catsmate
No longer the 1
- Joined
- Apr 9, 2007
- Messages
- 37,158
Joseph Williamson, the "Mad Mole of Edge Hill" was born in Yorkshire in 1769, the son of a glassmaker. He became a successful businessman in Liverpool in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, mainly in the field of tobacco products, and was quite wealthy. He was also rather eccentric (in the great tradition of such men), a philanthropist and friend to people as different as the engineer George Stephenson and the philosopher James Martineau.
In 1818 be retired from his business interests and gave full reign to his rather odd hobby (especially after his wife's death in 1822); he created a labyrinth of tunnels, underground halls and other subterranean works, extending for several kilometres under the Edge Hill district of Liverpool, much of which he owned. The ranged from about 3 metres under the surface to more than fifteen, all well constructed and brick lined and averaging about a metre wide and two high. There are larger rooms; the one known as the the "banqueting hall" is more than twenty metres long and 6-8m high.
Exactly why he did all this isn't known; explanations have ranged from weird occult rituals and preparations for the impending apocalypse (very unlikely) to a simply eccentric hobby to a philanthropic project to provide work (in the aftermath of the end of the Napoleonic Wars there was a glut of labour in Britain).
After Williamson died in 1840 the work ceased and by the late 1860s the tunnels became rather a nuisance, with drains emptying into them and people using them to dump refuse, leading the city government to engage in filling them with rubble. They were generally forgotten about until the the early twentieth century when soldiers from the West Lancashire Territorial Forces Association, whose drill hall in Mason Street stood on top of one of the tunnels, began to explore them.
Today a group of volunteers under the aegis of the Williamson Tunnels Heritage Centre is carefully excavating the tunnels, unearthing a treasure trove of Georgian , Victorian and Edwardian artefacts.
Links.
The Lost Tunnels of Liverpool
The Enigma of Liverpool's Labyrinth
Williamson Tunnels Heritage Centre
BBC video on the unearthing of the lost Williamson tunnels
In 1818 be retired from his business interests and gave full reign to his rather odd hobby (especially after his wife's death in 1822); he created a labyrinth of tunnels, underground halls and other subterranean works, extending for several kilometres under the Edge Hill district of Liverpool, much of which he owned. The ranged from about 3 metres under the surface to more than fifteen, all well constructed and brick lined and averaging about a metre wide and two high. There are larger rooms; the one known as the the "banqueting hall" is more than twenty metres long and 6-8m high.
Exactly why he did all this isn't known; explanations have ranged from weird occult rituals and preparations for the impending apocalypse (very unlikely) to a simply eccentric hobby to a philanthropic project to provide work (in the aftermath of the end of the Napoleonic Wars there was a glut of labour in Britain).
After Williamson died in 1840 the work ceased and by the late 1860s the tunnels became rather a nuisance, with drains emptying into them and people using them to dump refuse, leading the city government to engage in filling them with rubble. They were generally forgotten about until the the early twentieth century when soldiers from the West Lancashire Territorial Forces Association, whose drill hall in Mason Street stood on top of one of the tunnels, began to explore them.
Today a group of volunteers under the aegis of the Williamson Tunnels Heritage Centre is carefully excavating the tunnels, unearthing a treasure trove of Georgian , Victorian and Edwardian artefacts.
Links.
The Lost Tunnels of Liverpool
The Enigma of Liverpool's Labyrinth
Williamson Tunnels Heritage Centre
BBC video on the unearthing of the lost Williamson tunnels
