Sir William Forbes, James Hunter & Company (1773-1838)

The private banking company of Sir William Forbes, James Hunter & Company, owes its origins to the merchant and banking firm of John Coutts & Co., established in the 1720s.  Its chief activities were dealing in corn, buying and selling goods on commission, and the negotiation of bills of exchange on London, Holland, France, Italy, Spain and Portugal.

William Forbes and James Hunter (later Sir James Hunter-Blair) were both apprenticed to the Coutts' firm in 1754, and from 1761, they increasingly took on the running of the business.  The following year it was decided to withdraw the company from the grain trade and concentrate solely on banking.  From 1782 the company issued its own notes.

In January 1773, the company name was changed to Sir W. Forbes, J. Hunter & Company.  Following the deaths of the two main partners, the senior role in the firm was assumed by William Forbes' son (also Sir William), who was a great friend of Sir Walter Scott. 

The younger Sir William died in 1828 and in 1838 the company formed a 'junction' with the Glasgow Union Banking Company.  They eventually merged in 1843 with the (by then) Union Bank of Scotland.  The valuable Edinburgh connections of Sir William Forbes, James Hunter & Company were maintained however by the establishment of an Edinburgh head office of the Union Bank, which continued in operation until the Union's merger with Bank of Scotland in 1955.

Further information

• 'Memoirs of a Banking House' by Sir William Forbes (1859).
• 'The History of the Union Bank of Scotland by Robert Rait (John Smith & Son, 1930), chapters 3-4
• Some archival material relating to Sir William Forbes, James Hunter & Company is held by HBOS Group Archives.
• Records and artefacts relating to Sir William Forbes, James Hunter & Company are on display in the Museum on the Mound  in our Corporate Headquarters,

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