by Joy Horn
Less than two months before the outbreak of the Second World War, on 10 July 1939, a new bank opened on the north side of the High Street in a smart, purpose-built home. It was built of small bricks in an old-fashioned style of bricklaying. Its site, previously the home of two generations of shoemakers called Randall, had been bought by Barclay’s Bank the previous year for £1,000. One curious condition of the purchase, enshrined in the deeds, was that this ‘parcel of land’ was not to be used ‘for the trades or businesses of a Baker and/or Confectioner’. From the evidence of the early photo, the building seems to have been fairly small, consisting only of what was later the front part. The branch bank cost £1, 953 to build.
The staff in 1939 would have been almost entirely male, and in their recruiting, Barclay’s looked for potential clerks with tidy handwriting and excellent mental arithmetic skills. No calculators for bank staff in those days! Soon after the opening of this branch, some of the staff were conscripted into the armed forces. One of them, P.C. Reynolds, a lieutenant in the Royal Armoured Corps, lost his life on September 2nd 1944. His name figures in the Barclay’s Bank’s roll of honour, but not on Cranleigh’s war memorial, suggesting that he was not a local man.
Barclay’s Bank was founded in 1696 by two Quakers. From 1736 it took the name of James Barclay, the son-in-law of one of these. It has pioneered several innovations in banking nationally.
In 1962, a night safe was installed at the Cranleigh branch. Proprietors of local businesses and shops could deposit their day’s takings after the bank had closed and could know that it was safe.
In 1966, Barclay’s was the first bank in the world to introduce credit cards. The branch at 20, The Town, Enfield, Middx, had a Barclaycard cash machine installed in that year, and customers could withdraw £10 at any hour of the day or night. It was soon clear that this was a revolutionary change in banking. Other national banks were spurred into developing a similar card, and in 1972 they jointly launched Access. However, the Cranleigh branch of Barclays did not have a cash machine for Barclaycard until 1990. (By 2004, people in Britain were spending more on retail purchases by plastic than by cash.)
Barclay’s Cranleigh building was thoroughly refurbished in 1970-1. While this was being done, the branch was temporarily relocated to Victoria Hall, on the corner of Victoria and Rowland Roads.
On a wall inside the bank there used to hang a painting of Cranleigh’s ‘Coronation Oak’. The oak tree was planted at the head of Knowle Lane in 1911, to commemorate the coronation of George V. The picture of it was painted in 1959. The tree was cut down in 1970 to make space for buses to pull into the bus stop, causing considerable public outcry. It is said that three parish councillors who had supported this removal lost their seats on the council at the next election.
Barclay’s was closed in 2022, following Lloyd’s, NatWest and HSBC. In March 2025 the building reopened as an attractive branch of Caffè Nero (‘Black Coffee’, nothing to do with Roman emperors), a smart addition to Cranleigh’s range of tea and coffee shops.
The Cranleigh History Society normally meets on the second Thursday of each month at 8pm in the Band Room. However, the next meeting is the May outing, on May 1st to The Meath, Godalming.
