From a drawing by W. G. Herdman, in the possession of Messrs. Rankin, Gilmour and Co.. Ltd.
IT was in 1668 that Caryl, Lord Molyneux, cut a road through the Castle orchard to enable his tenants to gain access to the Great Heath. His scheme was opposed by the Liverpool Corporation, and Professor Ramsay Muir in his interesting “History of Liverpool” states: ”When his servants began to build a bridge at the busy junction of our day where Lord Street joins Church Street, they were met by forcible resistanc : the Mayor pulled the bridge down and confiscated the wood and stones. Lord Molyneux responded by a whole series of actions-at-law, in which the question of the right of ownership of the waste, as well as many other questions were raised.”
However, in the end a compromise was effected, and Lord Molyneux Street, or Lord’s Lane, as it was first called, became a thoroughfare. Afterwards it was called Molyneux’s Lane, but as the traffic along it increased, and shops were erected on either side, the lane was paved, then lighted, and the importance of the thoroughfare established by the bestowal of the present name of Lord Street.
The Molyneux family occupied a house on the north side of the street, and in 1781 William Roscoe resided with his father at 51 Lord Street. It also possessed two famous inns, the Castle Hotel and the Brown Cow Tavern. Perhaps it was at one of these inns that Samuel Derrick dined, for he writes in 1760: “There are at Liverpool three good inns. For tenpence a man dines elegantly at an ordinary consisting of ten, or a dozen dishes.” In 1811 Egerton Smith established the Liverpool Mercury, then a weekly paper, and in 1827 the office was at 76 Lord Street. The original width of the street was about that of the present Cable Street, but in the year 1826 it was widened at a cost of about £170,000.
The view shows the street as it was in 1798, between Doran’s Lane and Whitechapel.
Bibliography
Muir, Ramsay, et al. Bygone Liverpool. Liverpool: Young, 1913. Internet Archive online version of a copy in the University of Toronto Library. Web. 29 September 2022.
Last modified 28 September 2022