Claes Grill (sometimes spelt Claës Grill; 19 April 1705 – 6 November 1767) was a Swedish merchant,
factory owner and
ship-owner
A ship-owner is the owner of a merchant vessel (commercial ship) and is involved in the shipping industry. In the commercial sense of the term, a shipowner is someone who equips and exploits a ship, usually for delivering cargo at a certain frei ...
. He was director of the Grill Trading House, one of the leading companies in the East India trade through the
Swedish East India Company
The Swedish East India Company ( sv, Svenska Ostindiska Companiet or ''SOIC'') was founded in Gothenburg, Sweden, in 1731 for the purpose of conducting trade with China and the Far East. The venture was inspired by the success of the Dutch East ...
(SOIC). The trading house also ran a banking business and owned several
ironworks
An ironworks or iron works is an industrial plant where iron is smelted and where heavy iron and steel products are made. The term is both singular and plural, i.e. the singular of ''ironworks'' is ''ironworks''.
Ironworks succeeded bloomeri ...
in Sweden. Grill also owned several estates, was interested in
natural science and had a brief and unsuccessful political career.
Family
One of the notable
Grill family,
Claes Grill was born in
Stockholm
Stockholm () is the capital and largest city of Sweden as well as the largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people live in the municipality, with 1.6 million in the urban area, and 2.4 million in the metropol ...
, the son of
Abraham Grill and Helena Wittmack and twin brother to Anthoni Grill.
Grill married his uncle Carlos' daughter, Anna Johanna Grill (1720–1778), a woman famed for her beauty. They had two children,
Adolf Ulric, collector and natural scientist, and a daughter named Anna Johanna 1745–1801), who donated ''
The Conspiracy of Claudius Civilis'' to the
Royal Swedish Academy of Fine Arts
The Royal Swedish Academy of Fine Arts ( sv, Kungliga Akademien för de fria konsterna), commonly called the Royal Academy, is located in Stockholm, Sweden. An independent organization that promotes the development of painting, sculpture, architec ...
.
Early years
Grill started to work for his father and at the age of 17 when he was employed at Abraham's office in the Grill Trading House. After the death of his father, Grill became director of the Trading House, and ran the company together with his uncle Carlos. The name of the company was changed to ''Carlos & Claes Grill'', at that time one of the largest trading company in Sweden. After the death of Carlos (1681–1736), he was sole head of the firm until 1747, when his half-brother joined him as partner.
Since the family had connections to the Netherlands, Grill went there in 1731 or 1732, to further his education and gain more experience with the trading business.
The Grill Trading House
During the mid 18th century, the Grill Trading House flourished both in Sweden and abroad. They were connected to hundreds of trading houses in Europe. Foremost was the export of goods to
Hamburg
(male), (female) en, Hamburger(s),
Hamburgian(s)
, timezone1 = Central (CET)
, utc_offset1 = +1
, timezone1_DST = Central (CEST)
, utc_offset1_DST = +2
, postal ...
, Amsterdam and England. The Dutch Grill company, Antoni Grill & Sons based in Amsterdam acted as a centre for payments to the Grill trading house in Stockholm. The Anglo-Swedish company run by Andrew & Charles Lindegren in London handled all the exports, shipping documents, vessel clearances, and insurance for the Grill Trading House. They also supplied Swedish ships with transit cargoes from England to the countries around the
Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on ...
.
During the second charter of the SOIC between 1746 and 1766, the Grill Trading House was one of the leading companies in the East India trade. They were partners in a large linen and rigging factory as well as a glass factory in Stockholm. They leased the Stora Stads wharf in Stockholm, owned the Terra Nova wharf and had interests in the Djurgården wharf. All three wharfs built ships for both the SOIC and foreign customers.
The Grill Trading House also ran a banking business for Swedes traveling abroad. Since the company was connected to so many other trading houses, they could issue
bills of exchange
A negotiable instrument is a document guaranteeing the payment of a specific amount of money, either on demand, or at a set time, whose payer is usually named on the document. More specifically, it is a document contemplated by or consisting of a ...
for travelers and diplomats to be redeemed at trading houses in other countries. Under the direction of Grill, the trading house acquired several factories and ironworks:
Söderfors 1748,
Österbybruk with the
Dannemora mine
The Dannemora mine (''Dannemora gruvor'') at Dannemora in Uppsala County, Sweden was once one of the most important iron ore mines in Sweden. The mine was closed by its owners SSAB in 1992. It may have been open since the 13th century, but the ...
(1750) and
Iggesund (1753). The main exports from these factories were iron, copper,
lumber
Lumber is wood that has been processed into dimensional lumber, including beams and planks or boards, a stage in the process of wood production. Lumber is mainly used for construction framing, as well as finishing (floors, wall panels, w ...
and
tar
Tar is a dark brown or black viscous liquid of hydrocarbons and free carbon, obtained from a wide variety of organic materials through destructive distillation. Tar can be produced from coal, wood, petroleum, or peat. "a dark brown or black b ...
. Imports consisted of salt from Portugal, oak and
hemp
Hemp, or industrial hemp, is a botanical class of '' Cannabis sativa'' cultivars grown specifically for industrial or medicinal use. It can be used to make a wide range of products. Along with bamboo, hemp is among the fastest growing plants ...
from the
Baltic states
The Baltic states, et, Balti riigid or the Baltic countries is a geopolitical term, which currently is used to group three countries: Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. All three countries are members of NATO, the European Union, the Eurozone, ...
, also wine, coffee, sugar, cheese, tobacco and textiles.
Grill ran his companies in an old-fashioned, patriarchal way writing letters every week to his managers at the estates concerning everything from the running of the factories to making enquiries about individual employees. Overall, the Grills industrial companies employed more than 4,000 persons at that time.
Houses and estates
With the building of the manor in Österbybruk, it became the hub for all the iron and mining activities of the Grill Trading House, although Grill and his family did not live there permanently. They lived in the Grill house in Stockholm until 1764, when he bought the Torstensonska Palace (now known as the
Arvfurstens palats
Arvfurstens palats (Palace of the Hereditary Prince) is a palace located at Gustav Adolfs Torg in central Stockholm.
Designed by Erik Palmstedt, the palace was originally the private residence of Princess Sophia Albertina. It was built 1783-1794 ...
) at
Gustav Adolfs torg, Stockholm
Gustav Adolfs torg is a public square in central Stockholm, Sweden.
Description
The square is located in the district of Norrmalm, where Strömgatan, Fredsgatan, Malmtorgsgatan and Regeringsgatan meet. The site was
named after King Gustav II ...
. The summers were spent at
Svindersvik, a country residence outside Stockholm, built by Grill in the early 1740s.
Grill was an art collector and his houses were decorated with
Chinese
Chinese can refer to:
* Something related to China
* Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity
**''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation
** List of ethnic groups in China, people of v ...
objects as well as paintings by Swedish and Dutch masters like
Alexander Roslin
Alexander Roslin (spelled Alexandre in French, ; 15 July 17185 July 1793) was a Swedish portrait painter who worked in Scania, Bayreuth, Paris, Italy, Warsaw and St. Petersburg, primarily for members of aristocratic families. He combined insightf ...
,
Gustaf Lundberg,
Hans Memling
Hans Memling (also spelled Memlinc; c. 1430 – 11 August 1494) was a painter active in Flanders, who worked in the tradition of Early Netherlandish painting. He was born in the Middle Rhine region and probably spent his childhood in Mainz. He ...
and
David Teniers. He owned six complete sets of
porcelain
Porcelain () is a ceramic material made by heating substances, generally including materials such as kaolinite, in a kiln to temperatures between . The strength and translucence of porcelain, relative to other types of pottery, arises mai ...
tableware commissioned from Canton (now known as
Guangzhou
Guangzhou (, ; ; or ; ), also known as Canton () and alternatively romanized as Kwongchow or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of Guangdong province in southern China. Located on the Pearl River about north-northwest of Hong Kong ...
). , the oldest and largest of these still has 325 pieces preserved.
Imported porcelain broken in transit from
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...
or by daily household use became decorative gravel used on the garden paths at one of the Grills' estates. This example of wasting money and resources was condemned by those who opposed the activities of the SOIC. Even noted botanist
Carl Linnaeus
Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his Nobility#Ennoblement, ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalise ...
was at first an opponent. He wrote: "A part of the silver, which withstands the wear and tear of time and which even fire cannot destroy, we exchange for fragile objects of clay, which, once dropped, cannot be mended."
Benefactor
Grill was interested in
natural science and contributed to different projects, such as helping Carl Linnaeus financially and with the collection of plants and animal specimens from foreign lands. In 1740, he became a member of the
Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences ( sv, Kungliga Vetenskapsakademien) is one of the royal academies of Sweden. Founded on 2 June 1739, it is an independent, non-governmental scientific organization that takes special responsibility for prom ...
. He gave financial support to young scientists and naturalists, lent money (without interest) to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for the construction of an observatory, contributed a substantial sum of money to the
Danviken Hospital
Danvikens hospital was a historical Swedish hospital, insane asylum and retirement home in Stockholm, active in 1558–1861. The area belonged to Stockholms kommun until 1984, when it was transferred to Nacka kommun.
The Danvikens hospital wa ...
and saved the
Sveriges Riksbank
Sveriges Riksbank, or simply the ''Riksbank'', is the central bank of Sweden. It is the world's oldest central bank and the fourth oldest bank in operation.
Etymology
The first part of the word ''riksbank'', ''riks'', stems from the Swedish w ...
(the
central bank
A central bank, reserve bank, or monetary authority is an institution that manages the currency and monetary policy of a country or monetary union,
and oversees their commercial banking system. In contrast to a commercial bank, a central ba ...
of Sweden) from bankruptcy in 1747 by buying banknotes at their nominal value. In 1748, he became ''
preses'' or president of the Royal Academy of Sciences and was elected to the board of directors at the central bank of Sweden, a position he held until 1756. Grill was also awarded the honorary title of ''kommerseråd'' ("trade counselor") by
King Adolf Frederick. In 1755, he was one of the initiating founders of the Factory Academy, a social network for factory owners in central Sweden.
Political life and fall
Between 1748 and 1750, Grill was a member of the
Bourgeoisie in the
Riksdag of the Estates
Riksdag of the Estates ( sv, Riksens ständer; informally sv, Ståndsriksdagen) was the name used for the Estates of Sweden when they were assembled. Until its dissolution in 1866, the institution was the highest authority in Sweden next to t ...
and politically involved with the
Hats
A hat is a head covering which is worn for various reasons, including protection against weather conditions, ceremonial reasons such as university graduation, religious reasons, safety, or as a fashion accessory. Hats which incorporate mecha ...
. He was also one of the partners in the infamous ''Växelkontoret'' (Exchange office), a private financial institution handling mainly
promissory notes without the involvement of the central bank. When the
Caps
Caps are flat headgear.
Caps or CAPS may also refer to:
Science and technology Computing
* CESG Assisted Products Service, provided by the U.K. Government Communications Headquarters
* Composite Application Platform Suite, by Java Caps, a Jav ...
became the ruling party in 1765, Grill, along with his half-brother Johan Abraham and all the other members of the ''Växelkontoret'', were accused of corruption and mishandling its affairs. In 1765, Grill and Johan Abraham, were fined by the Justice deputation of the Riksdag, and in 1766, they were sentenced to pay back "five barrels of gold" to the ''Växelkontoret''. When the Hats regained their political power in the Riksdag the following year, the sentence was revoked, but by then Grill had died.
Notes
References
Bibliography
*
*
Further reading
*
*
*
*
*
External links
Publications by Claes Grillon
LIBRIS
LIBRIS (Library Information System) is a Swedish national union catalogue maintained by the National Library of Sweden in Stockholm. It is possible to freely search about 6.5 million titles nationwide.
In addition to bibliographic records, one ...
Website of the Grill familyGodegård archive at the Nordic MuseumSOIC archive at the Gothenburg University LibraryGrill Family from Sweden and the Netherlands and their Chinese Armorial Services
{{DEFAULTSORT:Grill, Claes
1705 births
1767 deaths
18th-century Swedish businesspeople
Swedish merchants
Members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
Swedish East India Company people
History of foreign trade in China
Businesspeople from Stockholm
Members of the Riksdag of the Estates
Claes