THE JOBBING SYSTEM OF THE LONDON STOCK EXCHANGE: AN ORAL HISTORY

Interview No. 21: J.F. ('Jimmy') Priestley.

Interviewer: Bernard Attard

Home: 8th May 1990.

Tape 1, side 1

BA:  Could you first tell me Mr. Priestley, where and when you were born?

JP:  I was born at High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, in February 1915.

BA:  Which date in February?

JP:  22nd February?

BA:  And who were your parents?

JP:  My parents were Hugh Priestley, who married a Miss Hall, Elizabeth Hall; so I was the son of Hugh Priestley and Elizabeth Hall. 

BA:  And what did your father do for a living?

JP:  My father was in Laing & Cruickshank before the 14-18 war.  When he came back from the War he found that other people had been promoted over his head, and he was not very happy with Laing & Cruickshank and he went then to Wedd Jefferson, which eventually I joined, because a senior partner, Jack Russell, knew him and asked him to join them.  He then stayed there for a number of years and then was picked out by the Government Broker, who was then Eddie Gosling of Mullens, and he went to Mullens with a view to becoming Government broker when Eddie Gosling retired, but unfortunately he died in [1933], so he never became Government broker.

BA: Had any of your grandparents been in the City?

JP:  No.

BA:  Had you known any of your grandparents?

JP:  Yes, I knew both of them.  Dr. Priestley was an ordinary doctor, and his great grandfather of course was a great scientist who discovered oxygen.  On my mother's side, he was a parson who ran a school at Northaw, called Northaw School.  He was a parson.

BA:  Did you have any brothers or sisters?

JP:  Yes, I've got an elder brother who's still alive, four years older than me, who was in Mullens. And I've got a younger brother who died about five years after the War.

BA:  And your father was pursuing a career in the City. Was the Stock Exchange, the Stock Market, something that he talked about at home?  Were you as a young boy able to form much of an impression about what your father did?

JP:  No, I had really no impression.  In fact the only impression I can really remember was I actually thought that he dealt in stockings.  And really until I went into the City, no, I had very little idea of what he did.

BA:  Where did your parents send you to school?

JP:  I went to school at Horris Hill, followed by Winchester College, and then in fact my father died and I couldn't go to the Varsity because there wasn't enough money, so I went to America for a year to a school called Western Reserve Academy before going into the City.

BA:  What was your reason for going to America.

JP:  Because I was going to go to the Varsity. You didn't have to pass an exam. I wouldn't get in today. But then I wanted to do something rather than go straight into the City. So I actually got a scholarship, because you didn't have to pass an exam. I went up before five headmasters, I think it was in London, and they accepted me, just asked me a few questions, and I had a very happy year in America as a result.

BA:  Would you say your parents had a great influence on you?

JP:  Oh yes, definitely.  My father particularly, I would think.  He was very keen on games and so was I.  He never went abroad, and he was much loved and admired by everybody.  He was in fact very tall, he was 6 ft 6" and I think he was the first person [in] the gilt-edged market [for whom] they closed the market for an hour or two when he died - I believe that to be so.

BA:  What was the attitude to money in the family?

JP:  To money?  In the early days we were definitely badly off I think. I don't think money was really talked about very much.  I would say after that we were comfortable, and of course, later on when he went to Mullens, we were comparatively well off.  But in the early days I think it was a struggle for my parents to send us to private and public schools.  We certainly had a car much later than most people.  Our holidays used to be in a bus going down to the sea.  We were not brought up in great luxury.

BA:  At Winchester did any of the masters have any great influence on you?

JP:  I was a very keen games player and I think the late Harry Altham, who was a great cricketer, had a big influence on me. And also, because I was very stupid, I used to have private tuition with an also famous England cricketer called Rockley Wilson, and between the two of them they had a big influence on me I think.

BA: What was the feeling about the City or the Stock Market in the school? What would the boys have thought about someone going into the Stock Exchange for a career?

JP:  I don't think the boys ever really discussed that very much.  Certainly the City hadn't got a very high name.  I think most people thought the people who went there were rather like me who had very little brain but hoped to make some money, and I think that was really the feeling about the Stock Exchange in those days - which it certainly was in my father's day.

BA: So, you went to Western Reserve Academy in the United States and then returned to England.  What happened to you then?

JP:  Well, my mother was looking for a job for me and we had a great friend in the senior partner of Robert Nivison called Lord Glendyne, and my mother tried to ask him whether he would take me and he said no, because he didn't like mixing friendship with business. And then the senior partner [of Wedd Jefferson], who was still Jack Russell, who knew my father very well, offered to take me on trial and so I went into Wedd Jefferson just simply like that - the old boy net, I suppose - on œ80 a year!

BA:  And very roughly when was that?  

JP:  About 1933.

BA:  Do you have any early memories of the firm or the senior partners?

JP:  Indeed I do, yes. There were three of us.  I actually joined first. Six months later, Dick Wilkins, who's quite a famous name, and Dick Russell, joined.  We all three were in the office, as far as I remember, just writing in bond numbers in a book.  What I particularly remember is when payday came, once a month, we received one œ5 note, one pound note and a little bit of change - whereas the partners' money every week, which was handled by the same clerk who used to smoke a cigarette with the ash falling off the top of it: I remember George Wilkins, Dick Wilkins' father, I think he drew œ50 a week to pay the wages, and I thought, how rich he must be.  I can't believe that anybody would ever be like that again.  And of course all the clerks were drawing several fivers, but I managed very well on the œ80 a year and œ200 my mother could allow me, and on that I could take a girl to the Savoy once a week, and live very happily at home.

BA:  What were the offices like?  Was it a fairly big firm?

JP:  No, it was a small firm, I would have said about six or seven partners and about 40 staff, something of that size. I do remember a little later on - we didn't change much in size for some years - being horrified when looking at the expenses which, I think were between £40,000 and £50,000 a year.

BA:  What were the offices like, physically?  Were they small or ...

JP:  The offices were just adequate, yes. There was nothing pretentious about them. There was never any drink or entertainment of any sort, and the partners and dealers had a room.  We had about two rooms I suppose, in those days. We were gilt-edged only, so there was only a colonial department and a corporation department and a gilt-edge department. So we had three rooms, I think, for partners and about 45 staff, and we just worked.  The gilt-edged market didn't open until ten, so we got there about half past nine.  The Stock Exchange closed at 3 or half past and then we worked probably until about five.  It was quite a comfortable life in those days.

BA:  Did you have any ambitions for your life at this stage?  Did you think in terms of the future?

JP: ... from there until after the War, because I was only there for a short time before the War.  After the War yes, I was married and had children and I wanted to make enough money to send my children to school, because I had no inherited wealth of any amount.  My only ambition I think really was to get on and make enough money to educate my children.

BA:  Let's revert to the pre-War period.  What were the first jobs that the firm had you doing?

JP:  The first job, as I say, was working on ledgers in the office, the next job was when I was a blue-button.  A blue button in those days: you stood at the end of a bench facing the partners who were around a sort of pillar about fifteen yards away.  And they used to hold up their hand, like that, and Dick Wilkins, Dick Russell and I used to try and beat each other to it, to raise what in Winchester they used to call an oily quill; in other words, to be thought well of if you got there first.  And I was rather more athletic than the other two and used to get terrible stick from the other two because I think I very often got there first.  But our principal thing was to go and give messages to people, and I remember one young man who shall be nameless, who didn't stay very long who was sent for by the senior partner, Jack Russell, who said what was the price of War Loan?  He said I don't know what the price of that was, but so-and-so won the St. Leger.  But he went next day!

BA:  Do you have any other early memories of the Stock Exchange at that time?

JP:  I remember being very fearful of the senior partners, particularly Jack Russell who was a frightening character. Always wore a bowler hat; he came back from lunch and put his hat on the rack above him and there was definitely a hushed silence when he came in.  Yes, there were some commanding figures.  I suppose one feels that more when one was young and probably men who came after me felt it too.  But he was certainly a very commanding figure.

BA:  Was Wedd a family firm?

JP:  Yes, it was really.  I don't think Wedd was ever very much - I think he had some money, but the Jefferson family were the real ones and the Russells and the Wilkins were all, I think, connected to the Jefferson side - very much a family firm.

BA:  And how did Wedd compare with other gilt jobbers at this time?

JP:  When I joined I think Francis & Praed were definitely number 1.  I would have said we were probably number 2, but not much difference between us and Akroyd & Smithers as they were then.  But Francis & Praed were definitely number 1, I think.

BA:  Do you have any early recollections of being in the Stock Exchange itself? Was it a busy place?  Was it a crowded place?

JP:  Yes, it was like a big club really, I think.  It wasn't excessively noisy or anything.  But what impressed me was the very little writing that went on. Everything was by word of mouth. You just had a little book, and maybe occasionally you had to stand by a partner and write down that he'd bought something or sold something.  My experience was only the gilt-edged market. I think it struck me, 'My word is my bond' - it very much was so.  Because there used to be queries sometimes, somebody would forget to book something, or somebody said they'd done something, but it was always settled amicably.  There was an amazing amount of trust, I think.

BA:  Were you a blue button for a long time?

JP:  I was a blue button for - I joined in 33, I suppose I must have been more than a year in the office - I was a blue button therefore for about three years. And I was a dealer for about six months or a year before the War which broke out in 1939, so I was a dealer - I was then on £400 a year - when War broke out in 1939.

BA:  Can you describe what was involved in being a dealer?

JP:  Yes, there were usually three dealers on each book. There were three dealers, mostly partners, on the big Government book, and then there was a short Government book where there were probably another three dealers.  The next most important one, which I joined, was the colonial book which was quite big in those days because it had Canada and Africa and India, a number of things which all disappeared. And then the smallest and last - no there were two more actually. There was one, the corporation book with local corporation stocks, and then there was what I call an 'odds and sods' book, which did various things like Stock Exchange shares.  I can't remember exactly what they did.  So I suppose in all there were about sixteen or seventeen people dealing, something of that order.

BA:  How did you actually learn your jobbing skills?  Did you ...

JP:  Jobbing skills are a funny thing.  I think really you've got to have a flair for it.  Funnily enough the clever people - people with big brains - were not as a rule good jobbers, because they thought too far ahead or were worrying about something that was going to happen.  I think it's something that you've got a flair for, or you suddenly got a feeling.  There was an atmosphere in the Stock Exchange which must be missing nowadays, and you could somehow feel, suddenly the market wasn't any good, or it was going to go better.  And I think you had to be born with that, or perhaps you had to have a bookies' mentality.  But it was largely your skill; I think it was on flair, that's the only thing I can think of.  You can read all the things [i.e. news] - obviously sometimes it was obvious, because all the press said that the market was going up, but when you were actually in the market, I think you suddenly got a feeling, not always right, of course, but you suddenly got a feeling that it was going down or up and you had to be right more often than you were wrong, it was as simple as that.

BA:  Can you remember your feelings when you became a dealer?  Did you find it initially something that was a bit frightening?

JP:  Yes, I was under a very difficult man, called John Longuet-Higgins, who's long since died.  And he was very unpopular in the firm, but I think I learned more from him than anybody else. Because I remember coming back from lunch one day - or it was just before he went to lunch - he'd bought a whole line of New Zealand stock, and there was a great rumour at that time that the New Zealand Government was going to go broke. And he said to me before lunch, 'I've just bought 100,000 (or something like that) of New Zealand stock, that's not for sale'.   And shortly after he'd gone, somebody came up and asked me a price, a chap called Anstey of Wigram, and I made a ridiculously high price, thinking that in no way would he  buy anything, and he bought stock from me, so I was in a panic, didn't know what to do.  Shortly afterwards he came back again, so I made him a very much higher price, and he bought it again.  When Longuet-Higgins came back from lunch, I said, 'Well, I have actually sold a few New Zealand stock at a very good price'. And he said to me 'I told you not to sell that stock, go and buy them back.'  So I went round the market, which you have to do, to my rivals, bidding up the price. And of course I couldn't buy any. But by doing that he put the price of his own stock - what was remaining of it - up by another three points, and that was a very good lesson to learn.

BA:  Did you have any particular disasters as a young dealer?

JP:  I don't think so, because as a young dealer you always referred to the senior, you didn't really have the responsibility of running the book.  You were there really just to make prices and were probably told roughly what to make.  It was limited, the amount [in which you could make prices], until you got to running a book yourself.  After all before the War I was a dogsbody.  No I don't think in those days you had a great worry on that score.

BA:  Did the colonial market have its own characteristics that were slightly different to the main gilt market?

JP:  Yes, I think it was. It was very much a specialised market.  Of course the Crown Agents were great performers in the market in those days and they used to buy up their own stock.  There used to be ways of making money out of the Crown Agents, looking back on it.  They would always buy the stock provided there was a mark on the board, more or less the price that you were asking for it.  So I'm afraid what we used to do, if you bought a nice line of stock which wasn't all that common, you would then go round to these little dealers and find if they'd got a little bit of stock on their book, you'd buy that at a high price and stick a mark in and then you could make a nice profit out of the Crown Agents when they came in to buy the stock because they saw a mark and it was alright.  That's really all I remember.

BA:  Did you see much of the brokers who acted on behalf of the various Commonwealth governments?

JP:  Yes all the time. Scrimgeour was the dealer for the Crown Agents in those days [and Nivison for most colonial countries].

BA:  Do you remember whether the political atmosphere of the period, thinking about the late 1930s, whether that had a big influence on the market, you think of the period as being one of crisis?

JP:  No, I don't think so except immediately before an election or something of that sort, no I don't think it did.  My memory always really is that we did slightly better under a Socialist Government than we did under a Conservative Government overall, as far as I remember.

BA:  Was the Stock Exchange in the 1930s a very different institution to what it later became.  Was it a very formal place?  Were there very rigid dress standards?

JP:  Obviously, like everything else in the country it was more formal, it was bowler hats and ties and pin-striped suits and everything, and gradually after the War, it gave way fairly quickly I think to [become] less formal.  It didn't change a great deal, except slight[ly] [in] dress.  In fact we had one chap who was very good, who had very long hair, who we wanted to promote, bring downstairs and offered him promotion but he refused to cut his hair.

BA:  Are there any particular characters who stand out in the memory from your younger days?

JP:  Particularly this John Longuet-Higgins, and of course Dick Wilkins' father, George Wilkins.  He was an absolute charmer, delightful person, did not get on very well with John Longuet-Higgins, who was much cleverer and probably the  brains behind them.  And Jack Russell I've already mentioned.  They were all three in different ways pretty powerful characters.

BA:  Did you form much impression about the number of jobbers around you generally? Were there a lot of firms more or less your size? Were there smaller firms?

JP:  No, there were always in my day before the War only three that really counted, Akroyd & Smithers, Francis & Praed and ourselves.

BA:  What distinguished those firms from the other firms?

JP:  I think Francis & Praed inherited from somebody whose name I've forgotten, who was very famous in his day. He'd gone by the time I got there.  I think they inherited [from] him [a business] which they gradually lost.  And then of course Akroyd and Smithers were very much the Smithers family.  I think Langley Smithers, the senior partner was clever, and one or two others.  They were all charming but I don't think they had great talent in those days.  Nor did we really.  I think we were rather going on the reputation of Jefferson and all those people.  They all had money, those partners, and I think it's much more difficult when you've got money to be go ahead and do it better rather than when you're hungry.  And I think when the old boys [went], various people like ourselves were very hungry. We had much more ambition than they did.  They just wanted the quiet life. They had their money, they had their country houses.  It was rather a status quo immediately after the War, and it wasn't till they went and you got rather ambitious younger people that came on that the character of the thing changed a bit.

BA: So, were they very competitive among themselves, or were they quite happy to keep things ticking over and make an adequate living?

JP:  It's difficult to say, because really we're talking about a period before I was a dealer.  No, I think they weren't nearly as competitive as later on. I don't think they ever asked anybody out to the theatre.  They were just very pleasant to each other.  The Government broker came round, and they chatted to everybody.  I don't think there was the competition that there was later on.  There wasn't the business for a start.  The Government debt in those days was - I wouldn't know now what it was - but it increased enormously after the War as you know.  

BA:  Have you got any recollection about how large the bargains were that you were doing?

JP:  When I started dealing in the colonial book, œ25,000 was quite big.  And then, I think, after the war,  when I took over, at one time œ50,000 was quite big and then of course it escalated after that.  In the Government book -I didn't go on the Government book for some time after the War, and then of course I think when I first went on œ100,000 was quite big and then it went on to, not as big as it is now, but œ5,000,000 was quite big.

BA:  What was the attitude to the profession of being a jobber, as a young man?  Do you have any recollections about that? Was it one among many professions in the City, or were the brokers as regarded being slightly a cut above the jobbers.

JP:  Oh I think certainly.  I would have said jobbers were considered the lowest of the low.

BA:  Why was that?

JP:  Well because I think rather the same as perhaps bookmakers by some people are looked down on.  That's all a jobber was, just a bookie.  Having said that, there were many friends amongst the brokers. But certainly I think I was inclined to say if somebody asked me what I did, I said, 'something in the City', rather than I was a jobber, partly because nobody knew what a jobber was and partly also because it was considered a pretty low form of life.

BA:  Now, you mentioned earlier that you became an authorised dealer very shortly before the outbreak of war.  Can you, very briefly to fill in those years, describe what happened to you?  Very briefly, when did you join the forces?  Was it before '39?

JP:  Funnily enough this Longuet-Higgins I've talked about was very keen for us to join something, so Dick Wilkins and I joined the Hertfordshire Regiment Territorials, which was then two nights a week or whatever it was.  Then of course when War broke out we went there full time.  But I wasn't very happy there for reasons I won't go into so I wrote to my brother who was a regular Coldstreamer and asked him whether he could get me into the Coldstream. So I left Dick Wilkins and went to the Coldstream, and then they became armoured and I spent two years learning all about tanks and went across [about] D-Day plus 40 1944. And it was there that I first received a letter just before we went on the big attack at Caen asking me whether I'd like to become a partner, at either 1/2% or 1% I can't remember, of the profits.  It seemed very funny, just about going into a big attack which I thought I was very unlikely to survive.

BA:  Have you got any idea why they decided to ask you to become a partner at that rather odd time. Entirely apart from the fact you were about to go into battle, it was 1944, the War was still on.

JP:  I have absolutely no idea, I'm as staggered, thinking back on it today, as I was when I actually received it.  My reaction was roaring with laughter, couldn't believe it was possible.  I suppose they were leading an ordinary sort of life in England, and I suppose it didn't occur to them.  On leave I think I'd been back to see the firm, but no I was absolutely amazed.

BA:  What happened to the firm when War broke out?

JP:  Well I think almost all people of an age then went and it was run by a skeleton staff plus one or two who weren't fit or something of that sort. And it went on much the same but there was excess profits tax which I can't remember what it worked out at, but I think it was about œ120,000 or something for Wedd Jefferson.  And when you'd made that amount you gave all the rest to the Government.  So it ticked over and they were alright.  They went on paying me my œ400 a year, as far as I remember.

BA: So you more or less assumed that when the War was over you'd be returning back to the City.  

JP:  Yes, I don't think it ever occurred to me to do anything else.

BA:  When did you leave the services?

JP:  I ended up at Bonn, where the Government houses are at a rehabilitation scheme with a chap called John Haslewood, we ran a sort of rehabilitation school, and I suppose I must have come out about 1945 some time and went back to the City.

BA:  Were you married by this stage?

JP:  Yes, I was married on 9.9.39, five days after the War broke out.  I was so important as second lieutenant Priestley in the Hertfordshire Regiment I wasn't allowed more than five miles from my headquarters at St. Albans, so we spent our honeymoon on Ashridge golf course.

BA:  How had you met your wife?

JP:  I knew her before the War, I met her actually at a dance on the night the Crystal Palace burned down, sheer by chance.

Tape 1, side 2 

BA:  Can you remember what your feelings were when you returned to the Stock Exchange after the end of the war?

JP:  It was an enormous relief to start with, because I then had one child I think, and shortly afterwards another one.  I thought in fact I was very well off, because I remember I had œ1200 in the world at the end of the war because one saved a bit of money.  But then I realised that education was coming and that wouldn't last very long.  The fact that one had a reasonable return - I can't remember what it was...  What people probably don't realise now, in those days a partner as such was never paid any salary like they are today. They drew x per cent, whatever it was, on the profits of the year, and if there was a loss they lost money.  They weren't paid any salary as such. And the staff had their salary and if we made money they got a percentage of that, which I think in those days we used to give about 5%  But if we lost money they didn't get anything, and we lost it.  So you never really knew like you would today.  All these boys are paid these high sums. You couldn't say you were earning so and so, you just earned what you made, and there wasn't any question of a salary once you were a partner.

BA:  Did many of you return to the firm after the War?

JP:  Well, on what you might call the executive side in those days there were four of us I think.  One was a Purnell who didn't last long, and there was Dick Wilkins, Dick Russell and myself.  We were the only three what you might call authorised dealers of the executive type that returned as far as I remember.

BA:  Did you return to the same book?

JP:  Yes, certainly, for myself I returned to the colonial book.  Very shortly after that.... This Longuet- Higgins, who was then senior partner, was not very popular, particularly Dick Wilkins didn't get on with him, and eventually they had a conference.  I wasn't actually in it.  But he was more or less presented with the fact that either he'd got to go or we would go, and in fact he gracefully did retire, and left his money in. We had no money.  All the money really in those days belonged to ex-partners of the firm. And I do remember shortly after we took over - which we really did - Dick Wilkins I think took over the Government book and I took over the colonial book and Dick Russell took over the corporation book - anyhow we lost a lot of money, and I remember walking up and down my house wondering whether I ought to sell it, because I was owing money overall if I'd been run over by a bus or anything. And Higgins came up one day and said how were we doing and one of them said 'well we've lost all our money and we're starting on yours' and he thought it was a great joke and roared with laughter. He didn't realise in fact it was the truth.

BA:  Was there a particular reason why you were losing money at that stage?  Were markets generally very difficult?

JP:  No, I think it was merely that we'd got rid of them, and they'd run it, and we had to learn the hard way, and I think it did us a lot of good.  When your back's up against the wall, you learn fairly quickly, and I think we learned how to do it, and we then did become without question very much the market leaders for a number of years.  I think we outstripped Francis, and Akroyd I would have said.

BA:  What were the reasons for that?

JP:  I think we were pretty professional.  I think the basic reason was: shortly after I left the colonial book I went on to the Government book, and we had in Dick Wilkins a wonderful contact man.  He was the sort of person who could walk into any room and everybody would 'eat out of his hands'.  It didn't matter whether they were roadsweepers or the Royal family or anybody else, he had this electric power, and he could go to the Governor of the Bank of England or the Government broker or it didn't matter who it was, or the clerks who dealt with him, he had this magnetic power.  They all wanted to please him. And he was wonderful at finding out anything that one wanted to know. And I think I was a fairly good technician.  Between the two of us I think we got the reputation for doing it.  He was wonderful at avoiding making a price. Normally, a normal individual, people would go to several people to make a price, but Dick Wilkins would say, 'Well what do you want to do?' and they would tell him, which made it very much easier.  I'm seventy-five years old. I only met Winston Churchill once. But outside him, I think he's the biggest character - like him or not; most people did, but not everybody -  he was certainly the biggest character that I've ever come across, which I'm sure you will have found by talking to other people.  And I probably knew him better than anybody.  He was my best man, though we got a little further apart towards the end of his life.

BA:  You said you were the technician. What did that mean in practice?

JP:  Well I was the one who said what prices we will make. There was always one chap really in charge. And we used to have a big board.  One of the things you'd do, you'd suddenly write up different prices on your board to somebody else. And I would have a morning's conference.  I was one who said I think the market's going to go better or it's going to go easier and yes, I was the person who basically decided what the policy for the day was to be. And if I wanted to find something out, what the Government broker was likely to do or something, I just said to Dick, 'Can you find out?'  and he'd be jolly good at that.  I'm not saying he did anything he shouldn't do, but he just had a way with everybody - an amazing person, amazing character.

BA:  What were the other factors that would go into the price that you would make?  You'd be changing the price during the day also?

JP:  Yes, absolutely and one of the things a jobber hates is when there's nothing happening, so very often I'd come back from lunch - perhaps a good lunch - and I'd suddenly mark everything up a quarter or down a quarter when there was nothing going on.  And then some people would say, 'Well, he knows something'.  Other people would say 'he was bluffing'.  It very often started some business going and some people would buy because they said, 'He's marked them down, even if he doesn't know something', and very often you could start some business and make some business by doing that sort of thing.  In fact I used to be slightly unpopular I think sometimes, by altering the prices too often.  But I found that it stimulated business and very often they thought you were bluffing and sometimes you were. It was rather like a game of poker.  As we were dealing in fairly big amounts, you could make or lose money quite quickly.

BA:  Were there occasions when you did make or lose a lot of money.

JP:  Oh indeed, oh yes.  There were sort of three days at a time when I couldn't sleep or anything when things were going wrong, obviously.  And other days, yes, when you could make - we're talking relative sums now obviously - you could make big money overnight.  Absolutely.  In fact I know Akroyd used to say they made most of their money in one month in the year.  The answer was really - jobbing: when things were bad you had to lose as little as possible, when things were good you had to make as much as possible. That was really the secret of it.  No good trying to make money all the time. 

BA:  Did you have a particular approach to jobbing?  Did you for example prefer to be a bear rather than a bull, or did you tend to...?

JP:  I think, to be absolutely honest with you, I think I preferred to be a bull, though obviously in the Government market it's a bear market.  Because all Governments inflate.  But it's relative and it usually used to fall quite quickly and then go up rather more slowly, and I think we usually made money on it.  In the latter years, when Akroyd were (we were more comfortable than they were), when they were young and hungry (the Peppiatts were a generation younger than me), they were more able - not more able, but better advised - and they ran a bear position much bigger that we ever did, and as a result they rather took the business away from us towards the end of my time; probably my fault.  

BA:  Going back to the post-war period, can you remember much about the atmosphere in the gilt market this time?  Was it an active market or was it one quite depressed?

JP:  In the post-war period? 

BA:  Yes.

JP:  I don't remember. I think one was so interested in one's own little circle, I don't think one looked beyond the next day much.  I don't think one looked at the big picture.  It was only later on when you got to be a huge firm, when we joined Durlacher and that sort of thing, that you then looked at the thing much bigger.  I think in those days you had a very narrow view in the market, I don't think you worried about anything except about making some money the next day, I'm afraid.

BA:  Did the first big devaluation in 1947 [i.e. 1949] affect the firm?  Were you caught out with big positions?

JP:  I don't remember ever being caught out particularly, no.

BA:  And as you began to settle back into the post-war - well, into the way of the Stock Exchange - did you begin to cast your thoughts towards the future, did you have any plans for the future or were you quite content to keep the firm going as it was?

JP:  Speaking personally, yes indeed, because it became obvious that one was going to have to have plenty of capital.  And in fact it came down, after a time, that only two of us in the firm, of which I was one, had retained or kept much capital.  And therefore it became a very dangerous looking position, so it was quite obvious really that we'd have to amalgamate with somebody.  Capital is a funny thing.  It's no good just having a lot of capital. And you don't really need capital if you've got a money-making business, because you can borrow it, and therefore what's happening today is very obvious.  You have too much capital, it isn't any good because you go and lose it.  We had no difficulty, we were making money and virtually borrowing what we wanted to borrow.  But having said that the thing got so much bigger you obviously had to have a bigger base and so it was obvious we had to join.  I actually personally wanted to join Val Powell's firm, in point of fact.  But Dick Wilkins didn't particularly get on with Val's father and Durlacher were obviously the biggest fish in the [Stock Exchange] and they were very keen to join us.  I personally was not keen to join them for various reasons, but in the end I gave way and said that we could, because there was no alternative, really.  [As] Pinchin weren't any good, there wasn't really anybody else.  We couldn't join with Akroyd because they were in the opposite camp, so it was really Durlacher.  The chief reason I didn't like it was because it then became so enormous one lost the personal touch, whereas I knew all the staff at Wedd Jefferson.  Once we'd joined them, there were hundreds of them.  In a way I felt I was signing my own death warrant in that I would not enjoy it as much once we became a really large firm, which in fact was true and part of the reason I retired at the age of 59.

BA:  How had your career with Wedd developed?  Had you stayed on the same book during that time?

JP:  Yes, I started on the colonial book before the War and went on, I suppose for about two years after the War. I can't remember the exact date. I then switched to the main Government book on which I was until I retired.

BA:  How would you contrast the main Government book with the colonial book?

JP:  In the days before the War when the colonial book was much bigger, the profit and loss on the colonial book would - I'm guessing - be somewhere near three-quarters of the Government book.  It was quite a big book.  Latterly of course, all the colonies disappeared and so colonials and corporations really didn't count.  I actually saw that coming and that was why I switched from the colonial book to the Government book, because clearly I was on a dying book, and I was on the main Government book for the rest of my career.

BA:  Was it a very active market?

JP:  Oh, very.  Most of the time. 

BA:  Were you seeing different brokers to the brokers you'd seen on the Commonwealth book?

JP:  Some of them. The big difference really was of course the Government broker.  The Government broker was all powerful - or rather his minions were.  Because you had to get on with them, because they had enormous power obviously because they dispensed all the Government business. And they handled the tap stocks and everything.  So they were vitally important.  Yes, it was different.  People like Pember & Boyle, who were well-known gilt-edged [brokers], didn't deal in the colonial market much.  Yes, it was slightly different.  But they were much the same old people, Sebag and Scrimgeour and Mullens, Pember & Boyle, one knew them all, so it wasn't much of a switch really.  But the Government broker was the all-powerful.  He could make or mar your career really, I think.

BA:  Did you have any contact with the institutions behind the Government broker, for example, the Bank of England?

JP:  I would think certainly Dick Wilkins did towards the end of the time.  Personally myself, no.  But we had a certain amount of contact with merchant banks.  But certainly with the discount market - not so much the merchant banks, but with the discount market, yes.  Marginal.

BA:  And would that be outside the House?

JP:  Yes.

BA:  What would those contacts involve?  Would they be social contacts or ...

JP:  This was really more on the short book, which I was not concerned with, and I think they used to liaise about the market and occasionally they used to offer a big line of stock direct to the discount market. But of course it always had to go through a broker, and they would nominate a broker. But there was a certain amount of contact towards the end of the time, which I'm not sure was strictly legal, or strictly practice.  But yes, it got so big that there was contact.  But mostly on the short side of the market, with the discount market.  The Bank of England didn't come into it, but certainly, I think Dick Wilkins used to talk to the Governor.  He made personal friends of all the people who were in high places.  He was very good at that.  But really everything had to go officially through the Government broker.  You could ask to see the [Governor].  I met the Governor once or twice.  But you had to see him through the Government broker, obviously through the correct channels.

BA:  What kind of relationship did you have with your own banks in terms of providing you with additional capital when you needed it?

JP: It was mostly done - very little personally - mostly done through the office, people like Gerald Dennis, who had close contacts with them.  It was built up over many years of course and just occasionally we came into it if there was a crisis or something of that sort, but day to day it was run by the office.

BA:  And did you have much contact with the press?  Would they use you, as a firm, as a source of information?

JP:  Oh yes, the press used to come.  Personally, I think, right up to the end. The Times used to come and see me every day - Old Constant, until he died.  Oh yes, they used to ring up and come and see us when there was anything of importance.

BA:  How did the firm develop until the merger with Durlacher?  Was it steadily increasing in size, were you taking on additional dealers?

JP:  No, I think it was totally static. I think there were about ten or twelve or it might have been fourteen partners, something like that.  It wasn't until we joined Durlacher....  In other words in all the years I was in it, it probably only doubled in size, in partnership. There were only about fourteen of us when we joined Durlacher.

BA:  Did you have a particular approach to running the firm as partners?  You said earlier for example that you liked to be on friendly terms with the staff and know the staff and so on.

JP:  Yes, I had quite a lot to do with the staff side.  Both Dick Wilkins and I had quite a lot to do with the staff side.

BA:  How did you approach questions like recruitment of staff?  Was it still as in your day when you joined the firm?

JP:  I think it was mostly, funnily enough, family contact.  Some of the clerks used to have a son they thought was quite bright and we'd look and interview him and take him on.  It wasn't until we joined Durlacher who did it much more professionally and they had examinations, I think, from Cambridge and Oxford and so on, but of course they were a much bigger concern - but until then, on the executive side, we mostly took families who were known.  I think we made quite a lot of errors, without going into names, by doing this.  Durlacher were much more professional.  Part of the reason we had to join somebody was we hadn't got enough money-makers.  In any jobbing firm there are only a given number of money-makers.  The others just do other jobs. But they are comparatively few, even in a big firm like Durlacher, the actual people who make money year in year out. In other words the flair people are pretty few. 

BA:  Had you been involved in any mergers prior to the big one with Durlacher.

JP:  No, we didn't merge with anybody I don't think until we joined Durlacher.

BA:  Now again, let me ask you about particular events and whether they impinge on your memory or had any effect on the firm?  The '57 increase in bank rate from I think 6 to 8%, no 5 to 7%, which ultimatly led to the Bank Rate Tribunal.  Do you have any particular ...?

JP:  I don't remember it in particular, because one usually was in a pretty good position to have.... Occasionally you got help, too, from the Government broker, who would say, probably - he wouldn't tell you it would happen - he might come round, and say 'I don't think the market looks very good' or something, and you'd take the hint.  Because he didn't want us to get caught out and go broke in a big position.  I think we were in a semi-informed position very often.  Of course we had shocks and sometimes we were caught out and you just had to cut it.  And one of the secrets of good jobbing is to be a good cutter.

BA:  Can you remember any particular examples of that?

JP:  I can remember one very good example.  We had a senior partner who I won't name at the time, who was clever but not a very good jobber and he went on holiday and he bought, I can't remember, some quite big sum of particular stocks - no, he didn't, he sold them.  And he said, 'I've sold a bear of so-and-so.  I'm going away for a month, you're not to close it.  We'll put it aside out of the book.  You're not to buy it back.  I'm very bearish of the market'.  And we waited.  After about a week, they went up a point; then they went up another point; then after about two and a half weeks we had a little conference, and we decided we would disobey him.  So we bought it back.  I think it would have broken us if we'd kept it open. He was right of course nine months later, but you can't do that in our trade, however much you think so and so's going to be, what you want to know is what it's going to be in the next day, or the next week.  You can't really afford to do these things.  So that particular one has stuck in my memory.  I remember being much too big sometimes and having sleepless nights, but I don't remember being caught out by any particular [event] - no doubt I was - but nothing has stuck in my mind in particular.

BA:  So does Suez... the Suez crisis, Cuba?

JP:  No, I don't remember any particular thing.  Because there were always small or large dramas going on all the time, and although it appears big in the papers, it didn't [always affect us much].

BA:  Did you have much contact with the other jobbing firms in the Gilt market, either the big jobbers or the smaller ones.

JP:  Oh yes it was a very friendly atmosphere.  You were rivals but you talked together, sometimes lunched together, and by and large you were as helpful as possible to the smaller jobbers.  The rivalry was only really between the big ones, mostly to persuade the broker to bring his business to you.  If he had a really big order, you see, he would probably pick one jobber; he couldn't very well start going round all of them.  It might spoil his business, so he would probably have a favourite jobber who he thought would be the best to do his big deal.  Ordinary little amounts you could go round to [any jobber] but if you found out that a chap had been to another jobber first, and he hadn't told you, then you didn't do him very well. So brokers had to mind their [methods]. It wasn't all on one side.  They had to be careful who they took their business to because they could easily be spoilt.

BA: How could their business be spoilt?

JP:  Well, because they would go with something and you'd suddenly see the market slip in a particular stock that  they were trying to sell or buy or something. So you'd say to them, 'now, has anybody seen this?' and if he said 'yes they had', you'd say, 'Well you've spoilt the market'.  You had to be very careful.

BA:  Were there any particular broking firms that Wedd had a long-standing relationship with?

JP:  I don't think I'd like to answer that question.

BA:  You mentioned on early occasions, a few moments ago, that you would try and help out the smaller jobbers.  What kind of situations would those be?

JP:  If the market went sour they got caught with something, you'd buy stock off them at the wrong price, probably to help them.

BA:  What was your impression of the jobbing system generally as you go through your career into the 1960s.  Were you conscious of a diminishing number of jobbers or did the jobbing system not impinge on your thoughts in that way?

JP:  I was on the Council for a number of years and Ken Ritchie, incidentally a cousin of mine, was the Chairman, and I made a bet with him.  I can't remember when it was, but there were then about 50 jobbers and I think I said there won't be 12 jobbers in five years time.  Actually I lost the bet by one, but yes it was very obvious it was going to do that.  Because in any system like a jobbing system you never have more than about two big firms, the third one will get killed. You can see the same happening today on a much larger scale, because the competition will drive the other one out and the chap who's best or with the longest purse will beat the others.  You can have small ones because they don't matter, but in the big league they're going to kill each other.  That's why I think it was such a very good system because it was highly competitive and I don't think anything will replace it. No doubt you couldn't have gone on because of the huge size and all the other business, but it's the best system there's ever been in my opinion, with all its faults.

BA:  Were you aware as a jobber standing in the House day after day of particular pressures on the jobbing system or on single capacity?

JP:  Yes, but the pressures came from the institutions who I thought were very short-sighted.  For one thing most of them - a great many of them - if they possibly could, they used to take the price in the market and deal outside.  And secondly they were always pressing for reduction in commissions and complaining about the system, which in fact served them very well on the whole.  They did not like the Stock Exchange system.  People like the Pru in particular, I remember, always used to be fussing that the system was making too much money out of them, but in fact they were entirely dependent on the price we used to make, and it used to irritate me particularly, coming and asking the price at which we were prepared to deal and then they'd deal outside, which didn't seem to me fair.  And I think they didn't like the system because - we didn't make vast sums of money, but we did alright.  And I think they were jealous of that because the people who ran the business were salaried people, and the people who ran the business with us, we were principals. And they probably were well paid but didn't make much capital, and we, if we were lucky, we did make some capital.  And I think that there was a certain amount of human jealously behind the system. They felt that they were vast - like the Pru - why should they give commission or anything else.  I think it was a pity, but I suppose it was inevitable, eventually, with world-wide things and all this talk about capital.  I always think it's very exaggerated this capital thing.  If you make money there's no shortage of capital.  If you've got too much capital and lose it, it doesn't do you much good. But I think the system was [good] and could have been adapted better. I was not a believer in Big Bang. And of course they gave these enormous prices to people who they thought could do the job and spent the whole time getting rid of them afterwards.  I was amazed that they didn't consult more with - I'm not trying to be conceited - but with somebody with experience like me who'd retired, I had no vested interest, before they did all this mad thing. You didn't need to be clever to foresee what was going to happen.  And also one knew there was only a limited number of people had a flair, so it was no good just buying somebody or some name or some firm ....

Tape 2, side 1

BA:  Could you tell me roughly when you became a member of the Stock Exchange Council?  1950s, 1960s?

JP:  I should think it was about - when did I retire? I retired about '59 - I should think it was about 50 to 55, something like that.

BA:  And how did that come about?

JP:  Well, nearly every big firm used to have to have somebody on the Council and it was generally suggested that I should go.  I can't remember the particular reason, whether there was a reason to do with the Gilt-edged market or what reason.  But I consented that I would do it for a bit.  And I did it for about five years.  I didn't then realise quite what it involved.

BA:  What did it involve at that time?

JP:  Well, it involved an enormous amount of reading at weekends, but it also really involved things for which I wasn't trained to really know anything about.  My contribution from my very narrow experience wasn't really of much use, except from a common sense point of view, to the Council. Because most of the business they were talking about was something right out of my ken and therefore unless something to do with the gilt-edged market came up or some commonsense question, I was really irrelevant and never felt that I really made a useful contribution on most subjects.

BA:  How did it affect your involvement in the firm's business?

JP:  Very much so, because jobbing is a thing from moment to moment and I used actually to hate taking days off. It didn't matter how much holiday I took on end. But you could take one day off, you might just as well have taken a week or a fortnight. If there was a dramatic move in prices, it would take you four days to get back into it.  Well, the Council was rather like that, except that you were always having to go up and you missed some important point.  Looking back on it, I think one ought to have given up trying to run a book altogether, the two did not combine.  If you're running a book, it's essential to be there when you're running it virtually all the time.

BA:  At some stage you'd taken complete charge of the Government book?

JP:  Yes, Dick Wilkins and I ran it together. But the tactical side, I think really from shortly after I took it over, I was responsible for running it till towards the end, when I handed over to a boy called Michael Everson who I knew was going to succeed me in running the book.  I let him do a great deal of the running of it.  But for all the main time until a bit after I joined Durlacher, yes, I virtually ran it when I was there.

BA:  And again, did you adopt any particular approach to running the book?

JP:  No, purely opportunist.

BA:  What kind of capital did you feel you required to adequately run the book?

JP:  I never felt I was short of capital, but I had a ceiling in my own mind; when I was uncomfortable, it had got bigger than that, whatever it might be at a certain time.  It was obviously related in some way to capital, but more to my own mind.  If I got a position bigger than I cared to deal with, then I would do something about it.  Relative to capital terms I don't think there was any particular figure. As the market got bigger, one naturally got bigger positions.  But I know mentally I used to be quite happy with something at some figure, then it got bigger, to a higher figure and then I would be unhappy and have to do something about it.  I never felt, if you gave me another œ50 million capital I would make you more money.

BA:  About how many of you were on the Government book?

JP:  Four.

BA:  And what was the chain of command when you were in charge?  Did you keep a fairly close eye on what was going on?  Did you expect everyone to be referring back to you?

JP:  In ordinary times you probably could.  In a really busy time, no, you couldn't,   and I probably didn't know my position by the end of the day within several million.  It was impossible because all four of you were flat out dealing probably with queues on occasions, when there was a new tap stock that was very much in demand or something of that sort.  But you tried to keep in the back of your mind that, overall, if it was going up, you knew you had some stock on the book, or if it was going down, you didn't get too big.  In busy times you could only keep an overall [view].  But you were very close and you used to whisper to each other what you were doing.  It was very often difficult - several times I forgot to book a bargain in a million or two in busy times.

BA:  Did that ever create problems?

JP:  Small.

BA:  What was your attitude to the brokers you were dealing with?  Did you feel you had to be fairly sharp because they were sharp?

JP:  One or two of them who had a reputation you had to, but mostly no, it was a position of pretty good trust.  They trusted you and you trusted them.

BA:  Could I ask you what a typical day would have been like for you at this stage in your career in the 1960s for example.  Where were you living at this time?

JP:  I was living in Hampshire.  I used to catch the 7.25, I should think, in the morning, and I used to catch the 5.30 or sometimes 6.00 o'clock to get back in the evening.  I actually started dealing earlier.  It used to be you never dealt before 9.30 because the Government didn't operate until 10.00 o'clock.  I then found that if there was a thing like a tap stock or something, if you dealt earlier you could do much better because they couldn't go to anyone else really because the Government wasn't operating, and so we very often made most of our money between 9.15 and 10 o'clock, because you more or less had the Government broker buttoned up as to what he was going to do with you at 10 o'clock.  So I started, and bitterly regretted, starting earlier, because once you start of course, then somebody else went earlier and then you got this awful thing of it opening up, and I think eventually the Government broker was forced to deal a bit earlier, I can't remember.

BA:  What was the daily routine like?  Were you reading the newspaper on the way in to work?

JP:  Yes, funnily enough I was. I had a flat in London.  I had to at that time, but I commuted when I could.  I was far better informed when I commuted than I was when I lived in London, because it was vital to know what the press said.  I took all the relevant papers.  And it was vital to know in the morning what they said, because it did cover the market for the first hour and that made your position right or wrong for the day.  Living in London you were less well prepared.

BA:  Would you go into the office first in the morning  or would you go straight to the House?

JP:  Oh, always into the office first.  You planned your day in the office.  You might change your mind, but you virtually planned your day in the office, what you were trying to do.

BA:  Would you take a break for lunch every day, or would you be too busy?

JP:  Oh yes, always. The thing usually went dead between one and two, and didn't start up again, unless it was an exceptionally busy time, really, till about 3 o'clock.

BA:  And about when would you be leaving the House?

JP:  Well the House closed at half past three.  But you often did a lot of dealing in the office afterwards.

BA:  Was dealing in the office any different to dealing face to face or did you feel you were basically doing the same thing?

JP:  Oh yes, it was. Some of it was advantageous, some of it wasn't.  You didn't of course know what your rivals were doing. In the Stock Exchange you could see your favourite broker talking to the opposition.  You didn't know really what had gone on on the telephone.

BA:  Would you meet with your other partners at some stage in the day?

JP:  Well you were all huddled together in the Stock Exchange, so you were next to each other all the time, really.  One of the advantages of the telephone was that in busy times, telephones would become jammed and if they got on to you, they daren't not deal with you, as a client on the other end, because it might take them ten minutes before they could get through to the other chap, so it worked both ways.

BA:  Could you briefly describe now what happened with the firm after you'd merged with Wedd Durlacher, or what happened with your career? You retired in the early seventies, so did you stay on the same book?

JP:  I stayed on the same book. Life went on much the same, but the whole atmosphere changed then because we got involved with Rothschilds. Rothschilds, you probably know, bought 15% of Wedd Durlacher, and therefore we had outside contacts. And Durlacher were quite different. They were in different markets, they used to have a big entertaining room and people would come in and drink in the evening and discuss business.  We never did anything like that. It had its advantages and it had its disadvantages.  It upset quite a lot of younger peoples' private lives, they used to sit and talk business and perhaps drink too much in the evening, and their wives would get browned off.  We never suffered from that. We always said we weren't going to do business other than perhaps asking somebody to lunch or something. We had no luncheon rooms in Wedd Jefferson.  But Durlacher were a much bigger concern and ran on quite different lines.  I'm not saying it was better or it was worse, it was just quite different, and therefore it was a big change for us to go into there.  And it's not a change that I enjoyed.

BA:  As equity jobbers did they have a different ethos, did they think about jobbing in a different way?

JP: I think they were harder worked, because equity jobbers had to know the background of their companies. We only had to know the background of the Government. And all Government stocks are the same with their different peculiarities.  Whereas if you deal in the equity market, then you have to know all about the management of the company. Yes, it was quite a different ball game.  But the same flair I would have said went all the way through.  There was much more to be learned, you had to know about your companies much more in the equity market.

BA:  So during the early seventies you were beginning to think about retiring and finishing your career in the City?

JP:  Yes, very much so.  I always meant to retire when I could because I had a horror of staying there too long.  Anyhow I think if you've done that sort of job for long enough and been through the hard times and the good times and everything, you get less good at it, you get more sedate, you want to keep what you've got.

BA:  So roughly when was it when you retired?

JP:  It must have been ... fifteen years ago, I suppose.

BA:  So that's about 1975. 

JP:  Yes.

BA:  Had you moved into the new House by that stage?

JP:  I hadn't moved into this one, I was still at the other one.  I moved into this one after I retired.

BA:  And what about the House in the sense of the Stock Exchange?  Had you moved into the new building, the new Stock Exchange?

JP:  Oh yes, I had some time but not very long in the new building.

BA:  Reviewing now the whole span of your career, had jobbing changed in any way, the actual business of standing on the floor of the House and trading day in day out?

JP:  No, it increased enormously in volume, but no, the principles of it I think. It was a very rapid change towards the end, I suppose, but I think the same principles and things went on as before.  Firms got very much bigger.  There were some big amalgamations. Whereas before it was just a small firm doing one type of business, it then got much bigger with merchant banks and the Bank of England and things involved with the finances of the firms and all that sort of thing.  Yes, it did change in character, I suppose.

BA:  Did the attitude to jobbers change?  You mentioned earlier that jobbers were regarded as being a bit sharp?

JP:  I don't think so. I think brokers and jobbers became more or less the same category, whereas perhaps before the jobbers had been considered the inferior of the two.  But I think it was still considered only rather slick people went into the..., rather the same as the whole City.  People not in the City are rather inclined to think the City is a place which, lately, it's been proved to be rather so!  But it was pretty straight in the times when I did it.  There were various people.  There was one chap I remember who wouldn't deal if he had a big order unless you put 10,000 shares down to him before the deal started.  But there was very little of that, very little of it.  But of course in the old days without mentioning names, the big fortunes were built up by people who contacted the Pru or whatever it was and knew that they were going to buy a tenth of Marks & Spencer or whatever it is and they helped themselves on the way.   I think that that business - I don't think anybody thought anything of it, talking way back.  But of course looking back on it now, it was [sic] very much frowned on today.  But I think some of the fortunes of brokers, not jobbers, brokers, were made on the back of what big clients were doing in the early days. They knew they were going to buy a proportion and I don't think there was a law against buying something yourself; I suppose it was inside information.  You never heard the word 'inside information', I don't think, until comparatively recently.

BA:  What would you say in retrospect had been the main strengths of the jobbing system?

JP:  I think because it was one of the few really free genuine free markets, in which you lived or lost by your wits; not on your brain!

BA:  Would you say it had any weaknesses?

JP:  Yes, I think it did, because it depended a lot on how you got on with particular people of power, and there were some people, without mentioning names, who wielded in the broker angle, or their minions, enormous power which could make or break someone.  I don't think it was ever exploited, but it was there, and it was very very necessary to get on well with certain people.  Otherwise they could finish you.  I think that would be a weakness.  It was in the hands of - I'm talking about the gilt-edged market more than any other market - the Government broker was definitely very much all-powerful, and the people under him - the dealers.

BA:  Had you found jobbing a risky career?

JP:  Oh yes, without question.  Without question.

BA:  Can you elaborate on that a little bit?  In what sense was it risky?

JP:  Take for example the year after we took over when I actually owed - I know, it doesn't seem much money now, but it was in those days - I reckon I owed £20,000. And I walked up and down the house we had then, which was near Basingstoke, which I bought for £7,000, mortgaged £4,000; I remember the extortionate price of 4 per cent.  And my wife and I walked up and down deciding whether we ought to sell it and rent something.  Sounds small beer, but it was not in those days.  And one went through agonies, yes, absolutely, but I think if you're playing for biggish fish, which I suppose we were in those days, you had big risks with it. And I think if you've been through the mill, you're probably better at the game than those who just take on something when it doesn't really matter.  I wasn't only worried about myself. I thought [of] all the clerks, who I all knew; I knew  how many children they had; we were all worried, and were we right to..., and ought we to tell the people whose money was in the firm. Because in those days you didn't ever send them a company report or anything.  Oh yes, there were great risks involved.   I always knew there were big risks involved.

BA:  Would you ever have advised your children either for or against going into a career in the City or into jobbing if they'd ever come and asked you?

JP:  No, I had two sons. I hoped that not more than one would go into the City but actually they both went in, one's in Henderson Administration, and the other in Wedd Durlacher.  No, I told them quite frankly, if you've got a big brain, for goodness sake don't go in the Stock Exchange, because you'll do very well somewhere else, but if you're average or less than average, it's quite a good place in the City to be able to possibly make enough to do the things you want to do in life.

BA:  Finally what would you describe as the qualities required to be a successful jobber, perhaps thinking about your own personal experience or the experiences of the people who you have known?

JP:  I always think that is very difficult to define, but my experience is that people who were scholars and the like in our firm were good at the admin side - they did not make jobbers.  It's got to be somebody who has a flair for that particular game and I think it's very difficult.  We'd got one or two. I can think of a little chap called Wood we got, who came from the office, who we discovered had a flair. But a great many of the people who were eventually taken over by BZW and paid large sums did not have a flair.  In any firm, I'll tell you one, who you probably know, who had a great flair in the gilt-edged market was Peppiatt and his co-partner.  They had a flair.  Maybe they were clever too but they had a flair.  Le-Roy Lewis I would have said he's got a very good brain much more on the admin side and no doubt was very good at running the firm. But the market flair people were people like Brian Peppiatt.

BA:  Would you have said a person from any kind of background would have been able to make their way as a jobber?

JP:  Absolutely.  We had some from what you might call the upper echelons and equally good ones from the lower ones, and that was so before we were there. I can remember a chap called Renny particularly who had no particular background, who was one of the kings of jobbing before [the war]. I say it's entirely a question of flair, but not necessarily brains.  The clever people on the whole - they used to think too far ahead.