Sir Hugh Allan was a Scottish-Canadian shipping magnate, financier and capitalist.
Background
Allan was born on the 29th of September 1810, at Saltcoats, Ayrshire, Scotland. He was the second son of Captain Alexander Allan and his wife Jean Crawford (1782–1856). He was a first cousin of Sir Alexander Tilloch Galt and his father was a first cousin of the Scottish bard, Robert Burns. In 1819, Allan's father established the Allan Shipping Line, which became synonymous with running goods and passengers between Scotland and Montreal.
Education
Hugh Allan received a parish education at Saltcoats.
Career
He started work in 1823 at the family's counting house of Allan, Kerr & Co. , of Greenock.
Allan immigrated to Canada in 1826 and in 1831 began work for a general merchandising company with shipping interests in Montreal. By 1839 he was a senior partner, and by 1853 he and his brother Andrew owned their own steamship company, eventually called the Allan Line, and conducted shipping between Montreal, Glasgow, and Liverpool.
In 1872 the Canadian government gave Allan the transcontinental railway charter for his Canadian Pacific Railway. It was later revealed, however, that, as a member of a Chicago financial syndicate, he had subsidized Macdonald’s Conservative Party election campaign. The subsequent scandal not only discredited Macdonald’s government but also led to the dissolution of Allan’s railway company.
Not long after the death of his wife, he died while visiting his son-in-law, Sir George Houstoun-Boswall, in Edinburgh, December, 1882. At his death he was one of the richest men in the world with a fortune estimated to be between eight and twelve million pounds. His remains were brought back to Montreal and he was buried with his family at the Mount Royal Cemetery.
Achievements
Politics
In 1872- 1873 he obtained from the Canadian government a charter for building the Canadian Pacific railway, but the disclosures made with reference to his contributions to the funds of the Conserva-tive party led to the Pacific scandal (see Canada, History), and that company was soon afterwards dissolved.
Connections
At Montreal, August 13, 1844, Hugh Allan married Matilda Caroline Smith (1828–1881), the eldest of the four daughters of John Smith (d. 1872) of Athelstane Hall, Montreal, and his wife Betsy Rea. John Smith was a native of Athelstaneford in Scotland and became one of Montreal's leading dry goods merchants. Caroline's sister, Isabella, married Hugh's brother Andrew in 1848. Lady Allan's two remaining sisters married respectively Hartland St. Clair MacDougall (brother of George Campbell MacDougall) and James St. George Bellhouse, of the firm Bellhouse & Dillon. Lady Allan died in Montreal, June, 1881, aged 53. They were the parents of four sons (a fifth predeceased his father) and eight daughters.
The Allan's Canadian enterprises, almost entirely built by Hugh, were continued by his brother, Andrew Allan.