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Factfile: Wirral and the American Civil War

Oct 21 2009 by Lorna Hughes, Birkenhead News

Confederate warship Alabama is widely thought to be the 290th vessel built at Lairds in Birkenhead but Len Ellison says it was actually vessel number 293 because the first three were given letters of the alphabet rather than numbers.

The Manor House (later St Margaret’s Convent) in Mersey Lane, Rock Ferry was the home of cotton merchant Stephen Watson. His wife was an American from North Carolina and Southern sympathiser.

Visiting Wirral in 2006, legendary US Civil War historian Edwin Bearss said Cammell Laird was “as significant to the history of the US as many of the battles”.

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