Frederick Peter George Barker (1825 - 1899)

Born 1825 in Smyrna (Izmir) Turkey

Ancestors

Husband of Caroline (Lafuente) Barker — married 10 Nov 1849 in Alexandria, Egypt

Died 1899 at about age 74 in Paris, France

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Biography

Frederick Peter George Barker was born in Smyrna (Izmir) Turkey in 1825. He is the son of Edward Barker and Anna maria Mavroyanni. His father was the British Consul in Cairo, Egypt until 1834 and his uncle John Barker was the Consul in Alexandria and the the Consul-General for Egypt. The family moved back to Smyrna towards the end of his father's life.

After his father died in 1844, Frederick left Smyrna and went to Alexandria in about 1846 where he worked for a British company. His mother and 8 siblings joined him in about 1849. Frederick married Caroline Lafuente in 1849 and he and his brother Henry established a business Barker and Co in 1850. It is likely that Frederick and Henry had connections within the British business community of Alexandria acquired through their father and uncle John Barker. Business was booming following Mohammed Ali’s reforms and work on communications and infrastructure in Egypt. The Mahmoudieh Canal which joined Alexandria to the Nile had been completed in their father's time and the Alexandria to Cairo railway was completed in 1851. Frederick, who was 25 at the time, owned 60% of Barker and Co and Henry, who was 21, owned 40%. They became major exporters of grain and cotton seed cake from Egypt and later expanded into shipping. Family records suggest that their eldest brother John who had gone to London, may have helped with startup capital for the business.

Frederick spoke fluent French and Italian, which were required to do business in the Levant at the time. He was also required to do significant traveling for business, at a time when travel and communications were slow and journeys could be rough. Longer trips to Europe and Britain were combined with family holidays and were usually of a 2 - 3 months duration over the summer. Staff were left in charge in Alexandria. It was also necessary to journey regularly to Cairo and Suez for business and mail. The company was profitable and allowed the Barkers to live well and provide for their mother.

They established a business presence in Paris and had staff from Alexandria there from the 1860's. In 1872 Frederick and Henry bought a warehouse in Minet-el-Bassal, an industrial area in West Alexandria. The warehouse was bombed during the Second World War and then when Egypt began a policy of nationalization, it was expropriated for a school in 1955.

According to company reports, by 1875, Barker and Co held the agencies for Credit Foncier of England, Burns and McIver’s Cunard Line, Wilson of Hull, Palmer Hall, Rubattino of Genoa, London and Southwark Insurance, Queen Insurance and the Maritime Insurance Company. The shipping lines they represented, called at numerous ports including in America, Antwerp, Le Havre, Italy, the Baltic region, Marseilles, Trieste and Bombay in India. export Exports shipped to Britain were grain, cottonseed, wool and cotton while coal was the main import.

In 1880 Frederick retired from Barker & Company and moved to Paris with his wife, his 19 year old son and 14 year old daughter. His son married but had no children. His daughter Marie (Mimi) married Edouard Jacquemet and lived in Pau, France. Marie lived to the age of 93, and descendants remain in France today from her many children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. After Frederick left for France, Henry ran the company on his own. The company was later taken over by his son, then grandson and then great grandson before the Barkers were expelled from Egypt in 1956 due to the Suez crisis. The Barkers of Egypt all descended from Henry.

Sources

• http://www.levantineheritage.com/testi30.htm
• http://levantineheritage.com/book5.htm