Sir John Lubbock, 1st Baronet

In 1797, he insisted that the bank was fully competent to liquidate all the demands that could be brought against it, and recommended that £3,000,000 should be added to the capital, to enable the directors to discount to such an amount as would accommodate the commercial world. He was well disposed to the Greville ministry, which made him a baronet on 9 Apr 1806. John accepted this on the condition that he might pass it on to his nephew John William. This was granted and John William in gratitude chose the family motto to go with it "Auctor pretiosa facit" (the giver makes the gift precious). He was listed amongst the "staunch friends" of the abolition of the slave trade at around the same time. His nephew wrote of him "he was an excellent man of business and a genial, kind friend. He was fond of horses and hunting and used to drive 4 Greys into the City from his house in St James Place, which he had purchased in 1802 with Samuel Rogers the poet; Sir John taking two-thirds and Mr Rogers one-third.

In addition to St James' Place, Sir John bought a large house on the west side of Clapham Common on 25 May 1787 from Isaac Akerman, and after a short period of residence there let it to W. G. Hamilton MP (known as "Single Speech" Hamilton). By then known as Battersea Rise, this house was sold in August 1792 to the abolitionist Henry Thornton, who for some years shared it with his cousin and political ally William Wilberforce. Lubbock's acquaintance with these gentlemen helps to explain his anti-slavery stance. Afterwards he rented Marble Hill Cottage near Richmond from a Miss Hotham, daughter of Sir Charles Hotham, Bart. (this being the first known link between those two families; the son of his heir and nephew was later to marry Harriet Hotham) from 1792. He then purchased it in 1807 and kept it as a residence until 1812. Other residences included Lammas in Norfolk (all his life), Honingham Hall in Norfolk (let from Hon Charles Townshend 1811 - his death), 13 Token House Yard in London (Jan 1765 – Jul 1768), Stratford Place (from Jun 1794) and a house in Gorleston, Norfolk which he sold in Mar 1802.

In addition to the Bank premises mentioned above, he also part owned several general merchant houses including Broad Street, Walthamstow (1771–1774), St Mildred's Court, Poultry in the City of London (from 1783), a building in Oxford Street (from 1794) and 8 Bishopsgate Street (known to be occupied between 1778 and 1782).

Two portraits of John are known. The first is a full-length portrait of him as a young man aged about 18 (see above), which used to be at High Elms in Kent, the family home during the 19th and 20th centuries. The second is of a more rotund version of him in much later life seated in a chair. There is also a picture of his young wife dated 1774 by John Downman, which appeared for sale advertised in Country Life magazine. The portrait shown was lost when the family home at High Elms burned down in 1967. The portrait of the elderly man is held at Clapham Library.

He died on 24 Feb 1816 at 23 St James Place. He is buried at St James's Church, Piccadilly where there were tablets to his memory, and that of his wife, in the belltower. There is no sign of them now and it is thought that the memorials may have been destroyed in the blitz. His wife outlived him by many years, moving to St Leonards in Sussex after her husband's death. She eventually died there in 1845 at the age of 94.

• Leigh Rayment's list of baronets
• Leigh Rayment's Historical List of MPs
• The History of Parliament (the House of Commons) Vol IV 1790-1820
• A biographical index to the present House of Commons, 1808
• The Family of Lubbock by Robert Birkbeck, 1891
• Occasional papers of the Clapham Antiquarian Society, Minet Library, Lambeth
• Country Life Dec 1987
• Holdens Directory
• Annals of the Borough of Devizes 1791–1835, ii 263

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by Sir John Lubbock