Two Green Vellum Manuscript Ledgers Containing Fair or Final Quarterly Accounts of the Phoenix Company 1782 to 1820

Two volumes, measuring approximately 22 by 27.5cm, bound in green vellum covered boards, lettered and decorated in gilt, with marbled endpapers front and rear. 180 and 196 pages respectively, plus occasional tipped-in manuscript inserts for the "Charges Account", which detail sundry expenses, e.g. the charwomen's wages, beer & coffee houses, both with an unused blank to the front, and the later book with 3 unused blanks to the rear. Containing fair or final quarterly accounts, written in a highly legible hand in black and red ink, for the first 38 years of the Phoenix Company's existence, covering their years of early growth; expansion into foreign markets such as Hamberg, America and the West Indies; the long period of Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, during which many new competitors arose in the British insurance market, and the crucial post-Waterloo economic depression period. Both bindings appear contemporaneous with the dates of the accounts, the gilt title to the upper-cover of the earlier volume provides a very good clue as to a precise date, giving the company name cautiously as the: "Phoenix Company or New Fire Office". The Phoenix began as the latter in 1782 and became the Phoenix Company around 1785, suggesting that the first two years of Company accounts were initially kept in a slightly more casual fashion, until they grew confident that the venture was going to be successful. The New Fire Office was founded by a group of disgruntled Georgian London sugar refiners, in response to the high premiums charged by the established insurance companies. Sugar refining or baking was considered hazardous and therefore too risky for some insurers, and the high premiums added to the other financial risks endured by sugar refiners, chiefly the unpredictable supply of the raw product from the West Indies. The founders were unusual in commencing such a venture, in that they were a collective of wealthy merchants, rather than the very rich plutocrats or established City financiers, who might be expected to take such a risk and be considered immediately credible to outsiders. The 1720 Bubble Act, which followed the economic disaster of the South Sea Bubble, further complicated the venture as it meant that without a Royal Charter or Act of Parliament it was impossible to form a joint-stock company which gave the protection of limited liability to subscribers. The founders, led by Nathaniel Jarman, obtained the necessary licence from the Commissioners of Stamp Duty in July 1782, which notionally allowed the fledgling New Fire Office to issue fire insurance policies. However, they persisted in an attempt to obtain a Royal Charter with a petition to the King until February 1783 when it was firmly declined, before settling on a non-incorporated partnership governed by a legally binding Deed of Settlement and overseen by a group of Trustees. Replicating many of the aspects of an incorporated company but with the risk of unlimited liability, meaning that individuals could be pursued for the whole of collectively accrued debts if the venture should fail. These quarterly accounts would have been presented for scrutiny to the Trustees by the Company Secretary, to ensure that the venture remained on a sound financial footing and provide a basis for discussing future risks and expansion at their regular meetings. The first few accounts are unsurprisingly sparse, given that they pre-date the final agreement upon the company structure and little actual business had been done, but are fascinating for the names which crop up, e.g. the short-lived first company Secretary, John Warner Phipps, who was dismissed due to financial irregularities. Another name appearing throughout the first 20 years of the company's existence is Lady Irwin, i.e. Frances Gibson Shepheard Ingram (1734-1807), wealthy widow of the 9th Viscount of Irvine, from whom the Phoenix leased its first premises at 18 Lombard Street beginning in March 1782, until 1802 when they move.…