Henry Starnes

Henry Starnes

Henry Starnes (born October 13, 1816 in Kingston , Upper Canada , † March 3, 1896 in Montreal ) was a Canadian politician , businessman and banker . He was twice mayor of the city of Montreal, from 1856 to 1858 and from 1866 to 1868. In the years 1858 to 1863 he sat in the lower house of the province of Canada , from 1867 in the upper house of the province of Québec . A bank he presided over was involved in the Pacific scandal that led to the fall of the federal government in 1873.

biography

Starnes grew up in Montreal and received his secondary education at the Petit Séminaire de Montréal . In the 1830s he started working for the grocery importer James Leslie and Company , founded by the politician James Leslie . In 1849 he became Leslie's partner and the company now traded as Leslie, Starnes and Company . From 1851 he also worked as a banker; he was initially director of the Banque du Peuple for two years and then until 1876 director of the Banque d'Épargne de la Cité et du District de Montréal . In 1859 he turned away from the import trade and opened the Montreal branch of the Ontario Bank , which he managed for twelve years. In 1871 he founded the Metropolitan Bank , of which he was president.

Starnes' political career began in 1852 when he was elected to the Montreal City Council. In 1856 he was elected mayor for the first time and held this office until 1858. In January 1858, the election into the legislative assembly of the province of Canada followed ; in this he represented the constituency of Châteauguay until 1863 . In 1866 he was elected mayor of Montreal for another two years. The government of the newly founded province of Québec appointed him a member of the Legislative Council (upper house) in 1867 . He held this office for almost three decades until his death.

The Metropolitan Bank , chaired by Starnes, served as an intermediary between the influential entrepreneur Hugh Allan and the nationally known politician George-Étienne Cartier . Allan secretly provided Cartier and other Conservative Party politicians with substantial funds to aid them in the 1872 general election. In return, Cartier had promised that Allan's consortium would be awarded the contract to build the transcontinental railroad. The exposure of this agreement sparked the Pacific scandal that eventually led to the resignation of Prime Minister John Macdonald's government.

In 1876, the Metropolitan Bank was forced to cease operations, for which Starnes' unorthodox and risky financing methods were blamed. The shareholders lost most of their investments and sued Starnes, who was acquitted in court. He remained a member of the Legislative Council as he was appointed for life and not elected. In the provincial government of Québec he was from 1882 to 1884 chairman of the railway commission and 1887 commissioner for agriculture and public works.

Web links

• Henry Starnes . In: Dictionary of Canadian Biography . 24 volumes, 1966–2018. University of Toronto Press, Toronto ( English , French ).
• Biography on the website of the city administration (French)
• Biography on the Québec National Assembly website (French)