William Nelson Cromwell

William Nelson Cromwell
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Born	(1854-01-17)January 17, 1854 Brooklyn, New York
Died
Nationality	American
Alma mater	Columbia Law School
Occupation	Lawyer
Employer	Sullivan & Cromwell
Net worth	$15 million ($150 million inflation-adjusted)
Political party	Republican
Spouse(s)	Jennie Osgood Nichols
Parent(s)	Sarah M. Brokaw and John Nelson Cromwell

William Nelson Cromwell (January 17, 1854 – July 19, 1948) was an American attorney active in promotion of the Panama Canal and other major ventures.

Life and career

He was born in Brooklyn, New York, and raised there by his mother, Sarah M. Brokaw, a Civil War widow. His father, John Nelson Cromwell, died in the Battle of Vicksburg.

He worked as an accountant for the attorney Algernon Sydney Sullivan, who paid for his education at Columbia Law School and made him a partner in Sullivan & Cromwell in 1879.

According to Stephen Kinzer's 2006 book Overthrow, in 1898 the chief of the French Canal Syndicate (a group that owned large swathes of land across Panama), Philippe Bunau-Varilla, hired him to lobby the US Congress to build a canal across Panama, and not across Nicaragua, as rivals would have it.

On June 19, 1902, three days after senators received stamps showing volcanic activity in Nicaragua (although this was more the work of Philippe Bunau-Varilla), they voted for the Panama route for the canal. For his lobbying efforts, he received the sum of $800,000. After the Hay–Bunau-Varilla Treaty was ratified, Cromwell was paid another $2,000,000 — at the time, the highest amount ever paid to a lawyer.

One of his main pro bono activities was in the founding of "the Society of Friends of Roumania" in 1920 under the patronage of Her Majesty Queen Marie of Romania, granddaughter of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom. Under his tutelage, the New York-based Society promoted numerous exchanges between the two countries and published the distinguished Roumania — A Quarterly Review.