The one-man firm of G. A. Derrick & Co. started in 1889 at a desk in a general store in Raffles Place at a time when there were no rules governing who could list himself as an accountant. Derrick chose a profession that had begun growing out of the 18th century British Industrial Revolution that saw the accumulation of British capital and its spread around the world. Accounting, as a profession to oversee capital, was still in its infancy – the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants had only been founded in 1887, and the professional title of “Chartered Accountant” was newly instituted in 1855 in Scotland.
Accountancy began basically as asset management but its modern basics as double entry bookkeeping can be traced to the famous trading port city of Venice. The “Venice Method” of bookkeeping took time to spread in an age when businesses were all family-owned or partnerships. Then, there were no joint stock companies and faceless investors, and the generation of an annual bottom line was far less critical.
Nevertheless, numbers mattered and Derrick in Singapore was in a world where numbers have always mattered – and his skill with them stood him in good stead. Given the fact that he came to Singapore when he was just 18, in all likelihood he had no training as an accountant but had picked up bookkeeping skills when he worked in an agency house.
World demand for tin, a traditional Malayan export, led to the creation of British Malaya. The availability of large tracts of land for the establishment of a plantation economy and an outflow of large amounts of British capital to the region aided the growth of accounting firms like Derrick & Co. The development of sugar and rubber as plantation crops in Malaya further fueled the growth of Singapore as a trading port-city and brought UK accounting firms to the region.