William Sword Jr., investment back chief, dies

William Sword Jr., managing director of the Princeton, N.J.-based investment bank founded by his father, was struck and killed Monday by a tree toppled by the storm that swept across the Northeast. He was 61.

Princeton Township police found him trapped under the tree, "which had fallen on him as he cleared storm debris from his driveway," according to a police report. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Sword was head of Wm Sword & Co. since 1981. He joined the firm in 1976 after graduating from Princeton University.

His father, William Sword, who died in 2005, helped start Morgan Stanley's mergers and acquisitions department as managing director in the 1970s. He left Morgan Stanley in 1976 to form his namesake firm.

Sword Jr. "was a very well-respected, well-connected guy, an old-school gentleman in every sense of the word," said Daniel B. Rowe, his co-managing director.

At Princeton, Sword majored in politics and was a member of Ivy Club, the Daily Princetonian reported.

In 2003, Sword was the victim of a stabbing at his home. According to an account in The New York Times, he was attacked by Jelani Manigault, 24, a senior at the University of Maryland. Police shot and killed Manigault. Sword, wounded in his upper chest and shoulder, underwent surgery and recovered.

That violent incident made Sword more of "a lover of life," slightly less ambitious and more appreciative of time with friends, Rowe said.

With his wife, the former Martha Sullivan, he had two daughters, Gretchen and Hope, and a son, Will.