William Russell (banker)

[1] The Russell family has been traced back to Duddon Bridge, near Millom (now in Cumbria).

[3][4] His uncle Matthew Russell moved to Sunderland in 1717 and was in business there as a timber merchant and shipbuilder.

[6] Russell took on a lease for New Washington colliery in 1775;[7] the royalty holder in 1820, in the time of his son as owner, was Sir Wilfrid Lawson, 1st Baronet, of Brayton.

They developed pre-steam waggonways, and a system of wayleaves worked out with landowners, to extract coal.

[10][11] Around 1825 William Russell the grandson was negotiating for a deal with the Marquess of Londonderry and John George Lambton for wayleave access to Penshaw on the River Wear, in return for blocking construction of the Stockton and Darlington Railway.

[13] Russell, Allan & Wade, as it was termed in a 1790s directory entry, had Hankey & Co. as the London bank on which it drew.

The business was moved from the North Hylton Works to the Ouseburn valley, Tyneside in 1815, by John's son Robert.

[22] During the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars Russell raised a body of County Durham infantry, the Usworth yeomanry cavalry, and the Wallsend Rifles commanded by John Buddle.

[27] The castle was eventually much altered, by his son and grandson, who employed respectively John Paterson and Anthony Salvin.

[30] There Russell had in effect bought the one seat, of two, managed by the Buller family, and had his son Matthew elected, in 1802.

[31] At Great Grimsby, a "notoriously venal borough",[32] Charles Tennyson, brother-in-law to Matthew Russell, aimed to enter parliament with him in 1807, relying on William Russell's funding, and keeping out John Henry Loft.

[37] Their other daughter, Mary, married in 1810 Welch Hamilton Bunbury of the 3rd Regiment of Foot, who died in 1833.