History of the Fylde of LancashirePorter, John (Writer on the Fylde of Lancashire)
History
History of the Fylde of Lancashire
Porter, John (Writer on the Fylde of Lancashire)
Lancashire (England) -- History
westerly direction, was much greater in ancient days than it is in our
own, and that the Lune formed its highest boundary, whilst its seaward
limits, opposite Rossall, were carried out to a distance of nearly eight
miles beyond the existing coast, and comprised what is now denominated
Shell Wharf, a bank so shallowly covered at low water spring tides that
huge boulders become visible all over it. Novel as such a theory may at
first sight appear, there is much that can be advanced in support of it.
From about the point in Morecambe Bay, near the foot of Wyre Lighthouse,
where the stream of Wyre meets that of Lune at right angles, there is
the commencement of a long deep channel, apparently continuous with
the bed of the latter river as defined by its sandbanks, which extends
out into the Irish Sea for rather more than seven miles west of the
mouth of Morecambe Bay, at Rossall Point. This channel, called “Lune
Deep,” is described on the authorised charts as being in several places
twenty-seven fathoms deep, in others rather less, and at its somewhat
abrupt termination twenty-three fathoms. Throughout the entire length
its boundaries are well and clearly marked, and its sudden declivity
is described by the local mariners as being “steep as a house side.”
Regarding this curious phenomenon from every available point of view,
it seems more probable to us that so long and perfect a channel was
formed at an early period, when the river Lune was, as we conjecture,
continued from its present mouth, at Heysham Point, through green plains,
now the Bay of Lancaster, in the direction and to the distance of “Lune
Deep,” than that it was excavated by the current of Lune, as it exists
to-day, after mingling with the waters of Morecambe and Wyre. The course
and completeness of Wyre channel from Fleetwood, between the sandbanks
called Bernard’s Wharf and North Wharf, to its point of junction with
the stream from Lancaster, prove satisfactorily that at one time the
former river was a tributary of the Lune. Other evidence can be brought
forward of the theory we are wishful to establish—that the southern
portion of Morecambe Bay, from about Heysham Point, bearing the name of
Lancaster Bay, as well as “Shell Wharf” was about the era of the Romans,
dry or, at least, marshy land watered by the Wyre and Lune, the latter
of which would open on the west coast immediately into the Irish Sea.
If the reader refer to a map of Lancashire he will see at once that the
smaller bay has many appearances of having been added to the larger one,
and that its floor is formed by a continuous line of banks, uncovered
each ebb tide and intersected only by the channels of Wyre and Lune. The
Land Mark, at Rossall Point, has been removed several times owing to the
incursions of the sea, and within the memory of the living generation
wide tracts of soil, amounting to more than a quarter of a mile westward,
have been swallowed up on that part of the coast, as the strong currents
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