St Patrick
St Patrick according to legend is supposed to have sailed for Ireland from Liverpool in the year 444, but it can be equally as well argued that he sailed from Parkgate, Hoylake or North Wales.
However, at one time there stood a cross at the Great Crosshall Street end of Hatton Garden, which was known as St Patrick's Cross and was said to have been erected to commemorate the visit of the Saint to Liverpool. The street immediately behind it was known as St Patrick's Hill. There is no date recorded of the erection of the cross, but it was pulled down about 1775.
Close to the cross there was a pond known as The Flashes, though it is shown on maps as the Watering Pool. It is probable that there was a ducking stool here used to punish scolds and other shrewish women. Reynold's Waxworks in Lime St, had a ducking stool on view there, consisting of a long plank on a trestle, at one end of the plank was a seat into which the woman was strapped. The plank was then placed over the pond and the unfortunate woman was totally immersed.
The life of St Patrick is not so obscure, not only did he write his own Confessions, but his life was written by Jocelyn a Cistercian monk of the 12thC, and by Probus, who lived in the 17thC. Patrick, whose family name was Calphurnius, called himself both a Roman and a Briton, and was born in the village of Bonaven Taberniae, which is probably Killpatrick, between Dunbriton and Glasgow. He was seized by pirates and sold into slavery in Ireland, where he was forced to tend cattle in the mountains. He escaped, suffered a second captivity and eventually went to France and Italy, where he received the Apostolic Benediction from Pope Celestine before leaving for Ireland.
Hatton Garden is not, like many Liverpool thoroughfares, called after a London name. It was made in 1806 by John and Richard Johnson, builders, who had offices close by. They were natives of Hatton near Warrington, and they called the new road after their birthplace. After the district was built it obtained an unenviable name for violence, and it was unsafe for a policeman to pass through it by himself. There was an appalling murder in 1874 when a crowd of roughs murdered an unoffending person for the sake of a few shillings.
Vauxhall Road was originally called Pinfold Lane, the pinfold standing a few yards away from Tithebarn Street, the name was changed in to Vauxhall Road in 1796 and comes from a mansion house with large pleasant gardens sloping down to the canal. One of the first industrial buildings erected there was the Union Mill, a cotton factory on the east side of the road. The weaving of cotton, however, has never flourished in Liverpool. The Union Mill closed down and became the foundry of Messers G. Forrester and Co.
The Bootle Water Co, had their reservoir and pumping station in Vauxhall Road and the land close to the reservoir was known as Pumpfields. It was on this land that the wooden water pipes were bored. Some of these wooden water pipes can be seen in the Liverpool Museum.
Freemasons Row, off Vauxhall Road consisted of houses with long gardens all of which have long since disappeared. It was in this area that terrible riots took place after the tragedy of, Bloody Sunday, just before the war when gangs of men attacked the militia and attempted to rescue those who had been sentenced and were being escorted to Walton Jail.
July 11th, 1939
The decision of the Liverpool Corporation to sell the property in Church Street close to Post Office Place, calls to mind an interesting licensed house on this site which gave the lie to a Liverpool saying in pre war days that it was possible to walk to Garston from the Town Hall without passing a public house.
The route was along Castle Street, Church Street, Bold Street, Leece Street, Rodney Street, Sandon Terrace, Rodney Street, Percy Street, Parliament Street, Princes Road, Belvedere Road and Aigburth Road to the cricket ground which is on the borders of Garston. Anyone who did not know Liverpool well would believe that this statement was correct. Actually there was a restaurant in Castle Street with a license, and there is still a restaurant in Lord Street. In Church Street was a small and exclusive public house close to the Athaeneum. It possessed an ordinary looking door in Church Street and the only suggestion that drinks were sold was a small trade advertisement. Inside there was a long room panelled in oak, with long highly polished oak tables.
Church Street is not an old street it was laid out at the end of the 17th C, and very little building was done for some years. The first buildings put up was the residences of a solid respectable type. The first building was St Peters Church which was completed in 1704 at a cost of £2,500. Although the church disappeared some years ago the main door is marked by a Maltese cross on the curb stone. This stone, which is just by the pedestrian crossing, is a stone taken from one of the doorways.
A large portion of the property which the Corporation has sold was at one time an orchard and ornamental garden belonging to Mr BROOKS, whose name is perpetuated in Brooks Alley. This garden extended as far as Hanover St.
The Liverpool Dispensary was close to Post Office Place, in Church Street. It was a brick building with stone dressings and an ornamented portico. It was a building of considerable charm and lasted for 47 years before being pulled down to make way for shops. At the back of these shops were rooms where the Liverpool Academy held exhibitions.
Post Office Place takes its name from the post office which was moved here from Lord Street in 1800. Thomas BANNING was the postmaster, and the job remained in his family for almost 100 years. At the corner of Post Office Place and Church Street was a strange shop, famous throughout the North of England and known as Woolfields Bazaar. The Bazaar was pulled down for street widening purposes and the company was paid £38,800 for the site and £23,000 compensation for the business and stock.
A little further down lived a man famous in his day as a surgeon, he was George COLTMAN, who was dismissed from the Navy for striking an officer. His skill as a surgeon kept his patients faithful to him despite his habit of swearing and expressing extreme radical views.
There was another famous building on the site which the Corporation has just decided to sell. Immediately opposite the entrance to Parker Street was the Liver Theatre. This building was at one time a kind of Assembly Rooms known as, The Dominion of Fancy, which is a flamboyant title but it describes its innumerable mirrors and grotesque decorations. A certain John SMITH, who made a fortune from indigo dye, came to Liverpool and realised that many of the population were dissatisfied with having only one theatre. He bought the Dominion of Fancy and turned it into a theatre, which he called the Pantheon. The place changed hands after a few years and was called the Liver, with a large gilt wooden liver bird over the door. Sims REEVES made one of his first appearances on the stage here at a salary of 30s a week. The place was closed down in 1850 and became a drapery establishment.
In those days the Theatre Royal, Williamson-square, held the patent and monopoly, and the proprietors objected to a rival. Long and involved legal proceedings were brought, and the result was the making of a new Act of Parliament and all the patent houses in the country losing their monopolies. The Act was passed in 1843, and the Liver Theatre was the first theatre in the country to be licensed under the new Act.
July 24th, 1939
Where to take a visitor who comes from London and wants to see the town, when the weather was appalling. Had it been a fine afternoon the problem could have easily been solved. In good weather there are two ways of showing Liverpool to the visitor, neither give a true impression.
One method is to go down Queens Drive, by way of Princes Road, Croxteth Road and Sefton Park and then turn along Woolton Road to Gateacre and Woolton. Reynolds Park, Woolton Woods and the floral clock are always worth a few minutes visit, and if you return by way of Calderstones Park and walk round the wild flower concession and the rose garden half a day passes. The result of the tour is that the stranger gets the impression that Liverpool is largely a garden city full of enchanting public parks, and that there is very little hardship and scarcely any ugliness. This last view is heightened by the occasional glimpse of the tops of the blocks of the new Corporation flats seen in the distance rising out of a blue haze which is actually smoke.
The other method is to concentrate on the river, to those who do not know a seaport, the Mersey is a delightful river. I have known persons stand by the hour watching the ferryboats arriving, discharging their passengers and sailing again to the Cheshire side. The question one is invariably asked is do the boats ever hit each other when they come alongside. The skill of the ferryboat captains is proverbial. It is on rare occasions that one boat strikes another and even then it is the slightest bump.
Unfortunately it is now impossible to take a boat to Rock Ferry and sail past the yard of Cammell Lairds and close to the training ship Conway. From the esplanade at Rock Ferry you get a splendid view of Liverpool. The mass of houses is broken by innumerable church steeples and towers, and to the south is the green of Mossley Hill.
The alternative is to take your visitor on the New Brighton boat which always seems to be much more of a holiday boat than any of the utilitarian Birkenhead ferries. The Wallasey front is a gay place on a fine day, and at high tide, with boats sailing in and out of the river and the sands of Seaforth and Crosby, with the solid row of Regency houses on the esplanades, the Mersey looks at its best. Your visitor will assume that all Liverpool people appreciate their river, whereas it is a fact that not a third of the people who work in Liverpool ever see the waterfront.
I was unable to take my visitor on any of these tours and fell back on the sights which the Corporation provides. To see over the Town Hall requires a permit, so a brief run through and back in the Queensway Tunnel brought us to the Museum which, although it has been redecorated inside is scarcely a cheerful place, with two sections excepted, the childrens corner, which attracts as many adults as children and the shipping gallery, very overcrowded at the time but there were models there to hold the interest of any person interested in the sea.
The Picton Reading Room, in the next building, is an example of the progressive use of steel in the Victorian period. The reading room is carried on steel arches visible in the roof of the Picton Hall beneath. Liverpool Art Gallery, in the next building is one of the best outside of London. The immense number of pictures is constantly being changed, just at present there is an admirable exhibition of Ikons.
The Corporation provide two free organ recitals at St Georges Hall on Saturdays. This organ has 8,000 pipes and more than 100 stops. The opening of the Hall is fully illustrated by a band of carving above the entrance to the Art Gallery. It shows Queen Victoria and the Prince Consort in an open landau driving through cheering crowds to open the Hall.
Other places to visit, were the Liverpool Cathedral, the completed crypt chapel on the site of the Metropolitan Cathedral and the Pier Head.
July 31st 1939
Tunnel under Brunswick Road
What is the mystery of the tunnel which runs under Brunswick Road?
Access to the tunnel is through the cellar of licensed premises adjoining Tichborne Terrace. Part of it is extremely wide and high and has a long stone seat which makes it look like a mediaeval prison. Although both ends are now blocked with building rubbish it is possible to explore for a considerable distance. Under Brunswick Road the tunnel goes down a series of steps rather like the spiral steps in a castle and then continues in its original direction. The other section goes under Tichborne Terrace towards Everton Hill.
The walls are smooth and cut from the solid rock. It is possible to walk upright having due regard for the rubbish on the floor. It is damp an d musty and terrifyingly dark. There are many old bricks lying about. These bricks belonging to the days when they were made larger than now, and are a rich red colour. The legend is that the tunnel was used by Prince Rupert in 1644 when he laid siege to Liverpool and captured the town. He is supposed to have brought his troops from Everton Hill under cover of this tunnel. I do not believe there is any foundation for this story. Prince Rupert camped at Everton, looked down on Liverpool and called it contemptuously a “crows nest” He attacked Liverpool in broad daylight and mounted his cannon on the heath, where Lime Street is now.
It is interesting to note that the cellars of the inn which the Royalist troops commandeered on Everton Brow are still in existence. There are pictures of the original building, which was a small cottage.
I have examined numerous maps of Everton district and the Brunswick Road area and none of them show a tunnel.
There is a possibility that the tunnel was made by WILLIAMSON who made the network of tunnels at Edge Hill, but this is a little out of his area.
Brunswick Road is comparatively modern. It was originally called Mill Lane, then Folly Lane and Brunswick place before it was given its present title.
There were only two houses on the north side in 1827. These were a mansion at the corner of Everton Road and known as Everton House, and next door to it Brunswick House where lived Rev James FORMBY, and later Mr James ROWDEN a merchant. At the top of the road was the well known as Gregson’s well. This had an iron railing round it and steps leading down. The water was for domestic purposes and had no medicinal benefits, unlike many of the other wells in Liverpool.
Everton House was built by Dr Daniel FABIUS a well known Baptist of this time. He used to hold services in the house in 1700. Later on the GREGSON family bought the house, and after almost pulling it down, rebuilt it on a magnificent scale. The interior was said to be so fine that there was nothing else like it outside London.
William GREGSON was Mayor in 1763, and his son John held the same office 20 years later. When William GREGSON was building his house he used his influence and had the roadway altered so that people would not pass too close to his house. The result was a most awkward bend in the road which was a source of annoyance for many years.
The Duke of Gloucester, who became Prince William, was a frequent visitor to the house. William GREGSON died in 1800 and John GREGSON committed suicide by hanging himself in the magnificent house. He was then aged 52.
The first houses built in Brunswick Road were pleasant villas with long gardens. They were built on the north side. The property on the south side was built between 1835 and 1840, and very soon the villas were converted to shops. As early as 1860 the whole road was commercialised.
Aug 7th, 1939
It is proposed to build a large block of offices at the corner of Moorfields and Dale St, this is probably due to the fact that the motor buses serving the Crosby district have taken many passengers from the railway, resulting in not much business being done in the shops in Moorfields as there used to be.
Moorfields was part of the patrimony of the MOORE family. The actual date of its construction is not known but it is shown on the first map every made of Liverpool, the Chadwick map of 1725.
The map shows Liverpool had a population of 11,000 and about 2000 houses. It was a small town but highly concentrated as regards population. Oldhall Street was built up only as far as Union Street. Dale Street the principal street for entering and leaving, had houses only as far as Fontenoy Street. All the land lying between Tithebarn Street and Dale Street had only been built up at Hackins Hey, Cheapside and Moorfields. Lord Street had been completed, Church Street had been made but not developed. The stream leading to the pool had only just been culverted and only half the land between South Castle Street and Paradise Street had houses. Duke Street was a country lane and there were several fine mansions in Hanover Street. One or two of these are still standing and are used for commercial purposes.
The greater portion of the people lived in narrow, tortuous streets between Castle Street and the water front, this was a very tough part of town. In Fenwick Street was a Dames school to which went Emma HAMILTON, famous for her association with NELSON. She stayed, when a child, for a short time with an aunt in Cable St.
Moorfields was a narrow miserable street, so narrow at the north end that carts could not get through. The Liverpool Directory of 1767 shows that only one person was worthy of being registered in the whole street, an Edward DAVIES, horse hirer.
Under an Improvement Act of 1820, Moorfields was widened to its present width, and during the next few years were put up the buildings which still stand rather gloomily.
Exchange Station was built in 1850 and rebuilt about 30 years later when it was considerably enlarged. It was built by the old Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Co, and originally called Tithebarn Street Station. It stood much higher than the present station and there was an awkward approach up a long flight of wooden stairs.
At the corner of Ormond Street and Bixteth Street was a well known hostelry, The Ship, with white walls and oak beams. In George Street was the, Pig and Whistle, famous as a chop house. When the cotton trade developed it was the favourite eating place for the cotton merchants. The proprietor was Abraham WARD, who had a very sharp tongue, which he would use on his customers. So sure was he of the supremacy of his steaks and chops that he did not mind insulting his customers. One man complained of his steak and WARD ordered him off his premises. The man went to every other chop house in town, but nowhere could he find anything so succulent as the, Pig and Whistle steaks. He returned to George Street where he was met by Abraham WARD, who said he was willing to forget the past, but it must not occur again.
August 21st, 1939
The outrages being committed by members of the I.R.A, call to mind the efforts made to terrorise the public by the Fenians in the 80’s of the last century.
Mr GLADSTONE proposing his Home Rule Bill and feeling ran high throughout the country in the matter. In Ireland there were daily riots. Liverpool also came in for more than a fair share of trouble.
An attempt to blow up the police station in Dale Street was made in the spring of 1881, but the effort was prevented in time. A more serious attempt was made early in the morning of June 10th to blow up the Town Hall. Had the bomb been a better made machine and the police not so quick, a tremendous amount of damage would have been done.
A cabman named John ROSS was sitting in his cab in Castle Street when he noticed two men go to the west door of the Town Hall. He thought they were sailors and they appeared to be carrying a sack, which they placed on the steps in front of the door. At that moment two policemen came across the exchange flags and the Fenians ran away.
One of the policemen picked up the sack, from which there came a sizzling noise. He threw it into the roadway where it exploded. All the windows on the west side of the Town Hall were broken and stone work on the Brown’s buildings [pulled down a few years ago] was shattered. Part of the railing outside the Town Hall was twisted by the force of the explosion.
The two Fenians were chased and one was caught in Edmund Street, the other very nearly escaped. He reached the Leeds and Liverpool canal and jumped from one barge to another. Then he fell into the water and swam under cover of the barges. The police made a systematic search and found him crouching in the hold of a flat. Papers in his possession proved he was a Fenian
The men were eventually identified M’GRATH and M;KENITT, M’GRATH was sentenced to penal servitude for life, M’KENITT to 15 years
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Myrtle Street Baptist church, which is to be closed, was built because the congregation wanted to have their church in the country. It was built in 1844, When Catherine Street was being developed and there were only a few villas in Prince’s Road. Eastward of Myrtle Street were fields and there were some mansion houses in Smithdown Road. Before the Myrtle Street Church was built the church was in Lime Street
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Among the many cries which are disappearing from Liverpool streets are the cry of the “rag and bone” man, though there are still a few of them left.
The rag business is on the decline, the principal reason being that paper is now chiefly being made from wood-pulp. At one time rag pickers had a brisk trade by selecting rags for paper making. The rags which are most in demand are tweeds, serge and woollen materials. These are carefully unpicked and sold for their value of wool which fetched over 2d a lb. Strangely silks and linens have no value.
Curiously every person who has rags will bargain to get an extra copper or two for stuff that they can well afford to give away.
Aug 26th, 1939
Whenever anyone says that Liverpool has destroyed all its Elizabethan houses and there is nowhere left in the city worth visiting from an historical point of view, I take them to Walton Church. The trees in the graveyard were planted about 50 years ago, and the present church is comparatively modern, but at the back of the church screened by trees is Church Flags.
This is a row of delightful Elizabethan houses in a good state of preservation, and all of them are lived in. In front is the original cobble stones and flagging for the footwalk. The roofs of two of the houses are made of flags six inches thick. The people living in these houses are immensely proud of them and willing to show them to genuinely interested visitors.
One house is particularly charming. It is behind the others with a little whitewashed entry of its own. It has a cosy living room on the ground floor, a built in stairway and two living rooms above. The original built in cupboards are still there. The view through the doorway with the cobble stones, a stone wall beyond and an overhanging tree is the kind of thing one expects to find in Cornwall not Liverpool.
Strangely Church Flags is not referred to in the Liverpool Directory. The houses in Church Lane also have their charm, but they are not so old as those in Church Flags. A mission hall now stands where there used to be an interesting hostelry at the corner of Church Lane. The house has been strangely converted, for the actual corner is now the Mission , and yet many of the rooms and part of the old bar belonging to the adjoining house in Walton Village. The loveliest building in Walton is what is now the Men's Club, this stands in the corner of the churchyard close to the main thoroughfare and is completely screened in the summer time by trees and shrubs. The building is a fine example of Tudor architecture. It was until recently a Grammar School and there are still several old Waltonians who can remember attending it.
The building was reconditioned in 1908 and was very well done indeed. One of the original Tudor windows has been left untouched. The main door to the building is the original one and has elaborate iron hinges.
The present Walton Church is not so interesting, but it has a history that goes back before Liverpool. Liverpool in fact, was at one time under the control of Walton, and the church at the quay, St Mary's and St Nicholas, was only a chapel of ease to Walton.
Walton Parish Church dates back to Saxon times and has a font of Anglo Saxon workmanship. The church was rebuilt in 1326 and again when the present church was erected in 1769. The six bells of the church are dated 1730, and the existing registers go back to 1586. The bells were brought from Gloucester and travelled the water logged roads of Liverpool by means of logs being laid down. There is a record of a charge being made for putting down logs.
The churchyard contains a famous tombstone to a blacksmith, a certain George MILES who died in 1719, also the originator of Everton Toffee, Molly BUSHELL, who had a shop in Everton Brow, and made all her toffee by hand, is buried in the Walton graveyard.