The boat beneath the car park

New pub being built behind original Railway Inn, 1938

In 2007 a planning application was made to construct a patio extension at the Railway Inn, Meols. The assessment that routinely followed by the County Archaeology Office revealed a document reporting a vessel of unknown antiquity that had been buried underneath. Potentially an archaeologist’s dream: a major find under a pub!

In 1938, when the Railway Inn was being knocked down and rebuilt further from the road, the site of the old pub being made into a car park, workmen had revealed part of a clinker vessel from under the waterlogged blue clay 2-3 metres below the original pub. A clinker has overlapping planks, a style which originated from Scandinavia over 2000 years ago – mastered by the Angles and Vikings and characteristic of all their shipping – and a style of boatbuilding so successful it has subsequently been used through the ages and is still used today. The foreman on duty ordered the workmen to put all the clay back, in case the work was held up by archaeologists, costing time and money. This was duly done and the vessel was largely forgotten about. A year later, the world was at war and the country had more urgent priorities.

Building site, 1938

John McRae, the builder who discovered the boat in 1938, told the story to his family. Before his death in 1991, his son (also called John McRae) asked him to describe what he had seen, which he turned into a sketch. He sent the details to archaeologists at Liverpool Museums, who put them on record. The appearance of the sketch in 2007 sparked speculation as to the nature and date of the vessel. The report was brought to the attention of Tim Baldock, a local police officer and amateur history sleuth, who contacted me. Two questions arose – was this vessel still underneath, and what was it? This led to the hypothesis: could it have derived from the Viking Age settlers or their descendants?   Or perhaps something else?

This hypothesis was recently considered by BBC’s Our Coast (https://www.nottingham.ac.uk/~sczsteve/BBC_OurCoast_BoatClip.mp4?fbclid=IwAR0XQAFqKSfAeSj-utrlQQHhkM8vi88uOXZ_vGAPR2dvPpKAyyiijOIOEIY) email me at steve.harding@nottingham.ac.uk if you have difficulty viewing this).

The sketch and report of the vessel made by the McRaes and presented to the National Museums, Liverpool

Geophysics expert, Malcolm Weale of Geofizz Ltd, was commissioned to investigate, using an integrated Magnetometer and GPR device. With the enthusiastic support of the Railway Inn and consent from Greene King, who own the pub, litter bins, plant pots and tables were all moved out of the way and the area in front of the entrance was systematically scanned and analysed. A computer then converted the signals into a profile of what is underneath the surface. The results appear to show the outline of one end of a boat-shaped anomaly, which broadly matched the position and dimensions given in John McRae’s sketch. Unfortunately, it was not possible to extend the scanning because of a street lamp and other non-movable objects that were in the way. And that is where investigations stopped in 2007.

Scan team standing over the position of the boat. Left to right: PC Tim Baldock, Malcolm Weale (Geofizz Ltd.), John McRae jnr., Professor Stephen Harding

The shape and depth of the find prompted a number of news reports and headlines referring to a Viking vessel. However, both the character and date of the find remain unproven until further study is undertaken to resolve the mystery of the boat. Nevertheless, the position and depth of the potential vessel raise the possibility that it is of considerable antiquity. The location is approximately 1km away from the present coastline and even further from the medieval coastline, which has been affected by erosion.

Ground penetrating radar (GPR) result – view looking from the side

A much more recent GPR survey conducted by James Slater of PM Surveys appear to support these observations.

It is possible that the boat may have been washed in by an ancient flood and/or sank in a local marsh – the area is full of Old Norse field and track names associated with marsh and wetland. For much of the ninth and tenth centuries the Vikings controlled the Irish Sea and Meols (Melar ON, “sand hills”) was one if its main seaports with a natural harbour formed by a large sandbank known as “Hyle bank”. We also know that Wirral was an area of intense Scandinavian settlement with its own Thing parliament. Settlement has been confirmed by a detailed genetic study of Wirral and neighbouring West Lancashire showing high levels of Scandinavian genes in the DNA admixture of men from old families (possessing surnames present in the area prior to 1600). Knut Paasche, a Nordic ship expert from the University of Oslo, has scrutinised the 1938 sketch and report and has noted a similarity with a 30ft long clinker boat of the “Faering” type, a six-oared boat which could carry 12 people, which was discovered with the famous Gokstad burial vessel.

1734 map of Wirral (courtesy Dr. P. Cavill) showing Meols in relation to the natural harbour of “Hyle Lake”

Excavation was – and still is – not an option because of the enormous costs of preservation and display. Sadly, researchers can’t just dig up an interesting wooden find without a full preservation strategy in place: underground in the oxygen-free (anaerobic) blue clay – microbial degradation is minimal and the wood is safe. However, more than a decade later, plans are being discussed by Wirral Archaeology and Professor Steve Harding to dig down, take some of the wood sample and get it dated by measuring carbon-14 levels or using dendrochronology (tree-ring dating). The initial focus will be on the possibility of additional survey and analysis with a view to assessing the stratigraphic position and general context, and the overall state of the vessel.

Of course, it would be amazing from a Viking perspective if it turns out to be a vessel built before the Battle of Largs, 1263, a date which probably marks the end of the Viking Age in the Irish Sea and British Isles. As scientists, we have to keep an open mind. Things were just beginning to progress well in preparing an application for lottery funding when the Covid pandemic stalled the application process. Thankfully we are now in the process of finalising this funding bid. If all goes well, we could soon find out what has been under the Meols pub car park for at least two hundred years and as long ago as 2000 years.  Until then, the origin of the Meols boat remains a mystery!

Watch and listen to TV and radio programmes about the Meols boat:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=385fLL29jTU&list=PLN1ANYZrllJ3BemDQg9tQ5gwgp_i8icW3&index=6

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WAjbeqUHMA&list=PLN1ANYZrllJ3BemDQg9tQ5gwgp_i8icW3&index=2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7147ilPEXI&list=PLN1ANYZrllJ3BemDQg9tQ5gwgp_i8icW3&index=1

Join us for a talk about the Meols Boat project on 31 July 2022 at 3pm at the Railway Inn: 

15th St. Olav's Wirral-Chester Viking Heritage walks, July 28-31 2022 (profstevehardingvikingwirral.blogspot.com)

To find out how science can help with an understanding of the Vikings, read “Science and the Vikings”:

Science and the Vikings: Amazon.co.uk: Harding, Stephen: 9781527207066: Books