Home » Deed/Indenture Agreement dating to March 1881

Deed/Indenture Agreement
dating to March 1881

This Indenture or deed is between The Duchy of Lancaster, ‘The Queen’ to The Fleetwood Local Board, Grant of Foreshore at Fleetwood. In March 1881, the Duchy of Lancaster (the Queen) granted rights over part of the Fleetwood foreshore to the Fleetwood Local Board, in exchange for a payment of about £700.

At that time, Queen Victoria held the Duchy of Lancaster, a private estate of the monarch that still owns land and foreshore in Lancashire. The Duchy of Lancaster still owns the foreshore at Fleetwood. The Duchy’s ancient foreshore estate stretches along the Lancashire coast from Barrow-in-Furness down to the River Mersey, which includes the coastline in and around Fleetwood. For context, in the UK, the majority of the foreshore is owned by the Crown Estate, but the Duchy of Lancaster holds approximately 90,000 acres of it, primarily in the North West.

In 1881, the Duchy (i.e. the Crown in its Lancaster capacity) owned part of the coastline at Fleetwood. The Fleetwood Local Board (a precursor to the council) wanted to use or control that land to develop the docks and maritime works, promenade or seawall construction, drainage or flood defences.

In practical terms, the Local Board paid the Duchy to obtain legal control over that stretch of shoreline so they could develop or manage it. The indenture records a “grant”, meaning a long lease or transfer of rights of £700; this is likely to have been a premium (one-off payment) for the right granted.

£700 in 1881 was a substantial civic investment. It could equate to many years’ wages for workers, a major infrastructure budget for a small town. So in “economic significance” terms, it would seem like several hundred thousand pounds or more in modern local-government spending power. But in civic terms, it represented a major strategic investment in the town’s waterfront.

The legal agreement is interesting in that it includes a plan of the Fleetwood Foreshore at that time. The Foreshore is the strip of land between high and low tide along the coast.

The Indenture also has 3 substantial seals housed in metal containers.