AN ARTIST whose most famous painting went missing from a Liverpool pub is trying to track it down and put it in a gallery.

Tribute to the Mersey, a four- foot wide oil painting showing 19 ships that sailed the river over a 100-year period, hung over the fireplace at the Baltic Fleet for most of the 1980s.

But, when the landlord died and the Wapping pub briefly closed, the painting vanished.

Now artist Brian Entwistle, 69, is hoping to find his most famous work and put it on public display.

The well-known maritime artist, who now lives in Anglesey, said: “It was my idea to do the painting. I gave the then landlord John Meakin a price of about £800 - £900. That was in the early eighties.

“I used old photos, turned them round, and put colour in. The whole thing became a sort of vignette of all the various types of shipping on the river up to that point in time.

“I used to get letters left to me in the Baltic Fleet. Sea people and skippers used to bother me for prints. I would get letters from people from all over the world.

“We had prints done of it and John Meakin would sell them behind the bar. It worked out well for me. It was quite impressive, if I do say so myself.”

Featured ships include the ferry Marlowe, a Mersey Flat and the White Star Liner Olympic.

Brian, who used to live in Wavertree, said: “I used to go down to the Mersey as a kid. I was always fascinated by it.

“I remember going down with my dad in May, 1945, and seeing the captured German U-Boats.

“That’s one of my first memories.

“I never lost interest in the river and would paint it a lot. But not just bright sunny days. I liked it in the fog.”