BOARDS OF GUARDIANS West Derby Union

Board Minute Books 58 Vols., 1848-1930

Indexes to Board Minutes 2 Files, 1922-1930

Finance Committee Minute Books 4 Vols., 1883-1923

General Purposes and other Committee Minute Books 5 Vols., 1871-1913

Visiting Committee Minute Books 7 Vols., 1871-1913

West Derby, Liverpool and Toxteth Park Joint Hospitals Committee Minute Books 3 Vols., 1899-1922

Miscellaneous Committee Minute Books 4 Vols., 1866-1922

Account Books 3 Vols., 1852-1855, 1900-1911

Guardians' Declarations on Acceptance of Office 2 Vols., 1894-1921

Newscuttings 1 Vol., 1907-1912

Weekly Returns of Persons Relieved 2 Vols., 1920-1922

Miscellaneous records 4 Vols., 1884-1929

Records of Walton Workhouse 7 Vols., c.1866-1935

Walton Workhouse Chaplain's Report Books 13 Vols., 1870-1935

Some of the records in this collection contain sensitive personal information. Those records containing sensitive personal information of adults are not available for public inspection for 75 years. Those records containing sensitive personal information of children are not available for public inspection for 100 years. This is in accordance with Section 40 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

The records listed at 353 WES 1 - 12 below were deposited in this library by the Town Clerk of Liverpool in May 1960. Prior to their deposit they had been kept in the stationery store of the then Corporation Children's Department, Broughton Terrace. Details of later deposits are given separately in the list.

A list of the records in the Brougham Terrace store room had been made by the Town Clerk's department in 1934. It is not known whether the volumes themselves were checked but a number of volumes not listed in 1934 were found to be present at the time of deposit while the following volumes, although listed, could not be found on transfer and have never since been traced

Board Minute Books

1840 - 1841

1847 - 1843

1865 - 1866

1866 - 1868

Building Committee Minute Book

1838 - 1841

General Purposes Committee Minute Book

1882 - 1889

School Attendance Committee Minute Book

1877 - 1885

In pursuance of the Poor Law Amendment Act, 1834 (An Act for the Amendment and better Administration of the Laws relating to the Poor in England and Wales, 14 Aug. 1834, 4 & 5 Wm. IV, cap. 76) the Poor Law Commissioners in an Order of 5th January 1837 declared that "... the Parishes, Townships and Places, the names of which ... are specified in the margin of this Order ... shall on the thirty-first of January ... be and thenceforth shall remain, united for the Administration of the Laws for the relief of the Poor, by the name of the West Derby Union ..." (see the first Order bound into the volume of Orders ... amongst the records of the Toxteth Park Union, 353 TOX 3/1). The twenty-three townships making up the West Derby Union were as follows (here listed in alphabetical order)

Aintree

Allerton

Bootle-cum-Linacre

Childwall

Croxteth Park

Everton

Fazakerley

Garston

Great Crosby

Ince Blundell

Kirkby

Kirkdale

Litherland

Little Crosby

Lunt

Netherton

Orrell and Ford

Sephton

Thornton

Walton-on-the-Hill

Wavertree

West Derby

The Union was to have a Board of thirty-one Guardians, five representing Toxteth Park, three West Derby, two each for Everton and Kirkdale and one for each of the other townships. Details of Guardians' terms of office, voting qualifications for the election of Guardians etc. were laid down in the Order.

In 1857 the West Derby Union lost the township of Toxteth Park which was carved out of it to form, in May of that year, a separate Toxteth Park Union established "... at the request of the inhabitants ..." (see The Toxteth Guardians in Liverpool Citizen, 1889 - 1890, 5 Feb. 1890, p. 6)

The first West Derby Workhouse was built in 1844 in Mill Road, later to become Mill Road Infirmary. Walton Workhouse, the second West Derby Union Workhouse was opened in April 1868. According to the West Derby Union section in the Liverpool Red Book for 1901, pp. 114 - 119, the constituent townships of the Union were the same as those given in the 1827 Order with the exception of Toxteth Park and the addition of Seaforth, Waterloo and West Derby Rural. The Union offices were at Brougham Terrace, West Derby Road and its institutions were listed as Walton Workhouse, Mill Road Infirmary, the Cottage Homes, Fazakerley and the Elm Institution for Epileptics, Anfield. The 1919 Red Book, p. 129 lists in addition to these institutions Seafield House for Feeble minded Children and Imbeciles, Alder Hey Hospital, the Training Home for Boys, 101 - 103 Shaw Street and the Training Home for Girls, 57 Shaw Street.

Under the terms of the Liverpool Corporation Act, 1921 (see An Act to Consolidate with Amendments the Local Acts in force within the City of Liverpool; to provide for the Union of the Parishes therein and to consolidate the Local Rates leviable in the City ..., 4 Aug. 1921, 11 & 12 Geo. V, part 3, secs. 20 - 51) the Select Vestry (Board of Guardians for Liverpool) and the Toxteth Park Union were dissolved and the areas formerly under their jurisdiction and that of the West Derby Union were all amalgamated to form an enlarged and reconstituted West Derby Union, now "... the largest in the Kingdom ..." (see Cuttings Historical and Topographical Relating to Liverpool, 1922, p. 23 Liverpool's New Board of Guardians). The new West Derby Union also took in the parishes of Little Woolton and Much Woolton both formerly in the Prescot Union but Kirkby was transferred from the West Derby Union to the Prescot Union. The Guardians for the Liverpool Select Vestry and the Toxteth Park Union were to go out of office on 31st March 1922. Details of the new West Derby Union are given in West Derby Union: an Outline of the Main Features ..., 1925. It now had 106 Guardians and was responsible for the following institutions (given here in alphabetical order)

Alder Hey Hospital

Belmont Road Institution

Brownlow Hill Infirmary

Cleaver Sanatorium, Heswall (for tubercular children)

Cottage Homes, Fazakerley

Cottage Homes, Wavertree

Deysbrook House, West Derby (children's convalescent home)

Domestic Training Home for Girls, 57 Shaw Street

Kirkdale Homes

Mill Road Infirmary

Seafield House, Seaforth ("... high-grade Mentally Defective Children")

Smithdown Road Institution

Walton Institution

Working Boys Home, 101 - 103 Shaw Street

In addition to institutional care the Union also administered out-relief, being "... divided into 24 districts each with an appropriate Relief Office or Depot. In addition ... three separate Depots ... had to be established ... for the purpose of coping with the special demands made upon the Guardians in certain populous areas in the relief of the unemployed ..." (see West Derby Union: an Outline op. cit. p. 1).

Under the terms of the Local Government Act, 1929 (see An Act to amend the law relating to the administration of poor relief, registration of births, deaths and marriages, highways, town planning and local government ... 27 March 1929, ch. 17, Part I) Poor Law authorities were abolished and their functions transferred to County Councils or County Boroughs, each council working through a Public Assistance Committee. Thus after 31st March 1930 the West Derby Union ceased to exist as an authority.

A number of Orders of the Poor Law Commissioners and the Poor Law Board to and relating to the West Derby Union may be found amongst the records of the Toxteth Park Union (see 353 TOX 3/1 - 3/7). Prior to 1857 all Orders are addressed to the West Derby Union. From 1858, however, Orders predominantly relate to Toxteth Park and se have been placed with the records of that Union.