Up to the nineteenth century, the area had a reputation for
smuggling and
wrecking, and secret underground cellars and tunnels are still rumoured to exist. It also had a strategic position at the entrance to the
Mersey Estuary. The
Perch Rock battery was completed in 1829. It housed 18 guns, mostly
32-pounders. Three 6-inch guns were installed in 1899. Originally cut off at high tide, coastal reclamation has since made it fully accessible. In 1830, a Liverpool merchant,
James Atherton, purchased of land at Rock Point, which enjoyed views out to sea and across the Mersey and had a good beach. His aim was to develop it as a desirable residential area and watering place for the gentry, similar to
Brighton, one of the most elegant seaside resorts of that Regency periodhence the name "New Brighton". Substantial development began soon afterwards, and housing began to spread up the hillside overlooking the estuary a former gunpowder magazine was closed down in 1851. During the latter half of the nineteenth century, New Brighton developed as a very popular seaside resort serving
Liverpool and the
Lancashire industrial towns, and many of the large houses were converted to inexpensive hotels. Designed by the noted architect of seaside structures
Eugenius Birch, the
New Brighton Pier opened in 1867 and the promenade from
Seacombe to New Brighton was completed by 1901. This served both as a recreational amenity in its own right, and to link up the developments along the estuary, and was later extended westwards towards
Leasowe, making it the longest in the UK. The River Mersey and the resort were described by the diarist
Francis Kilvert in 1872 as: "crowded with vessels of all sorts moving up and down the river, ships, barques, brigs, brigantines, schooners, cutters, colliers, tugs, steamboats, lighters, "flats", everything from the huge emigrant liner steamship with four masts to the tiny sailing and rowing boat ... At New Brighton there are beautiful sands stretching for miles along the coast and the woods wave green down to the salt water's edge. The sands were covered with middle class Liverpool folks and children out for a holiday." From the 1880s until the
First World War, New Brighton was one of the regular destinations for the Bass Excursions, when fifteen trains would take 8,000–9,000 employees of
Bass's Burton brewery on an annual trip to the seaside.
Twentieth century & Ballroom, viewed from the
River Mersey, c. 1910 The
New Brighton Tower, the tallest in the country, was opened in 1900 but closed in 1919, largely due to lack of maintenance during
World War I, and had been dismantled by 1921. When it was built, it was the largest
lido in Britain, at a cost of £90,000. The saltwater pool survived until 1990, when it was damaged during a storm and later demolished. after which the ferry
pier and landing stage were dismantled. By 1977, the promenade pier had suffered the same fate. ==Geography==