The Gestation of an Economist: Early Financial Career

Abstract

Having made the decision to marry, David Ricardo and Priscilla Wilkinson had to look to greater London for a place to settle and raise a family. So long as they remained in the East End, the hostility from their respective parents would have been too omnipresent and uncomfortable. They could have remained in Middlesex, but the most likely location would have been some distance north of the City, beyond the regions of the depressed Irish immigrants, and the many acres of vegetable nursery gardens ever expanding to meet the needs of a growing London market. To move west, to Westminster, would have been to live a great distance from the commercial center of the City and the Stock Exchange. To be sure, there were many expanding and beautiful suburbs in Westminster, “London beyond the Bars,” where the restrictions and covenants of the City were inoperative. But the fashionable West End would have to wait until David was better able to afford the luxury and high rents. In the meantime there was peaceful Lambeth, within an easy distance of the City, and at the same time a growing region for the near well-to-do.