ALEXIS JACOB

Born 27th May 1882 - Died 1959

 

 

He was the second son of Sydney Long Jacob. He was born at Villeneuve, Switzerland on 27th May 1882, while his mother was staying with her widowed mother, having with her his sister Gertrude and brother Syndey Monatague. He practised as an accountant, founding a company that still operates and bears his name to this day. He became, like his father, a Plymouth Brethren; he never married.

Obituary:

Mr. Alexis Jacob, who died while playing tennis on Whit Monday, would have been 77 today. The younger son of Colonel S.L.Jacob, R.E., he came from a family whose service in India as soldiers and administrators covers 150 years. After leaving school he was articled to the late Sir Harry Peat and qualified as a chartered accountant in 1905. Until 1928 he was with the Wolseley Motor Company in Birmingham, resigning the secretaryship when the company was taken over by the Morris Group.

He then started in practice as a chartered accountant in London and Birmingham and founded the firm of Jacob, Cavenagh and Skeet, of which he was a senior partner when he died. A director of many companies, he will be greatly missed on the boards where his sound judgement on finance was invaluable. As an advisor to trusts in the investment of their funds, he proved particularly successful.

His holidays were spent whenever possible in the mountains of Switzerland and Austria with his sister, who was an enthusiastic a climber as he was. At the age of 18 he felt the call of God to devote his life to Christian work, and while he excelled in all his business pursuits his heart was in the many missionary activities with which his name is connected. Throughout his life he managed the Panahpur Charitable Trust, established by his father for the relief of famine orphans in India. For many years he was chairman of the Midmay Mission Hospital in Bethnal Green. He supported missionary work in India, the Congo, South America, Portugal, and Palestine, and was instrumental in helping many Jewish refugees from Hitler's regime.

A great student of the Scriptures, of which he had made an intensive study, his Book Without Seam is a scholarly exposition of one of his favourite themes.

After Alexis's death a small booklet was published in his memory, giving witness to the love and affection felt for him by so many. To view this click
HERE.

Links:

A link to the site of the Plymouth Brethren in Germany, which gives a short biography (in German)

Sources: