Barclays Bank Memorial Panels and Books of Remembrance

Barclays Bank Memorial Panels and Books of Remembrance

1926

After the War, Barclays Bank erected memorial panels in the banking hall at Head Office at 54 Lombard Street. The main panels were headed “In honoured memory of the members of Barclays Bank Limited who gave their lives for King and country during the war A. D. 1914-1919”. There were also adjacent panels headed “In honoured memory of the members of London & Provincial Bank Limited who gave their lives for King and country during the war A. D. 1914-1919” and “In honoured memory of the members of London & South Western Bank Limited who gave their lives for King and country during the war A. D. 1914-1919”. Pictures of the memorial panels were published in the first official history of Barclays in 1926, and posters of them were also made. After WW2 it was decided that the permanent official Barclays memorial should be an illuminated inscribed book of remembrance, one for each war. A Staff Circular issued in 1951 said, “The Staff War Memorial Committee recommended that the permanent memorial should take the form of books of remembrance, which would be suitably housed in the new building at Head Office. The management, in accepting this recommendation, arranged that in the meantime the names of the fallen in both world wars should be recorded on panels … which have now been placed on the walls in the Large Hall at Head Office.” The WW1 book of remembrance has parchment pages, with leather binding, engrossed, decorated and gilded by Dorothy Hutton, and bound by Sydney M Cockerell. It lists members of staff who lost their lives serving in the armed forces, is separated into sections for Barclays Bank, London and Provincial Bank, and London and South Western Bank, and includes illustrations of head offices and coats of arms of the three banks. Both books were duly completed by 1960 and put in purpose-built wall cases at 54 Lombard Street, replacing the panels. When the head office was rebuilt in the 1990s, the books were put on display in the new building, and when the head office moved in 2005 to 1 Churchill Place, Canary Wharf, the books were put on display in cases there. In 2008 Barclays commissioned new stone tablets to accompany the memorial books, and these are also on display at Churchill Place.

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    Born 1899

    Died 1918

    Air Force (RAF/RFC) 89729 Air Mechanic 3rd Class Royal Flying Corps

    Air Force (RAF/RFC) Second Lieutenant Royal Air Force 43rd Training Depot Station

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