Banks/national.html
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National Bank
The National Bank, on Lot 416 on the corner of High and Market Streets at no. 98, was, according to Hitchcock, the first bank in Fremantle, in the 1860s. As he writes (in 1919, remembering 1869):
Next to the Era office was the National Bank, occupying portion of the block on which the National Hotel now stands. It was the only bank operating in Fremantle at that time, and its staff consisted of two – R.M. Sutherland, manager, and W.F. Samson, cashier – the latter being succeeded by A. F. Durlacher (now in England), who afterwards became a member of the firm of W.D. Moore and Co., whilst Mr. Samson (now deceased) became head of the firm of L. Samson and Son.
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Photo by Stephen Stout, c. 1865, in SLWA, Clifton Album. The crossing street in the foreground (right) might be Market Street. If it is, that is Josephson's shop at the right, then the National Bank, with Albert's two-storey Hotel further along, with the upstairs verandah. The Higham store would be the two-storey building on the other side of High Street (left).
I take it from Hitchcock that in 1869 Josephson's shop was on the very corner, but being 'tiny', did not take up much of Lot 416, and the first National Bank building was not right on the corner still on the same lot. It seems that a new building was constructed for the bank, probably in the 1880s. That building may have become the National Hotel. Whether or not that is so, a new National Hotel building took its place in 1895.
References and Links
as above
This page incorporates material from Garry Gillard's Freotopia website, that he started in 2014 and the contents of which he donated to Wikimedia Australia in 2024. The content was originally created on 10 November, 2023 and hosted at freotopia.org/banks/national.html (it was last updated on 10 November, 2023). The donated data is also preserved in the Internet Archive's collection.