Lord Leverhulme and Port SUNLIGHT
Lord Leverhulme - Mayor of Bolton, Lancashire
Fig 5 Lord Leverhulme by
Prince Arthur, on Flickr
William Lever was born on 19 September 1851 at 16 Wood Street, Bolton, Lancashire, England. He was the seventh child born to James Lever (1809–1897), a grocer, and Eliza Hesketh, daughter of a cotton mill manager.
From William Lever’s humble beginnings, he would go on to become one of the most powerful industrialists in British history.
Honours and titles included:
Mr William Lever 1851–1911
Sir William Lever, Bt 1911–1917
The Rt. Hon. The Lord Leverhulme 1917–1922
The Rt. Hon. The Viscount Leverhulme 1922–1925
Lever Baronetcy, of Thornton Manor (1911)
Baron Leverhulme, of Bolton-le-Moors in the County Palatine of Lancaster (1917)
Viscount Leverhulme, of The Western Isles in the Counties of Inverness and Ross and Cromarty (1922)
High Sheriff of Lancashire, 1917
He also served as Member of Parliament (MP) for the Wirral constituency between 1906 and 1909.
William Lever laid the foundations for what is now one of the biggest companies in the world – Unilever
Unilever by
Unilever, on Flickr
Unilever an Anglo-Dutch transnational consumer goods company co-headquartered in London, United Kingdom and Rotterdam, Netherlands. Its products include food and beverages (about 40 percent of its revenue), cleaning agents and personal care products. It is the world's largest consumer goods company measured by 2012 revenue. It is Europe’s seventh most valuable company. Unilever is one of the oldest multinational companies; its products are available in around 190 countries.
William Lever was a very active and dedicated Freemason. However, it is unclear from public records as to when Lever was first initiated into Freemasonry and to which lodge.
From historical records it can be seen that Lever was a member of the following Masonic Lodges:
Albert Coveney 3519 (Birkenhead, Cheshire)
Egerton Lodge of Mark Masons 165
(Location Unknown)
Lilley Ellis 3236 (Birkenhead, Cheshire)
Bohemian Lodge 3294 (Birkenhead, Cheshire)
Royal Colonial Institute 3556 (Great Queen Street, London)
Lodge Puerorum 3377 (Great Queen Street, London)
King George V 3514 (Wallasey, Cheshire)
United Temperance 3107 (Wallasey, Cheshire)
Oxton 3462 (Birkenhead, Cheshire)
St Hilary 3591 (Wallasey, Cheshire)
Deva 3447 (Hunter Street, Chester)
Birkenhead Rose Croix Chapter 150 (Birkenhead, Cheshire)
Zion R.A. Chapter 537 (Birkenhead, Cheshire)
De Tabley Chapter 605 (Birkenhead, Cheshire)
Broadsmith Chapter 3261 (Ellesmere Port, Cheshire)
Preceptory of St Hilary 184 (Birkenhead, Cheshire)
Commercial Lodge 3628 (Birkenhead, Cheshire)
Royal Solomon Council 24
(Location Unknown)
Lodge of King Solomon’s Temple 3464 (Hunter Street, Chester)
William Hesketh Lever Lodge 2916 (Port
SUNLIGHT, Cheshire)
Randle Holme 3261 (Port
SUNLIGHT, Cheshire)
York Lodge 236 (York)
Lancastrian 2528 (Oxford Street, London)
In 1907, while sitting as an MP, he was a founder of the Phoenix Lodge 3236 (Birkenhead, Cheshire) listed above as Lilley Ellis.
Further research shows that Lever was initiated into the following lodges between 1917 and his death in 1925. However, this list is not necessarily exhaustive.
Leverhulme Lodge 4438 (Port
SUNLIGHT, Cheshire) 1922
Progress Lodge 4584 (Port
SUNLIGHT, Cheshire) 1923
Lodge Fortrose [SUP][11][/SUP] 108 (Stornoway) 1923
William Lever was a co-founder of no fewer than 17 lodges.
In 1902, at the age of 50, William Lever had his very own Masonic Lodge named after him – the William Hesketh Lever Lodge No. 2916 in Port
SUNLIGHT. In 1907 he became Worshipful Master, going on to found many Lodges and hold various offices at national level. In May 1912 he founded St. Hilary Lodge No. 3591. He then became Past Pro-Grand Warden (P.P.G.W) and Immediate Past Master (I.P.M). In 1919, he was appointed Senior Grand Warden of the Grand Lodge of Mark Master Masons of England. He was Provincial Senior Grand Warden of the Provincial Grand Lodge of Cheshire, and founded many other Lodges.
Leverhulme saw Freemasonry as a useful tool to promote social cohesion and high standards of personal conduct and actively encouraged membership amongst his workforce. He established a Masonic control network to facilitate the smooth running of Lever Brothers at Port
SUNLIGHT. Separate Lodges were created for managers, supervisors and workers. Freemasonry was an important instrument in his paternalistic policy for the welfare of his workers.
Lever designed and oversaw (along with more than 30 architects) the building of what was in effect a large-scale social experiment. Between 1899 and 1914, 800 houses were built for a permanent population of 3,500-4,000 workers, managers and administrators. Once completed, Port
SUNLIGHT housed not only the vast new factory and offices, but also a hospital, church, technical institute, museum and library, auditorium, gymnasium, heated outdoor pool and refectories for workers.
Fig 11 Port Sunlight Light and Dark by
Prince Arthur, on Flickr
Although most of the architects working at Port
SUNLIGHT were local, some were of national importance, notably Sir Ernest George, Ernest Newton, and Sir Edwin Lutyens - nearly all the buildings are Grade II listed.
Sir Ernest George RA (1839–1922) served as President of the Royal Institute of British Architects (1908 - 1910).[SUP][5][/SUP]
Ernest Newton RA FRIBA (1856 – 1922) served as President of the Royal Institute of British Architects (1914-1917).[SUP][5][/SUP]
Sir Edwin Landseer Lutyens OM, KCIE, PRA, FRIBA (1869 – 1944) career would include the Presidency of the Royal Academy (1938-1944) and in 1925 chaired a jury panel for an international architectural competition for the design of
Freemason’s Hall, United Grand Lodge of England, Great Queen Street, London.
Lord Leverhulme certainly appears to have been a popular boss - his funeral was attended by 30,000 people[SUP][7][/SUP] – clearly a well respected man amongst his workforce and the community at large in the UK. (He is buried in the churchyard of Christ Church in Port
SUNLIGHT, Cheshire).
However, Jules Marchal (1924-2004), a former diplomat in the Belgian Congo spent twenty years researching forced labour.
In Marchal’s book, ‘Lord Leverhulme’s Ghosts – Colonial Exploitation in the Congo’, the back cover summary is as follows:
“In the early twentieth century, the worldwide rubber boom led British enterpreneur Lord Leverhulme to the Belgian Congo. Warmly welcomed by the murderous regime of King Leopold II, Leverhulme set up a private kingdom reliant on the horrific Belgian system of forced labor, a program that reduced the population of Congo by half and accounted for more deaths than the Nazi Holocaust. In this definitive, meticulously researched history, Jules Marchal exposes the nature of forced labor under Lord Leverhulme’s rule and the appalling conditions imposed upon the people of Congo. With an extensive introduction by Adam Hochschild, Lord Leverhulme’s Ghosts is an important and urgently needed account of a laboratory of colonial exploitation”.
Fig 13 Lord Leverhulmes Ghosts Jules Marchal by
Prince Arthur, on Flickr
William Hesketh-Lever was certainly
illuminated but was there a darker side to his character….?
https://pubastrology.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/house-of-the-rising-sun-v0_7.pdf
_https://pubastrology.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/house-of-the-rising-sun-v0_7.pdf