Charles Horsley Correspondence
by Michael R. Reilly, Editor, copyright March 18, 2013
Last updated08/15/2015
Charles Horsley, 1913 newspaper article
What is contained on this page is mainly correspondence between Charles Horsley and different business partners (mainly German or their agents), such as, Sigmund Le Vino, a Mr. Duncan, Sigmund Seckendorf (S. S. & Co.), Messel & Co., the Nuremburg group, etc. Nothing to do with Val Blatz.
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Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Dec 1, 1888, to Charles Horsley, concerning Manchester Joint, and Nuremburg people , page 1.
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Dec 1, 1888, to Charles Horsley, concerning Manchester Joint, and Nuremburg people , page 2.
Sigmund Le Vino, Telegram follow-up, Frankfurt, Dec 1, 1888, to Charles Horsley, concerning Manchester Joint, and Nuremburg people , page 3.
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Dec 3, 1888, to Charles Horsley, concerning California Joint, regretting his involvement in project, page 1.
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Dec 3, 1888, to Charles Horsley, concerning California Joint, regretting his involvement in project, page 2.
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Dec 3, 1888, to Charles Horsley, concerning California Joint, regretting his involvement in project, page 3.
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Dec 3, 1888, to Charles Horsley, concerning Messel & Co. (London stock brokerage), page 1.
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Dec 8, 1888, to Charles Horsley, concerning California Joint and Sig. Seckendorf
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Jan 5, 1889, to Charles Horsley, concerning Messel, page 1.
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Jan 5, 1889, to Charles Horsley, concerning Messel, page 2
Seckendorf to Horsley about Messel, Jan 8, 1889, page 1
Seckendorf to Horsley about Messel, Jan 8, 1889, page 2
Jan 11, 1889, Munich Bank (?) to Horsley concerning Manchester Brewery
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Jan 12, 1889, to Charles Horsley, concerning Messel, a Mr. Duncan, and Sig. Seckendorf, page 1.
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Jan 12, 1889, to Charles Horsley, concerning Messel, a Mr. Duncan, and Sig. Seckendorf, page 2.
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Jan 12, 1889, to Charles Horsley, concerning Messel, a Mr. Duncan, and Sig. Seckendorf, page 3. Note: Le Vino first mentions some forthcoming American venture.
Sigmund Le Vino, Frankfurt, Jan 12, 1889, to Charles Horsley, concerning Messel, a Mr. Duncan, and Sig. Seckendorf, page 4.
Messel rep to Charles Horsley, Jan 26, 1889
Messel rep to Charles Horsley, Jan 26, 1889, Le Vino accounting, mentions Manchester, page 2
Messel rep to Charles Horsley, Jan 26, 1889, Le Vino accounting, page 3
Alex Horsley, brother, Mountain, Horsley & Co., to Charley Horsley, April 17, 1889
E. T. Hargraves, London solicitor, to Charles Horsley, April 20, 1889
W. S. Davies, Sewell & Pierce, 34 Nassau St., NY, to Charles Horsley, April 25, 1889
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The following excerpt from The Statist provides some insight into what the three letters above seem to allude to. Some of the terms and places become more focused. Find additional information about Charles Horsley, and the various breweries he was involved with, following this.
Charles Horsley
The Statist: A Journal of Practical Finance and Trade, Volume 23
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MORE BREWERY COMPANIES.
The brewery company promoters are still busy. The stock of directors of a famous brewery company promoting syndicate shows signs of exhaustion. Usually they have been sent out in couples, but for the Voight Brewery Company, of Detroit, brought out this week, one has had to suffice. Mr. Durranr-Cardinall alone represents on its board the devoted little band of Justices of the Peace from a corner of Essex, who, since they were first called together for the service of Daniell and Sons’ Brewery, at Colchester, have been sent out in many directionsand on many directionswith an equally charitable purpose, and are now extending their mission to the United States of America. In aid of Tamplin And Son’s Brewery enterprise at Brighton, two of the brotherhood have been told off, but theirs is especially an errand of mercy. “It is with a view to relieving the present proprietor,” the prospectus just issued of Tamplin and Son’s Brewery, Brighton, states, “from the sole responsibility of so extensive a concern”which brings him in, it is added, an average income of £20,000 a yearthat “it has been determined to form the business into a joint-stock company.” The representatives of the Colchester mission who, with a zeal which it may be hoped will meet its reward, have flown to the relief of the overburdened proprietor of £20,000 a year, and have joined in imploring public subscription to a fund of £270,000 in order to partially release him from his responsibilities, are Hector John Gurdon-Rebow, Esq., J.P. and D.L., and Charles Page-AVood, Esq., J.P. and D.L. If it were told how often they have tried to do good in similar directions they might blush to find it fame, but a few instances it is only fair to them to mention. The first gathering was around
Daniell And Sons’ Breweries, Colchester.
London Offices:
38, Poultry.
Directors:
Durrant Edwd. Cardinal1, Esq., Ardleigh, Essex.
H. J. Gurdon-Rebow, Esq., J.P., D.L., Wiveuhoe, Essex.
Charles Page-Wood, Esq., J.P., D.L., Wake’s Colne, Essex.
Robert Curzon, Esq., J.P., Coggeshall, Essex.
Promoter:
Mr. Thomas Jervis.
Amongst those which followed were the
Hull Brewery. Northampton Manchester
London Offices: Brewery. Brewery.
38, Poultry. London Offices: London Offices:
Directors: 38, Poultry. 38, Poultry.
D. E. Cardinal!, Directors: Directors:
H. J. G. Rebow, D. E. CardinaU, D. E. Cardinal],
Hy. Alexr. Haig, H. J. G. Rebow, H. J. G. Rebow,
and others. H. A. Haig, H. A. Haig,
Promoters: and others. Alexander Horsley.
A. L. Elborough and Promoter: Promoter:
Thomas Jen-is. Thomas Jervis. Thomas Jen-is.
To the Barnsley Brewery, of which Mr. A. Davidson was the promoter, no director of the Essex division was allotted, but Parker’s Burslem Brewery has the services of Mr. C. Page-Wood and Mr. F. M. Haig. It will be noted that, as far as possible, impartiality has been observed in giving to each gentleman his fair share of the good work. Mr. Curzon’s other engagements have, perhaps, prevented him from giving so much time to it as the others. If the weekly board-meetings of the respective companies are arranged for convenient hours on different days in each week, a director leaving East Essex on Monday after the board of Daniells’ Company will be able to attend Northampton on Tuesday, Manchester on Wednesday, Hull on Thursday, Nottingham or Burslem on Friday, the Commercial Brewery Corporation in London on Saturday morning, Tamplin’s Brighton Brewery on Saturday afternoon, and by taking the mail train from Liverpoolstreet on Saturday night to spend Sunday, like the modern commercial traveller, at home.
The prospectus of the Voight Detroit Company requires but little notice. The capital, or some part of it, for two or three important American breweries has been formed here, because the businesses were offered upon terms apparently more favourable for the buyer than those upon which most English brewery companies have been formed, and because also seemingly trustworthy certificates from competent surveyors were given as to the value of the American brewing properties. No attempt is made in the prospectus of the Detroit scheme to show that the brewery established not very many years ago on a small scale is now worth the £185,000 which the promoter wants to get for it. The profits for three years only are given, and these, as well as the sales, show a decline in that time. Last year’s profits were £15,516. Is. 8d.; and hereafter, if the company should be floated, there will be, as the accountants suitably point out, the costs of London administration and the salary of the vendor as managing director. The vendor has agreed to guarantee, on certain conditions, 13 per cent, on the ordinary share capital for six years, a kind of arrangement suggestive of a purchase price on a very high scale.
Tamplin’s Brighton Brewery is well known in its district, where it was founded in 1821 by the grandfather of the present owner, with a view to relieving whom from the sole responsibility of so extensive a concern the present company has been promoted by Mr. Alexander Horsley, who was also concerned with Mr. Jervis in the promotion of the Manchester Brewery Company. Mr. Charles Horsley is to join the board of Tamplin’s Brewery Company after the allotment of shares. For old-fashioned brewery businesses there are always to be found, through the usual trade channels, plenty of buyers outright at a fair price, or partners ready to bring in capital and share the responsibility upon terms favourable to the present owner. For the introduction of buyers or partners in this legitimate way the agency commission upon large sums is only a small percentage. Tamplin’s Brewery is said to have a 45-quarter plant. Five per cent, on the purchase money at the outside ought in the ordinary way fully to cover all the expenses of transfer of such a business; in most cases 2 J per cent, would suffice. The buyerwould, of course, want to sec the return of profits for the past ten years. He would expect the average profit of the past five or seven years to show about 10 per cent, on the proposed purchase money, and he would require an independent valuation of the properties to be made on his behalf. The certificate of the profits of Tamplin’s [Brewery is, for some reason not stated, given only for the two years and nin mouths ending 31st March last. It is said to show, including rents, an average of £20,895. 9s. 8d. per annum. For the purchase of this business the promoter requires from the company £265,000.
No independent valuationnor any valuation at all is offered to show that this very great sum is justifiable. But very properly some of the various contracts are specified. By one of these, made on the 13th May, it is disclosed that the promoter is to pay £231,350 for the business, which on the 15th May he agrees to transfer to the company for £265,000. The promoter has the chance of securing nearly £ 35,000 in a week.
In previous articles on the prices which brewery companies are sometimes made to pay for the businesses which they take over, we have assumed about one-third of the capitalusually the whole of the ordinary shares as representing the difference between the ordinary market value and the company value of a concern. The result, as shown, was that on nearly two and a-quarter millions of capital invested in half-a-dozen of what we consider dearly-bought country breweries, and subject to all the risks of trade, the profit last year was only £120,440, or not quite 5 per cent., and the total of the reserve funds formed was only £8,500, or less than the balance of preliminary expenses not yet written off. The Manchester Brewery Company, which has lately issued its first yearly report (and on the direction of which are two of the directors and the promoter of Tamplin’s Brewery) has actually not written oft’ one penny of its preliminary expenses, although these are only £5,291, and the company has a capital, including mortgage debt, of £680,000. This £5,291, the report states, “will be written off during the next seven years,” and the directors also “propose to postpone writing off for this year” anything from the leaseholds, which are of course a year nearer expiry. No allowance whatever is made in respect of the sum paid as promoters’ and vendors’ profit. If but very moderate reductions had beeu made in these three items the ordinary shareholders must have, foregone their dividend, which, as it is, is only 8 per cent, as against 12 per cent, promised in the prospectus, the profit being about £9,000 less than even the average of the five previous years instead of an increase, represented as likely.
In spite of the present popularity of brewery companies’ shares and debentures as an investment, and the undoubted respectability of many of the businesses which they were formed to take over, it is worth while for intending investors to consider sometimes whether in the long run it is likely to answer for the public to go into trade upon terms which make those already experienced most eager to get out. It is not without significance to note that amongst the contracts specified in Tamplin’s prospectus there is a little supplementary one between the promoter and another, dated May 13. This discloses that the promoter did not after all find the £5,000 deposit paid to the vendor, but another did; and for this little service apparently £15,000 are to be paid in addition to the repayment of the £5,000 out of the first moneys coming to hand, which ought to be within about a fortnight after allotment. There are contracts with other parties, specification of which applicants are invited to waive. What such contracts arc likely to be must be left to the imagination.
Tamplin Brewery ( aka Phoenix Brewery ), Brighton, England – history and Charles Horsley information
Source: Brighton and Hove and South Sussex Graphic magazine, page 4, July 29, 1915
continued: Tamplin Brewery, Brighton, England – history and Charles Horsley information
Source: Brighton and Hove and South Sussex Graphic magazine, page 5, July 29, 1915
continued: Tamplin Brewery, Brighton, England – history and Charles Horsley information
Source: Brighton and Hove and South Sussex Graphic magazine, page 10, July 29, 1915
continued: Tamplin Brewery, Brighton, England – history and Charles Horsley information
Source: Brighton and Hove and South Sussex Graphic magazine, page last, July 29, 1915
Source: Brighton and Hove and South Sussex Graphic magazine, back cover, July 29, 1915
Letter to Charles Horsley, Plankinton House, Milwaukee, from R. W. Forbes & Sons, New York, May 4, 1889, concerning sugar shipment to England.
May 8, 1889, telegram (?) from R. W. Forbes & Sons, New York to Horsley, staying at the Plankinton House, Milwaukee, about a sugar (?) delivery.
Telegrams May 10 and 16, 1889 Forbes to Horsley, still at Plankinton House, Milwaukee, about Horsley’s travel plans back to England and about Chicago sugar shipment.
Telegrams, Forbes to Horsley, about travel plans, May 13 and 14, 1889
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