THE DISUSED RAILWAY LINE (continued)
The Cheshire Lines railway from Garston to Manchester through Hunts Cross, with Hunts Cross Station, had been complete and opened in 1873, with the extension to Central Station, Liverpool opened next year. So when we consider the most striking feature of the part of the line on our walk - the embankment about 18ft high at Belle Vale Road, the question must be asked, where did all the 'fill' of which it is made come from ? The answer must be the nearly 3 miles of 'cutting' north of Broad Green; and one of the skills of a Railway Engineer is to plan a line so that the amount of material cut out shall equal that needed for filling.

We walk up, noting the cast iron gate posts at Belle Vale Road to the old coal yard where there was a siding. Along the track (the lines were removed when the freight service ceased) it is instructive to see, at this time of the year when trees are in full leaf, that there is very little view of the surroundings. This is part of the proposed cycleway/footpath. At the Nook the stone bridge was built by the railway company over the occupation road from Nook farm to its fields to the east.

We thus approach the area of the Nook from the embankment and can appreciate what a disruption was caused by its formation and your guides' trepidation in trying to unravel the story. This year we grasp the nettle, without having seen any deeds, our sources being the Tithe Schedule and Map, the Censuses, Rates Books and Chapel records.

Inner group of houses - some 180 yards from Halewood Road - engulfed by the railway embankment.

a) The Nook (Dr Shepherd's house). If we stand on the path 66 yards from the railway bridge, facing NNW (about parallel with the old railway line) we will be within some half dozen yards of the front door and facing it.

In 1733 the Rev. Joseph Lawton (c.1684-1747) bought the house and about 19 acres, and from that time to the death of the Rev. Noah Jones in 1861, this was the home of the Ministers of Gateacre Chapel. A copy of a deed of 1699 records that this property was leased by John Whitfield, yeoman of Little Woolton, from John Atherton of Atherton, a cousin of the late Margaret Ireland, wife of Sir Gilbert Ireland of Bewsey, then owner of the Lee. Some idea of the appearance of The Nook is preserved in photographs (see our exhibition) and we would describe the front as a late 17th or early 18th century house with a doorcase added in the mid 18th century.

continued . . .