Wirral Archives Service Tracing the history of your house at Wirral Archives Service There are a number of sources held at Wirral Wirral Archives Service Opening hours Archives Service that may help you trace the Monday - Friday, 9.30 - 16.30 Tracing the history history of your house or other local buildings. Contact Details Saturday, 10.00 - 13.00 of your house This leaflet lists the main resources that we hold. Wirral Archives Service Cheshire Lines building A guide to house history records Canning Street Please note that access to the Service Birkenhead is via Shore Road. at Wirral Archives Service

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124FEB08JS Title Deeds Rate Books and Auctions and Sales of the directory the fewer Wirral These can be one of the oldest Valuation Lists Catalogues localities are included. Wirral Archives sources of information relating to the Rate books record the collection of Printed auction and sales catalogues Service holds a series of microfilms of sale or lease of land and property. rates from property owners or can provide descriptions of a property these directories for the nineteenth The oldest title deed held by Wirral occupiers by local authorities. These and details of its rooms and contents. century. Archives Service is also our oldest were based on the value of the document, dated 1447. property, which is detailed in the Wirral Archives Service holds the Records Held Elsewhere Valuation Lists. records of Corkhill and Job, Birkenhead Reference Library holds Wirral Archives Service holds various auctioneers, which include a series printed copies of street directories collections of title deeds received For this reason all buildings in the of sales catalogues dating from 1882 up to 1974 as well as local maps and from different sources, including area covered by the Rate Book or to 1974, most of which are covered photographs. The address is: solicitors’ offices and private Valuation List are recorded, with by a street-name index. The sales donations. They are listed under the details of the occupier (head of the catalogues itemize furnishings room Birkenhead Reference Library reference number YDX in our Title household only), the owner, the type by room. These records are listed in Borough Road, Birkenhead Deeds catalogue. of building, the rateable value of the our Business Records catalogue Wirral CH41 2XB property and the sums collected. under reference number ZCJ. Tel: 0151 652 6106 ext. 7 Building plans Maps Census Returns [email protected] From the middle of the nineteenth Wirral Archives Service holds rate Maps were produced for various Census records can reveal who lived Another collection of sales century local authorities required the books dating back to 1836 (for reasons and in varying detail, but in a property, giving the names of all catalogues for the Wirral area, Cheshire Record Office holds title submission for approval of plans for Bebington). However survival of some, particularly large-scale household members as well as their formerly held in the offices of deeds and maps relating to the new buildings, or alterations to these records is inconsistent for the Ordnance Survey maps, can provide ages, occupations and places of Edmund Kirby and Sons, Liverpool Wirral area, which was part of existing buildings. nineteenth century. valuable information on the size, birth. The first national census for Architects, is listed under reference Cheshire before 1974. The address is: layout and even former usage of Britain took place in 1801, and they YPX/87, in our Small Private Wirral Archives Service holds a large As the population grew so did the properties. have taken place once every ten Deposits catalogue. Cheshire and Chester Archives and number of these plans, which are size of rate books, and for this years since (apart from 1941). The Local Studies Service, listed in Building Plan Registers. The reason they began to be divided into Wirral Archives Service holds a wide first census to record details of Street Directories Cheshire Record Office, Duke Street Registers vary in detail and generally smaller sections. Birkenhead rate range of maps, some of which date occupants, however, was 1841. Street Directories are a useful source Chester, Cheshire CH1 1RL list the name of the road, the type of books, for example, are divided by back to the early nineteenth century. of information for local addresses. Tel: 01244 972574 building work to be done, the names political ward. They include a set of the Ordnance Wirral Archives Service holds census They are generally divided into [email protected] of the owners and the builders, and Survey 6 inch to the mile maps of returns for the Wirral area from 1841 sections including an alphabetical list the date of application. Actual house the Birkenhead area from 1875, to 1901. (The census is closed for of street names, an alphabetical list Useful Websites numbers are not always recorded. which are very detailed. Another 100 years.) They are on microfiche, of residents by name, giving address Land Registry: useful resource is the CD-Rom of the with the exception of the 1881 and occupation, a list of www.landreg.gov.uk The earliest plans date from 1855 1900-1912 Ordnance Survey 25 inch census, which is on CD-Rom. householders by street, a classified The Land Registry is the government (for Wallasey) but most date from to the mile maps of Cheshire, which list of people and businesses by agency which holds the register of the late nineteenth and twentieth covers the whole of Wirral. Earlier census records do not tend to trade or occupation, as well as lists state-guaranteed landowners in centuries. Unfortunately some plans provide as much detail as later ones, of public buildings, and even annals England and Wales, including details listed in the Plan Register may no and may not list house numbers or listing significant local events. of the extent of the land in the title. longer be in existence. even street names. However, we do hold certain street and surname Wirral was covered by the Gore's and English Heritage: indexes to the census, mainly for later Kelly's Directories of Liverpool www.imagesofengland.org.uk Birkenhead and Tranmere. The and its surrounding districts, although This database contains photographs archives staff can guide you on use generally speaking the earlier the date of listed buildings. of these indexes.