Michael Babington Smith

Brigadier Michael James Babington Smith (20 March 1901 – 26 October 1984), known in London as MJBS, was a British banker, sportsman and soldier from the Babington family. During the Second World War, he served under General Dwight D. Eisenhower as Director of Finance at SHAEF from 1943 to 1945. Following the war, he was a director of the Bank of England for two decades. He served as treasurer of the National Art Collections Fund and was twice High Sheriff of the County of London.

Early life and education Babington Smith was born in Constantinople in 1901, the son of Sir Henry Babington Smith, a British civil servant who was serving on the council of the Ottoman Public Debt Administration, and later became a director of the Bank of England. His paternal grandfather was lawyer and mathematician Archibald Smith of Jordanhill and his brothers were MP James Parker Smith and curator Arthur Hamilton Smith, Keeper of Greek and Roman Antiquities at the British Museum. His mother was Lady Elisabeth Bruce, daughter of the 9th Earl of Elgin, who was Viceroy of India from 1894 to 1899. Michael was the eldest of 10 children; one of his younger sisters was journalist Constance Babington Smith MBE (1911–2000). He was appointed a director of the Bank of England in 1949, a first for a director of a clearing bank, a position he held for 20 years.

Babington Smith spent his entire career with Glyn's, but also served as a director for numerous other institutions, including the Bank for International Settlements (1965–74), the London Committee for the Ottoman Bank (from 1947; serving as chairman, 1975–82), the Royal Bank of Scotland (1938–63), (1957–74), and the holding company AEI (1949–68). When the Second World War began in 1939, he was called up with the Yeomanry and spent two earlier years of the war with the Home Guard.

He was also decorated as a Chevalier of the Legion d'Honeur avec Palme and the Croix de Guerre.

Babington Smith never officially retired, but in later years he suffered from crippling arthritis and was further disabled by a car accident. He died in London in 1984, aged 83. She died 22 November 2001.

Ancestry