Liverpool,
a port on the north bank of the estuary of the Mersey, was first used
as a harbour in the 13th century for sending supplies to Ireland.
Liverpool only had a population of about 22,000 in 1750 but the city
grew rapidly in the second half of the century as a result of the
slave trade and the textile
industry. By the beginning of the 19th century Liverpool had replaced
London as the principal port where cotton
was imported. To cope with this increased traffic, eight new docks
were built between 1815 and 1835.
The early part of the 19th century saw a rapid growth in the trade
between Liverpool and Manchester. The
success of the Stockton & Darlington
railway opened in 1825, convinced Liverpool merchants such as Joseph
Sandars that the city needed a new transport system. Sandars formed
the Liverpool & Manchester Railway Company
and with the help of William James, recruited
George Stephenson as chief engineer.
The Liverpool & Manchester railway
was opened on 15th September, 1830. The railway was a great success.
In 1831 the company transported 445,047 passengers. Receipts were
£155,702 with profits of £71,098. By 1844 receipts had reached
£258,892 with profits of £136,688. During this period shareholders
were regularly paid out an annual dividend of £10 for every £100
invested.
The railway increased the importance of Liverpool as a trading centre.
A new series of docks were built, including the Albert and Stanley
Docks during the 1840s. Large warehouses were also erected and the
dock area eventually spread for 7 miles (11.3 km) along the Mersey
Estuary. The expansion in size of the port also stimulated the growth
of other industries such as marine engineering, clothing manufacture
and food processing. By 1861 the population of Liverpool had reached
444,000.
Atkinson Grimshaw,
Liverpool (1875)
(1)
Daniel Defoe, A Tour Through the Whole
Island of Great Britain (1724)
Liverpool has an opulent, flourishing and
increasing trade to Virginia, and the English island colonies in America.
They trade round the whole island, send ships to Norway, to Hamburg,
and to the Baltic, as also to Holland and Flanders; so they are almost
like the Londoners, universal merchants. There is no town in England,
London excepted, that can equal Liverpool for the fineness of the
streets, the beauty of the buildings; many of the houses are all of
stone and the rest (the new part) of brick.
(2)
Dr. William Duncan, Report
on the Sanitary Condition of Liverpool (1839)
In the streets inhabited by the working classes, I believe that the
great majority are without sewers, and that where they do exist they
are of a very imperfect kind unless where the ground has a natural
inclination, therefore the surface water and fluid refuse of every
kind stagnate in the street, and add, especially in hot weather, their
pestilential influence to that of the more solid filth. With regard
to the courts, I doubt whether there is a single court in Liverpool
which communicates with the street by an underground drain, the only
means afforded for carrying off the fluid dirt being a narrow, open,
shallow gutter, which sometimes exists, but even this is very generally
choked up with stagnant filth.
(2)
Edwin Chadwick, The Sanitary Conditions
of the Labouring Population (1842)
Of the deaths which occurred amongst the labouring classes in Liverpool,
it appears that no less than 62% of the total number were deaths under
five years of age. Even amongst those entered as shopkeepers and tradesmen,
no less than 50% died before they attained that period.
(3)
Ida
Wells visited Liverpool in 1894. She wrote about the experience
in her autobiography, Crusade for Justice (1928)
Liverpool has few
manufacturing interests. Her importance is derived from her situation
as a seaport; her life is purely commercial, and her wealth is derived
from handling the produce of other towns and countries.
Liverpool has learned that she can prosper with out the slave trade
or slave labour. Her docks are crowded with ships from all parts of
the world. And the city, with its population of six hundred thousand
souls, is one of the most prosperous in the United Kingdom.
Her freedom-loving citizens not only subscribe to the doctrine that
human beings regardless of colour or condition are equal before the
law, but they practice what they preach. Here a coloured person can
ride in any sort of conveyance in any part of the country without
being insulted; stop in any hotel or be accommodated at any restaurant
one wishes without being refused with contempt; wander into any picture
gallery, lecture room, concert hall, theatre or church and receive
only the most courteous treatment from officials and fellow sightseers.
(4)
Edwin Chadwick, The Sanitary Conditions
of the Labouring Population (1842)
Average
Age of Death
| Place |
Professional/Gentry |
Tradesmen
|
Labourers |
| Bethnal
Green |
45
|
26
|
16
|
| Bolton |
34
|
23
|
18
|
| Derby |
49
|
38
|
21
|
| Kendal |
45
|
39
|
34
|
| Leeds |
44
|
27
|
19
|
| Liverpool |
35
|
22
|
15
|
| Manchester |
38
|
20
|
17
|
| Wiltshire |
50
|
48
|
33
|
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