Forums Forums Wirral History : Chasing the Past History Information Request Wirral ship canal

Some time back, there was a mention in one of the history threads of the ship canal that was proposed in the 1820s to cross Wirral from West Kirby to Wallasey Pool. I can’t remember in which thread this was mentioned. Can anyone help?

I think Nightwalker said he was doing some research on it. It was originally a scheme by Thomas Telford, if I'm not mistaken, and funded by John Tobin & William Laird. A survey was conducted for it but it never went ahead.

I believe that one of the original options / plans for the Manchester Ship Canal was for it to come across the Wirral and come into the Dee Estuary.

W.R.S McIntrye published a detailed article on the scheme in the Transactions of the Historic Society of Lanc.& Cheshire (1972). Available for just a quid if you're interested.

Visit the society's website.

I think I asked whether there had been a topic on the canal a few months ago. Apparently there hasn’t been so I started doing a bit of digging and have found a surprising amount of info about a project which never happened.

Basically, the plans were drawn up by Thomas Telford in 1828 to build a canal between Wallasey Pool and the River Dee at West Kirby roughly following the course of the River Birket. The plans included the building of a dock complex at the Wallasey/Birkenhead end. If the proposals had been implemented the canal would have completely transformed the topography and history of North Wirral. When Liverpool Corporation found out about the plans they realised that they would have a detrimental effect on their own docks and immediately started buying up land around Wallasey Pool to scupper the plans of Telford and his partners. This in turn affected Birkenhead’s history as the land lay undeveloped until money was found to build the Birkenhead dock system (first part opened in 1847).

I plan to put an article about it on wiki but if there’s anything particular that you’re interested in, let me know.

Wish I'd known that, geekus, I could have saved myself a lot of effort!!

They'll have it in the reference library at Earlston Rd., Wallasey, or Borough Rd., Birkenhead if you ask. It's got a few maps/plans if you're interested.

this may be of interest

Great map but it's from an earlier scheme. This one's unrelated to the scheme outlined by Nightwalker.

Think the date of 1820 is an error.

The map above actually dates from the 1790's, not 1820.

I know very little of the Wirral canal and look forward to learning more, i seem to remember reading that its intentions was to allow safer passage from the Dee to the Mersey without having to navigate dangerous sandbanks by going around, was the introduction of steam also a reason for not carrying out such a scheme.

The original canal scheme was more to do with people on the Cheshire coast not wanting to pay the hefty port duties imposed on shipping by the Liverpool authorities.

Thanks for all the responses so far - it's an interesting topic.

Why not just build a port on this side of the river, why would they need a canal to achieve that?

...something to do with the River Dee being under the control of Chester and the Cheshire authorities whereas the River Mersey was controlled by the Port of Liverpool.

But, there were also some issues concerning preservation of the Rock Channel, as you rightly suggest.

Was there ever a charge on entering the Mersey or Dee, regardless of using the port, staying in open water and anchoring?

The most used way into the Mersey in the 1820s was via the Rock Channel running along the north Wirral coast (the Formby Channel was deeper but was unreliable because it kept shifting). However, the Rock could not be navigated at night and was very narrow with dangerous sandbanks in the middle. In bad weather it was virtually impossible for a sailing ship to get through in one tide, causing frequent and long delays in entering the river.

This was also the era of the infamous wreckers of Hoylake and Wallasey. There had been national outrage in 1820 when a schooner, the ‘Mary Betsy’, had struck a sandbank near Leasowe and the vessel had been stripped by the locals who apparently had made no attempt to save the crew but just concentrated on plundering. Whether the incident had been deliberately caused by the wreckers or they had just taken advantage of the situation was never determined, but it is an example of the dangers faced in navigating the Rock Channel.

The canal itself was only part of the proposed project. Embankments were to be built from the coast line across to Hilbre Island creating a large harbour which would provide safe anchorage for ships waiting to enter the canal. So, the plans produced by Telford were aimed at providing a safer and quicker way into the Mersey and at the same time directing the shipping to the proposed dock system based round Wallasey Pool which would be more attractive and accessible than Liverpool’s.

Not sure bert. Wouldn't surprise me though if there was! The various channels into both rivers would have required being regularly surveyed and maintained, so I assume these costs would have been passed on in one way or another. Most ships entering the Mersey would have had to anchor for quite long periods (mainly in the Sloyne off Birkenhead) waiting for the right tides to assist them in and out of the Liverpool docks. So there may well have been a charge for anchorage.

Here's an interesting little link concerning navigation in the area: -

http://lch.arena-housing.com/print_view.aspx?infoid=1064

I'm sure someone on here will fill you in with the details.

No, Bert…Liverpool Corporation were so terrified of the effect that the Wirral canal project would have on their docks that within months of Telford’s report they started buying up land fronting Wallasey Pool to prevent the scheme getting off the ground. There was a conspiracy theory (isn’t there always!) that it was never intended for the project to be implemented and it was a ploy by the owners of the land around the Pool to push up land prices.

...well Tobin & Laird did originally buy the land for £80 an acre, and then sold it for £726 per acre only a few years later!

Thanks Nightwalker and Geekus for the replies. even conniving buggers then as well as now, nothing changes. Putting any conspiracy theory to one side, had it gone ahead for reasons maybe thought, its comparative lifespan, initial use, would have been short apart from what canals are used for today.

Thanks for all those informative replies. The canal does sound to have been a bit of a pie-in-the-sky scheme, possibly with an eye to profit from land speculation.
It surely would have taken ages for a ship to anchor at West Kirby and wait for a slot so it could go along the canal, by which time it could be making its way round into the Mersey via the regular route.
Also, the proposed harbour development would have totally ruined Hilbre and the other two islands, along with Red Rocks and West Kirby.

Maybe, but Hoylake was always an anchorage for sea going vessels and Hilbre has a long history of being associated with being a place for embarkation, etc.

It's also perfectly possible that, if it hadn't been for the silting up of the River Dee, Parkgate may have become a much bigger port.

Thomas Telford certainly didn’t think his scheme was pie-in-the-sky, and as one of the finest engineers of his generation with a wealth of experience in canal construction, I think it’s reasonable to respect his judgement. In fact, he was so incensed when the scheme collapsed that he destroyed all his plans, documents and surveys. However, it was Telford himself who first started the conspiracy theory by suggesting that his reputation had been used to give weight to what was indeed a premeditated land speculation scam by Tobin and Laird.

I don’t think there would have been much hanging around at West Kirby. Although entrance to the new harbour was dependant on the tides, once there ships would be able to enter the canal at any time, day or night, be protected from the weather and without the risk of running aground on an uncharted sandbank or lured aground by wreckers. I’m fairly sure that ship-owners and seamen would have preferred that to braving the Rock Channel.

When I first read of the canal, I pictured it as a narrow stretch of water with room for a couple of barges to pass. In fact, the plans were for a canal which was 163 feet wide and 22 feet deep for most of its length (nearly eight miles), which as Telford said would be ‘wide enough for three great ships’.

To speculate on how West Kirby, Hilbre and the rest of North Wirral would have been affected if the scheme had gone ahead would be completely pointless but extremely fascinating!

One of the great attractions of developing docks at Birkenhead was that most of the docks at Liverpool were simply not big enough or deep enough at the time to accommodate the increasingly larger ships which were coming in from places like America.

Parkgate's growth as a port would always have been restricted to catering for smaller vessels because of the problems of silting in the River Dee and its relative shallowness compared to the Mersey. It's quite well known that even in the 18th Century many bigger ships had to anchor at Dawpool.

Nightwalker is right in saying that Telford clearly anticipated the need for a canal and dock system that would be able to cope with Trans-Atlantic trade on a much grander scale.

Certainly would have been a grand sight and the dimensions Nightwalker put up are impressive for that time, I take the view that such a canal would have a short life, of course the dock system was badly needed for bigger vessels as Geekus described, however, though the transition by shipowners from sail to steam was slow it did eventually happen, along with that, safer passage navigating to the Mersey and also the ability to mechanically dredge. There would also have been steam tugs available. Putting safety aside, would a trip through a 8 mile canal be any quicker going around in open seas.

Is it known if any basins were going to be put in along its route?

Sorry if I gave the wrong impression by calling the scheme pie-in-the-sky. I know Telford himself, who was honest and upstanding, would have done the survey and drawn up the plans in all seriousness and would have built an excellent canal.
What I meant was: Were the promoters ever serious about going ahead with the project, or was it just an elaborate ploy to make a hefty profit by pushing up the value of the Wallasey Pool land?

You're right, bert, the canal would have had a short life, if any life at all. Assuming the scheme had obtained the funding (a massive £1.4 million) I imagine that it would have been well into the 1830s before work was completed. However, in 1834-35, Commander Denham's survey of the river estuary identified the Victoria and Crosby Channels which were safe, deep and stable. The Rock Channel suddenly stopped being the main route into the Mersey and Telford's primary argument for the need of a canal no longer applied.

As far as basins are concerned, I did not put Telford's full quote in when talking about the dimensions. The ship canal was planned to be 'wide enough for three great ships so as to admit part of it being used as a floating harbour and still leaving room for navigation. That is to say, in parts along the canal quaysides could be constructed for ships to berth while others passed by'.

Its a great pity Telford destroyed all plans and documentation, it would have been interesting to view his costings, how many men he would he have employed and who was his main financial backers, private or banks. So much lost because he effectively threw his dummy out of the pram, what a shame.

Although Telford may have destroyed his own plans and documentation I would have thought his financial backers (i.e - Tobin & Laird) would have received copies of these plans and costings, and that perhaps (somewhere in the Tobin or Laird family archives) some of these records might still exist.

I doubt Tobin and Laird had that kind of money, guessing about 90-100 million in today's terms, i wonder if they were knocking on Parliaments door.

I suppose that, regardless of the precise source of financial backing, it would have almost certainly required an Act of Parliament to permit such a scheme to progress. If the likes of Laird or Tobin did not have copies of the documentation then it could well be that details were submitted in proposals put before Parliament.