Referring back to Pinz's thoughts and memories, I can as a child remember flooding and a fast flowing Fender, obviously after heavy rainfall, anyone who tried to play football or rugby on the bottom pitches at Woodchurch school or the community center will testify to that, knee deep in mud springs to mind. As the coastal defences where well in place by then, that flooding was caused by the water coming from up high, Noctorum, Oxton, etc. All that is not getting the baby washed. Back to the Main Fender/Birket, I've always assumed it was a natural water course which led to the River Fender/ Ford Brook, or should that be the Fjord Brook. If the name Fender was used for a defensive barrier and not as a natural river name, am i being silly thinking its being suggested it was dug out by some medieval navvies. If so, when the break through came about and connection to the Birket, the whole stretch adopted the name Birket. As for the Ford Brook being changed to The River Fender, is the river named after the valley it sits in or is the valley named after the river that flows through it?
God help us, Come yourself, Don't send Jesus, This is no place for children.
Interesting to note that information. Is there evidence of such constructions along the course of the River Fender? Moreover is a date known for such banks?
With you on those questions, it is, to my albeit limited knowledge, unusual for a river to be named at some medieval/post-medieval or even later period, and then after an artificial construction. More so when considering that other nearby rivers, equally prone to flood, retained an original name unconnected with river management. As to naming, my understanding is a valley takes its name from the river, hence Wye Valley etc
This has been a fascinating and informative thread. My interest is in the Birket/Fender (I don’t know the Ford/Fender area well enough to comment. I've done a bit of reading up and would like to throw in my two penn’orth.
From what I’ve read here and found in old books I’ve come round to the idea that the name Fender was descriptive of its purpose rather than a river name, i.e. that it was an ancient sea defence and outfall (see the posts by geekus) based on a stream which conveniently emptied into Wallasey Pool. In his book ‘A History of Wirral’ Stephen Roberts states “The river was named Birket after Birkenhead by the Ordnance Survey in the 19th century. Its course has been altered by man, but the strange way in which it runs parallel to the north coast, rather than emptying into the Irish Sea, is thought to be natural and a result of the sand-dune barrier”. I have been unable to find any old maps with it being called the River Fender (17th and 18th century maps seem to show rivers without naming them). The only time Fender is shown, is on the early 19th century map provided by bertione when it is called ‘The Main Fender’. Again, could this be descriptive – if it was a river name, why ‘Main’ when at that time there was no other River Fender on the Wirral?
If Roberts is right and the Ordnance Survey named the river The Birket after Birkenhead (incidentally the river is variously called Birkett, Birken and Birkin in subsequent documents), the questions are when? and why? The earliest reference I can find was written in 1838: “From the confined nature of the Hundred of Wirral there is only one stream of any importance, and that is very small; it has however obtained the name of the Birkin; it rises at Newton Carr, and runs along Bidston Marsh, to which it forms a drain falling into Wallasey Pool.” (A Flora of Liverpool, by T.B. Hall).
Shortly before he wrote this, there had been a major development – the building of the Wallasey Embankment which started in 1829, “to prevent the low-lying lands of Meols, Moreton, Leasowe, Bidston and Overchurch from inundation by the sea in consequence of the continual erosion of the sand dunes and the injury likely to arise therefrom to the Port of Liverpool” (Rise and Progress of Wallasey). It could be that from this date the Main Fender was no longer required for its defensive purposes and its name became irrelevant and inappropriate. After perhaps many centuries as a fender, it then reverted to being a rather insignificant river that had no name and Ordnance Survey created one.
I have not been able to find any specific references to ‘our’ Fender prior to the 19th century. However, along with many other duties, the Wallasey Improvement Act of 1845 gave responsibility to the Commissioners for main drainage. Two of the drains were fixed as “one of which to follow the ancient fence dividing the said tract called Wallasey Pasture from the Wallasey Leasowe; and one running in a southwardly direction to the ancient fender or watercourse running from Newton Carr towards Wallasey”. Note the ‘ancient’, and ‘fender’ spelt without a proper name capital letter.
That there had been problems with flooding and coastal erosion in this area is not in doubt. In a report made by William Chapman in 1813 he states that the first embankment (or ‘slope wall’) had been built in 1794 and this had needed replacing two or three times, each time further inland. An interesting comment in his report which might be relevant was “The winds and tides in October last year [1812], with only a 16-ft tide, tore up the last slope wall, constructed to defend the shore, and not only prostrated that work but advanced upon the land from ten to twelve yards for an extent of nearly 2,000 yards. This overflow, had it not been for the short period at which the tide continued at its height, would have perfectly inundated the low grounds. As it was, considerable damage was occasioned, and the water on the fall of the tide passed off through the sluices into Wallasey Pool”. The last sentence is particularly interesting as it seems to indicate that a water management or control scheme was in place.
Another interesting comment is contained in a letter from Sir Edward Cust (who lived in Leasowe Castle and must have been affected by flooding) to the Mayor of Liverpool in 1828. The letter was written to try to get the Liverpool Corporation interested in building an embankment at Leasowe on the basis that floodwaters were carrying silt into the Mersey via Wallasey Pool which could have a detrimental effect on the shipping channels in the Mersey which Liverpool depended on for its existence. He talks about “…the common danger…from the great dip of the land towards ‘The Fender’ [the apostrophes are his] which would convey any irruption of waters into the Mersey”.
It could be that the position of the Main Fender, running parallel to the coast and feeding into Wallasey Pool, had been used from early times as a defence against flooding and perhaps as part of an early land reclamation scheme (when did Overchurch stop being ‘The Church on the Shore’?) . Later, as the natural defences - the sandhills - became more eroded and flooding more regular, the fender was gradually strengthened and upgraded to initially prevent the spread of flooding and then to channel the water to Wallasey Pool via Warrington’s Bridge where it is known that a system of sluices had been in place since about 1738.
A lot of this is, of course, conjecture and hopefully other older resources will come to light. Still, it’s been an interesting exercise to keep the old grey cells of an armchair historian working!
An excellent post Nightwalker and like all the posts in this thread, very informative and plausible, my thoughts now go to the present day River Fender (Ford Brook), dare we suggest this River was named after an ancient embankment or purley coincidental. In fact, we still don't know why the name changed in the first place, more research i fear.
God help us, Come yourself, Don't send Jesus, This is no place for children.
Well for sure that's an option, there are equally tempting possible origins, meanwhile if defensive river banks are the source of the name, is there evidence to be found for such structures along the course of the river? Also do we know any documentation, historical or archeological that testifies to when such structures were raised?
Floodgates are clearly shown on the 1665 map, located at the upper reaches of Wallasey Pool (roughly in the area of Reeds Bridge/Leasowe Common). They are specifically labelled as 'Floodgates'.
A number of other structures are also visible crossing the watercourse at regular intervals between Leasowe and Moreton but these are not labelled.
The map is generally accepted as dating from 1665 but some copies bare a cartouche with the date 1656.
Apart from more obvious coast-based defences, no indication of embankments, or similar noted by that map along the course of the river itself, more inland?
...I only have a very poor quality photocopy of the Wallasey & Leasowe parts of the estate map. Can't see any indication of embankments but there are one or two fairly large ditches - one of which is labelled 'Moore Ditch' and is shown located directly between what is now Leasowe Castle and the township of Moreton. One of the gate-like structures shown across the watercourse is indicated just before this ditch. I wonder if the name Moore Ditch indicates that this was Moreton's ditch?
A large part of Bidston is shown enclosed by walls. It's common knowledge, of course, that Bidston had an ancient deer park.
The ancient fence mentioned by nightwalker may possibly have been a feature of the Wallasey Race Course which existed in the 18th Century and which stretched between Wallasey Village & Leasowe. This fence is clearly shown on a later map of Wallasey from 1735.
I do, however, recall seeing indications of an 'ancient' embankment around the Bidston end of Wallasey Pool, shown on some of the early plans for the enclosure of the Pool. I can't recall off the top of my head exactly which plans they are but, if I remember I'll let you all know another time.
just registered/logged on haven't worked out how to use the site yet. I am doing some local history with children. Do you have anything on The Mount big house which I understand stood at the top of the hill on Mount Road and/or can you tell me what was on the corner plot of Hamilton Road before Mount Primary was built in the early 1950'x Any help would be well received,
..'s excellent web-site of old Wallasey includes many interesting old photographs of the area. Just noticed one particular one of Leasowe (taken from the top of Leasowe Lighthouse) which shows a property named Bankfield House. It's only a stone's throw from the Birket, so I can't help but wonder if the house was named after an earlier field named the 'Bank Field'? In which case, this may provide some of the evidence you're looking for concerning flood defences.
Some excellent work being done on this ladies and gentlemen thank you,I've just been catching up,I do remember the "Fender" from the railway bridge,Woodchurch rd to Upton when I was a lad it was a natural watercourse,with natural banks, it was then about three feet from the water to the top of the bank with the water about 6" in summer,it varied from about 4ft to 10ft wide,apart from further towards Upton by the railway footbridge it was higher due to a hillock and had running water even in a hot summer,I can remember in the seventies I think ,they used one of those drag line cranes and deepened and widened it out of all recognition, not sure if they carried on all the way,as that time I was elsewhere and was just visiting.
