LIVERPOOL DOCKS a unique handwritten & hand-illustrated description

c1940s, with seventeen full page original drawings

Author

Publisher

Printing Details

This is a unique description of Liverpool Docks, comprising of fifteen pages of hand-written text, and seventeen full-page hand-drawn illustrations.

It is housed in a cloth binding with bespoke, hand-made cover with tan coloured cloth laid on to blue cloth, and with a string binding inside. The binding measures 27.5 × 22cm. It is undated but is late 1940s or early 1950s, as the written description starts off with a quotation from Thomas Armstrong's King Cotton (set in 1859), which the writer states in nearly a century ago. There is no indication of who the author was.

The text forms four chapters and is titled "A Description of Liverpool's Famous Waterfront", followed by 1. Introduction, 2. Garston Docks, 3. The Dock Road, and 4. The Landing Stage. Bound in throughout are seventeen hand drawin illustrations, all neatly executed in black ink against a coloured background. The illustrations show ships at dock, tugs, dock cranes, warehouses, the dock railways, Thelfalls (a brewery) etc. There is an illustrated title page, very Edward Bawdenesque in style showing a dock worker and with black lettered title "Water Front", there is a small "The End" vignette of dockside warehouses to the end, and the final illustration is a portrait of a man on the dockside with a ship in the background. Maybe this is the author.

Condition

Good plus condition. There is some spotted foxing throughout but the album retains its charm and this remains a fascinating piece of Liverpool history.

Further images are available on request.

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