1914: The coming of war

As one door closed: another opened. The onset of war led to heightened demand from insurance companies for reinsurance cover. Hatry bought a small reinsurance company from its former German owners and recapitalised it. So successful did this business prove that within 18 months, Hatry was able to sell, realising a substantial profit. The profit was used to buy a small bank, Commercial Bank of London, which Hatry then reorganised so that it could be use as the foundation for his future stock exchange transactions. In December 1916, Hatry was just 28. Clarence Hatry’s uncle John Eiser was the senior partner of J.G. Eiser & Company, one of the largest broking firms specialising in trade with brokers in Germany. Hatry was able to concentrate upon the family’s financial problems because his health was fragile after a bout of rheumatic fever in childhood which left him with a slight limp, so he was honourably absolved from military service. Acquisition of Commercial Bank was another significant milestone for Hatry who thereafter directed all his energy to developing its business, moving his office to the City from 180 Piccadilly. On the coming of war, proclamations immediately prohibited trading with the enemy, terminating all arrangements by which British insurance companies had arranged reinsurance with German and Austrian companies and prohibiting any new arrangements with such companies As the culmination of a crisis that had careered out of control, the declaration of war was a shock to which a rash of suicides and premature births testified.