MORE than 100 people gathered to mark the return of the historic “Sailors’ gates” which have come home to Liverpool 60 years after they were lost to the city.
Ex-seamen from down the generations attended, along with civic leaders and campaigners who have long fought to see the “Henry Pooley Gates” brought back to their rightful place.
Yesterday morning, the Grade II-listed gates were officially unveiled, taking pride of place outside John Lewis on Paradise Street, close to where the original seaman’s mission stood.
The gates, which feature one of the earliest architectural depictions of the Liver Bird, were taken down for repair in 1951 but ended up languishing outside a foundry in the Black Country.
After a hard-fought campaign by ex-seaman Gabriel Muies, Phil Griffiths and Steve McKay, the foundry in Smethwick agreed to let them go and Liverpool council stumped up around £35,000 to bring them home.
Council leader Cllr Joe Anderson, who, like his father and brothers before him went away to sea for 13 years, said: “We have to recognise the contribution to this city that was made by merchant seamen and the Merchant Navy, for that is what has made Liverpool the world-renowned port that it is.”
Entertainers from the Mersey Heritage Trust performed as the crowds began to arrive, relating the tale of how the sailors’ home was first conceived in the 1800s.
