*click for much larger view
Following on from last week’s Friday Photo when I believed I mistakenly named the jetty in the photo as being off Sandhey slipway rather than from Trinity Road, here’s perhaps a photo that proves us all wrong?
Ian Davies (Hoylake RNLI) found the above photo which shows a landing jetty out on the shore near to the Sandhey slipway. Ian writes:
“After the recent discussion under the ‘Friday Photo: Messing about on the river’ about a jetty at Sandhey slip I thought I would send you this photo, it was taken in 1920 from the bottom of Roman Road looking towards Sandhey Road and shows where you can see a jetty that was constructed probably so the fishermen could bring their catch ashore with handcarts to the awaiting hawkers.”
So what do you think?
IanP says
I think this is NOT the jetty in the previous post. I remember there were three groynes near Sandhey slip, each made of sandstone covering a surface water outfall, and each marked with an illuminated post. There was one to the baths side of Sandhey, and I am sure there was a wooden bit at the end of it made of railway sleepers roughly in the shape shown, but not wide enough to be a jetty and coated with seaweed. The next groyne was near Firshaw road and had a pool at the end of it even at low tide (was that called “darkey’s dock”?) The third one was near Roman road. There is no illuminated post in the previous photograph, but if you look carefully, you can see the post at the end of the Sandhey one. The groynes were also intended to stop sand drift and keep a navigable channel away from the shore.
Ian says
I wonder if anyone could help to identify who took this picture. Here is the writing on the reverse
Ian says
Ooops click on “Ian” above for the link!
Peter Wilson says
A great picture. How different to the flat beach of today. The jetty looks somewhat dilapidated, looks like a groyne with a jetty at the end. Wouldn’t it be great to see a detailed picture. There are so many wonderful old photographs appearing on this site.
It is really important that such wonderful images of old Hoylake are not lost. Could a project be started to digitise and secure these images for posterity?
Sue says
re the “Trinity Road” jetty- I remember that well. Does anyone recall the time when a local fisherman ran pleasure trips from the end of it. (In the fifties I think?)
Syd Bird says
Yes,I remember that ,as you say Sue in the fifties. The fisherman I recall running those trips was Dick Bird who used to live in School Lane opposite the infants school.
Sue says
Thanks Syd! I thought it was one of the Bird family- as of course you are! But wasn’r sure who. I don’t think the trips went for many summers!?
IanP says
I did ask earlier if anyone remebered Mr Bird and the motor launch trips. It was a nice varnished wood launch as I remember. I guess the fact that the tides varied in times and height, and the vagaries of the weather limited the number of trips which could be made (unlike the marine lake in West Kirby which could offer more regular and self drive trips throughout the day).
Some big tides would fully cover the jetty as it started about 50 yards out, or you might have had to wade in a few inches of water to get on the jetty as the height of the tides went down, and then on the very low tides, the far end hardly got wet. It was however a great feature to play on and search for crabs with a small net.
The Sandhey slip groyne structure was made of one foot square timbers, it was just a single width and covererd in green weed. You had to clamber over sharp rocks to reach it and it was too slippery to stand on. It was however a strange thing to find and I am not sure what it was. (Perhaps it was part of a wrecked ship? – just a thought!)