trinity College Cambridge, - he joined the bank in 1957. . his career there spanned more e than four decades.
Under his stewardship, the e bank’s total assets grew from m £40m to £4.6bn.
Sir evelyn was close to top politicians on both sides of the Atlantic, including Margaret Thatcher.
In 1986, the then Conservative government turned to NM Rothschild for help with one of its flagship policies – and one that would revolutionise the City – privatising British Gas.
According to Rothschild lore, the ‘Tell Sid’ campaign to sell shares to the public was named after one of its postroom clerks. The real-life Sid worked at the bank’s headquarters at new Court in the City. The British Gas sale positioned NM Rothschild Rothschild to cash in on a lucrative wave of privatisations that took off around the world. In the UK it was involved in the sell- offs of British Steel, the electricity and water companies, British Coal and BT.
Political connections played a role in his third marriage, to British-American Lynn Forester de Rothschild. The couple were introduced by henry Kissinger and spent a night of their honeymoon in 2000 at the Clinton White house. house Forester de Rothschild, Rothschild who survives him, is a successful businesswoman in her own right.
Sir evelyn’s first marriage, to Jeannette Bishop, ended in divorce. he had three children with his second wife, Victoria Lou Schott: Jessica, Anthony and David. That marriage also ended in divorce. he had two stepsons with Forester de Rothschild.
As well as his role in the family firm, Sir evelyn also served as chairman of The economist magazine from 1972 to 1989. Knighted in n 1989, he was for many years a trusted tr financial adviser to the late la Queen elizabeth II.
her Majesty was, he told me, quite frugal because ‘she was brought up during the war, with very careful ideas. If you had rationing, that had a big effect on your life, didn’t it? All your life.’
he was an usher at the Coronation, where he turned up in the wrong uniform. ‘I went to Moss Bros because I didn’t have a uniform and they made me a Commodore overnight by mistake.’
no- one noticed his faux pas, because, he said: ‘They were all drunk anyway. You had to get up at five in the morning to be on parade at Westminster Abbey at seven o’clock or something and they were all drunk.’
In later life, he concentrated on his family investment company eL Rothschild and on philanthropy, declaring: ‘I don’t think banking is as amusing as it was.’
One of his favourite causes was elephant Family, a conservation charity he founded in 2002 with the Rajmata of Jaipur and Mark Shand, the late brother of the Queen Consort. elephants, he opined, ‘are probably more intelligent than we are’.