Founder of the secret society that Quigley documents in The Anglo- American Establishment. Rhodes' first will of 1877 was the founding act: he left his fortune "to form a secret society which was to devote itself to the preservation and expansion of the British Empire." Six subsequent wills refined the design; the seventh (the famous one) established the Rhodes Scholarships at Oxford. Made his fortune in South African diamonds and gold (De Beers Consolidated, 1888) and used it to fund the network that operated through Milner, Stead, Esher, and the post-Rhodes-Milner generation through to Lothian, Brand, and the post-WWII Round Table continuity. Quigley AAE Ch 1 names him as the originating figure: the secret society "was created by Rhodes and his principal trustee, Lord Milner, and continues to exist to this day." Died March 26, 1902, at age 49 (heart failure).
His personal occult-political vision was unambiguous: "to render the British Empire impregnable... to bring under British control all the inhabitable parts of the world... to colonize all the unsettled portions of the world... to organize a system of secret political associations which would have for its purpose the union of all the English-speaking peoples." This is from Rhodes' 1877 Confession of Faith — the founding document Quigley quotes in full. The "English-speaking idea" Osterrieder treats in WiU Ch II.1 is Rhodes' direct project. (Claims WiU-22-006; Quigley AAE Ch 1 verbatim.)