My friend was digging his garden in Egan rd and said it was full of bricks. He was convinced it was an industrial site previously. Maps and pictures do not show this. I suspect it was a dumping ground for waste from the Dock Cottages. Can anyone confirm that assumption?
Here is a picture from BFA in 1926 showing them streets already built. My friend was sure the land was built on before the houses were constructed. I’m convinced it was just a dumping ground from nearby projects like the building of the dock cottages or as Gibbo says, the nearby brick field. Maps show nothing before the houses.
I've pondered on this and got no where but here are some thoughts ....
The land was swampy and would have had to be raised with drain-able infill. Flaybrick quarry would have had loads of sandstone waste. I can't think of where they would get the quantity of brick for that whole area. How about it simply being demolished outbuildings? Coal shelters and maybe outside loos were probably built in that era. There would have been air-raid shelters in that location for WW2 because they are close to the docks. The back-to-back gardens are now entirely fenced, for that era I would have thought they would have had brick walls which have now gone. Were the gardens originally back-to-back or were the gardens extended for WW2 vegetable growing? Likewise, they may have had brick paved yards which were demolished for WW2 vegetable gardens. I can't find any detailed maps pre-Flaybrick but could this land have been quarried before moving uphill to Flaybrick? There is no record of landfill there but if we are talking pre-flaybrick the records would be spartan.
There's a real danger that the left will drag Britain back to the 1970s, with secure well-paid jobs, ample housing, properly-funded NHS and social care, free tuition, student grants, final salary pensions, affordable rail fares and fabulous films and music. David Osland 2025
We don't do charity in Germany, we pay taxes. Charity is a failure of governments' responsibilities - Henning Wehn
Your thinking that it may be demolished outbuildings and toilets seems the most plausible.
I know it sounds good but new buildings after 1920 (and much earlier in Liverpool) generally had to have an indoor loo, also as the house had back-to-back gardens would their coal cellar be at the rear of the property where there was no rear entry?
My detailed maps don't quite go that far West so I will have to check the plan maps at the Library which isn't likely to be for some time.
There's a real danger that the left will drag Britain back to the 1970s, with secure well-paid jobs, ample housing, properly-funded NHS and social care, free tuition, student grants, final salary pensions, affordable rail fares and fabulous films and music. David Osland 2025
We don't do charity in Germany, we pay taxes. Charity is a failure of governments' responsibilities - Henning Wehn
