No.46-48 High Street

House History

Notes

• No. 46 is the flat above the bank, No. 48 is the main bank.
  
  

• Foster's Bank & Bird's Alley

• Foster's Bank originally started business in Cambridge. The attractive Tudor shop on Trinity Street, now occupied by the clothes shop Jigsaw, was once the Turk's Head Coffee House, one of the earliest coffee houses in the country (17th c.). The building later became the home of Foster's Bank, which subsequently moved in 1891 to a new building on Sidney Street opposite Petty Cury, the bank's original name name can still be seen carved over the door (see below).
  
  The Bank was founded by the Foster brothers; Richard and Ebenezer (one-time majors of Cambridge) in 1804, for the benefit of the workers at their mills, of which there were three in Cambridge, including the large one known as the Foster Mills next to the Railway Station, built in 1894 and acquired by Spillers in 1947.
  
  Foster's moved into Newmarket sometime around 1874, though the bank's new bank building, the one that stands here today was built sometime later between 1891 and 1901.
  
  Previous to that the area here in the High Street was much more complicated and congested compared to the sole building that occupies this location now - in the middle was Bird's Alley; stretching back from the High Street, which originally contained up to 7 small tenement dwellings. Flanked on either side of this was the original Foster's Bank on the left and a small shop on the right that for many years was an ironmongers. Further details about the ironmongers can be found on the page for No.39-41 High Street, one-time location of F.W. Hobbs, ironmongers.
  
  When the new bank was built it completetely replaced all these buildings and Bird's Alley was gone forever.
  
  Foster's also opened a branch at St. Ives.
  
  Foster's Bank became Lloyds Bank in 1918.
  
  

  Richard Foster

  Ebenezer Foster

  Turk's Head Coffee House

  Foster's Bank Cambridge

  Foster's Bank Cambridge

  
  

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• Lloyds (TSB) Bank

• Trustee Savings Bank used to be in No.13 Wellington Street ... they later became the TSB Bank.
  
  Lloyds merged with the TSB in 1995 and amalgamated the Newmarket branches, closing the bank in Wellington Street.
  
  In 2013 Lloyds TSB divested themselves of some of their branches, re-branding them as TSB again. Those remaining (which includes Newmarket) reverted back to once again being just Lloyds Bank.
  
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lloyds_Bank
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trustee_Savings_Bank
  
  

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• Building Changes

• Suffolk Record Office, Bury St Edmunds Branch
  Newmarket Urban District Council Records
  Reference EF 506
  
• Banking premises, High St, for Foster & Co (John Flatman) EF 506/6/1/G46(a) Feb 1894
• Drainage of new WCs, Lloyds Bank, High St, for Lloyds Bank Ltd EF 506/6/1/17/586 Mar 1921
  
  
• Planning Application - F/75/007
  Lloyds Bank Flat 46 High Street Newmarket Suffolk
  Application Registered 12-02-1975
  Change of use of bank flat to Dentist Surgery.
  
  
• Planning Application - F/76/366
  Lloyds Bank Ltd 48 High Street Newmarket Suffolk
  Application Registered 12-02-1975
  Extension at rear to form additional office and rear entrance, access as amended by letter and drawing No C/98/3F received on 13.10.76.
  
  
• Planning Application - F/82/120
  Lloyds Bank Ltd 48 High Street Newmarket Suffolk
  Application Registered 10-03-1982
  Installation of through the wall cashpoint in the front elevation of the bank.
  
  
• Planning Application - F/89/376
  Lloyds bank 46-48 High street Newmarket Suffolk
  Application Registered 27-10-1989
  Alterations to front and extension and fire escape to rear.
  
  
• Planning Application - F/95/474
  Lloyds Bank 48 High Street Newmarket Suffolk
  Application Registered 02-06-1995
  Construction of access for the disabled.
  
  
• Planning Application - F/96/170
  Lloyds Bank PLC 48 High Street Newmarket Suffolk
  Application Registered 26-03-1996
  Installation of satellite antenna.
  
  
• Planning Application - F/98/014
  Lloyds Bank Plc, 46 - 48 High Street, Newmarket
  Application Registered 07-01-1998
  Erection of shed for storage of refuse in rear yard as completed by plan received 4.2.98.
  
  
• Planning Application - F/2008/0632/FUL
  48 High Street Newmarket
  Application Registered 24-09-2008
  Modifications to shop front, including the installation of two new ATM's, the relocation of the existing nightsafe and the replacement of an existing door with glazed screen. Secure glazing with frosted film will be installed to certain windows where internal spaces are of a secure nature.
  
  

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• Note from webmaster - my claim-to-fame regarding the flat above the bank is that my mother was housekeeper for the Lloyds Bank Manager in around 1965, until he moved away.
  I remember visiting the flat on one occasion and there being a full-sized grand piano in the very large, wood-floored, living room. 
  
  
• Many thanks to Tony Pringle for the photo below.
  
  
• Postcard and enlargement courtesy of Roger Newman - 'Fosters Bank Nov. 1906'.
  
  
• Many thanks to 'Old Newmarket' for the photo 'Fosters Bank c.1910'.