1207
Liverpool received a royal charter from King John in 1207. There appeared to be very little in the area at the time - effectively it was creating a new town from scratch.
The reason appears to have been the King's desire for a new port in the North-West from where to launch a campaign against Ireland. And the major advantage of the area as a port appears to have been the Pool, an inlet of the River Mersey, which was capable of providing safe mooring for shipping. For an indication where the Pool was relative to present-day Liverpool, go here.
A castle was built, on the promontory overlooking the Pool and the River Mersey, to guard this new port and a system of seven streets was formed (constructed like an H-shape where the 'middle 'bar' is extended each side).
If viewing the street plan from the river end, the 'left-hand vertical' comprised Chapel Street (named after St. Mary del Key, which was converted to a school after the Reformation, not after the current St. Nicholas which likewise lies at its river end) and Moor Street (now Tithebarn Street).
The 'right-hand vertical', further south comprised Bank Street (now Water Street) and Dale Street
The 'middle bar' comprised (from South to North) Castle Street, Juggler Street (the only one of these streets not still in existence - the Town Hall was built on it) and Whiteacre Street (now Old Hall Street). The castle was situated at the South End of Castle Street/ Between Castle Street and Juggler Street, a square came into existence called 'High Cross' which contained the village cross and the stocks and pillory. Juggler Street was later re-named High Street, although its old name seems to have continued to exist in usage.
1300 At the beginning of the century, the population appears to have been in the region of about thousand, although the population later varied considerably. Obviously the Black Death of 1349 was a factor here, as were several other outbreaks of illness. Fishing was a prime industry.
1315 Castle besieged during the Banastre Revolt, a local family feud in Lancashire. The castle was not captured, but the older, neglected castle at West Derby was.
1323 From 24. October to the 30. October, Edward II stayed at Liverpool Castle.
Fifteenth Century The Molyneuxs bought the right to the tithe from Shrewsbury Abbey, and a stone tithe barn was built (as remembered by modern-day Tithebarn Street, the tithe barn was at the far end, on the edge of the town, and was demolished at the end of the 17. century)
As a result of the Reformation, St. Nicholas became the only church in Liverpool. The parish church at the time, however, was in Walton. In 1699, St Nicholas did beoome a parish church. A spire was added in 1746 (although the present spire is a different one to this).
1564 First mention of the Townsend Bridge, a stone bridge carrying Dale Street over the Pool.
1558 About 250 people die of Plague (the total population was not much different from that at the beginning of the fourteenth century).
1586 The city is visited by William Camden, who wrote this description
A contemporary description: The Mersey spreading and presently contracting its stream from Warrington falls into the ocean with a wide channel very convenient for trade, where opens to view Litherpole, commonly called Lirpoole, from a water extending like a pool, according to the common opinion, where is the most convenient and most frequented passage to Ireland: a town more famous for its beauty and populousness than for its antiquity: its name occurs in no ancient writer except that of Roger of Poictou who was lord, as stated of Lancaster, built a castle here, the custody of which has now foe a long time belonged to the noble and knightly family of Molineux, whose chief seat is in the neighborhood of Sefton, which Roger aforesaid in the early Norman times gave to Vivian de Molineaux. This Roger held, as appears in the Domesday Book, all the lands between the rivers Ribble and Mersey.
(Despite the description above, it appears that the population was less than 1,000).
1588 Everton Beacon burns to warn of the approach of the Spanish Armada.
1588-1592 Liverpool is represented in Parliament by Francis Bacon, although he appears never to have mentioned Liverpool in his writings.
1591 Toxteth Park, outside the city boundaries (until 1835), has its park status removed. Up until then it had been a royal deer park with an area of about 25 km2, fenced off to keep the deer in. It was divided into twenty tenements but the name 'Toxteth Park' continued to be used. It was here that the astronomer Jeremiah Horrocks grew up, at Otterspool.
Liverpool is originally held for the King because of the influence of the aristocratic families - the Stanleys and the Molyneuxs. In 1643 parliamentary troops under Colonel Assheton attacked, and after street fighting resulting in 30 dead, the Parliamentary forces took the town. A makeshift wall was build and fortified with cannon. The castle was strengthened.
In May 1644, Prince Rupert arrived and besieged the town - his troops were stationed on the hills overlooking Liverpool (e.g. Beacon Hill in Everton, Copperas Hill). On 13 June, his troops forced an entry to the north, around present-day Old Hall Street. He was helped by the fact that the parliamentary troops, under John Moore, had left Liverpool via the Pool, apparently without telling the people of Liverpool.
Nevertheless, the citizens apparently themselves put up fierce resistance, and there are claims that the Royalists exacted murderous 'revenge' even after they had won.
On 2 July, the Battle of Marston Moor took place, and a couple of months later, Parliamentary troops returned to Liverpool. They laid siege and regained the town in October.
The fortifications were dismantled in 1654.
1666 - the Antelope sets off for Barbados with various cargo, returning the next year with sugar cane. This was the first cargo ship to travel from Liverpool to America. Within ten years, twelve ships were plying between the port and Barbados and also to Virginia, carrying tobacco back to Britain from the latter destination
Other trade was increasing, and more and more trade was also being despatched at Liverpool and transported South by road, rather than be taken directly to London.
1668 After the restoration, (Lord) Caryl Molyneux, who had led the violent and murderous Royalist assault on Liverpool on 13/14 June 1644, constructed Lord Molyneux's Street (now Lord Street), leading from the Castle to the Pool (which occupied present-day Paradise Street/Whitechapel). He built a bridge across the Pool, but it was demolished by the City Council for some reason.
1677 By now there were 18 streets. Additions included James Street, Hackin's Hey (after a John Hackin), and Fenwick Street.
1697 By now there were 28 streets.
1698/9 Until this date, Liverpool had been a part of the parish of Walton. St Nicholas's and St Peter's became twin centers of the new parish of Liverpool.
1700
Population was about 7.000 - the most inhabited street was Dale Street.
First recording of a slaving ship sailing from Liverpool. Until 1698, this had been a monopoly of London (and the Royal African Company), but this role was largely taken over by Bristol in the early eighteenth century. Only towards the end of the century did Liverpool become the dominant slaving port.
1704 St Peter's Church consecrated, in present-day Church Street (it was demolished in 1922).
1708 By now there were 36 streets.
1710s Pool filled in, and the Old Dock built at its former mouth. This was carried out on the recommendation of Thomas Steers, a well-known engineer. The Old Dock was about 200 meters by 100 meters and had gates to neutralize the tide. This was apparently a major advance at the time, following on from a similar but smaller dock at Rotherhithe, London. It took five years to build. A street laid out on a part of the filled-in Pool was called Paradise Street by Steers because he once lived in Paradise Street in Rotherhithe.
1715 With the march southwards of James 3., the Old Pretender, Liverpool constructed some hasty ad-hoc fortifications - a trench, a small amount of artillery, and flooded some areas of the town. These would probably have been inadequate if James had been able to attack, but he never reached that far. The castle was in a very bad state, and was no longer capable of being used for any military purpose. In 1726, its last remains were demolished, in order to make way for a church - St. George.
1726
The first Charity School had been opened in 1708, and in 1726, it transferred to Blue Coat School, in School Lane.
The reamins of the castle were demolished. It had been partly demolished already during the reign of Charles II.
1734 Work commences on a second dock - Salthouse Dock, taking 19 years to complete.
1740 The Strand laid out (although originally known as New Street), along the original waterline. As you can guess from the name, it was laid out on what had been a strip of sand.
1745 Some fortifications were put in place against a possible attack by Bonnie Prince Charlie, but they proved to be unnecessary. The Catholic chapel was burned down by arson. It was also around 1745 that Clayton Square was laid out by Sarah Clayton - her brother-in-law was Thomas Cases after whom the adjacent Cases Street is named.
1753 The Everton Toffee Shop was opened by Molly Bushell.
1754 Present Town Hall opened. On 18. January 1795, it was severely damaged by fire (attempts to put the fire out were thwarted because water pipes had frozen).Enough of the structure remained to allow rebuilding, with some modifications, e.g. a two-storey portico and a dome, with Minerva atop it. Rebuilding was completed in 1820.
Wealthier inhabitants tended to move towards the hills surrounding the town.
1761 The first thru-service by coach from London came into service. The journey took four days. Entry into Liverpool was along the Prescot Road, which had become a turnpike and been improved in comparison with its former status as a 'packhorse route', in which form it would have been totally unusable by stagecoaches.
1770 Work started on the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, although many years were to pass before it was fully completed. The Liverpool section came into use in 1774 (to Wigan). Even on completion, no direct connection was made with Liverpool Docks - this was due apparently to some dispute between Liverpudlian and Yorkshire interests. Eventually connections were made with Stanley and Collingwood Docks.
The wealthier citizens set up home in areas like Rodney Street, which was built in 1770/80. The working-class settled in Vauxhall to the North and Harrington to the South.
1771 George's Dock opened (where the Liver Building now stands).
The American War of Independence causes a reduction in trade. The resulting poverty caused sailors to rebel and hold the town for several days. Allegedly, several lives were lost in the ensuing struggle by the army to gain control of the town.
Peter Baker, a privateer during the Seven Years War, captures the French ship Carnatic, with £135,000 of booty. With his riches he purchases the manor of Garston.
1784 The oil-stone dealer John Mann dies, after whom Mann Island is named. It was apparently previously called Mersey Island, and was created between the docks. When George's Dock was filled in (the present site of the Liver Building and its two companions) it ceased to be an 'island'.
1788 King's Dock opened, south of Salthouse Dock.
1793 Goree Piazzas built, reconstructed after a fire in 1802, but finally destroyed by the Luftwaffe.
1800
Registered tonnage of shipping was third behind London and Newcastle. On the other hand, during the Industrial Revolution, Liverpool appears to have 'deindustrialized' and resorted to being primarily a port, without actually making or manufacturing a great deal itself. Fire in the Goree
1801 Population 77,653
1802 Liverpool Botanical gardens opened. Around this time, the Lyceum Club was founded in Bold Street.
1805 Last duel fought in Liverpool
1806 William Roscoe was elected as MP, and voted for the abolition of slavery, a cause in which he had been active for about 30 years. Nevertheless, Liverpool was a major center of opposition to the abolition of slavery (among the reasons touted by opponents of abolition was that it would cause unemployment - a standard reason still used to this very day against many progressive moves ). Indeed a group of unemployed seaman were lead to belief that Roscoe was responsible for their state, and attacked a procession in Castle Street which included Roscoe and was being staged to celebrate the ending of the slave trade. Roscoe failed to be re-elected in 1807. It should be stressed that slavery itself continued, only the transport of slaves from Africa was prohibited.
1809 William Gladsone born in Rodney Street (his father, John Gladstone became the owner of about 1500 slaves).
1810 During a church service, the tower of St. Nicholas collapsed. A procession of children was just entering the church and 24 were killed. Three adults were also killed.
1815 In July, the Elizabeth, a steam-driven paddle steamer operates on the Mersey, mostly as a ferry. Others followed, not just as ferries but also as tugs. Some steam ships began to be built in the Liverpool area. In 1819, a steamer was plying between Liverpool and Belfast.
1817 The seawater baths were demolished, in order to make way for the Prince's Dock.
1824 Jesse Hartley appointed engineer to the docks.
1825 Anti-emigration laws were repealed. Between now and 1860 about two-thirds of the total number of people who emigrated to America and Canada traveled via Liverpool - amounting to about three and a half million to America and 350,000 to Canada (i.e. two-thirds of the entire emigration to these countries, not just British people - which such a mix of emigrants from all over Europe, con-merchants abounded, ready to fleece them. There was even a network which allowed American con-merchants to receive prior information from their 'colleagues' in Liverpool).
1827 Old Dock was filled in. The spece was used for a new Custom House..
1829 Saturday October 10 - the Rainhill Locomotive Trials for the new Liverpool and Manchester Railway. It is worth making a specific note here that the winning Rocket locomotive was built by Robert Stephenson. All these years later, some sources (including a notice at Rainhill itself until fairly recently) attributed the construction to George Stephenson. In fact, this was a misinterpretation that was even perpetuated on a recent Bank of England banknote.
1830 Liverpool and Manchester railway opened. The original proposals of 1825 had been rejected by the Council. but an amended bill the following year was accepted.
1832 Jesse Hartley's first dock, the Brunswick Dock, is opened (although the Clarence Dock had been opened earlier, in 1830).
1833 Major fire among the warehouses of Lancelot's Hey
1835 City boundaries extended to include Kirkdale, Everton, Toxteth Park and parts of West Derby.
1836 Lime Street Station opened - on this site at one time stood several lime kilns, given the street its name (although the name was originally Lime Kiln Lane).
1839
First Grand National Race. Aintree racecourse was opened by William Lynn in 1829. A four mile race had been staged in 1836, which was won by Captain Becher riding 'Duke. The 1839 race was a larger scale affair with an estimated crowd of 50.000. It was christened the Grand National by a journalist, the name becoming official in 1847
For the first race, Captain Becher was riding Conrad, who threw him twice at water jumps. The race was won by Lottery.
In 1848, the horse Valentine fell at one of the water jumps.
July Prince William crosses the Atlantic. Originally its was intended to compete with Brunel's Great Western for the first steam crossing, but it was not ready in time.. However, when it was ready, it managed to cross the Atlantic in 19 days outward and 15 days back again.
Hermann Melville arrived in Liverpool, as a crew member of a ship from New York. Allegedly, Hermann Melville bears great responsibility for popularizing, in his book Redburn, the story that Liverpool had been named in honor of an extinct bird called the Liver Bird. This story was contained in a guidebook to Liverpool owned by his father.
1840s Despite Brunel's success, the contract for the transatlantic mail was given to Cunard and their Britannia, one of their first ships. This ship took Charles Dickens to America in 1842. Brunel's further ships 1841 In 1838, two businessmen from Lima had sent samples of guano to Liverpool merchant William Myers, who had farming interest and opportunity to test its efficacy. The result was that Myers himself decided to put up the money for shipment of this new fertilizer (not new to the South American Indians obviously). In early 1841, 2000 tonnes of guano set sail from Callao for Liverpool.
1842 The workhouse on Brownlow Hill (opened in 1772 on the site
now occupied by the Catholic Cathedral) was rebuilt to hold 1.800 people (although
it eventually held many more than this).
It was actually the largest in the country.
1843
Joseph Paxton was commissioned to lay out Prince's Park. This was part of a 35 hectare
piece of land just
outside the city, bought by Yates, a local man, who used the rest of the land for
residential property. Princes Park was
a prestigious park in its day, and its concepts copied elsewhere. In 1851, Joseph
Paxton built the Crystal Palace in
Hyde Park.
The park was purchased by the city council in 1918.
1844 Construction started on Birkenhead Docks. Major infestation of potatoes by disease (not just in Ireland, incidentally, but In Europe as well)
1845
Albert Dock opened.
Designed by Jesse Hartley, it was of a new design - surrounded by warehouses.
Previously docks had been of the 'open' type, with warehouses situated a distance
from the docks. Today, the Albert
Dock buildings are the largest Grade 1 listed buildings in Britain.
Holt Line founded
1846
William Lassel of West Derby discovered Triton, the largest moon of Neptune, which had
itself only been
discovered 17 days earlier. Originally, it was a mystery why Lassel didn't put more energy into
trying to find Neptune himself, he did
actually receive 'news' from John Adams of the prediction of its existence and where it was likely to
be found. Recent documents have been unearthed currently suggesting that Adams' predictions were bogus, and were part of a well-orchestrated attempt by Cambridge University to share credit for a discovery actually made by a French mathematician, Urban LeVerrier.
Dr WH Duncan becomes first Public Medical Officer in country.
1847 Immigration from Ireland, due to the Potato Famine (during which 25%
of the population of Ireland die), reaches its peak
in this year, with a oft-quoted figure of 300.000 Irish emigrants in this year.
By no means all of these remained in Liverpool. Official census figures show a population
of 223.000 in 1841 rising to 376.000 by 1851, most of the increase being Irish.
Contemporary reports tend to imply that the reaction at the time was fairly similar to present-day attitudes to immigration and
to asylum-seekers, maybe. As for Ireland, the loss of a quarter of a country's population would
nowadays incur
a greater reaction than what seems to have been the
prevailing one at the time.
Kirkdale Beach is 'developed' as Wellington, Huskisson (1852) and Sandon Docks (1849).
1848 The Ocean Monarch carrying 338 emigrants caught fire in the Mersey and sank off Llandudno, with the loss of 178 lives.
1849
Cholera epidemic
Philharmonic Hall opened on the site of the first house built in Hope Street, by William Hope.
1850 Railway station opened on Tithebarn Street, serving areas to the North of Liverpool. This station was replaced by Exchange Station in 1888. By 1855, Southport had devloped as the first seaside resort in Lancashire.
.
1851
Population 376,065
Charles MacIver founded a shipping line. Joined by Samuel Cunard, a Canadian, and George Burns to form the Cunard Line.
1853 Nathanial Hawthorne arrives as American consul.
1854 St. George's Hall opened, as a joint concert hall/assize court.
1857 The Mersey Docks and Harbour Board created, taking over control of the Liverpool docks from the City Council, as well as the docks in Birkenhead.
1859 Canada Dock opened
1860s Reduced cotton imports during the American Civil War lead to the opening of a trade in cotton with Egypt.
1860 William Brown Library opened, financed by the eponymous ship-owner. It's original purpose was apparently to display the natural history collection bequeathed to the city by the Earl of Derby. The library later absorbed the Picton Reading Room which was opened in 1879, and was modelled on the Reading Room of the British Library. James Picton was a historian who wrote a well-known history of Liverpool.
1862 Castle Line founded.
1868 Bootle became a borough.
1869 The first Adelphi Hotel is opened by the Midland Railway. It was replaced by a new hotel built in 1912.The hotel stands on the site of the former Liverpool Ranelagh Tea Rooms, after which the adjacent street is named.
1871
North Western Hotel opened, at the front of Lime Street Station. It was designed by Alfred Waterhouse, the architect also of Liverpool University buildings and Manchester Town Hall. It is now used as a hall of residence by Liverpool Polytechnic.
Stanley Park opened, It was laid out by Edward Kemp, a disciple of Joseph Paxton
1872 Sefton Park opened. The two steams called the Brook (the smaller and larger) meet at the boating lake, one flowing through the Fairy Glen on one side of the lake (from here the joint stream flowed through the Otter's Pool to the Mersey, and can still be viewed in the Otterspool area)
1874
A notorious gang murder became national news.
One evening in 1874, twenty-six-year-old Richard Morgan was walking home from a Bank Holiday trip to New Ferry with his wife and brother when he was set upon and brutally kicked to death by a gang of youths.
They were passing a pub at the end of Tithebarn Street, when Morgan was asked for ale money by McCrave, a member of the notorious High Rip Gang, who terrorised North Liverpool. Morgan made the mistake of suggesting that McCrave should work for this and was promptly knocked to the ground. Joined by other gang members Campbell and Mullen, the victim was kicked to the other side of the street before police could intervene.
McCrave was arrested that evening after being pursued by Morgan's brother. The others were also in custody within days, Mullen having tried to escape to sea. The youths, who were all 17, were sentenced to death but Campbell was reprieved on account of his previous good behaviour, after petitions to the Home Secretary were made by their families.
McCrave and Mullen were hanged at Kirkdale on 3rd January 1875. McCrave, the gang ringleader displayed great terror at the end but Mullen remained calm and indifferent throughout. Campbell received life imprisonment.
The Tithebarn Street Outrage, as it became known, brought starkly to public attention the mobs of thugs who plagued Liverpool at a time when the city was one of the world's greatest and most prosperous seaports. Long hidden in the shadows of the fetid slums and alleyways, the gangs of Liverpool now emerged to take centre stage. Over the following years, the exploits of the Hibernians, the Dead Rabbits and the Finnon Haddie would make them household names. But most feared of all were the High Rip Gang, who announced themselves with the infamous Blackstone Street Murder and went on to terrorise the city center streets as they fought a bitter war with their sworn enemies, the Logwood Gang. Emulating them were juvenile mobs with names, such as the Lemon Street Gang and the Housebreakers Gang.
1877 Walker Art Gallery opened.
1878 St. Domingo's Methodist Church Football Club formed.
1879 St. Domingo Football Club change their name to Everton.
1884 Everton Football Club move to a new ground at Anfield Road.
1886 A Bootle - Everton cup tie is interrupted by crowd trouble. Everton become a founder member of the Football League - their first home match was a 2-1 win over Accrington Stanley, before a crowd of 9.000. Three years later, Everton win the Championship.
1889 Liverpool becomes a County Borough, i.e. administratively it became independent of Lancashire and responsible for its own affairs (or, for the benefit of non-British people, as much of its own affairs as the backward, centralized British Constitution would allow)
1892 Everton begin to play at Goodison Park, after a dispute with the owner of Anfield Road, John Houlding.
1893 Liverpool Overhead Railway opened.
1894 First League match between Liverpool and Everton (they had met before in a cup tie, won by Liverpool). Everton win 2-0 before 44.000 spectators.
1895 Boundary extended to include the rest of West Derby, Wavertree, Toxteth and Walton, trebling the size of the city. The 1901 census gave a population of 685.000.
1898
The whole tramway system came under City Council control
John Brodie became City Engineer. He introduced the first reserved tracks for the tramway.
1901
Population 684,947
Giles Gilbert Scott wins the competition for a design for the new Anglican Cathedral. The central tower was not completed until 1942. It survived the war despite some still-visible damage, and was not fully completed until about 40 years later.
1903 An independent Liverpool University was formed. Previously
it was one component of the Victoria University. The Victoria Building on Brownlow Hill, completed in 1892 and designed by Alfred Waterhouse, was its Headquarters.
1906 Liverpool win the League Championship and Everton win the F.A. Cup
1907
The offices of the Mersey Docks and Harbour Board were completed on the site of
George's Dock which had just been filled in.
This is later joined by the Liver Building and the Cunard Building.
September The Lusitania leaves Liverpool on her maiden voyage.
November The Mauretania, sister ship to the Lusitania sets sail for America.
1909
First British branch of Woolworths opens, in Church Street.
1911
Major strikes
The Liver Building opened - work had started in 1908.
The Royal Liver Company itself apparently had humble
beginnings, selling things like funeral insurance to the working-class. If anyone
died in the workhouse, they was a
good probability that, without this insurance, they would end up being dissected
for medical research.
1913 Meccano factory in Binns Road opened. Meccano had its origins
in 1901, when Frank Hornby's employer took an interest in his product and allowed him some space
in his own works. The firm also started making Dinky Toys and Hornby Model Railways.
In 1979, the Liverpool factory closed down, and the firm was taken over by a French company
based in Calais. Frank Hornby also served briefly as M.P. for Everton.
1915 On 7. May, the Lusitania is sunk as it travels to Liverpool.
The Mersey ferries 1918 In the election, Sinn Fein win Liverpool Exchange. The constituency of Liverpool Scotland was held by the Irish nationalist T.P. O'Connor until 1929.
1928 Dixie Dean, the Everton player, scores a total of 82 goals in the 1927/8 season.
1930
1932 Riot in Birkenhead last for several days.
1934 Mersey Tunnel officially opened - construction
had started in 1925, and it seems to have become available for use from
17 December 1933.
Before opening, about 300.000 people had walked thru it. Apparently, at the time, it was
the longest underwater road tunnel in the world, at 3.2 kilometers.
The government paid half the cost, one quarter came from Liverpool and
Birkenhead and one quarter
was to come from tolls for a period of up to 20 years (the tolls are stilll there).
The tunnel has a maximum depth of 52 meters below the surface at the river, although
around there it is only
about a meter away from the bottom of the river. A lot of the spoil
went to Otterspool and Dingle.
1936 Matt Busby signs for Livepool
1939
Unemployment still double the national average.
Everton win the last Football League Championship before the war suspends the competition.
Brendan Behan arrested for trying to blow up a battleship and sentenced to three years in borstal. 1940s A new estate in Woolfall Heath,
Huyton is used as a detention camp, where poor sods who had been kicked out by Nazi Germany, or left
voluntarily, were banged up almost as criminals (quite a topical issue this).
1940 November. A landmine lands on a shelter in Durning Road Junior Technical School housing 300 people. 166 people were killed.
1941
Anti U-boat measures were controlled from Liverpool, from the basement of Derby House. Previously this work had been done in Plymouth.
Goree Piazzas destroyed in a blitz
May Blitz During May and the first two weeks of June, bombing
took place practically every night - about half the dead and injured due to bombing in the entire war
occurred during this period. This is commonly reported as being some
sort of final action before the invasion of the USSR.
The first week of May seems to have been the
really bad time. Altogether 79 raids took place. 11.000 houses were
destroyed.
Thursday May 1. Low Hill and Cazeneau Street hit badly but it appears the bad weather
hindered the Luftwaffe's plans
Friday May 2. Four / five hours of bombing
Saturday May 3. Bombing from 22.30 until 0500. Lewis's and Blacklers department stores destroyed.
The music section of the William Brown Library was totally wiped out, along with an
estimated 150,000 volumes throughout the entire City Library.
The fire in the Library spread to the neighboring Art Gallery and Museum.
The Central Post Office in Victoria Street was put out of action and all the records
held by the Tax Offices in the India Buildings were destroyed by fire.
The major area of devastation was to
south of Lord Street - this area seems
never to have recovered and become a 'part' of the city again (talking subjectively). In
Huskisson Dock, incendiaries set fire to an ammunition ship, the S.S. Malakand, which
blew up the entire dock and ripped a section out of the Overhead Railway.
Despite this, only four people seem to
have been killed by it - two crew who were trying to scuttle the ship and, tragically,
a newly-married couple whose car was hit by debris. A stray bomb caught a munitions train parked seemingly out of the way in Clubmoor, in the
Forfar Road area. Despite the tragedy of this incident there appears to have been a slightly
comic outcome - when the emergency crews realized they couldn't do much about the
ammunition trucks, they
went about saving
a large cargo of Spam and corned beef.
Mill Road Infirmary was hit, demolishing several of its buildings.
Sunday May 4. Bombing started at midnight and lasted until 04.30
Monday May 5. Bombing again started about midnight. Bold Street/Berry Street area was
particularly hard hit. The bombed-out remains of St. Luke's church remains to this day
as a memorial. A high-explosive bomb appears to have fallen through the roof of the Anglican
Cathedral but was deflected back by a beam. The resulting explosion
caused severe damage to the windows.
Tuesday May 6. Bombing again from midnight. Extensive damage, including
Cooper's shop in Church Street.
Wednesday May 7. Considered to be the worst night after Saturday May 3..
For Bootle, this was their worst night.
Raids continued but not with the same intensity.
1942 Last bombing raid. Apart from
the damage already mentioned, St Nicholas had been gutted, the Customs House
damaged so severely it was demolished. An incendiary came thru the roof of St.
George's Hall but was dealt with quickly by the Fire Brigade. No damage was done
to the Liver Building and its neighbors.
On 18 June, Paul McCartney was born.
1947 Liverpool win the first post-war League Championship.
1955
Liverpool City Council controlled by Labour Party for the first time.
In 1939, the Labour Party had had only one councillor (although, before the war, the system was less-than-democratic. Large numbers oif people had no vote, and many people had more than one vote. This system was abolished in Britain (but not Northern Ireland) by the post-war Labour Government).
Bill Haley appeared at the Odeon, resulting in disturbances in which 150 seats were wrecked.
1957
Last tram runs in September. In 1945 the network extended for about 150km. A new line to the Kirkby Industrial Estate had been built in 1943. From 1934 to 1939, 360 new Green Goddesses had been introduced
1960 Beatles play Hamburg for the first time. Their
impressions in comparison with Hamburg are instructive -
they described Liverpool as 'pockmarked and shagged out' in comparison,
and the 'Reeperbahn was still open while Liverpool was shut'.
Other Liverpool bands follow producing the standard quote :
'The Liverpool beat was born in Hamburg'
.
1962 Liverpool promoted from Second Division, after eight years there.
1964 On 13th August, Peter Allen at Walton Prison, and his accomplice Gwynne Evans at Strangeways, became the last people to be executed in Britain. Around about this same time, Kirkby becomes a pilot area for the introduction of panda cars instead of foot patrols. Legend has it that the shade of blue used for the cars was chosen because the Chief Constable of Lancashire went to either Oxford or Cambridge University (whichever one it was!)
1965 Liverpool win the FA Cup for the first time in their history.
1967 Liverpool Catholic Cathedral consecrated. Work had been started in 1933, with an original plan by Edward Lutyens, although the new cathedral was a major departure from the original plans.
1973 Last ever win in a local election for the Protestant Party.
1981 South End Riots, called the Toxteth Riots by the national media. CS gas used by the police for the first time in Britain. The Central Government respond by announcing a Garden Festival is to be held in Liverpool.
1985 The Council had been taking a strong anti-Thatcher stance, and so was abolished by Thatcher (I state this is in this manner because I think you would have to be very devious to come up with any other explanation). By means of some creative accounting, Labour councillors were also surcharged an appreciable amount.
Further details here
Second World War
Both the Cavern and the Mardi Gras clubs opened. The Mardi Gras in Mount Pleasant (pictured) was a former cinema. The Swinging Blue Jeans became the house band, being managed by Jim Ireland, the owner of the club. Latterly it became known for Northern Soul with resident DJ Billy Butler.
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