Dig aims to uncover origin of Egremont's ancient furnace

A few years ago a member of Wirral Archaeology CIC stumbled upon what he recognised as an early ironworking site on the foreshore at Egremont.

Liverpool Museum took a look at the site and concluded that it was either a Roman or Viking era bloomery site.

A bloomery was an early type of ironmaking kiln fuelled by charcoal and with bellows used to drive up the temperatures to forge iron ore.

The process resulted in a softened iron mass called a bloom which was then hammered into useful tools and weapons.

A team from Wirral Archaeology CIC will carry out the investigation to uncover the truth of what era the site is from.

Led by WA CIC director and marine archaeologist, Dr Brian Atkin, it is due to begin this Saturday and Sunday at Egremont.

Possible site of Egremont's Bloomery (Image: Wirral Archaeology CIC)

The general public are not allowed on the investigation site but there will be a public information point on the promenade at the bottom of Maddock Road.

The work is expected to take three or four weekends to ensure the maximum amount of information can be retrieved.

Samples of remaining tapslag which can be found adhering to the rocks and lying loose under the sand will be catalogued and removed for analysis.

Dr Atkin said: "This form of iron smelter was simple to construct and was used from the Iron Age right up to the mediaevel period.

"We plan, systematically, to expose and carry out a full survey of the site over a number of weekends and, if possible, discover items of iron working which can then be subjected to dating and chemical analysis. It may then be possible to determine where the ore used in the bloomery originated.

"The site is currently covered in up to four metres of water at high tide.

"Whilst some of this may be explained by the building or seawall and the Liverpool docks frontage constricting the estuary at this point and raising water levels, it cannot account for all of the tidal cover experienced by the site. This indicates that it is very old."

Dr Brian Atkin (Image: Wirral Archaeology CIC)

Dr Atkin continued: "If it is found to link to the Roman era, this would add to the body of evidence supporting a Roman presence on this part of Wirral.

"Or it may provide information about the Viking presence in the north of Wirral, which up to now has left few traces apart from the wealth of Norse place names."

The bloomery at Egremont was constructed by cutting into the sandstone bedrock creating a series of boxes.

The box was then surrounded with bricks, made out of clay, or perhaps using the cuts from the sandstone to form a cone with an open spout through which the charcoal and the ore was introduced.

A bellows was fitted into a small opening at the side and forced air into the Bloomery to get the temperatures high enough. Iron slag is fused to the surrounding sandstone and loose fragments can be found in the vicinity of the work site.

There are considerable amounts of this iron waste which suggest that this was a site of some intense smelting.

All of the Wirral foreshore is an Sight of Special Scientific Interest so Wirral Archaeology had to obtain permission from Natural England to work there.

They eventually received this in December 2022 with some additional help from Wirral Council who have been the main supporters.

In particular, at the Egremont Bloomery site, which covers a tiny portion of the whole of the Mersey Narrows, the low tide uncovers a shelf of sandstone running out from the Seawall for four to five metres, followed by a thin band of sand, shale, pebbles and broken shell probably covering deeper layers of sandstone.

The sandstone shelf then reappears for one-two metres and the remaining shoreline from this to the sea is covered with sand, shale and mud.

Wirral Archaeology Community Interest Company is a local voluntary group dedicated to researching Wirral’s historic past and bringing it to life by sharing knowledge with the local community and preserving it for future generations.

Its aim is to promote serious professional analysis of Wirral’s historic past, to raise community awareness of Wirral’s history, and use professional methodologies to jointly investigate local archaeology and history with several universities, scientists and historians.

On this weekend's investigation on Egremont foreshore, Wirral Archaeology CIC's chair Dominga Devitt said: "For years, local people will have played on the beach and walked their dogs across the area, not realising its huge significance to the history of the Wirral."