The Penders and the Murphys are shown in a book
given away by The Rotunda Centre in Great Mersey Street next to Stanley Road,
Kirkdale (Please see the photos at the end of this piece, but I need to explain
here for them to make sense). That’s what I discovered last month when me and
Susanne wandered into their brilliant heritage centre following our stay at the
Throstles Nest on Scotland Road (we stay overnight in Liverpool annually now
since our 20th wedding anniversary in 2013. We’ve stayed in the
Throstles couple of time now because we
share ancestry from there –Susanne’s family on mothers side ran a pub (now
demolished) right next to the Rotunda
centre, the King George – and they have a picture of it in their Heritage café
wall! Sue’s Liverpool-Irish great grandmother Mary Ann Kearns (Mary Ann’s
parents like our Penders/Learys were from Wexford too) married a Swede Johanne
(John) Bladlund who was a publican there shown on 1911 census – he banned his
girls, including Sue’s gran Rose, from going into the pub because of the rough
sailors – probably included our ship firemen Penders Tom, Patrick, Joseph, John
or Robert who were a stone’s throw away!
I’ve put quite a few photos from our fascinating ramble, which included
me tracking down my great grandfather Tom Pender’s original baptism record at
St John’s RC church on Fountain Road . I was helped in this by St Anthony’s who
said that because Tom was born in Aspinall Street (number 37 - I got his birth
record) at that time he would have come under St John’s. Other Pender brothers
and sisters were baptised at St Anthony’s, Scotland Road as well as our Our Lady
of Reconciliation, Eldon Street and St Alphonsus (now demolished) as they moved
between streets from Vauxhall to Kirkdale. Tom’s sister Mary Agnes Pender, who
married Michael Murphy was baptised in St Alphonsus on 11 November 1881, 5 days
after being born, and married Co Armagh born Michael at that church too on 11
June 1903. Then the church stood at the end of Great Mersey Street where it met
Kirkdale Road at the bottom of Everton Valley. Brother Robert, who married south
Armagh born Kate Murphy (Michael’s younger sister) also got baptised (Sept
1879) and married (Jan 1912) in St Alphonsus.
You’ll
see from the book from the Rotunda Centre that Michael Murphy is at number 26
Aspinall St and Joseph Pender (Tom’s youngest brother) at number 44. Sadly the
graphic is for 1929 and Mary Agnes Murphy (nee Pender) is no longer in the
number 26 household because she died 5 years earlier, neither are her parents
(and my Tom’s, Robert, Joseph etc) because Tom and Johanna (nee Leary) from
Wexford passed away just later in 1926/7 after having lived in 65 Aspinall
Street for over 20 years, and in Liverpool’s Vauxhall and Kirkdale district for
over 60 after emigrating from Ireland.
My gran, Maggie Ashcroft (nee Margaret Pender), was born 1907 in Athol
Street which runs to the Junction of the top of Scotland Road and Stanley Road.
On her mother’s side, the similar sounding surnamed Pedders, - 4th
generation barge people - occupied a
site in nearby Slade Street by the canal.
Maggie used to love going every weekend from her St Helens home to the
Cazneau Street/Paddy’s Market with her daughter, my Auntie Sue (and I had to
suffer wearing some of the strange purchases!) Funnily enough on my mothers
side of farmers they also loved to visit Cazzy market, but with their cart
horses laden with spuds, after working
the Bickerstaffe, Kirkby, Knowsley, Rainford, Eccleston and Huyton fields up to
WW2. And they loved the drinking en-route back too, falling asleep sometimes in
a warm pile of manure picked up for the return journey while the horse knew the
way home!
Please take a look at all the pic and census/birth records showing the
strong connection of the Pender and Murphy families on those Kirkdale Streets
now under the green grass of the Billy Collins playing fields. The Rotunda
centre and its heritage café and friendly staff (Emma Jensen and Anne Marie) is
well worth a visit and has a great community spirit and superb garden and
allotment too. Some of us are planning to meet there when Marie (of the
Cannons) and her daughter Catherine Morris come over from Ireland this month. Des
and Su Herlihy and Irene and Robbie Cannon could make it too, and maybe Cormac and Kitty - so if you’re interested please let us know – it’ll be sometime in the week
beginning 22nd, Monday to Friday in the daytime.
Thanks Duncan!
