Charles de Bretteville

Charles de Bretteville (March 11, 1913 – September 4, 1992) was an American banker and business executive during the mid-20th century in California. He served as president of the Spreckels Sugar Company and later as president, chief executive officer, and chairman of the Bank of California.

Early life Charles de Bretteville was born in San Francisco, California, the son of Alexander de Bretteville and his wife Clarisse Lyons.

Although Alexander de Bretteville was a successful businessman in his own right, eventually becoming vice-president of the Union Iron Works in San Francisco, upon Adolph Spreckels's death in 1924, his sister Alma insisted that he leave his position and work for her, representing her interests in the Spreckels companies and acting as her personal financial manager. Despite his lack of knowledge of the sugar business, he was soon made vice-president of the J. D. and A. B. Spreckels Company, the holding company that controlled the Spreckels family's companies. His business career was interrupted by the outbreak of World War II when he joined the United States Navy and served from 1942 to 1945. He held the rank of lieutenant commander, serving aboard the USS Bunker Hill in the Pacific theater.

Leadership of Spreckels Companies Returning to the Spreckels companies after the war, Charles de Bretteville quickly rose through the ranks as an executive. In 1947, he took his father's seat on the board of directors of the Spreckels Sugar Company and soon after became vice-president of the J. D. and A. B. Spreckels Company, as well as president of three Spreckels sugar cane plantation interests, the Hakalau Sugar Plantation Company and Kilauea Sugar Plantation Company in Hawaii

In 1950, the American Sugar Refining Company, which already held 50% stake in the Spreckels Sugar Company (an arrangement that went back to Claus Spreckels founding of the company) bought out Blair Holdings' 40% stake of the Spreckels companies, leaving it as the largest shareholder of Spreckels Sugar overall and a significant minority interest in the Spreckels Companies. American offered to buy out the remaining shareholders, but the offer was rebuffed. In 1951, de Bretteville became president of the Spreckels Sugar Company.

De Bretteville stepped down as Spreckels Sugar president in 1962 and sold his stake in the Spreckels Company to the American Sugar Refining, allowing it to fully take over the companies. Spreckels Sugar Company was then merged in as a division of that company, rebranded as the American Sugar Company.

One way that de Bretteville attempted to stimulate growth was to bring in new investment, and one of the investors that he courted was French banking magnate Baron Edmond Adolphe de Rothschild, who ended up purchasing 17% of BanCal Tri-State Corporation, the holding company that owned the Bank of California. Nevertheless, he would remain a board member of the bank for another two years. Soon after, FBI investigators announced that they had previously found de Bretteville's name on a list of about 25 potential targets titled "Possible People to Snatch", recovered from a Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) safe house in Concord, California the year before. Police investigators had suspected a link between the two groups, which were active at around the same time. However, FBI investigators were of the opinion that there was no connection between the two groups. Investigators speculated that he might have been targeted due to his position on the PG&E board of directors, as the NWLF had targeted facilities and offices of that company in previous bombings.

Personal life and death De Bretteville lived in Woodside, California, before moving to Pebble Beach, California following his retirement from banking in 1978. He died on September 4, 1992, at the nearby Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula, at the age of 79. The cause of death was reported as a heart attack. He was survived by his wife, Frances Mein de Bretteville, and four children.