Maurice de Hirsch

Moritz Freiherr von Hirsch auf Gereuth (German: Moritz Freiherr von Hirsch auf Gereuth; French: Maurice, baron de Hirsch de Gereuth; 9 December 1831 – 21 April 1896), commonly known as Maurice de Hirsch, was a German Jewish financier and philanthropist who set up charitable foundations to promote Jewish education and improve the lot of oppressed European Jewry. He was the founder of the Jewish Colonization Association, which sponsored large-scale Jewish immigration to Argentina.

Hirsch was born on 9 December 1831 in Munich, Bavaria. Descended from a family of Jewish court bankers, his parents were Baron Joseph von Hirsch auf Gereuth [de] and Caroline Wertheimer. His grandfather, the first Jewish landowner in Bavaria, was ennobled in 1818 with the appellation auf Gereuth. His father, who was banker to the Bavarian king, was made a Freiherr (baron) in 1869. For generations, the family occupied a prominent position in the German Jewish community. At the age of thirteen, Hirsch was sent to Brussels for schooling. He then went into business, at the age of seventeen.

On 28 June 1855, Hirsch married Clara Bischoffsheim, daughter of Jonathan-Raphaël Bischoffsheim of Brussels. They had a daughter who died in infancy and a son, Lucien (1856–1887), who predeceased his parents.

Hirsch died at Ógyalla in Hungary (now Hurbanovo, part of Slovakia) on 21 April 1896. His wife seconded her husband's charitable work with great munificence — their total benefactions have been estimated at £18,000,000. She died in Paris on 1 April 1899, leaving the remaining family assets to her adopted son, Maurice Arnold de Forest (later titled Count of Bendern). Hirsch was amongst the top five richest individuals in Europe at the time.

In 1855, Hirsch became associated with the banking house of Bischoffsheim & Goldschmidt, of Brussels, London and Paris. He amassed a large fortune, which he increased by purchasing and working railway concessions in Austria, Turkey and the Balkans, and by speculations in sugar and copper. In 1869 he bought the concession for railroad building in Turkey from the bankrupt "International Land Credit Company". His best-known railway venture was the Chemins de fer Orientaux, a visionary railway project intended to link Vienna to Istanbul. Hirsch lived in Paris, where he owned a townhouse on rue de l'Elysée and the Château de Beauregard. He also had residences in London, Hungary, and in what is now the Czech Republic (Veveří, Rosice). In 1890 Hirsch bought Bath House, Piccadilly in London.

In 1890 he sold the Ottoman railroads to a consortium that included Deutsche Bank and Wiener Bankverein.

Hirsch devoted much of his time to schemes for the relief of Jews in lands where they were persecuted and oppressed. He took a deep interest in the educational work of the Alliance Israelite Universelle, and on two occasions presented the society with gifts of a million francs. For some years, he regularly paid the deficits in the accounts of the Alliance, amounting to several thousand pounds a year. In 1889, he capitalized his donations and presented the society with securities producing an annual income of £16,000. Hirsch donated £1000 to The Chelsea and Westminster Hospital in 1892.

On the occasion of the fortieth anniversary of Emperor Francis Joseph's accession to the Austrian throne, he gave £500,000 for the establishment of primary and technical schools in Galicia and the Bukowina. Hirsch donated to charity all the prize money won by his string of racehorses, including more than £35,000 won by his mare La Fleche between 1891 and 1894.