Michael Godfrey

Michael Godfrey (22 February 1658 – 1695) was an English merchant and financier, who was one of the founders and the first deputy governor of the Bank of England.

He was the nephew of Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey, a magistrate who was murdered in 1678 after receiving Titus Oates’s depositions concerning the Popish plot and foreman of the grand jury that found a true bill against Edward Fitzharris for high treason.

At a general court held on 16 May 1695, at which Peter Godfrey was elected a director, the bank resolved to establish a branch at Antwerp in order to coin money to pay the troops in Flanders.

'Being an eminent merchant,' writes Luttrell, 'he is much lamented; this news has abated the actions of the bank by 2 percent.

"[3] He was unmarried and was buried near his father in the church of St. Swithin, Walbrook, where his mother erected a tablet to his memory.