Historical Liverpool Dwellings - Broad Green Hall

The picture above is a post card of Rocky Lane looking downwards from Childwall Priory Road (later Queens Drive) towards Bowring Park Road. It really was rocky and it really was a lane, a typical country lane with hedgerows and sandstone banks. The farm there was known as Pye’s farm and in the 1910s the Pye’s had been there for over seventy years but it’s 'proper' name was Rocky Lane Farm. The wall on the left is of the grounds of Broad Green Hall and the entrance to it was higher up, just beyond Laburnum Cottage which was on the opposite side of the lane. Behind that cottage was Childwall Gas Works with a small gasometer. Broad Green Hall itself was a picturesque black and white cottage, near Childwall, initially owned by John Chorley, a Tanner in Prescot and owner of the Tan House, who married Ellen Leather in Prescot on the 21st of March 1762. In a Coroner's report it was detailed that 'A husbandman fell into 'one of the lyme pits' in "the tan house yard of John Chorley a Prescott gent. 'When rescued, he 'appeared to be in a fit', and died later 'by the lyme water he then and there received or took into his body'. John sold the property to a Mr Thomas Staniforth on the 30th of January 1789. Thomas Staniforth was the son of Samuel Staniforth and Alethea Macro of Darnall Hall, Sheffield. He was born on the 27th of March, 1735 and, following the death of his parents when he was still a teenager, he was raised by his sister Elizabeth, and her husband John Travers Younge. Seven months after his mother’s death, Thomas was sent to Liverpool to work under Mr. Charles Goore, a merchant and (at that time) future Lord Mayor. Thomas remained apprenticed to Charles until the 3rd of February, 1758 when he was aged 21. Thomas obviously caught the attention of Mr. Goore's daughter, as on the 12th of June, 1760, Thomas Staniforth married Elizabeth Goore at St. Thomas' Church, Liverpool. Here in Liverpool he would remain for most of his life and where he took part in the slave trade along with his son Samuel. In 1771, at the age of 71, Charles Goore began to construct a house on Ranelagh Street, which at the time was located on the outskirts of the town. His daughter and son-in-law would also reside here. In 1796 Thomas was chosen for the role of Bailiff, and the following year, he followed in his father-in-law's footsteps and was elected Lord Mayor of Liverpool. Thomas passed away on the 15th of December, 1803 of a low fever which he was suffering from for several days. His wife was suffering from the same fever and the funeral was postponed due to the assumption that she would soon pass and there would be need for a double funeral. Mrs. Staniforth recovered however, and went onto survive another 18 years.

Ranelagh Street in 1825

In the course of the following summer Mrs. Staniforth left her house in Ranelagh Street, of which her son took possession on the 17th of August, 1804, and went to reside at Broad Green Hall. Until this time it had only been used as an occasional favourite country residence, where they went when they wished to get away from the bustle of the town, which was expanding fast and following them to their once country mansion in Ranelagh Street. During the sixteen years which Mr. Staniforth enjoyed the place, he had considerably improved it, and in 1796 he added to the house an excellent dining room. For twelve years after the death of her husband Mrs. Staniforth made Broad Green Hall her constant residence and in 1813 the Ranelagh Street house was let by Mr. Staniforth’s son for the Waterloo Hotel, familiarly known as Lynn's; its exact situation is now part of the main entrance to Central Railway Station. It opened in 1818 and was the first building in Liverpool to be known as a 'Hotel' and was described as one of the most popular hostelries in Great Britain. In November 1816, Mrs Staniforth was induced to leave Broad Green Hall and go to her son's house, who had for two years been living at Walton Breck, near Everton. Following the death of his father Mr. Samuel Staniforth gradually withdrew from mercantile affairs and, in 1813, accepted the situation of Head Distributor of Stamps in Liverpool, which he retained until 1849, two years before his death. In 1845, he sold Broad Green to a Dr. Brandreth, by whom the house would be greatly enlarged and altered.

Thomas Brandreth senior lived at Lees and later at Ormskirk, where some of his children were born and he was a wealthy man. The Brandreths had a high social standing in the community that allowed them to marry into families of high regard that carried their own coat-of-arms. Thomas and Mary Brandreth had several sons and daughters including Thomas junior who was born at Ormskirk and married Alice Lamb. He was a qualified medical doctor and the family initially lived at Ormskirk and later in Liverpool having several sons and daughters. There was Elizabeth and her brothers Thomas, Joseph, James, a solicitor who resided in Liverpool and was married to Margaret Tomlinson, and William, who became a merchant in Liverpool and married Elizabeth Chappell. Joseph in 1780 was appointed to the staff of the Liverpool Infirmary where he served for the next 30 years and in the same year of his appointment, he married Catherine Pilkington of Anderton, the daughter of John Pilkington and Catherine Shaw.The discovery of the remedy to apply cold water or cloth in fever treatment is attributed to Joseph Brandreth. The Brandreth family lived at Broad Green Hall and the children of Joseph and Catherine Brandreth were Joseph Pilkington, a medical doctor like his father, who married Alice Harper on 28 June 1810. His wife was the daughter and co-heir of William Harper of Davenham Hall, Davenham, Cheshire. Their marriage produced seven children. The Brandreth family having resided at Broad Green Hall later moved to 45 Rodney Street where they lived for 20 years. For much of that time Joseph's younger brother Thomas was his neighbour, residing at 43 Rodney Street and who married Harriet Byrom on 4 February 1822. Thomas qualified as a barrister, and in 1829 made history when he participated in the first ever locomotive trials during the 6th to 14th of October 1829 at Rainhill by pitting his Cycloped, a horse-powered locomotive against four steam locomotives, Novelty, Perseverance, Rocket and Sans Pareil. Wrigley’s one-horse powered engine did not get far, when the horse fell through the wooden treadmill at the start of the race. In 1913 Broad Green Hall, with its associated outbuildings, yard and plantation, was described as 'architecturally one of the most beautiful halls in the neighbourhood'.