Description:Similar to a modern day paying in book, the Trentham Savings Bank issued Depositors’ Check Books to all its customers. These small books had a brown or blue cover which read:
‘Trentham Savings Bank, Established 27th December, 1817, For the safe custody and increase of small savings, under the Patronage of his grace the Duke of Sutherland’.
Inside, the books state the depositor’s name, their occupation if they were a man or, if they were a woman, their relation to a man (wife, daughter) and where they lived. The book then lists all deposits paid into and withdrawn from Trentham Savings Bank until the account was closed. A great deal of information about individuals can be gained from examining these documents and the letters which are hidden inside many of the books relating to the financial affairs of individual depositors.