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Royal Mersey Yacht Club

Royal Mersey Yacht Club was founded in 1844 under the Royal Patronage of Queen Victoria.  In the early years the club held major national regattas but the club yachts also prided themselves in forming an escort fleet for the Queen whenever the Royal Yacht visited this region.  

With its base in the City of Liverpool, most members maintained their yachts at the Club’s Marine Station at Rock Ferry, a location that remains the racing centre for the club to today.  Queen Victoria presented many fine trophies for the Club regattas –the so-called “Queen’s Silver” and this attracted competitors from most other Royal Yacht Clubs to race at Royal Mersey.   

During the American Civil War, the club was particularly active on behalf of the Confederate Navy.  

The ship-builder John Laird, a prominent club member at the time, was instrumental in constructing warships for the Confederates and when the most famous of these, the CSS Alabama, was sunk in battle it was a Royal Mersey Yacht that just happened to be there in time to rescue the officers and crew and carry them back to England. Later in the nineteenth century, Charles Dickens was entertained by the Club; an event that he recorded most favourably in his diaries.  

In the golden years of the large yachts as the twentieth century approached, many famous yachts from around the world competed at the Royal Mersey Regattas. One of the most striking was the record-breaking Britannia, raced by the Prince of Wales, which won one of the annual regattas at Rock Ferry.  Two world wars changed the social and sporting face of Britain, but keel-boat racing under the club burgee continued to flourish.  

Royal Mersey Yacht Club maintains a strong national and international profile and includes HRH the Duke of Edinburgh and King Harald of Norway as Admirals of the Club.

Tranmere Sailing Club

The first mention of Tranmere Sailing Club in public record is from The Yachtsman 1st September 1892. It is accompanied by the phrase yet another sailing club on the Mersey which gives an indication of the level of sailing activity there was on the river at this time.

This history of the club is included in a series of notes compiled by Stuart Todd in 1986 from a collection of minute books from meetings of the club dating back to 1905 and the full history can be found on the website.

Historical Society of Birkenhead

The Society was inaugurated as a result of a group brought together in a University extra-mural class "Toward a History of Birkenhead", held during 1973/1974 in Birkenhead Central Library. As the class could not continue without an official tutor, it was decided to start a history society to study the growth and development of Birkenhead and to research and record the changes that had taken place. 

The Society website includes a special section dedicated to the history of Rock Ferry. 

HMS Conway Association

In the mid 1800s the British merchant fleet had many shortcomings. The Merchant Shipping Acts of 1851 and 1854 were designed to force improvements and control. They required all deep sea vessels to be commanded and officered by experienced, certified individuals who were to sit examinations. Those making a career at sea now had to be trained and educated in academic as well as nautical subjects.

The merchant fleet owners, fearing further legislation and government intervention, determined to take the initiative. Ship owners in various main ports of the UK formed Mercantile Marine Service Associations (MMSA). Liverpool was one of the earliest and in 1857 they decided to set up a school ship specifically to train young boys for a life at sea.

In 1859 after much debate they petitioned the Admiralty for a ship to accommodate the school which was to be moored in the Sloyne, off Rock Ferry, on the River Mersey in Liverpool, England. The mooring was approximately a quarter mile ESE of the river end of Rock Ferry Pier.

Refreshment Rooms

The former Admiral pub on the Rock Ferry waterfront reopened it’s doors in June 2012 after lying neglected for 5 years. Under it’s original name Refreshment Rooms. It was the original Refreshment Rooms for the cross-Mersey ferry in the 1880s and is now a very popular pub and restaurant for visitors to the waterfront 

Rock Park Estate

With the benefit of regular Ferry access from the pier the area became so popular that Rock Park was developed as an exclusive estate, providing grand villas for the influential and wealthy merchants of Liverpool. Notable residents included Nathaniel Hawthorne a famous American writer and the American Consul and the Norwegian Consul. The current residents are very proud of the association with the estate and maintain very interesting Facebook page.