Paul Julius Baron von Reuter (July 21 1816 - 25 February 1899) was born in Kassel, Germany, a son of a rabbi. His birthname was Israel Beer Josaphat.

In Göttingen Reuter met Carl Friedrich Gauss who experimented with the transmission of electrical signals via wire.

Reuter moved to London on October 29 1845, calling himself Joseph Josephat. On November 16 he was baptised as Paul Julius Reuter. One week later on November 23, he married Ida Maria Elizabeth Clementine Magnus. He fled from Germany in 1848 and went to Paris and worked there in a news agency.

While telegraphy evolved, Reuter founded an institute in Aachen which transferred messages between Brussels and Aachen using carrier pigeons. This was the missing link to connect Berlin and Paris. The carrier pigeons were much faster than the post train, giving Reuter faster access to stock news from the Paris stock exchange. In 1851, the carrier pigeons were superseded by a direct telegraph link.

In 1851 Reuter moved back to London and set up an office at the London Stock Exchange.

A telegraph link was established between Britain and the European continent through the English Channel. This link was extended to the south-western shore of Ireland, at Cork in 1863. There ships coming from America threw canisters containing news into the sea. The news was telegraphed to London, arriving before the ships.

On September 7, 1871, the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha conferred barony on Julius Reuter.

Reuter founded Reuters, one of the major financial news agencies of the world. He died at the Villa Reuter in Nice, France at the age of 82.