Sir Charles Cayzer, 1st Baronet

Sir Charles William Cayzer, 1st Baronet (15 July 1843 – 28 September 1916) was a British businessman and Conservative Party politician.

Born in Limehouse, a maritime district of London, Cayzer was the son of Charles Cayzer, a schoolmaster, and his wife Mary Elizabeth née Nicklin. At the age of fifteen Cayzer took a position as clerk on a commercial shipping route to Japan. In 1861 he took up employment as a shipping agent in Bombay and by 1868 was working for the British-India Steam Navigation Company as master of stores.

He left India in 1873, to work for the British-India Line's London agents. In 1876 he approached British-India's owner William McKinnon, seeking to form a business partnership. McKinnon refused, and Cayzer founded his own shipping business C.W. Cayzer & Company in Liverpool in 1877. The company traded between India and the United Kingdom, and in the following year he formed a partnership with Captain William Irvine and the firm became Cayzer, Irvine & Company. Later in the same year the Glasgow shipbuilder Alexander Stephen took a stake in the business which moved headquarters to Glasgow and was relaunched as the Clan Line. In 1880 the wealthy industrialist Thomas Coats became involved and the enlarged Clan Line Association of Steamers was formed.

Cayzer amassed a large fortune from his shipping interests, and purchased a number of estates in Scotland, totalling approximately 12,000 acres in area. These included Gartmore near Aberfoyle in Perthshire, Ralston near Paisley, Renfrewshire and Newtyle in Forfarshire. He was also known for his philanthropy, including donating Ralston House to the Red Cross for use as a home for paralysed servicemen. He was a Freemason and an Officer of the United Grand Lodge of England and went on to found Wilbraham Masonic Lodge No. 1713, in the Province of West Lancashire in 1877. The Lodge went from strength to strength as did all of Freemasonry in England. Wilbraham Lodge's last meeting was in May 2008 and was formally erased due to falling numbers in December 2008. In 1890 he purchased Clevedon House, Cove as a summer home. He was elected provost of the burgh of Cove and Kilcreggan in 1891.

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