The early Bank of Montreal in Brockville

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3 Wall St. at the corner of Pine St. on Brockville’s Court House Square

This is a very old picture of the Court House Square branch of the Bank of Montreal, taken about 1865. Constructed of cut and dressed limestone, the property was enclosed for many years by an impressive white-painted fence of wood.

Sources: This photograph of the bank in its earlier days was taken from a small “carte de visite” taken by Brockville photographer, A.C. McIntyre and found in a box of memorabilia saved by the late Dr. Jack McDougall. This is the earliest picture discovered of this building to date.

The Bank’s History

The Bank of Montreal established its first agency in Brockville in September 1843, according to bank records, but its first location is not known. James Stevenson came to Brockville from Bytown as the first manager. He remained here until 1849, when he moved on to Hamilton.

In 1851, it is recorded that the Bank of Montreal, with Thomas Lee as agent, was located on Court House Square. The location was the Hubbell Building on the east side of Court House Ave. And a map of Brockville published in 1853 indicated the “Bank of Montreal” at that site, and lists F.M. Holmes as the agent. The bank was a tenant only, the property at that time was owned by Dr. Elnathan Hubbelll who died in 1856. The Court House Ave. building then passed to the control of Dr. Hubbell’s sons, James and Henry.

This was also the time that the directors of the bank in Montreal decided to build their own building. They chose a site just south of the Wesleyan Methodist Church, on the east side of the square, and were able to open their new branch in 1857.

The building, built of grey, cut stone, was done in the style of banks of the time. The architect is not known, but was probably from Montreal. The ground floor housed the banking hall, and the manager’s residence was upstairs.

This photograph of the bank from the south-west dates from about 1900-10

Brockvillians became used to seeing this building facing Court House Square, and were naturally appalled when it became known in 1966 that the bank was not happy with their branch and intended to replace it with a new and modern structure. This was built at the rear, and the old building was torn down and disappeared.

The front elevation of the bank as drawn by a U of T Architecture student in 1963

[Any of these photographs can be viewed full size in a separate window by double clicking on the picture on this page until you reach the enlarged version further in the system]

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Tags: "Bank of Montreal", "Court House Square"