Category: History - Other

Liverpool a few years since: by an old stager

Old Coaches. Macadam. Coachmen. The Umpire. The 164 Bang-up. Pleasures of travelling on the old roads. Hours kept by our grandfathers and grandmothers. Visiting. Sedan Chairs. Routs. Going out and going home

Chapters

48. CHAPTER XXV.

There must be many old stagers still surviving amongst us who can remember the two managers of the Theatre Royal, Messrs. Knight and Lewis. The latter was the father of Mr. Thom...

46. CHAPTER XXIII.

Our shops frequented by the fashionables were “few and far between” in those old times. We had not then reached the bustling age of competition, colossal plate-glass windows, an...

45. CHAPTER XXII.

An election was an election, indeed, in those days. It was not merely a rush to the hustings for a few short hours, and then all over. There was no getting the lead by ten o’clo...

40. CHAPTER XVII.

We have spoken in a former chapter of the oil lamps, which, “few and far between,” just made darkness visible, and of the old watchmen, who were supposed or not supposed to be t...

41. CHAPTER XVIII.

Whether we consider the magnificence of its estate, the amount of its revenue, or the extent of its influence, the Liverpool Corporation might ever be compared to a German princ...

42. CHAPTER XIX.

The Church, in the days we are speaking of, was in a very torpid and sleepy state, not only in Liverpool, but throughout the land. None of the evangelical clergy had then appear...

43. CHAPTER XX.

The two rectors of those old days were the Rev. Samuel Renshaw and the Rev. R. H. Roughsedge. They were both men past the meridian of life, at the earliest period to which our r...

47. CHAPTER XXIV.

Travelling was both a difficult and a dangerous operation in former days. We do not know when a direct communication by coach between Liverpool and London was first established;...

35. CHAPTER XII.

Some people have very strange notions of the duties of the historian and the biographer. They fancy that our part is to suppress or distort the truth, and to substitute flattery...

39. CHAPTER XVI.

It would be a strange picture of “Liverpool a few years since” which did not exhibit Mr. (afterwards Sir) John Gladstone in the foreground of the canvas. He had, in those early...

36. CHAPTER XIII.

Among the great West Indian merchants of the days we are writing of, we must not forget to place the James and France families. The representative of the latter resides at Bosto...

38. CHAPTER XV.

A little back from Water-street, between it and St. Nicholas’s Church, stood an ancient Tower in those days. It was one of the remaining antiquities of Liverpool. It had origina...

34. CHAPTER XI.

Liverpool society, like that of every other place, has always been divided into sets; how formed, by what mysterious line separated into divisions and sub-divisions, and section...

44. CHAPTER XXI.

We spoke, in the last chapter, of St. George’s as the church which the mayor and corporation always attended. Once, when Mr. Jonas Bold was Mayor, it happened that Prince Willia...

37. CHAPTER XIV.

In our last chapter we mentioned the names of some of the wits and illustrious in jest of whom Liverpool could boast a few years since. We now descend the scale, to speak of a c...

32. CHAPTER IX.

In Mount Pleasant lived, in those good old times, Sir George Dunbar, the representative of an ancient race in Scotland, and a model gentleman, both in appearance and manners. He...

31. CHAPTER VIII.

In Rodney-street, likewise, lived Fletcher Raincock, one of the most remarkable characters of his day. He had few equals in a legal capacity, and no superiors in literary attain...

33. CHAPTER X.

He who undertakes to be the chronicler of Liverpool society at the commencement, and in the early years, of the present century, must not forget to mention the old and respectab...

30. CHAPTER VII.

A little higher up than Colonel Bolton’s, but on the same side of Duke-street, stood the noble palace mansion of Moses Benson, one of the merchant princes of the old times of wh...

28. CHAPTER V.

We spoke, in our last chapter, of the false alarms by which the soldiers forming our garrison were once or twice called together in the night, to try their zeal and alacrity; an...

25. CHAPTER II.

But the peace of which we spoke in our last chapter was nothing but a hollow and armed truce, which gave both parties time to breathe for a few months. England was suspicious. N...

26. CHAPTER III.

We spoke of the old guardship, the “Princess,” in our last chapter. Many and many a time have we walked on her deck, until we thought that we ourselves might grow into a Nelson,...

29. CHAPTER VI.

We have already said that, in the days of which we are speaking, the Cheshire side of the Mersey, now bridged to us by steam, was a _terra incognita_ to the general inhabitants...

27. CHAPTER IV.

But when the war, at the beginning of the century, was renewed with Napoleon, the preparations against him were not confined to the water. We had not only our guardship in the r...

23. CHAPTER XXV.

This little volume has been twice published, and this issue of it is in ready response to the “third time of asking” by an appreciating public, largely, as we imagine, made up o...

24. CHAPTER I.

We are not great at statistics. We do not pretend to be accurate to an hour in dates, chronology, and so forth. We write, indeed, entirely from memory, and therefore may perhaps...

22. CHAPTER XXIV.

Old Coaches. Macadam. Coachmen. The Umpire. The 164 Bang-up. Pleasures of travelling on the old roads. Hours kept by our grandfathers and grandmothers. Visiting. Sedan Chairs. R...

15. CHAPTER XVII.

18. CHAPTER XX.

16. CHAPTER XVIII.

21. CHAPTER XXIII.

12. CHAPTER XIV.

19. CHAPTER XXI.

1. CHAPTER I.

13. CHAPTER XV.

17. CHAPTER XIX.

5. CHAPTER V.

20. CHAPTER XXII.

6. CHAPTER VI.

10. CHAPTER XII.

9. CHAPTER IX.

8. CHAPTER VIII.

14. CHAPTER XVI.

2. CHAPTER II.

4. CHAPTER IV.

7. CHAPTER VII.

3. CHAPTER III.

11. CHAPTER XIII.