William Rubinstein is an expatriate New Yorker who has spent his
academic life investigating wealth and the wealthy in modern
Britain and overturning cherished ideas by looking at the
British from the top down rather than from the bottom up. Who
Were the Rich?, compiled from probate records, will identify
everyone who died in Britain between 1809 and 1914 leaving
personal assets of £100,000 or more - which is equivalent to
between £8 and £10 million today. The first volume, covering the
years 1809-39, lists 881 people - about one in ten thousand of
those who died. After their scarcity the most immediately
striking thing about these rich people is their longevity. The
nine millionaires died on average at 78.3 years; the half-
millionaires whose age is known (33 out of 39), at 74.5 years.
Forty-two per cent of people leaving half a million or more died
over the age of 80. The average age at death of a random sample
of 93 of those leaving £100,000 was 71.1 years. The richest
woman in Britain, Jane Innes, was also