The
Bank of England was incorporated in the late seventeenth century in
order for William III to finance a war against France - the new national
bank was to lend its share capital to the government. Originally the
Bank operated from Mercer's Hall Cheapside before moving to Grocers'
Hall where it remained until 1734 when the Bank moved to a building
designed by George Sampson on its present site.
David
Hughson called the Bank one of the most magnificent buildings in the
world (see a rather water-stained
view of the front of the Bank). By the early nineteenth century
it consisted of a grand front about eighty feet in length, of the Ionic
order, raised on a rustic basement. In the front was an impressive gateway
which led into a great hall almost eighty feet in length and forty wide,
and beyond the hall lay a quadrangle surrounded with buildings housing
all the offices of business. By the time Hughson wrote in the very early
nineteenth century "the public debt of the country having so amazingly
increased within a few years" that the bank was increased considerably
in size, and plans were underway to thoroughly renovate and update the
building. The new Three
Percents Warrant Office was part of these renovations and extensions.
