The Leeds to Liverpool Canal, by Bill Froggatt - November 11th 2024
Forgive the writer of these notes for the slightly scattergun format, I was writing in near darkness so that we could see the excellent images on the screen. We learned that Bill is a Heritage Advisor to the Canal and Rivers Trust (CART), which looks after 2000 miles of canal. One of his biggest quests is to “keep the water in”.
He said they had to look after over 3000 bridges, and sometimes felt that they were more of a road authority as much as a canal one. Repairs to bridges must be done virtually immediately, as you can’t “cut a community in half”. Bill said that “they were continually firefighting repairs, with limited financial resources”. He gave us an example of what can happen, a person hires a narrow boat for a week, with no boating experience, sets off and then rams a set of lock gates! They have 15,000 locks to look after, as well as 2,700 listed buildings. So, it is a daunting task, not for the faint hearted.
Bill was pleased that wildlife is coming back to canals, in a way that he never thought possible, only recently he had seen an otter in a downtown Burnley canal. Peel Ports have been known to boast that they own the oldest canal in the UK. But of course, the oldest is the Sankey, part of which CART owns.
What caught my eye in one of Bill’s early images was the list of members of the “canal committee” (Liverpool end!), “Usual suspects” instantly came to mind, (many tobacco importers), I’ll list them, they’ll ring a bell with some of you: - William Davenport, William James, Clayton Case, Thomas Ryan, Alexandra Nottingham, Thomas Earle, John Sparling, John Tarleton, Thoams Case, John Walker, Jonathan Blundell, Benjamin Heywood, and Thomas Faulkner. Sir Thomas Johnson MP promoted the canal idea in Parliament.
The reason for building the canal was to move coal to where it could be used, especially in salt production, also to heat houses, work pumps etc. and in the opposite direction limestone could be sent to where it could be heated to make lime as fertilizer.
The Leeds Liverpool Canal took a long time to build and join up the two ends! There were two committees on the project, a Lancashire / Liverpool one and a Yorkshire one.
Bill told us that the first part of the canal from Liverpool was built with wooden swing bridges which were cheap to build but expensive to maintain and operate. The later stage of the canal used stone bridges, which was specified in the act of parliament for that section of the canal. In the 1780’s progress on the canal nearly stopped since the Americans wouldn’t sell cotton to the British (as we were at war with them!) much of the finance for the canal was from cotton “barons”.
We learned that in 1940 pill boxes were built along the whole of the canal, mainly facing Northwest. It was feared a German land assault would take place on the flat lands from Formby up to the River Ribble. Some canal side buildings can still be seen today that have had windows blocked up and gun ports made. This line of defence was announced in 1940 and would be manned by the LDV. Do readers recall what LDV became? (Local Defence Volunteers became the Home Guard, on Churchill’s instruction).
We were told that the reason why Exchange Station Liverpool came in on an embankment was to enable it to get over the canal. I never knew that!
The canal lost its last major contract for moving coal in the terrible winter of 1963 when the canals all froze over and hauliers’ customers discovered that road transport was in some ways more reliable, and quicker. From that time on the leisure industry became the principal users of the canal.
And so ended the talk which seemed to last only minutes as it was so interesting. The speaker answered questions very patiently and then made his way back home to Saltaire.
Forgive the writer of these notes for the slightly scattergun format, I was writing in near darkness so that we could see the excellent images on the screen. We learned that Bill is a Heritage Advisor to the Canal and Rivers Trust (CART), which looks after 2000 miles of canal. One of his biggest quests is to “keep the water in”.
He said they had to look after over 3000 bridges, and sometimes felt that they were more of a road authority as much as a canal one. Repairs to bridges must be done virtually immediately, as you can’t “cut a community in half”. Bill said that “they were continually firefighting repairs, with limited financial resources”. He gave us an example of what can happen, a person hires a narrow boat for a week, with no boating experience, sets off and then rams a set of lock gates! They have 15,000 locks to look after, as well as 2,700 listed buildings. So, it is a daunting task, not for the faint hearted.
Bill was pleased that wildlife is coming back to canals, in a way that he never thought possible, only recently he had seen an otter in a downtown Burnley canal. Peel Ports have been known to boast that they own the oldest canal in the UK. But of course, the oldest is the Sankey, part of which CART owns.
What caught my eye in one of Bill’s early images was the list of members of the “canal committee” (Liverpool end!), “Usual suspects” instantly came to mind, (many tobacco importers), I’ll list them, they’ll ring a bell with some of you: - William Davenport, William James, Clayton Case, Thomas Ryan, Alexandra Nottingham, Thomas Earle, John Sparling, John Tarleton, Thoams Case, John Walker, Jonathan Blundell, Benjamin Heywood, and Thomas Faulkner. Sir Thomas Johnson MP promoted the canal idea in Parliament.
The reason for building the canal was to move coal to where it could be used, especially in salt production, also to heat houses, work pumps etc. and in the opposite direction limestone could be sent to where it could be heated to make lime as fertilizer.
The Leeds Liverpool Canal took a long time to build and join up the two ends! There were two committees on the project, a Lancashire / Liverpool one and a Yorkshire one.
Bill told us that the first part of the canal from Liverpool was built with wooden swing bridges which were cheap to build but expensive to maintain and operate. The later stage of the canal used stone bridges, which was specified in the act of parliament for that section of the canal. In the 1780’s progress on the canal nearly stopped since the Americans wouldn’t sell cotton to the British (as we were at war with them!) much of the finance for the canal was from cotton “barons”.
We learned that in 1940 pill boxes were built along the whole of the canal, mainly facing Northwest. It was feared a German land assault would take place on the flat lands from Formby up to the River Ribble. Some canal side buildings can still be seen today that have had windows blocked up and gun ports made. This line of defence was announced in 1940 and would be manned by the LDV. Do readers recall what LDV became? (Local Defence Volunteers became the Home Guard, on Churchill’s instruction).
We were told that the reason why Exchange Station Liverpool came in on an embankment was to enable it to get over the canal. I never knew that!
The canal lost its last major contract for moving coal in the terrible winter of 1963 when the canals all froze over and hauliers’ customers discovered that road transport was in some ways more reliable, and quicker. From that time on the leisure industry became the principal users of the canal.
And so ended the talk which seemed to last only minutes as it was so interesting. The speaker answered questions very patiently and then made his way back home to Saltaire.
