OLD BANK HOTEL

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 84, 7 January 1928, Page 8

OLD BANK HOTEL

HISTORIC BUILDING TO BE DEMOLISHED LINK WITH THE EARLY DAYS NEW BOND STREET SCHEME DEVELOPS Yesterday the furniture and fittings of the old Bank Hotel, on tlie comer of parish and Manners Streets (more recent* ly known as the Clarendon) were sold at auction, and a start is to’ be made at once with the demolition of the premises—one of the hoary, original inns of Wellington. The hotel dates back, to 1861, when Manners Street, with the exception of two or three buildings, was comprised of one-story shops and dwellings; the whole of Willis Street had not been built upon; and the waters of the harbour used to wash over the site of the present Municipal Free Public Library (at the foot of Parish Street). In those days the Bank Hotel—so named as there was one- of the early banks in the vicinity, and the first Union Bank of Australia was on the present site of the Albert Hotel—stood out as a structure of some size and dignity, there being only one other two-storied building between it and the Duke of Edinburgh Hotel, on the Manners-Willis Streets corner. Comfortable Old-time Hostelry. The old Bank Hotel provided good fare for man and beast; the coaches used to leave that vicinity three times a week for Wanganui, via Otaki and Foxtonthe sailors and watermen on the adjacent waterfront found if a convenient place of call. The photograph appearing on this page shows Manners Street and a portion of Willis Street in 1870, nine years after the Bank Hotel, which can be seen opposite the steeplepoint of the old St. Mary of the Angels Church. Further along Manners Street can be seen the second Wesleyan. Church erected in Manners Street (which stood opposite the present Regent Theatre), whilst harbour-ward can be seen some of the old privately-owned jetties, from which the vessels lying off in the harbour were worked by watermen. The stores of Wellington’s first warehousemen and merchants are grouped between the harbour and Manners Street. The whole of the water visible.in the picture—and a good deal more—has long ago been reclaimed.

The demolition of the old Bank Hotel is one of the first movements towards the realisation of the New Bond Street scheme, which entails the widening of Old Customhouse Street and Ihe full length of Parish Street (on its eastern side).