http://www.the-times.co.uk/news/pages/Sunday-Times/frontpage.html March 26 2000 FOCUS A Norman noble has emerged as the richest Briton of the last millennium. Richard Woods and Dipesh Gadher report on his family's fortunes and what it tells us about wealth today The fortune that lasted 1000 years The eminent descendants of the richest man to have lived in Britain in the past millennium were doing the washing up this weekend. Sure, they live in a castle and can trace their family back through centuries of wealthy nobility; but the Earl of Arundel - known by some as "Fast Eddie" - and his countess, Georgina, lead a relatively modest life. He is a director of part of Sotheby's; she is the mother of five children who does the school run. "They are extraordinarily ordinary people," said Howard Flight, Conservative MP for Arundel and South Downs, West Sussex, where the earl's ancient castle towers against the skyline. "They are very proud of their history and their home, but they are not showy. Georgina often goes into the local chemist for a gossip and when the family come for dinner she always takes the plates out and helps wash up." The earl's father, the Duke of Norfolk, is Britain's premier duke and England's earl marshal, but he prefers to live in a more modest house in Henley-on-Thames, where he makes picture frames. Since Arundel Castle is now run as a charitable enterprise, he has to pay a few pounds for every night he stays there. "I tend to pay on a quarterly basis," the duke admitted. It's hardly penury, but it is a comedown for a dynasty that once would have made the Sainsbury family look like paupers. The wealth of the duke derives ultimately from a fortune that, though diminished and dispersed, has survived 1,000 years. It stretches back to the time when William of Warenne, a Norman noble, helped William the Conqueror invade England and give King Harold a fatal poke in the eye. For his efforts Warenne was rewarded with land that by 1088 stretched across 13 counties; he built a castle at Lewes, is believed to have built another at Reigate and another in Norfolk. At his peak he was worth about �57 billion in today's terms - 14 times more than Hans Rausing, the richest person now in Britain, and �4 billion more than Bill Gates, the world's richest man. Nobody in Britain (royalty apart, and they are a special case) has held such a dominant financial position since, and the journey of Warenne's outrageous fortune to the present illustrates the changing face of wealth. Modern billionaires pay their social dues by setting up charitable foundations or, perhaps, offering to run lotteries for nothing; feudal ones had more onerous obligations. They raised armies and spilt blood for the sovereign. Their wealth, grounded in land over which the monarch ultimately held sway, could never be cashed in like stock options, and its associated duties sometimes carried a mortal price: the 3rd Earl of Surrey, the title used by the Warennes, died on a crusade. As ever, it was also who you knew that mattered. But the right contacts were vital to a degree that makes today's would-be dotcom millionaires, networking like mad on their mobiles, seem mere beginners. Get it wrong, as did Edmund Fitzalan, who married into the Warenne line, and you risked not only your wealth but your life. Fitzalan, known as the Earl of Arundel, was beheaded in 1326 during a struggle over the monarchy. The art of the comeback (and you can forget Donald Trump) was never better demonstrated than by Fitzalan's son, Richard, who spent four years persuading the crown to restore his family's title and some estates. A loyal general, he went on to amass a fortune worth about �48 billion in today's terms, making him the second richest person in Britain in the past 1,000 years. Apart from royal confiscation, the greatest threat to such enormous wealth was not business incompetence or tax, but genes. Dying without a male heir could be ruinous. "Producing a son was crucial," says Professor Michael Hicks, an expert in medieval history at King Alfred's College, Winchester. "The rule of primogeniture ensured estates passed to the eldest son. Having several daughters or sisters as heirs would have spelt disaster." Which is what happened to an Earl of Arundel in the 15th century: some of his estates were split between three sisters, who married into other families, while the title and other land went to a male cousin. Marriage later brought the Warenne/Arundel line together with the Duke of Norfolk in the 16th century, which should have meant a resurgence in fortunes, and Thomas Howard, the 4th Duke of Norfolk, was indeed the largest landowner of his time. Political ambition, which has cost many modern ty-coons dear, proved to be the duke's downfall. After attempting to marry Mary, Queen of Scots, he was executed by Elizabeth I in 1572. The estates were confiscated again. Few now would be bothered by a rich man's religion, unless, say, Bill Gates suddenly became a Moonie. But it mattered much in the 16th century. The duke's son compounded the family's problems by becoming a Catholic. He was accused of treason, fined a vast sum, was stripped of all his honours, and died in the Tower of London. But yet again, the family later recovered some estates and the fortune soldiered on. Land was still the foundation of wealth. BRITAIN was the first country in Europe to shed the feudal system that concentrated wealth in a few aristocratic hands. The shift began with the peasants' revolt of 1381 and accelerated as parliament began to assert its power. By 1698 parliament had introduced the civil list for the monarchy. What was happening to the Norfolk dynasty around this time? Money certainly was not buying it happiness. In the late 17th century, the duke was finding it so hard to get by that he hit on a scheme to sell some manors in which his wife had an interest. To do so he tried to divorce her on the grounds that she had succumbed to "the ogles of the invincible Germyn", a chancer from Holland. When he was finally allowed to divorce his wife he was told to repay her a dowry of �10,000. He didn't, dying instead of apoplexy. The family luck did not improve in the late 18th century with the 11th Duke, who was known for his passion for wine and aversion to soap, which meant he was only ever manhandled into a bath when insensible with booze. The duke lost all his official positions, and the income they brought, after a dinner at which he drunkenly toasted not the king, but "the majesty of the people". Wealth, however, was no longer coming mainly from royal patronage and old estates. Through marriage to an heiress of the Earl of Shrewsbury, the Norfolks had acquired land around Sheffield. As the industrial revolution took hold, these properties proved valuable assets in coal and steel production. "The family faced terrible tragedies throughout the 16th and 17th centuries," said Dr John Martin Robinson, the historian of the Norfolks. "But they became rich from the industrial revolution, they had always been entrepreneurial." The royals could show commercial mettle, too. When Victoria ascended the throne, the monarchy was �50,000 in debt, but Prince Albert proved an astute manager of estates and drove hard bargains in buying Balmoral and Sandringham. He helped even more by dying in 1861 be-cause Victoria saved a fortune from the civil list during her lengthy and frugal mourning. She left �4m in her will. Throughout the 20th century, the wealth of various royals continued to grow, boosted by surreptitious arrangements to avoid tax. The aristocracy, however, did not escape. Income tax and death duties, introduced at single-figure levels, rose sharply. In 1941 the highest rate of income tax was 97.5%; in 1948 death duties were levied at 75%. Coal mines were nationalised and land development punitively taxed. Old fortunes collapsed. Entrepreneurial spirit was required. When the Marquess of Hertford moved back into Ragley Hall, Warwickshire, in 1956, he occupied two rooms and was on his uppers. Now, by attracting 90,000 visitors a year to his 6,000 acres, he is said to be worth �14m. But in the brave new world of commerce, not every noble can strike gold. More than 1,000 years after his family was granted an estate in Staffordshire by King Edgar, Sir Charles Wolseley is bust. His plans to set up a leisure centre failed and he now draws the jobseeker's allowance. "It was bad timing," said Wolseley. "We are battling on." Luck has had a lot to do with making and losing such fortunes, according to Professor Patrick Collinson, a historian at Trinity College, Cambridge. "There is an element of survival of the fittest, but it's also down to a good deal of accident." He identifies a winning long-term strategy as including: profitable marriages; political patronage; consolidating assets in strategic areas; and luck. Philip Hall, the historian noted for investigating royal finances, seems to agree. "The rich have to stay lucky or adapt," he said. "A lot of the older families have hung on by being involved in whatever makes you rich." The internet is no exception: even the Queen has made a mint from investing in a net company. Down in Arundel, the Norfolks' castle now pays its way. Its last accounts show �8.3m of assets and a profit of �379,000. The family has other holdings, which some estimate as worth at least �30m. But be-cause some are in charitable trusts, the family does not make it into the present Sunday Times list of the richest 1,000 in the country. The giant fortune of William of Warenne has spanned a millennium, dispersing with democracy. Even Sir David Frost, the broadcaster, can claim a share: he is married to Lady Carina, one of the Duke of Norfolk's daughters. But land no longer dominates. Finance, computers, banking, information, media and entertainment are now quicker ways to making a fortune than being a knight in battle. Inheritance is not key. Nearly 75% of the richest people in Britain today made their fortunes themselves. Mind you, what do the new billionaires do with their wealth? They buy the sort of estates Warenne once enjoyed and employ a good tax lawyer. "Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything." Communist Tyrant Josef Stalin (Listen anytime to Votefraud vs Honest Elections "crash course" radio show over the internet at www.sightings.com in the archives, April 3rd, 2000 show, Jeff Rense host, Jim Condit Jr. guest)
