Walton Gaol

[Colin Wilkinson]

Walton Gaol 1974Walton Gaol 1930If a gaol was to be built on your street, you would probably care little for the architecture – you would just want to move to another place. Prisons stir up deep emotions and it is unlikely that one would be built in the heart of a residential community. Nevertheless, there [...]

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[hmtmaj]

great pics them Colin.
What was there befor ethe prison ?
probably just farm land !

[wsteve55]

Good pic's Colin! Seeing that you are in "Prison" mode,I just wondered if you have ever come across any pic's,or info' on Liverpool city prison,which was in Great Howard st? This preceded Walton prison,and apparently,was the first purpose built prison,in the world?? It was demolished to make way for rail goods depot/sidings,and was of a radial style construction.There is a Herdman print of the prison,that I've seen,but wether it's demise was before the advent of photography,I dont know!

[scouse smurf]

Nice to see google are above the law.... Walton Prison

[Ged]

And a lot of other photographers Smurfy. Such piffle. I've got pics of it on my site, the LRO have pics - who doesn't if they really want one. Like that time it was said you couldn't photograph in Lime st station yet there's loads of people getting the Ken Dodd/Bessie Braddock statue and like those who said no photographing in the Walker or Museum - the guards move out of the way for me - .

[Colin Wilkinson]

Copyright law is a complex area but legally if a statue is in a public place (i.e. in the street) it is not subject to copyright (it is in the public realm - like a building). However, if it is on private land (i.e Lime Street Station/Walker Art Gallery), copyright does apply and it is a matter for the landowner and the artist as to whether they wish to control access to photographers. In most cases, this is not pursued - but I was caught out at the International Garden Festival in 1984 when I published postcards of all the attractions, including the sculptures. I received two solicitors' letters demanding compensation because artists they represent had their work in view in two postcards. It was settled amicably but the point was that the Garden Festival was not a public place and there was no automatic freedom to publish views without agreement from all parties.

[Samp]

Copyright law is a complex area but legally if a statue is in a public place (i.e. in the street) it is not subject to copyright (it is in the public realm - like a building). However, if it is on private land (i.e Lime Street Station/Walker Art Gallery), copyright does apply and it is a matter for the landowner and the artist as to whether they wish to control access to photographers. In most cases, this is not pursued - but I was caught out at the International Garden Festival in 1984 when I published postcards of all the attractions, including the sculptures. I received two solicitors' letters demanding compensation because artists they represent had their work in view in two postcards. It was settled amicably but the point was that the Garden Festival was not a public place and there was no automatic freedom to publish views without agreement from all parties.

I visited all the Garden Festival sites and took many photographs assfar as I am concerned the copyright is mine.

[Samp]

Does anyone have any information on the gaol that was located in or near Russel Street! this was supposed to have housed french prisoners of war, and may have accounted for them being buried in St Johns Garden, given the location?

[Ged]

Does anyone have any information on the gaol that was located in or near Russel Street! this was supposed to have housed french prisoners of war, and may have accounted for them being buried in St Johns Garden, given the location?

House of Correction (Gaol) Mount Pleasant.



This was on part of the site now occupied by Paddy's Wigwam.
It was built in 1776 (10 years before Great Howard Street).
From 1811 it was used as an asylum for pauper lunatics.
It was demolished in 1852 as the site was needed for an expansion of the Workhouse.


From my source and it's not HP.

[Colin Wilkinson]

I visited all the Garden Festival sites and took many photographs assfar as I am concerned the copyright is mine.

Hi Samp. The copyright of the photograph is certainly yours - but the right to reproduce photos of the sculptures lies with the sculptors. Because the Garden Festival was private land - the artworks were not in the public domain. A complicated legal position but correct (as I found to my cost - I withdrew two postcards rather than pay the rather silly amounts they were requesting as reproduction fees).

[fortinian]

re: The Gaol on Great Howard Street

As you probably know, Liverpools first Gaol was Liverpool Tower. The tower (shown in the picture below) was built largely in the 15th century and by the mid-1700s was in such a bad state that prisoners frequently escaped. There is still a small alleyway, next to St Nicholas church called Prison Weint.



In 1774 the tower was condemned and plans were stared to build a new 'modern' gaol. It was to be based on Newgate prison in London and one of the consultants on the scheme was John Howard - a great prison reformer who helped to make prison conditions better right across the UK. His name is commemorated in Liverpool in the name of the street that was built for the new gaol - Great Howard Street. From Wikimedia Commons

In 1793 the gaol was still not finished but 4000 french POWs were incarcerated there It wasn't until 1811 that it was finally used for prisoners of the city. The prison was designed with a cenral block with six radiating wings. This style was called the 'seperate-system' and was (according to Wikipedia) pioneered at the Eastern State Penitentiary, Pennsylvania USA in 1829. (shown below) From Wikimedia Commons

Here is a drawing of Great Howard Street from by WG Herdman in 1856.
From BM Collection

Its claim for being the 'first purpose built prison' sounds rather grand, but it is certainly an earlier example of the 'separate-system' prison than the Eastern State Pen and may be the first of that type.

I doubt there is a photo of it, looking at my maps from about 1865 it seems to have gone by then and Kirkdale Prison has been built.

[dazza]

Nice work fortinian,

Attached - the 1848 OS map, although I expect this is much later, as new railway lines and major alternations were included in 1864. I've pasted the prison [from an earlier map] onto this one for context. The entrance was directly opposite Neptune Street.

Not much evidence of the prison today except for the railway line to exchange station which had to detour around the prison when it was originally laid out. Great Howard Street Goods Station was later built on the site.



Also, Ackerman's 1847 view [copied from Liverpool - A People's History] originally sourced from LRO.

[dazza]

Did anyone spot the mistake on the coloured image above?

[wsteve55]

Thanks for the pic's, and info', Fortinian,and Dazza! I Noticed the interesting difference in design, from a square radial type,to an octagonal one,and wonder which one is true?

[fortinian]

If you mean the square one in my post - that isn't Great Howard Street. That is Eastern State Penitentiary, Pennsylvania USA. I used the image as an example of a hub-and-spoke prison.

The general concensus is that the Eastern State Penitentiary (built in 1829) was the first of this type. Dazza's research clearly shows this claim to be erreneous as Great Howard Street Gaol is clearly a hub-and-spoke design and pre-dates the Eastern State Penitentiary by at least twenty years.

According to David Brazendales notes in 'Georgian Liverpool a guide to the city in 1797' John Hope was given the task of preparing plans for a gaol based on Londons Newgate - just having been rebuilt in 1770. Newgate was not built as a hub-and-spoke prison so I can only assume that Hope's initial design was rejected for Howards design - although this is not made clear in the text.

I'm having difficulty finding an earlier prison with the hub-and-spoke design... so perhaps Liverpool really does have the claim to the worlds first 'modern prison'. I mentioned the 'separate-state' system before, and can find no mention of this sytem relating to Great Howard Street.