Centennial Of First Bank In Christchurch

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28180, 19 January 1957, Page 12

Centennial Of First Bank In Christchurch

A hundred years of banking in Christchurch will be marked on Tuesday when the Mayor (Mr R. M. Macfarlane, M.P.) will unveil a plaque at the Hereford street branch of the Australia and New Zealand Bank, Ltd. The plaque will commemorate the opening of the Union Bank of Australia—the first bank in Christchurch—on January 5, 1857.

The Union Bank of Australia, which was established on the present site in Hereford street in 1864, was merged with the Bank of Australasia, Ltd., on October 1, 1951, to form the Australia and New Zealand Bank, Ltd. The Bank of Australasia has also a long assqciation with Christchurch, being established here in 1864 in a building erected on the site of the present Cashel street branch. The present building was erected in 1903.

The plaque to be erected at the Hereford street branch of the Australia and New Zealand Bank, Limited, will recall briefly the bank’s long history. The inscription will read: 1857-1957 THE FIRST BANK IN CHRISTCHURCH.

This tablet commemorates the opening of the Union Bank of Australia in Christchurch on January 5. 1857. On October 1, 1951, the Union Bank of Australia, Limited, was merged with the Bank of Australasia in Australia and New Zealand Bank, Limited. Office in Cottage

Late on the evening of Friday, January 2, 1857, two men after an all-day walk from Lyttelton, arrived at a small gabled cottage in Cashel street, Christchurch. The men, F. J. Lucas and Fortunatus Evelyn Wright, were officers of the Union Bank of Australia. They were tired men, xor is one wrote to the Lyttelton manager, “through the neglect of Wheeler (the local carrier) in not having his cart at the foot of the hill, we were obliged to walk the whole way to Christchurch.” Their journey was not made the easier from having to carry with them £l5OO in gold and silver, some £3OOO in notes of the bank, and the necessary office books and boxes to open up the new agency on the following Monday. The modest cottage, owned by C. B. Fooks, standing on the town section where Steel’s buildings are now, had been rented at £lOO a year as a temporary bank premises until the bank decided how extensive a bank building should be erected on the site bought a few months earlier in Hereford street.

The bank office was duly opened for business on the Monday.

Some two years later, by which time the agency had outrun its Lyttelton office and become a branch itself, a new building was erected for the bank alongside the cottage and there the main banking business was conducted until 1864 when the bank moved to its new premises erected on the present Hereford street site. Delay in Opening

That the first bank did not open in Christchurch until six years after its settlement may seem surprising, but there were strong practical reasons. Lyttelton began as the main commercial centre, possessing not only the main newspaper, but the main post office, the customs office and the warehouses of the main importers and exporters. The first Lyttelton manager, J. Spowers had as early as September, 1855, informed his Melbourne inspector regarding Christchurch that “the people of that place are becoming rather clamourous and

discontented and talk of new banks, and are altogther rather unreasonable.” Still he thought it might be politic to establish a bank of deposit. The matter was, however, delayed for a year until Joseph Palmer became the Lyttelton manager. He thought a regular agency would not pay, but that a part-time agency might if run by a man already in business. Within a few months. Palmer confesed that “every day the clamour increases for some banking accommodation” in Christchurch. He noted too that by now nearly half of the deposits of the Lyttelton branch came from Christchurch residents. For these and other reasons, an agency at Christchurch was therefore agreed upon and J. F. Lucas left Australia in October of that same year. Bank Notes Though the Union Bank had issued notes in New Zealand since 1840, from 1851 until November, 1856, all trading banks were forbidden by an ordinance, promoted by the British Colonial Office, to issue their own bank notes. Late in 1856, the Lyttelton branch received a large supply of bank notes from Sydney, and it was these Sydney notes which were issued when the Christchurch office opened 100 years ago. When the Christchurch office became a full scale branch at the beginning of 1859, it began to issue its own bank notes. The first of these has survived having been returned to the bank some years ago. The signatures are those of the first Christchurch manager, F. E. Stewart and D. C. McDonald, the accountant.

The rapid development of the trade of Canterbury, which had led first to the erection of banking premises on the leased site in Cashel street, was followed by a decision to erect substantial premises on the Hereford street freehold, originally half an acre in area, and bought for £l5O in 1856. (Today the Post Office and adjacent buildings occupy some of this land.) After a long delay over the style of the building an imposing building was erected, and first occupied in September, 1864.

Managers Of the many officers who were associated with the Union Bank in Christchurch, Joseph Palmer held a unique place. Transferred from Adelaide. to Lyttelton in 1856, he supervised the Christchurch office while it remained an agency and his appointment

as Christchurch manager late in 1859 marked the rise in importance of the Christchurch office. Mr Palmer continued as manager until the middle of 1872 when he was appointed to the newly created office of chief officer for New Zealand. Palmer used Christchurch as his headquarters so that the Hereford street branch was also virtually the head office for New Zealand, until his retirement in 1890, when the headquarters were moved to Wellington. His connexion with the bank was retained by his appointment as a local director resident in Christchurch, until his death in 1910. which terminated 54 years of service to the bank in New Zealand. Finance For Tunnel Just as the Union Bank had heen the bankers to the Canterbury Association, so there developed a close connexion with the Canterbury Provincial Government which succeeded the Canterbury Association in 1853. Inevitably as the only bank in the province, and as one with particularly valuable connexions in London, it was to the Union Bank that the Provincial Treasurer looked when the treasury was empty or in deficit. The advancement of money to finance early immigration from London was such an example. Most notable was the financial aid given by the Union Bank to the Provincial Government in the construction of the Lyttelton tunnel.

The present manager of the bank’s Hereford street branch is Mr D. R. Matheson. After the unveiling ceremony on Tuesday, a reception will be held in the bank chambers to enable guests to meet the chief manager of the bank for New Zealand, Mr C. P. Edwards.