HYDE CHESHIRE

Harry Rutherford's
Festival of Britain Mural




Thursday 29 July 2010

The old Bank Chambers Building

The old Bank Chambers building stands on the corner of Hyde Market. It seems to have been unchanged for all the time it's stood here which is well over a hundred years now.

1905

In its time its has been the London City and Midland Bank ,the Midland Band Ltd (from 1923) and is presently the HSBC bank .In 1999 The Midland bank was rebranded as HSBC .According to some maps it is also believed to have been a post office in or around the year 1896.

Elijah Smiths funeral

This shows the building on the extreme right of the picture.It still has the same distictive arched windows. This was taken during the funeral procession for a soldier called Elijah Smith who lived on Union Street. He was shot and killed during the first world war. This appears to have been the only military funeral held in Hyde during the first world war.

midland bank
The building during it's Midland Bank days circa 1990.

Photobucket

The building can be seen in Local Artist Harry Rutherfords' most famous work "Northern Saturday", a vibrant painting showing life in Hyde on Market day.

market bank

A present day photo showing the market view from the Town Hall.

3 comments:

Lizzy said...

I have that picture on my wall at home, I can just remember the market being like that - can you

Tom said...

Excellent post Nancy...

Unknown said...

I have been researching my gg uncle, George Whitehead Bower, who was the first vicar of St Mary's, Newton from 1839 to 1873. He was a Rochdale lad, the son of William Bower, a Woolen Card Maker. He married Ann Hancock at St Luke's, Liverpool in 1833. I have not been able to trace any issue from this marriage. The vicar retired to Southport in 1873 and died there in 1875. I would like to know if Bower Street, the road St Mary's is situated on, was named after him, also Bower Court, which is adjacent. I would also like to know if he had any connection with the Freemasons. I would be very grateful if anyone could find references to George Whitehead Bower, and of course, if there was a photograph of him, this would be the icing on the cake!
From Mary Hayes
email address: mary.hayes11@ntlworld.com