Russell & Company

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Group.png Russell & Company  Rdf-entity.pngRdf-icon.png
William John Huggins - The opium ships at Lintin, China, 1824.jpg
Formation1824
Founder•  Samuel Russell
•  William Huntington Russell
Extinction1891
Type commercial

Russell & Company was the largest American trading house of the mid-19th century in China. The firm specialised in trading tea, silk and opium and was eventually involved in the shipping trade.

Founder

Samuel Wadsworth Russell (August 25, 1789 – May 5, 1862) started as an orphaned apprentice to a maritime trade merchant, made his initial investment capital on trading commissions while working for other traders, and eventually founded Russell and Co., the most powerful American merchant house in China for most of the second half of the 19th Century. He landed in Canton in 1819 and quickly amassed a fortune in the opium trade. His mansion, now known as the Samuel Wadsworth Russell House, still stands in Middletown, Connecticut. Russell's cousin and fellow opium trader, William Huntington Russell, was a co-founder and funder of Yale University's Skull and Bones Society.[1][2]

Notable people of Russell & Company

 

Related Document

TitleTypePublication dateAuthor(s)Description
Document:Wirt Walker, Russell and Co, CIA, and 911article3 September 2010Kevin Ryan
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