Gibson & Gardner Transcription List – Toxteth Park Cemetery

By law, as each graveyard or cemetery were closed and the headstones, etc, removed they were obliged to transcribe all inscriptions on each relevant memorial. These are lists of Inscriptions, Epitaphs & Memorials transcribe by James Turner & David Ensign Gardner in the 1800's and 1930's. A brief outline on each person and all relative Liverpool library references numbers are given.

INSCRIPTIONS, EPITAPHS AND MEMORIALS

REMOVAL OF GRAVESTONE

These lists and commentery below are taken from a hand book from Liverpool Central Library.

In response to legislation concerning burial grounds in cities and towns, a number of graveyards in the centre of Liverpool were closed in the second half of the 19th century. Many were later laid out as public gardens and some made way for street improvements. One of the requirements of further legislation, was that before tombstones or monuments are to be removed, the details and inscriptions on it should be noted and transcribed. Those recorded officially are preserved among Liverpool Corporation’s cemetery records and are noted on my list as “Inscriptions Of Gravestones Removed”. Within this column you will see either the name “Gardner ” or “Gibson”. These names relate to two men who transcribed and published the details from Memorials.

Gardner, David Ensign, of Oakfield, described as a “young member of the Society of Genealogists” copied inscriptions from gravestones and memorial tablets in churches in Liverpool and Lancashire in the years 1935 to 1939. His typescript copies were given to Liverpool City Libraries where they were bound into 5 volumes as follows:
Liverpool & District Epitaphs, (comp. 1935 – 1939). Typescripts with MS additions and corrections. 5 volumes. Prepared in Library. (HQ 929 5 GAR)

Vol. 1. Liverpool.	Vol. 2. S.W Lancashire.
pp 1 – 18 Anfield Cemetery.	Includes
pp 19 – 69 Knotty Ash Church (St John’s).	pp 1 – 101 St Mary, Bootle.
pp 73 – 101 St John’s, Old Haymarket.	Index of Names In Volume.
pp 102 – 110 Walton Parish Church, (St Mary’s).
pp 111 – 112 St Nicolas.
pp 113. St Luke, Bold Street.
Index of Names In Volume.

Vol. 3. Liverpool.
pp 1 – 12 Friends Burial Ground, Hunter Street.
pp 14 – 43 St Michael, Upper Pitt Street.
pp 45 – 80 St Anne, Stanley.
pp 84 – 135 St George, Everton.
pp 137 – 146 St Oswald (Roman Catholic) Church, Old Swan.
Index of Names In Separate Volume.
Vol. 4,5. Lancashire.

Gibson, James compiler of the volumes below, was described as a merchant or draper, a native of Stirling who lived and worked in Liverpool for many years. He wrote and edited a number of works on Robert Burns. James died, aged 60, in July 1886 in Stratford upon Avon where he had been employed for a short while as a librarian in the Shakespeare Memorial Library. During his time in Liverpool he had, in his own words “..taken notes from all the churchyards and chapels in the district”. Some of his transcribed epitaphs were printed in the “Notes and Queries” column of The Liverpool Weekly Mercury and reproduced in Notes and Queries relating to Liverpool 1882 – 1889 (HQ 942 721 MER).
The volumes of Gibson’s transcribed epitaphs were purchased by the library from a Liverpool book seller in 1887 for £5.00. In each volume the inscriptions are prefaced by historical, descriptive and sometimes critical notes on the relevant churches, churchyards or cemeteries, and occasionally illustrated.

Gibson died in 1886 and left Liverpool sometime before his death. Therefore it is unlikely that there will be any inscriptions or epitaphs for any burial taking place after 1885.
Gibson’s inscriptions were not confined to churchyards and cemeteries, but included memorials and mural tablets in secular buildings and churches without graveyards.
There is a separate names and index for all volumes in volume 10.

The volumes are arranged as follows:

Gibson, James Epitaphs and Inscriptions on the tombstones and monuments in Liverpool churches chapels, churchyards and cemeteries.

10 vols. MS. nd. (4 929.5 GIB)

Vol. 1. Church of England.	Vol. 2. Church of England.
pp 1 – 205 St Nicholas.	pp 1 – 49 St Paul, St Paul’s Square.
pp 207 – 383 St Peter.	pp 103 – 221 Christ Church, Hunter Street.
pp 385 – 399 Bluecoat Hospital Chapel.	pp 223 – 325 Holy Trinity, St Anne Street.
pp 401 – 405 Municipal Offices, Dale Street. (memorials to Sir Thomas Jackson (1670 – 1729)	pp 335 – 363 St Martin’s Church, Silvester Street.
pp 427 – 679 St John, Old Haymarket.	pp 383 – 583 St Mary, Walton.

Vol. 3. Liverpool.	Vol. 3. Church of England.
pp 1 – 12 Friends Burial Ground, Hunter Street.	pp 1 – 413 St James, Toxteth.
pp 14 – 43 St Michael, Upper Pitt Street.	pp 467 – 575 St Michael, Upper Pitt Street.
pp 45 – 80 St Anne, Stanley.	pp 581 – 631 St Mark, Upper Duke Street.
pp 84 – 135 St George, Everton.	pp 634 – 705 St Thomas, Park Lane.
pp 137 – 146 St Oswald (Roman Catholic) Church, Old Swan.
Index of Names In Separate Volume.
Vol. 4,5. Lancashire.

Vol. 4. Church of England.	Vol. 4. Church of England. con’t
pp 1 – 51 St Andrew, Renshaw Street.	pp 179 – 191 St Luke, Berry Street.
pp 59 – 63 St John The Baptist, Park Road.	pp 195 – 201 School For The Blind.
pp 72 – 77 Holy Trinity, Parliament Street. (Toxteth).	pp 207 – 211 St George, Castle Street.
pp 83 – 85 St Simon, Gloucester Street.	pp 217 – 221 St Silas, Pembroke Place.
pp 91 – 97 St Columba, Pleasant Street.	pp 225 – 229 St Jude, Hardwick Street.
pp 105 – 109 St Margaret, Princes Road.	pp 249 – 257 St Bride, Percy Street.
pp 111 – 115 Holy Innocents, Myrtle Street. (descriptive notes but no entries)	pp 269 – 435 St Mary, Edge Hill.
pp 119 – 165 St Philip, Hardman Street.	pp 453 – 547 St George, Everton.

Vol. 5. Nonconformist. Presbyterian.	Vol. 5. Wesleyan.
pp 3 – 57 Scotch Church, Oldham Street.	pp 299 – 433 Brunswick Chapel, Moss Street.
pp 105 – 163 Scotch Church, Rodney Street.	pp 435 – 525 Upper Stanhope Street, Wesleyan Church.
Vol. 5. Presbyterian Church of England.	Vol. 5. Unitarian.
pp 175 – 181 Mount Pleasant Presbyterian.	pp 527 – 743 Ancient Chapel of Toxteth. Vol. 5.
pp 185 – 187 Shaw Street Presbyterian.	pp 745 – 861 Renshaw Street Chapel. Vol. 5.
pp 191 – 193 Canning Street Presbyterian.	pp 891 – 907 Hope Street Church. Vol. 5.
Vol. 5. Congregational.	Vol. 6. St James Cemetery.
pp 227 – 250 Great George Street Chapel.	Vol. 7. St James Cemetery.
pp 255 – 273 Newington Chapel, Renshaw Street.	Vol. 8. The Necropolis.
pp 279 – 293 South Hill Road Chapel, Toxteth Park.	Vol. 9. Cemeteries & Roman Catholic Churches.

Cemeteries:	Roman Catholic Churches:

pp 1 – 103 Anfield Cemetery.	pp 385 – 397 St Nicholas. R.C Church, Copperas Hill.
pp 167 – 223 Toxteth Park Cemeteries.	pp 421 – 447 St Peter’s R.C Church, Seel Street.
pp 277 – 311 St Mary’s Cemetery, Kirkdale.	pp 451 – 455 St Francis Xavier’s R.C Church, Salisbury Street.
pp 341 – 359 Ford Roman Catholic Cemetery.	pp 463 – 497 St Patrick’s R.C Church, Park Place.

Vol. 10. Index to Volumes 1 – 9 Gives names of person buried (or commemorated), volume number, page number.

Other Sources.

Everton Road Baptist Burial Ground.

The Baptist Burial Ground, Everton Road, Liverpool: An account of the Graveyard with a Transcript of the Monumental Inscription (18th, early 19th Centuries), comp. Robert Dickinson (Revised 1971). Copy of typescript, with plans of Burial Ground and Index of Names. (HQ 929.5 DIC)

Friends Burial Ground, Hunter Street:

Register and description of graves prior to the removal of the remains to Allerton Cemetery, 1948
Prepared in the library, 1949, with plans of the burial ground and typescript index of names. (HQ 929.3 FRI)

Holy Trinity, Wavertree.

The monumental Inscriptions of the Parish Church by Liverpool Family History Society(1977) (HQ 929.5 HOL)

Oldham Street Scotch Kirk, Liverpool.

Monumental Inscriptions and Oldham Street Scotch Kirk, Liverpool.
Transcripts from the list of monumental inscriptions at Oldham Street Kirk included with the Oldham Street records in the Church of Scotland archives,

Scottish Record Office. The list was made when the remains were removed from the Burial Ground at OldhamStreet to Everton Cemetery, 1928. Transcribed, Arthur Brack, 1997 (HQ 929.5 OLD)

St Andrew’s Church of Scotland, Rodney Street, Liverpool:
Register of Graves, 18925 to 1854, 1867.
Trancr. Arthur Brack, 1997, from the original in the Scottish Record Office (HQ 929.5 SAL)

St Mary, Walton-on-the-Hill:

Monumental Inscriptions, St Mary’s Walton-on-the-Hill. MS and Typescript, Comp, R.A Molyneux-Johnson, 1962.