England & Wales Hardwicke Marriage Index
Marriages 1754 - 1837
Liverpool St George

The Parish

Liverpool is one of England's largest ports and cities, it is made up of numerous parishes many created during the 18th century to cope with the burgeoning population.St George's parish covered part of the waterfront area of the city it being one of the first such parishes created from St Nicholas, it covered the area between the Albert Dock and Pierhead as well as a few streets inland thereof. Liverpool is sited on the banks of the River Mersey which separates it from the Wirral area of Cheshire. It is thus in the extreme southwest of the ancient county of Lancashire. Liverpool is a relatively modern phenomenon, there was little here prior to the Elizabethan era, indeed the area was still just part of the wider parish of Walton on the Hill until the late 17th century. Nowadays Liverpool is a vast conurbation spreading for many miles both north and south of its origins but also inland too spreading to engulf what were separate villages until recent times. Liverpool was, at the commencement of this transcript's period, a small port with 4 parishes  Like all urban parishes St George, which was built upon the site of Liverpool's demolished castle, covered a very small area, just a few city blocks running from the docks inland for a few hundred metres. By the time this transcript completes there are 17 parishes licensed for marriage and numerous villages engulfed with their own records. Today the area around Derby Square remains an urban open space, now paved and dominated by the monument to Queen Victoria, it is surrounded by office blocks and commercial premises. St George was never as densely populated as some parish, the volume of marriages recorded being typical of a population averaging around 3,000.

The Church

St George Derby Square was one of the first parishes created from St Nicholas, it was built by 1734 on the site of Liverpool's castle, that had been damaged in the Civil War and by the early 18th century was merely rubble. The initial church was reputedly a grand affair with an elegant raised terrace as a stand-out feature which also served as a market place. Sadly the church was built across the rubble-filled moat of the former castle and by 1809 it had to be rebuilt, a process which took 16 years, due to cracking and subsidence of the tower. The church functioned, for most of its existence as the Corporation church but eventually lost its congregation. The church was finally demolished after closing in 1897, the suspect nature has left the site as public open space which now serves to show off the 1906 Beaux-Arts monument to the late Queen Victoria.