The Fylde & Wyre Antiquarian

Can anyone enlighten me as to the history of Wardley`s Creek? It`s full of boats at the moment but has it ever been something other than a home for pleasure craft?

So for how long might it have been used? Is the quayside on the riverbank? Is it reasonable to assume that the shape of the creek will have changed hugely over the years? Lots of questions but Wardley`s seems so unusual compared to the rest of the Wyre riverside.

Does ten feet of silt at Wardley`s indicate that the Wyre may have been a much deeper river for much of its length in those days or is silting up a phenomenon of estuaries?

Silting is apparently a constant problem caused by soil erosion & run off upstream. Preston Docks closed because the need for constant dredging due to silting of the Ribble was too costly for the companies operating there. Maybe the Wyre was deeper or easier to dredge; my father-in-law moved his ferry /transport company to Fleetwood from Preston despite the comparatively poor road network in the 50's - 60's. It still has to be dredged to keep the deepwater channel clear as these 2002 minutes indicate:

http://www.wyrebc.gov.uk/Page.aspx?DocI ... PgeID=9198

The Wyre might have been quite different in the days before extensive farming and land control. Much less soil run off into the river, less silt, possibly faster flowing. Are there any indications that the river may once have been appreciably deeper further upriver? St Michaels say.

Just a note on the jetty at Wardley`s:-
"Wardley's Creek
Wardleys Creek now houses the remains of an old ferry jetty.

Up until the 1930's this point on the river was used as a ferry crossing, and a ferryman would have been kept busy transporting locals, mariners and traders across the river.

Travellers had to summon the ferry by standing on the jetty and whistling or waving their arms wildly."
http://www.wyrebc.gov.uk/Page.aspx?PvnI ... =1-24-1157

And:-
"This creek on the River Wyre near Poulton-le-Fylde has become part of a modern marina. The white building beyond the sailing boat (center left) is Wardley's Hotel. The three pointed gables to its left belong to the 1824 warehouses in which guano, flax and cotton were stored (it was pulled down in 1965). The ancient ports of Wardleys and Skippool near Hambleton Creek handled slaves and ships from Russia. 19th-century visitors to the creek came for 'Hambleton hookings', large mussels which sometimes contained a pearl."
http://www.francisfrith.com/hambleton,lancashire/

"The ancient ports of Wardleys and Skippool near Hambleton Creek handled slaves..."

We have to be careful about this one. To the best of my knowledge there's no evidence anywhere to corroborate this allegation, although it's generally assumed that illegal slave trading was probably being conducted at Wardleys. It is just an assumption though...I think.

The phrase "handled slaves and ships from Russia" gives the impression that the slaves came from Russia. I take it that it means African slaves. I have read reports of Lancaster being involved in the trade though I would have thought the slaves would normally go to the Americas, not to England.

Lancaster I believe was involved in the slave trade but Liverpool was the main slave port in the North. I think you're right though; although some slaves were brought to England it was the 'triangular trade' manufactured goods from England to slave traders in Africa - slaves to America - cotton, tobacco, sugar etc to England that generated the wealth.

This description of Sambo's Grave at Sunderland Point near Morecambe from the website:

Just over a mile of single track road winding over the mud flats and sand marshes connects it to the mainland at low tide. It's hard to imagine that once ships from the West Indies and North America docked here, plying their trade in cotton, sugar and human lives as part of the infamous 18th century slave trade. But there are reminders, and most of the people who come are looking for Sambo's Grave.

Sambo (or Samboo, as the gravestone indicates) -- I don't suppose anyone knows what his name really was -- was an African and probably no more than a boy. He was a black slave who arrived at the port with his master. He was taken ill, probably with some European disease to which he had no immunity, and he died. Because he was black and not a Christian he was not buried in consecrated ground. His body was interred in land that was once behind the inn, but is now a remote spot on the windswept shore with nothing between him and the vast sea that brought him from his homeland so far away.

Lancaster`s involvement in the slave trade seems to have been in building specialized slave ships and in financing and presumably organizing the triangular trade. The slave ships could be surprisingly small (by modern standards) and it would be interesting to know if any other shipbuilders along the Wyre partook.