Last updated 7 February 2002
| | Brief History
| The Gillett & Co., Croydon, bells were cast in 1886 and installed in Birkenhead Town Hall to provide a "Westminster" chime for the Town Hall Clock. A total of six bells were supplied at the time (despatch date 4 October 1886) but, at present, the location and use of the sixth bell (2' 6" dia.) has not been established. The upper levels of the tower suffered fire damage in 1901 but the bells were unaffected by the conflagration.
| The bells remain in the tower to to the present day and are still in use. However, use of the building has changed since the early 70's, when Birkenhead was merged with four other boroughs to form the new Metropolitan Borough of Wirral. It now houses the Wirral Museum which is open to the public, 10.00 a.m. to 5.00 p.m. every day except Mondays. As might be expected, the bells are not normally accessible to the public but photographs of the bells can be seen in the Town Hall Picture Gallery on this website.
| The clock mechanism is also by Gillett and Co. This was subsequently modified to provide auto-electric winding, but is now defunct. The clock is now controlled by an electronic system, and the hammers driven by individual motors. This involves the use of smaller hammers than those originally used. An unfortunate consequence of the use of these lighter hammers is that the sound emitted by all of the bells is rather disappointing. This is not helped by the tendency for the hammers to dwell on the soundbow after striking. A simple manual test involving the use of the original hammers, still in position but disconnected from the clock mechanism, results in a much richer, sonorous output.
It is likely that costs would prove a constraint but reinstating the original mechanism, even with some modification, would produce significant improvement in sound quality of these bells which include the heaviest bell in Wirral.
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