THE RIVER MERSEY. 



2i 



to pass over without a bill, public or private, being brought into Par- 

 liament. 



Your Memorialists therefore pray the immediate consideration and direc- 

 tion of your Lordships on the matters submitted. 



(Copy.) 



No. 5. — Letter from H. M. Denham, R.N., to the Corporation of Liverpool, 

 27th September, 1836. 



Marine Surveyor's Office, Liverpool, Sept. 27, 1836, 



Sir, — Pursuant to a request to the following effect, — " That I would 

 furnish a plan of that part of the river opposite the property of Mr. Lace 

 and others, and a report and statement of the variation in Pluckington 

 Bank and the adjacent parts," — I took every opportunity afforded by the 

 tides and M'eather to produce the results set forth in this report and the ac- 

 companying plans, which will evidence how necessarily the question involved 

 an actual re-survey of the whole region between the Rock Lighthouse and 

 where the river ceases to be navigable at low water, viz. Garston and 

 Eastham ; for on no less datum than the most recent tests as to the causes 

 and effects of the river's deflection could I presume to give an opinion, which, 

 on the one hand, might involve capita! already embarked in projections, or, 

 on the other, incite the sanction of its conservators as respects those projec- 

 tions. I can, however, now assert, that so distant is the primary cause and 

 impetus of the river's deflection (on its eastern margin) from those projections 

 between Knott's Hole or Dingle Point and the southern extremity of the 

 Dock Estate, as to entirely absolve the works of Messrs. Lace and others 

 from any ill effects. 



Provided, that it be a sine qua non such jetties shall be subject to a 

 boundary-line on the strand, laterally with the low-water margin as deline- 

 ated on the Plan, such line to constitute the face of all projections, and 

 (until connected with the shelving rocks at Dingle Point) to have 100 yards 

 of face wall always at right angles to the southward of the southernmost 

 offset. 



In this stipulation it will appear that I admit the deflecting effect of any 

 offsets upon the ebb stream, although north of Dingle Point. So I do ; but 

 it is so slight, in comparison with the position and continuous diversion of 

 that point, that if we abstain from interrupting the downset of the recover- 

 ing water-level (feeble as it is) after rounding Dingle Point, by direct off- 

 sets, then we shall direct that feeble portion of stream ya^V/y and beneficially 

 down the face of the docks. 



Thus much. Sir, applies to the question of Mr. Lace's projection, or any 

 others in the limits quoted. 



I now beg to report on the nature of Pluckington and Devil's Banks ; to 

 elucidate which, I submit a plan of the features of the river between the 

 Rock Lighthouse and Garston, upon four inches to the mile, whereon the 

 course and velocity of the flood and ebb stream are portrayed, the former 

 in red and the latter in blue ink, showing that Pluckington owes nothing to 

 the flood-tide deposit, but that on the course of the eastern column of the 

 ebb does that deposit depend, and that course depends on Dingle Point; for 

 by practical tests on each half-hour of ebb from high to low water, we 

 perceive its inclination to follow the trend of shore until within 100 yards 

 of Dingle Point, which becomes so decidedly the point of deflection, as to 

 hurry it into the deep-water column with such impetus as to blend with it, 

 and divert the whole obliquely towards Birkenhead, whereby the tidal stream 



