|
Brighouse is one of
the oldest Branches of Martins Bank, having been in continual use since
being opened by the Halifax Commercial Bank in 1863, right through to being
closed by Barclays on 5 June 2020. Some of the images of Brighouse shown on
this page are taken from postcards, and we would like to thank Julian
Williams for finding them for us. It
did seem unusual to us that three postcards were actually produced,
between the 1930s and the 1960s.
|
In Service: 8 November 1863
until 5 June 2020
Image ©
Lilywhite Ltd., Brighouse Yorkshire and successors
|
|
Perhaps, as the
postcard company was once itself based in Brighouse, they might have banked
with Martins? Putting the two images
below side by side, you can see that the view in front of the town hall and
Martins Bank changes quite a lot, and these two views along with that shown
above (right) show the subtle changes that went on around the Branch over
the decades…
|
|
|
|
|
Images Above © Lilywhite Ltd
(Brighouse) and successors
|
|
 By the 1960s a roundabout and traffic
islands have been built, replacing the mini-roundabout and standing street
signs that went before. Martins Bank’s
branch at Brighouse certainly does seem to have been a popular subject for
photographs, and in July 2020 we were contacted by Chris Helme, a retired
policeman from Lightcliffe West Yorkshire, who now writes and publishes a
quarterly local history magazine BRIGHOUSE & DISTRICT
HERITAGE NEWSEUM. Chris sent us this wonderful image of Thornton
Square, circa 1930, with the Bank on the right hand side, looking very
grand indeed!
|
Image © 1930 Martins Bank Archive
Collections – Chris Helme
|
|
During yet another of Martins Bank
Magazine’s flying visits to Yorkshire in 1966, do the editorial staff find
themselves “up a nick in Briggate” (As an old Yorkshire saying apparently
has it)? No, they actually find that
all stereotypes of a “grim up North” existence are shattered by a swinging new addition to the
town…
Brighouse
a-go-go?
  On the first
Tuesday in April we called at Brighouse where the branch takes a bit of
finding if one is persistently directed to it by a well-meaning customer of
one of our rivals. Thus we arrived
late, and though Mr Ingham was away on holiday, we spent an enjoyable
twenty minutes with Mr Wood and a young staff who gave us as good as they
got. We had better say now that
Brighouse turns in a nice fat profit, and deal with carpets, spinning and
doubling, valve manufacture and brandy snaps. Lest readers imagine that the Calder
Valley is all grit and greyness Brighouse has just opened a night club…
|
|
|
|
|
Branch Images © Barclays Ref 0030/0391
|
|
|
This lovely example
of a Brighouse Cheque is from August 1932, and part of the extensive
collection of Martins Bank vouchers that belongs to friend of the Archive,
Stephen Walker. He also provided the
image below, a rare example of a paying slip slip for the Halifax
Commercial Banking Company Ltd, Brighouse Branch, from the 1910s…
|
|
Call the
grammar police!
 In the days of bartering, when you could pay
using sheep, or pebbles, life was much simpler. Yet a careful look at this
paying in slip might give the impression that you pay in cheques made from
Scotch Whiskey? – The word Scotch is used here of course to mean “Scottish”
– a mistake still made today, more than 100 years on. Our apologies to Scots people
everywhere!
Note too the rather alarming column headed
“Poo’s”(!) This refers, you will be glad to know, to nothing worse than
Postal Orders! This apparent
Yorkshire disregard for the sensitivities of the Scots, and the common
misuse of the apostrophe to indicate quantity, makes for a bank that
obviously “says what it likes, and likes what it says”…
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
