Historic Liverpool Dwellings - Beaconsfield & Stoneleigh

Prior to 1805, Woolton Hill was common land where people grazed their animals, Gateacre Brow and Beaconsfield Rd were no more than a track over this hill. The 1805 Enclosure Act allowed plots of land on the common to be reallocated,with the local gentry and wealthy merchants acquiring the best plots. Ambrose Lace, a merchant and ship-owner of St. Paul's Square, Liverpool was one of the most prominent slave traders and merchants in Liverpool in the last half of the 18th century. In June 1767, he was involved in what became known as the massacre at Old Calabar. His son Joshua Lace, was born in 1805 and became an Attorney-at-Law and founder and first president of the Liverpool Law Society in 1827.

An article in Liverpool Law magazine

In 1833 the deed for Plot 11, which Joshua purchased for 5 shillings for the site of just under 5 acres, was given to his solicitor son Ambrose. The younger Ambrose Lace was born at Throstle Nest, Belle Vale Road in 1792 and he built Beaconsfield in 1833 and, with its many chimneys and prospect tower, was one of the grandest houses in Woolton. It is assumed that Ambrose called the house and access road 'Beaconsfield' due to its proximity to the beacon on Woolton Hill. Ambrose also bought the adjoining site of 2¼ acres in 1847 and built two cottages as his new entrance lodge. They still exist today as Grade 2 listed buildings, Numbers 35 and 37 Beaconsfield Road. Ambrose died in 1870 aged 77. From the 1911 census the head of the household was now a local cotton broker named Paul Henry Hemelryk. As well as being in the cotton trade he was also a Lieutenant Colonel in the British armed forces. He lived at Beaconsfield with his wife Dorothy and his five children – Dorothea (6), Richard (5), Jean Marie (3) and Audrey (aged 6months). Paul and Dorothy were 35 and 28 years old respectively in 1911. On the census there were two visitors in the property at the time and the return was completed by Mr Hemelryk himself, but in the property there were also a total of six staff to cater for the family’s needs. The main house Beaconsfield was demolished in 1933 and the coachman's cottage is the only original building of 1833 surviving today as the present dwelling was constructed from the coachman's house and stables. This pair of houses are stone with slate roof, 2 storeys high with an attic and 3 x 3 bays with Quoins and 2 gables with mullioned and canted windows.
 

Stoneleigh

 

Stoneleigh is another situated nearby built as Fortfield House for Barton Wrigley in 1888/89 also from Woolton stone. This was connected to the big house long gone now, Beaconsfield, and was either a lodge or dower house which is where an elderly relative would have perhaps lived. It is now covered with Virginia creeper and is quite a substantial house. Born in 1832, Barton Wrigley married Margaret Moon on the 18th of April 1855 in Walton on the Hill, Liverpool. After he moved to Elm Hall, Wavertree two brothers lived there called Pilkington, Thomas and George, who were related to the St. Helens Glass making family. George was a Chemical manufacturer and a JP for Lancashire. There's an interesting clock on the mews where the coachman would have been able to see if he was on time when he was leaving to collect one of the Pilkington brothers in the coach. 

http://www.thefootballvoice.com/2023/01/historic-liverpool-dwellings-bank-hall.html