Sir Hans Sloane, born in 1660 to a well-to-do family in Ireland, collected over 71,000 items throughout his long globe-trotting life, to which he added a library and a vast array of plant specimens.
When he died, his trustees offered the entire collection, worth around £80,000, to King George II for the nation. In return, they asked for £20,000 to go to Sloane's two daughters.
The king was hardly overwhelmed by the offer, and replied that anyway, "he doubted if there was money sufficient in the Exchequer". The trustees then knocked on Parliament's door and received a warmer reception.
Start your trial of MoneyWeek today
Get unparalleled financial insight, analysis and expert opinion you can profit from.
Start your trial
Sign up for MoneyWeek’s free twice-daily newsletter.
Join more than 165,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with latest financial news, insights and expert analysis to help you understand what really matters when it comes to your finances.
Join more than 165,000 subscribers and keep yourself informed with latest financial news, insights and expert analysis to help you understand what really matters when it comes to your finances.
Parliament would be delighted to receive the collection in order to create a national museum. It had already acquired another collection in 1700 that had belonged to Sir Robert Cotton. Also up for sale was the Harleian Collection of manuscripts and medals that had belonged to the earls of Oxford. The problem was, Parliament had nowhere to house the collections, and no money to buy them with.
Latest Videos FromMoneyWeek
Not wanting to lose Sloane's collection to the Russians or the French, Parliament passed the British Museum Act on 7 June, providing for a public lottery to raise £300,000. But, in keeping with the politics of the age, the lottery was corrupt.
A hundred thousand tickets were meant to be sold for £1, and later £2, each. No one was allowed to own more than 20 tickets. However, a wealthy City banker by the name of Sampson Gideon sold many of the tickets before the public could get a look in, and kept 5,000 tickets for himself. Similarly, one of the receivers, Peter Leherpe, allowed buyers to snap up as many tickets as they liked, as long as they provided additional fictitious names.
A black market in lottery tickets sprang up. After just two days, tickets were selling at a 16-shilling premium – those lucky enough to be on the inside were making huge profits.
We'll probably never know who the winner was, but we do know he held ticket number 46885. £95,194, eight shillings and two pence was handed over to the newly created British Museum to buy Montagu House, which stood on the same site as the present museum.
