HMS Captain 1870         

Laird Shipbuilders

Lairds in 1840

Lairds was started in 1824 by William Laird, a Scottish entrepreneur. He set up a boiler making works on the south bank of the Wallasey Pool in Birkenhead, and in 1828 was joined by his son, John Laird, who realised the possibility of expanding into iron shipbuilding. The techniques of bending iron plates and riveting them together to build ships were similar to the principles involved in boiler making. Laird's first vessel was a 60ft prefabricated iron lighter in 1829.

In 1839 Laird built its first screw propelled steamer, Robert F. Stockton, a 63ft tug for use on North American waterways. By 1840, Laird had built another 21 iron paddle steamers including four gun boats for anti-piracy patrols for the East India Company. Laird’s reputation continued to grow and in the same year the Admiralty gave Laird an order for the paddle steamer Dover which was to be the first steamer for the cross channel mail service.

Nevertheless Laird continued to expand its shipbuilding business, and opened a huge new yard at Birkenhead in 1857, covering 20 acres with five drydocks. In 1858, an engine building works was added.

Laird also experimented by using steel plates instead of wrought iron when it built Ma Robert, a small river steamer for the famous explorer Dr David Livingstone. Between 1850 and 1870, Merseyside’s shipbuilders were among the most innovative in the country.

John Laird, son of the founder, retired in 1861 and transferred the business to his three sons, William, John and Henry Laird. The Laird family continued to run the shipyard until it was merged with Sheffield steel makers Charles Cammell & Co in 1903 and thus the name Cammell Laird was born.

By 1869 Laird had built a large number of small warships for the Royal Navy or associated government organisations and to foreign navies. In 1863, Laird was commissioned to build two armoured coastal monitors for the American Confederates. These vessels were technically significant as they were equipped with revolving turrets instead of the traditional broadside arrangement. The British Government seized both ships because they compromised the country’s neutrality and they were commissioned into the Royal Navy as HMS Scorpion and HMS Wivern. Laird also built four turret ships for the Dutch Navy between 1866 and 1869, as well as one for Peru and two for the Royal Navy, including the disastrous HMS Captain of 1869.

While the naval contracts probably provided more in the way of prestige and profit, merchant ship construction was Laird’s bread and butter and most were mundane vessels, such as bulk carrying iron sailing ships, tugs, dredgers or barges.

It built its last Royal Navy ship in 1993, having built many well known ships, aircraft carriers, submarines etc through the build-ups to and including the two World Wars.

Cammell Laird continued in business through nationalisation and re-privatisation, building its last ship, the submarine HMS Unicorn, completed in 1993. Subsequent mergers, liquidations and sales of the name mean that anything currently using the name Cammell Laird bears little resemblance to the 19^th and 20^th century company.