North of Liverpool city centre, between the docks and the River Mersey to the west and Everton to the east, Vauxhall is one of Liverpool’s inner city districts. Kirkdale borders it to the north, and today Vauxhall falls within Liverpool City Council’s Kirkdale ward and the edge of the Central Liverpool ward – though it was once a ward in its own right. The 1841 Liverpool Census recorded the area under two wards: Scotland and Vauxhall. By the 2001 Census, the population stood at 6,699.
Scotland Road and the Scottie Road Area
Vauxhall is more widely known as the “Scottie Road area”, a name drawn from Scotland Road running through it. That road was first laid out in the 1770s as a turnpike route to Preston via Walton and Burscough, later becoming part of a stagecoach route to Scotland – which is where the name comes from. It was partly widened in 1803, with streets of working-class housing built on either side as Liverpool expanded. By the mid-19th century, waves of destitute Irish immigrants arrived during the Great Famine, packing the area into some of the most overcrowded and disease-ridden conditions in the country. People lived in courts and cellars, and poverty and sickness were severe. The crypt of St Anthony’s Church on Scotland Road holds the remains of around 2,000 men, women and children who fled Ireland during the famine but later died in the cholera and typhus epidemics of 1847. Many of the original housing streets were demolished as slums in the 1930s and replaced with corporation flats. In Victorian times, Vauxhall had over 200 public houses, most of which are now gone. Historically, the area was within the boundaries of old Liverpool before the nearby townships of Everton (annexed in 1835) and Kirkdale (annexed in the 1860s) were absorbed into the city.
Landmarks and Local Life
Eldon Grove, built as model workers’ housing and part of a labourers’ village, was officially opened by the Countess of Derby in 1912 and is now Grade II listed. At the southern end of Vauxhall, near the city centre, Liverpool John Moores University occupies a campus on Byrom Street, with Atlantic Point and Marybone halls of residence nearby. The Scottie Press, a local newspaper covering the Vauxhall area, is recognised as Britain’s longest-running community newspaper. In June 2008, when Liverpool was European Capital of Culture, local residents – the Scottie Roaders – held their own celebration to mark the area’s contribution to the city. Despite its distinct identity, Vauxhall has sometimes been misrepresented in the media as Kirkdale or Everton, and around 2005 Liverpool City Council briefly erected signage labelling the area as “Everton” – signs that no longer remain.