Thomas Shelmerdine (II)
- Born 1845 at Broughton, Salford
- Christened 3 April 1846 Liverpool.
- Married 2 October 1872 Sarah Alice Haynes.
- Died 1921
Thomas Shelmerdine was the eldest son of Thomas Shelmerdine (I), and his wife Mary Ellen and brother of architects Edward and Henry Shelmerdine. Thomas (I) was born in Salford but had moved to Liverpool by the early 1840s where he was listed as an architect, surveyor and land agent in the 1853 Directory. For reasons which still remain unclear, Thomas (II) is recorded in the census records as having been born in the township of Broughton, later amalgamated into Salford, but was christened in Liverpool. His other nine siblings, including his older sister were all born in the Merseyside region.
After an education at the Liverpool Royal Institution Schools he was articled to Walter Scott (qv), a Liverpool architect. In 1869 Thomas began work as an assistant in his father’s office, where he added to his architectural knowledge with experience of estate management on the Speke Hall estate. He was appointed in 1871, at the age of 26, as the Corporation of Liverpool’s Land Steward and Surveyor (and later Architect), at a salary of £700 per annum. He took management control of the vast corporate estate and over the following 45 years was responsible for slum clearance and street widening projects, public housing and school building, entailing expenditure of some £12,500,000. He designed Fazakerley, the Northern, and other hospitals; the Wholesale Fish Market; the Fire Brigade HQ and Tramway Offices (both in Hatton Garden); a redesign of the Town Hall Council Chamber; Lister Drive Power Station; the City Analyst’s Office at 126 Mount Pleasant (now part of the University of Liverpool), and the lay-out of St John’s Gardens. He is now perhaps best known for the branch libraries in the Liverpool suburbs erected under his direction between 1890 and his retirement in 1914.Shelmerdine also designed the Hornby Library, part of the William Brown Street Central Library complex (listed Grade II*), paid for from the bequest of Hugh Frederick Hornby (1824-1899). A wealthy Liverpool merchant, Hornby left his entire collection of rare books, prints, autographs and manuscripts to the Corporation, together with the sum of £10,000 to build a suitable home for it.
As a member of the executive committee for the building of the Liverpool Anglican Cathedral, Thomas Shelmerdine attended the foundation stone laying ceremony on 28 July 1904, where he was presented to King Edward VII.
Following his marriage to Sarah Alice, the daughter of William Henry Haynes on 2 October 1872 at New Brighton he moved to Rock Ferry, later moving to Blundellsands on the north side of the river. He was interested in sports and was a slow left-hand bowler for Rock Ferry and a keen cyclist. In 1903 he was Captain of the West Lancashire Golf Club, while his wife was a leading member of Blundellsands Archery Club. Of his children, Beatrice married Ralph Adolph John Boursot at St Joseph’s RC Church Blundellsands in 1898 [1898-972]. Thomas Harvey Shelmerdine served with the Liverpool Regiment during the First World War, achieving the rank of Captain and married Eliza Joyce Stead at Bidston in 1929.
Thomas Shelmedine retired in 1914 and died in 1921.
Address
1869 5 Clayton Square, Liverpool – his father’s office
1871 Municipal Offices Dale Street Liverpool
1883 Municipal Offices Dale Street Liverpool
1894 Thomas Shelmerdine junior, Land Steward and Corporation Surveyor Liverpool
Municipal Offices Dale Street Liverpool
Residence
1872 Egerton Park, Rock Ferry
1878 16, Rock Park, Rock Ferry, Birkenhead, (Post office Directory: Cheshire1878)
1894 Fairfield, The Serpentine, Blundellsands, Great Crosby
Reference Pike Liverpool
Reference Building News 22 December 1871 page 487 - appointment
Reference Builder 16 December 1871 Page 995 – appointment
Reference Liverpool Courier obituary - CHECK
Reference John Tiernan Victorian Society Liverpool Group Newsletter
Reference John Tiernan: Shelmerdine Architectural Dynasty Liverpool Historical Journal 12