Thomas Guy was a British bookseller, speculator and de facto founder of Guy's Hospital

Guy's Hospital

Guy's Hospital is a large NHS hospital in the borough of Southwark in south east London, England. It is administratively a part of Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust. It is a large teaching hospital and is home to the King's College London School of Medicine...

, London

Early life

Thomas Guy was born a son of a lighterman, wharf owner and coal-dealer at Southwark

Southwark

Southwark is a district of south London, England, and the administrative headquarters of the London Borough of Southwark. Situated east of Charing Cross, it forms one of the oldest parts of London and fronts the River Thames to the north...

. In 1668, after eight years as an apprentice of a bookseller, he began his own bookstore in Lombard Street

Lombard Street, London

Lombard Street is a street in the City of London.It runs from the corner of the Bank of England at its north-west end, where it meets a major junction including Poultry, King William Street, and Threadneedle Street, south-east to Gracechurch Street....

. At first he sold bible

Bible

The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...

s that were poorly printed in England so he imported them from the Netherlands. Eventually he gained a privilege of printing them from the University of Oxford and became book publisher.

Guy had a reputation as a miser, mainly because a rival bookseller John Dunton accused him of paying low wages and refusing to help the charities. In fact, Guy was a stock speculator. He invested in government securities and bought shares to the value of £42,000 in the South Sea Company, a company involved in the Atlantic slave trade

Atlantic slave trade

The Atlantic slave trade, also known as the trans-atlantic slave trade, refers to the trade in slaves that took place across the Atlantic ocean from the sixteenth through to the nineteenth centuries...

. In 1720 he successfully sold his stock of the company with the price ranging £300-600 per share and amassed a large fortune. During the British wars against the Louis XIV of France

Louis XIV of France

Louis XIV , known as Louis the Great or the Sun King , was a Bourbon monarch who ruled as King of France and Navarre. His reign, from 1643 to his death in 1715, began at the age of four and lasted seventy-two years, three months, and eighteen days...

, Guy successfully speculated in seamen's pay tickets.

Sponsor of hospitals

Despite his reputation, Guy did provide for charities. In 1678 he gave money to almshouses at Tamworth

Tamworth

Tamworth is a town and local government district in Staffordshire, England, located north-east of Birmingham city centre and north-west of London. The town takes its name from the River Tame, which flows through the town, as does the River Anker...

, his mother's birthplace, and also represented that town

Tamworth (UK Parliament constituency)

Tamworth is a parliamentary constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one Member of Parliament by the first past the post system of election.- History :...

 in parliament from 1695 to 1707.

In 1704 Guy became a governor of St Thomas' Hospital. In 1707 he had built three wards and supported the hospital afterwards. In 1725 Guy opened the Guy's Hospital opposite to Thomas' Hospital at a cost of £18,793, 16 shillings.

Thomas Guy died unmarried on 17 December 1724. His will left £219,499 to the Guy's Hospital. He also gave an annuity of £400 to Christ's Hospital

Christ's Hospital

Christ's Hospital is an English coeducational independent day and boarding school with Royal Charter located in the Sussex countryside just south of Horsham in Horsham District, West Sussex, England...

, which at that time was in London. In his will, he bequeathed financial support for the releasing and discharging of poor prisoners for debt out of prisons in London, Middlesex and Surrey and made various provisions for the homeless as well as sick. The rest of his estate went to cousins, friends and more distant relatives or acquaintances, many of whom were left up to £1,000 each.

The will had been signed and sealed in the presence of a John Oldfield, William Pepys, John Adlam and Samuel Adlam.

In 1995, 271 years after his death, a new dual carriageway by-passing Tamworth

Tamworth

Tamworth is a town and local government district in Staffordshire, England, located north-east of Birmingham city centre and north-west of London. The town takes its name from the River Tame, which flows through the town, as does the River Anker...

was named Thomas Guy Way in his honour.