James Cropper (1773-1840)
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James Cropper (1773-1840) was the first member of his family to settle in Liverpool, according to the family pedigree. He had been brought up near Ormskirk, his father a local yeoman farmer, being known as "honest Thomas Cropper". Rather than following his father into farming he took up an apprenticeship with Rathbone and Benson, a mercantile company, in 1790, aged 17. Here, he showed a keen business sense which earned him consistent promotion and eventually he joined Robert Benson, as a ship owner, forming the firm of Cropper and Benson, in 1799. This later became Cropper, Benson & Co. with the acquisition of further partners.   The firm claimed credit for originating the first line of packets sailing on specific days between England and America. They carried mail and passengers as well as cargo. Soon the company was recorded as making £1,000 per day profit. James Cropper was also part owner of the S.S. Bengal, the first ship to sail from Liverpool for India after the ending of the East India Company monopoly.  It is frequently reported that although his ships carried guns, they were dummy guns, in keeping with his non-violent Quaker beliefs.

During his early days in Liverpool, James lodged with a certain Mary Brinsden, fourteen years his senior. After she nursed him back to health, following a serious illness, he married her in 1796. Around 1823 the couple secured the lease of a portion of the Dingle Bank estate from the Yates family who lived there. James Cropper then proceeded to build three houses, one for himself and one each for the couple's sons, Edward and John. The site was one of outstanding natural beauty, some two miles south of Liverpool and encompassed about thirty acres. . The position of the estate with fields rolling down to the Mersey was superb,  views of Wirral, Wales and Beeston Castle in Cheshire were obtainable. One tenant reminisced that it was "like living in the country and at a very interesting seaside place at the time, with the shipping and yacht racing and yet within a couple of miles of the centre of a huge town".

Edward Cropper's first wife, was Isabella Wakefield, an amateur landscape gardener. She set about making Dingle Bank's ground even more exquisite. She created a mile-long walk around the property and this was lined with Japanese-looking plants and trees and included winding paths and a wooden bridge. Several arbors with seats were placed along the walk overlooking the sandstone beach of the River Mersey, where peace and tranquility could be found in the beauty of the surroundings. Some of the seating places were dug out of the grassy bank behind so that they were sheltered from the wind and rain . The most popular arbour was one that faced south so as to catch every ray of sun. It was lined with sticks of bamboo and its entrance was bordered with sandstone rocks. This proved to be a favourite haunt of the residents of Dingle Bank throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The description accords well with this lithograph from about 1820 by S. G. Nicholson.

The size of the Cropper family increased considerably during the nineteenth century, despite several sad losses. Eliza, James' daughter died in 1835 shortly after her marriage to Joseph Sturge. Edward's first wife Isabella Wakefield died tragically as did both his second wife and their son Charles. Fortunately, his third marriage to Margaret Macaulay, lasted a good deal longer and produced a number of children. She was a widow and a sister-in-law of Lord Macaulay, but was still said to be 'poor'.

Lord Macaulay: 'Just before the general election Hyde Villiers, the Secretary to the Board of Control, died, and the position became vacant. Macaulay succeeded his old college friend in an office that gave him weighty responsibility and exceptional opportunities for distinction. About the same time, an event occurred which touched him more than could any turn of fortune in the world of politics. His sisters Hannah and Margaret had for some months been almost domesticated among a pleasant nest of villas which lie in the southern suburb of Liverpool, on Dingle Bank; a spot whose natural beauty nothing can spoil, until in the fulness of time its inevitable destiny shall convert it into docks. The young ladies were the guests of Mr. John Cropper, who belonged to the Society of Friends, a circumstance which readers who have got thus far into the Macaulay correspondence will doubtless have discovered for themselves. Before the visit was over, Margaret became engaged to the brother of her host, Mr. Edward Cropper, a man in every respect worthy of the personal esteem and the commercial prosperity which have fallen to his lot.'

John Cropper had at least one daughter, (by Anne Wakefield), this was Margaret, born in 1836. She lived to a ripe age dying only on 10th Oct 1930. A son by the same marriage is known also, this was Charles James Cropper. THIS LINK gives some genealogy on the Croppers, perhaps even to the present day.

In the early days at Dingle Bank, the Croppers tended to marry into families with similar Quaker beliefs. Isabella Wakefield and her sister Anne Wakefield, who married Edward and John respectively, were from an ardent Quaker family.
Eliza's Cropper's husband and his family, the Sturges, were associated with the Croppers in the anti-slavery campaign and remained old friends even after their victory against slavery.
However, much to Ann Cropper's disfavour, four of her daughters married ministers of the Church of England, and although she accepted the situation, she did warn one of her sons, who became a churchman, against entering the Roman Catholic Church, "thou wilt know what I feel if one of my sons becomes a Roman Catholic."

Though the family were rich, they apparently attached little importance to material goods and followed a relatively simple way of life. Their chief interest lay in leading a good Christian life which involved sharing their good fortune with their poorer brethren. They became widely known as a major charitable force in Liverpool. Once a begging letter was addressed to "the most generous man in Liverpool, c/o the General Post Office". It was forwarded to John Cropper. Each year the family entertained boys from the training ship 'Akbar', (a juvenile prison shop) at Dingle Bank where games were organised and treats provided. They also set up a ragged school, in nearby Miles Street, which provided teaching in moral and elementary education to pauper children. The urchins attending the school often referred to the school as "St Cropper's". Their works spread to the setting up of a benevolent home for fallen girls in 1839 where John Cropper held a bible class every Sunday afternoon.

The Cropper family's social conscience ran into the world of politics too, in particular their campaign against slavery. James Cropper, for example, made up parcels of sugar and coffee from the East Indies and sent them to every MP to show that slave labour was not essential to their cultivation. The crockery used in the Cropper household constantly reminded the family of the evils of slave labour by bearing the picture of a slave in irons and around him the mottoes, "Alas my poor brother" and "Am I not a man and brother". They rallied around them the supporters of the anti-slavery movement. Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of "Uncle Tom's Cabin" visited Dingle Bank on her tour of England. she was overwhelmed by the welcome she received there and from other dignitaries of Liverpool. She found the beauty of Dingle Bank captivating, "the green of the turf on April 10th dazzled her and the lawns were enclosed by banks of washed gravel to an ivied porch, where deft servants took charge of the visitors, leading Harriet to the most delightful bedchamber she had ever seen."

James Cropper held strong political views regarding the Irish situation. In 1824, he had paid a visit to Ireland accompanied by his daughter Eliza. To his horror he found the Irish peasantry on the brink of starvation with employment scarce and wages a mere pittance. He realised the evils of absentee landlordism and was convinced that the British Government was largely responsible. This was because of the implementation of unreasonable trade restrictions which discouraged Ireland from developing her resources.

James Cropper, at some stage, became embroiled in a personal feud with Robert Stephenson (brother to George). Cropper was a founder director of the Liverpool-Manchester Railway and knew the difficult and abrasive George as well as the apparently placid Robert.  Matters came to a head when Cropper's attentions were drawn to systematic overcharging and fraud in the construction of the Princes Dock. Stephenson himself seems not to have been personally involved, but it was apparently never resolved and the men remained enemies. (the spat is outside of my coverage here, but it is interesting that a timely report found that the amount of stone supposedly supplied for the construction of the Princes dock, would have been enough to have sunk all of the ships which were supposed to have delivered it!)

By the time that he died in 1840 Cropper had made a major mark on the foundation and history, not just of Dingle but of the anti-slavery movement, the Quaker church, Liverpool itself and the Industrial Revolution. His name is commemorated also in Cropper Street, Liverpool.

The words quoted above "a spot whose natural beauty nothing can spoil, until in the fulness of time its inevitable destiny shall convert it into docks" were to come true. The Mersey Docks and Harbour Board had acquired the lease of Dingle some years earlier (1872) and  terminated this about 1920. The remaining members of the family left Dingle, probably forever. They left behind an association of the family name with charity and generosity which last to the present day however.

After they left tipping and filling began. British Mexican established an oil fuel storage and bunkering depot at Dingle Bank. Four huge, cylindrical oil tanks capable of storing 32,000 tons were built with a 3,000-foot 10-inch feeder pipeline to the Herculaneum Dock. The oil was pumped by two of G. and J. Weir's largest pumps. This was in addition to the Mersey Docks and Harbour Board's facilities for bunkering oil-burning ships, also at Dingle Bank. Ironically the company has gone, the oil storage has gone, Herculaneum Dock has gone and even the Garden Festival which occupied the site was simply a temporary state, as housing now occupies the entire area. (LINK)

There is one last word on John Cropper written by Edward Lear 1812-1888
 

Records and History courtesy of Merseyside Maritime Museum and Liverpool Record Office, Liverpool Libraries. Visit Liverpool Libraries online catalogues at http://archive.liverpool.gov.uk
See also : Adrian Jarvis, "James Cropper, Liverpool docks and the Liverpool & Manchester railway", Journal of Transport History,  Mar 1998