I’m grateful to David Howard who sent me this picture of the Capital and Counties Bank at 22 High Street. Lloyd’s took over the bank in 1918 and remain there today. The Capital and Counties was itself an amalgamation of the Hampshire Banking Company and the North Wilts Banking Company, both of which were established in the mid-1830s but merged in 1877.

From at least 1855 this building was a branch of the Hampshire Banking Company when the manager was John Hodder. For a while there was some competition for business from the Heath family who owned the Andover Bank in London Street but it was short-lived. By that time the Heaths were largely a spent force and any such competition ended in 1861 when Heath’s bank amalgamated with the Hampshire Bank.

But going back further, this was the earliest bank in the town. Joseph Wakeford (c.1720-1785) opened here in 1759 after he and his father had developed rudimentary banking services in conjunction with their main trade of drapery. The story of Wakeford’s Bank is well told by Diana Coldicott in Lookback at Andover 1993 and 1994 but suffice to say, prosperity was followed by failure in 1826, with all those holding the firm’s banknotes suffering serious loss.

Such was often the history of small local banks when they were unable to draw on sufficient funds to see them over a crisis. Those holding notes – large scale creditors and members of the public - were registered and in time they received a small dividend, paid for by sale of the Wakeford properties.

The notes themselves remained in the creditors’ possession and even today they occasionally turn up, invariably stamped on the reverse to show that they were presented at the official bankruptcy hearing in 1826.

How old was this actual building? The lower façade with its deep carved lettering in stone will date from the Capital and Counties period, but behind that 1880s addition there was once a shop and two houses, each with their own door and entered by means of stone steps, built by Walter Robinson before 1700. All with three floors and cellars it was a substantial building and it is quite possible that much of the old fabric lies in situ today.

Over the centuries many buildings are given what may be termed a facelift, rather than being completely re-built. And indeed, when Lloyd’s took over this building in 1918, they constructed an entirely new front, employing the firm of Marden, Ball and Co of Fareham.

The adjoining annexe to the right was enlarged and brought forward to align with the main frontage, to create a five-bay building instead of four. At roof level a parapet gutter in front avoided the construction of an entirely new roof. The façade was designed by Horace Field, Lloyd’s London architect of choice, who designed many of the bank’s buildings over a period of 40 years or more. Its Palladian look is not unlike the Guildhall in some of its features and, itself now 100 years old, remains an impressive addition to the High Street today.