John Hanger | |
|---|---|
| Born | c. 1656 |
| Died | 1733 (aged 76–77) |
| Nationality | British |
| Occupation(s) | Merchant and banker |
| Known for | Governor of the Bank of England |
| Spouse | Mary Coles |
John Hanger (c. 1656 – 1733) was a merchant ofTrinity Minories who wasGovernor of the Bank of England from 1719 to 1721 when theBank of England was closely involved in the financing of theSouth Sea Company. His family were closely associated with thehundred ofBray inBerkshire and a memorial to the family exists inSt Michael's Church there.
John Hanger was born around 1656. His family were associated with thehundred ofBray.[1]
Hanger married Mary Coles. His eldest daughter, Anne (or Ann) (died 1754, aged 53), marriedHenry Hare, 3rd Baron Coleraine, in 1718. She was accompanied by a dowry of nearly £100,000. The couple separated only two years later, without issue, and thebarony of Coleraine became extinct upon his death in 1749.[1][2][3] The title was revived though in 1762 for Hanger's nephew,Gabriel Hanger, who became the 1st Baron Coleraineof the second creation.[4] John Hanger's second daughter, Mary, died in 1739 aged 35 and his youngest daughter Elizabeth in 1744–45 aged 38.[1] The monument to Mary was sculpted byPeter Scheemakers.[5]
Hanger was a merchant of Trinity Minories, just outside the boundaries of the City of London but within theliberties of the Tower of London. He was alsoDeputy Governor of the Bank of England from 1717 to 1719.[6] He replacedGerard Conyers as governor in 1719 and served as such until 1721 when he was succeeded byThomas Scawen.[7]
He was governor at the time when the Bank of England was intimately involved in the financing of theSouth Sea Company (known for the South Sea Bubble).[8] In November 1720, he and a party of bank officials visited the company and after enquiring into the security it could give, Hanger read a letter informing them that the bank would only provide the first £400,000 of its agreed rescue subscription of £3m, the future proceeds of which had underpinned the share price.[9] Afterwards, the company's share price collapsed to a new low, the bank's inaction causing, it was said, more families to be ruined than all the actions of the directors of the South Sea Company.[8][9] In 1871, Hanger featured as a character inW. Harrison Ainsworth's novelisation of those events.[10]
Hanger died in 1733 aged 77. A marble memorial to the family exists inSt Michael's Church, Bray, the details of which were documented by the architectural historianPeter Spokes in theBerkshire Archaeological Journal in 1939.[1]
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Goodwin, Gordon (1890). "Hare, Henry (1693–1749)". InStephen, Leslie;Lee, Sidney (eds.).Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 24. London: Smith, Elder & Co. p. 367.
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