Frank Cyril Tiarks

Frank Cyril Tiarks was born on 9 July 1874 in Balham, Surrey, the fifth child and second son of Henry and Agnes Tiarks. He sought a career in the Royal Navy, and in 1887, at the age of thirteen, he joined the naval training college HMS Britannia for two years and then served as a midshipman for four years in the Pacific. His father wanted his eldest son to follow him in the Schröder partnership, so after his elder brother Henry died in November 1893, Frank obtained a discharge from the navy and joined Schröders. For the next 6 years Frank spent time in London, Hamburg and New York, before returning to London as an associate partner in 1900. It was during this time that he met and married Emmy Broderman.

On 1 January 1902, Frank was admitted to the Schröder partnership. He became a significant player, not only at Schröders, but in the City of London and beyond over the next three decades. Frank was described somewhat later by one of his colleagues as the ‘happy extrovert and the practical man’ of the partnership. He was also very much a City insider, and so much respected that he was invited a number of times to become a Director of the Bank of England, which he eventually did in 1912.

The outbreak of war in 1914 hit the City of London hard, and the business of Schröders suffered badly. In 1914 Frank was active in obtaining the British naturalisation of Baron Schröder, without which the assets and business of Schröders would have been seized by the British Government. Eventually this was granted but still there was little business to be done during the war years.

In 1917 he rejoined the Royal Navy, in the newly formed Naval Intelligence. Frank took charge of the Direction Finding Section which identified the location and movements of German submarines by monitoring their radio signals. He also acted as interpreter during the surrender of the German Fleet in Rosyth in November 1918. At the end of the war he was asked to act as financial adviser to the British Army of Occupation in Germany, with the title Civil Commissioner. Despite the ‘considerable personal inconvenience’ he took up the post in Cologne in January 1919. He was appalled by the desperate plight of the civilian population and in early March went to Paris, where the Peace Conference was being held, to secure emergency food supplies. ‘I completed everything that I wanted by going direct to Lloyd George – Austen Chamberlain – Winston Churchill – Robert Cecil,’ he wrote to his wife, adding ‘everyone seems to want me and my advice on all and every subject’. His actions earned him the gratitude and friendship of the mayor of Cologne, Dr Konrad Adenauer, who later became West German Chancellor.

During the war Frank had found his position as a partner in a firm with a German name extremely difficult, and seriously considered closing the firm. The Governor of the Bank of England, however, advised against this, saying such an action would be contrary to the national interest. Frank returned to Schröders in 1919, a well-known and highly-regarded figure in the international banking community. In the crisis years of the 1920s he was active in attempts to resume the international gold standard, and worked with Montagu Norman, the Governor of the Bank of England during this period. Norman was a familiar face as a weekend house-guest at Foxbury.

Financially these were among the most profitable years for Frank. During the 1920s, Frank’s average share of Schröders’ profit was around £100,000 per annum. He took the lead in the establishment of a New York based bank, J Henry Schröder Banking Corporation. Frank had a personal shareholding in the company, which he retained until his death.

The international financial crisis of 1931 hit everyone very hard. Schröders was exposed more than most to the German suspension of debt repayments, and suffered heavy losses. Following the London Conference of world leaders in 1931, Frank was appointed Chairman of a committee formed by London banks to negotiate with Germany debtors. He led negotiations leading to the Standstill Agreement, agreed in August 1931, a significant international achievement, for which he received much praise: ‘its authors deserve to be congratulated on having solved successfully one of the most difficult tasks bankers have ever faced’, said one newspaper. Frank continued to be involved as the annual agreement was renewed.

While Frank was actively involved in, and internationally recognised for, his work in helping to deal with the financial crisis, he was having a crisis of his own. Under the terms of the 1919 partnership agreement, he was entitled to one-third of the profits, and responsible for one-third of the losses. Total losses in 1931 were £1.5million, a staggering sum in those days, and Frank’s share of the losses wiped out his capital in the firm. There was a new agreement, which recognised the value of Frank’s contribution to the earlier success of the firm, effectively giving him value, as yet unspecified, in the goodwill of the partnership, and from now on he was awarded an annual salary, rather than a share of profits. He was still a wealthy man, and did not have to go without, but increasingly he spent time in London and at Loxton, and less time at Foxbury, which he sold in 1937.

Frank retired from active participation in the business at the start of the Second World War, though he was involved from time to time from his retirement in Somerset. As an indication of his renown in the City, despite his financial difficulties, Frank remained a Director of the Bank of England for 34 years until 1946, when the Bank was nationalised, and Frank finally retired from all public life.

After leaving Foxbury, Frank lived at Loxton in Somerset. Emmy died there in 1943. He died on 7 April 1952, aged 77. Frank’s brother, Herman, summed him up: ‘He was most popular with everybody, and deservedly so. Always cheery, always a word for everyone, always the life and soul of every party, always an eye for a girl or a horse…’.

George Dovey, Frank Tiarks’ valet

George was a highly valued employee of Frank Tiarks. He was first engaged as under-chauffeur in February 1916, though it does appear that he was working at the same time at a munitions factory.  He remained in Frank’s employment for the next 36 years. As Frank’s personal valet, he travelled with him on many of his overseas trips, and there are references to Dovey in Frank’s letters to his wife. For example on Frank’s trip to the Caribbean in 1930, Frank wrote ‘At St Kitts we caught a fine 12 foot shark, much to Dovey’s delight. Dovey is the complete sailor. He takes his bedding on deck every night and sleeps in the open air. He is most popular with all the men and loves his naval life’. 

By this time, George and Annie were living at Homewood Villas, which was within the extended Foxbury estate. When Frank sold Foxbury, George continued to work for Frank, describing himself in the 1939 census as a butler, based in Kensington, where Frank had an apartment.

On Frank’s moving permanently to Loxton, George and Annie moved with him, George continuing as butler, and Annie as housekeeper. After Frank’s death, the Doveys moved back to Chislehurst, working for the two Tiarks sisters who were then living at St Peters Cottage in Holbrook Lane. This arrangement continued until George’s death in 1957.

They had at least one son, Raymond Randall Dovey, who was a professional cricketer, playing both for Kent and Somerset.

For more on Frank Tiarks, see The Forgotten Banker, by Tony Allen, available from The Chislehurst Society