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In the 17th century London's importance as a trade centre led to an increasing demand for ship and cargo insurance. Edward Lloyd's coffee house became recognized as the place for obtaining marine insurance and this is where Lloyd’s as we know today began - more than 325 years ago.
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And suddenly I am in Lloyd’s. There is a magic in it for the first time visitor. I stand before the „rostrum“ (according to a dictionary of old languages it is said to mean for maritime concepts something like „ship’s beak”); now the structure in which the bell of HMS Lutine was hanging, the symbol of Lloyd's.
The "Lutine Bell" weighs 106 pounds and has a diameter of 18 inches. It is one of the symbols of Lloyd's London a ship’s bell of Her Majesty’s ship LUTINE, which sank in 1799 off the Dutch coast with a cargo of gold and silver coins to the value of one million pounds. By tradition the bell is rung once for good news, twice for bad news. On the 27th of May 1941 news was received that the German battleship Bismarck had been sunk by the Royal Navy – the bell was struck once!
Terence explains to me with a broad grin on his face while giving me a guided tour through the Lloyd’s building, trying to show me everything special. Well this was not quite true. In fact the Bismarck was not sunk by the Royal Navy, but her rudders were hit by a torpedo launched from a seaplane - a Fairey Swordfish Torpedo Bomber, steered by a certain William Garthwaite. For this heroic deed he was made Sir William Garthwaite and I should work later together with his son. This way the timelines of history crossed at a later stage and the sons of the former antagonists became collaborators.
Terence is a Jew of German extraction but keeps this secret because it would have been an obstacle to his professional career at Lloyd’s. The truth however is, as I learn later: The biggest client of his firm Cayzer Steel Bowater ltd. is the Sultan of Oman, who categorically demanded that his Broker what not deal with Jewish clients leave alone to employ jewish personnel. That is what he thought. Terence biggest client in the opposite, is a shipbuilder in north Germany where speed- and torpedo boats had been built during the War. Ironically he has only German clients who love to talk with him about the War, an irony of fate which Terence accepts calmly. On a table in the rostrum there is the Loss Book, a log in which are registered losses from centuries ago till today. In the gallery there is an old edition from 1912 in which the sinking of the Titanic is chronicled. The Titanic was insured for a sum, then unimaginable, of one million British pounds. The owners were compensated to the full sum within thirty Days of the sinking (what a contrast to the customs of the firm Weyrauch, I think). Memories of times past and reminders of the fact that Lloyds' of London was party to many historical events that were in the limelight -
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