The Union Bank of Australia, Hereford Street, Christchurch
The Union Bank of Australia, Hereford Street, Christchurch
[ca. 1885]
The 'handsome stone premises' of the Union Bank of Australia (often called the UBA) were erected in Hereford Street on the site of a former Union Bank building which was destroyed by fire. The Union Bank was established in 1837 with headquarters in Australia and a directorate in London. A branch of the bank 'was the first bank in Christchurch, its opening ... having been contemporary with the foundation of the Canterbury province'. The bank was a careful conservative business house and was able to restrict its clientele to the prosperous, respectable and reliable. Unlike the Bank of New Zealand, which was set up in the 1860s, it could avoid those whose activities were of a speculative nature. In the 1850s and 60s the Union Bank attempted to stand at a distance from those provincial governments which it considered to have adopted a borrow, boom and bust mentality.
File Reference CCL-KPCD12-0094
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