Liverpool County Sessions House was built between 1882 and 1884 to house the Quarter Sessions for the West Derby Hundred of the county of Lancaster. The coat of arms of the County appears in the pediment over the main entrance.
The Quarter Sessions was a court in which cases involving non-capital offences were tried by magistrates. Cases of this type were heard at the policy court in Basnett Street and at the Kirkdale Sessions House attached to Kirkdale gaol. The Prison Act of 1877 transferred prisons like Kirkdale from local authority control to the state and a new home had to be found for the Sessions. Until the new Sessions House opened in Islington. They court was housed temporarily in St George's hall the magistrates held their first meeting here on Monday 4th August 1884.