Charles Horsfall

Charles Horsfall (1776-1846), merchant dealing in palm oil from West Africa in the 'legitimate trade', but previously a merchant and slave-owner in Jamaica. Awarded compensation for New Hope Estate in British Guiana and Knowsley estate in Jamaica as owner-in-fee. Awarded compensation for three further claims in Jamaica as co-executor of John Thompson. Leading member of the Liverpool West India Association. Mayor of Liverpool 1832-33. Horsfall's son Thomas Berry Horsfall (q.v.) was Conservative MP and Mayor of Liverpool 1847. Charles Horsfall's children had a significant legacy in Liverpool in the form the Horsfall Churches, of which six survive.

1. Charles Horsfall said to be born 21/06/1776 and baptised St Peter’s, Huddersfield, Yorkshire, on 17/07/1776, the son of Joseph Horsfield and Anna Hodgson (Charles names one of his sons Charles Hodgson). Joseph and Anna married at St Peter’s, Huddersfield on 02/03/1767.

2. Sailed to Jamaica on 20/11/1792.

3. In Liverpool to marry Dorothy Hall Berry on 09/06/1803 at Trinity Church, Liverpool. Dorothy, a minor at the time of the marriage, was born in Kingston, Jamaica 07/10/1784, and baptised 28/10/1784, daughter of Thomas Berry and Dorothy. The marriage of Thomas Berry and Dorothy Hall said to be 27/03/1779 but no marriage appears in the Kingston, Jamaica Parish Registers for that date. Statement that Thomas Berry was a Merchant and given as the Honble Thomas Berry, owner of a slave, at the baptism of Allegonda Ann Hall in St Andrew, Jamaica in 1807 but again entry not found.

4. Charles and Dorothy had thirteen children: Ann (1804-) Thomas Berry (1805-1878) [q.v.], Robert (1807-1881), Mary Sale (1808-), Charles Hodgson (1810-1847), Eliza Dorothy (1812-1876), Caroline (1814-), Ellen (1816-), Dorothy (1818-1899), Louisa (1818-), Sarah Sophia (1820-), William Joseph (1822-) and George Henry (1824-1900).

5. Charles Horsfall does not seem to appear in the list of Slave Traders in Gore’s 1807 Directory for Liverpool.

6. The History of Everton by Robert Syers states that in 1811 ‘on the North of Mr Ellison’s field’ Charles Horsfall erected ‘the elegant, commodious mansion which stands at the east part, and formed the whole into a most charming villa where he has resided ever since’.

7. Charles Horsfall executor to the will of Isaac Fox who died 1811.

8. In Baines's 1824 Directory, business address given as Horsfall Charles & Co. merchts. & ship owners, 1, Exchange buildings and private address given as Horsfall Charles, merchant; h. 8, Netherfield lane, North.

9. Charles Horsfall – Merchant recorded as a Corporate Officer in House of Commons Papers Corporate Offices and Charitable Funds, p. 349. Also recorded in Liverpool Poll Book 1832 are Robert Horsfall, Broker, Oldhall Street, Liverpool (as an elector) and Thomas B Horsfall, Merchant, Netherfield Road North, Liverpool, (as Burgess or Freeman), both sons of Charles Horsfall.

10. Charles Horsfall became Bailiff of Liverpool in 1829 and then Mayor 1832-1833.

11. On 22/11/1833 the Liverpool Mercury carried a report about part of a case of bribery at elections in the Liverpool Council: this part is about family connections among Council members and Charles Horsfall is mentioned.

12. Recorded, along with Eleanor Blewart (q.v.), Rev William Mason (q.v.), John Thompson, Charles Bower and Henry, Mary and Margaret Cross, in documents pertaining to the ‘Mortgage by lease and release of Old Middleton Brows and other lands in Middleton and Overton. Consideration: £1700’ 15 & 16/03/1841.

13. At some point Charles Horsfall seems to have remarried as the 1841 census shows, at Brook House, Brighton, Great Crosby, Lancashire, Charles Horsfall, aged 64, Merchant, with Mary, aged 56, Caroline, aged 25, Sophia, aged 20 and William, aged 19, an Engineer, plus seven servants. Charles and Mary are shown as born out of county with Caroline, Sophia and William, whose names and ages match the children born to Charles and Dorothy, are shown as born in county.

14. Charles Horsfall died 18/06/1846 and was buried in St George’s, Everton 24/06/1846, aged 70 years. A photo of his grave is available. He left £262,000 in his will.

15. The 1851 census shows Mary Horsfall, 68, a widow, born Sutton Coldfield, Warwickshire, living at Breck Road, Everton, Lancashire, with Eliza D, 38, Sarah Sophia, 30, and Wm Josh, 28, and Robert Horsfall, 10, a grandson, plus five servants.

16. Charles’ children built Christchurch, Great Homer Street, Everton, at a total cost of £13,000 in their father’s memory. (The church was destroyed in the May blitz 1941.)

17. Several of Charles’ children went on to become business men and/or politicians. Thomas Berry Horsfall was Mayor of Liverpool and a Member of Parliament.

18. Two ships built for Horsfall & company: the Charles Horsfall in 1855 and the Dorothy in 1856. Both built by A. Hall & Co. Aberdeen. Ships were for ‘the African trade, palm oil etc’.

19. Thomas Berry Horsfall portrait (by George Patten, 1853) in the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool.

20. The London Gazette, 3 July 1885 p. 3079. "NOTICE is hereby given, that the Partnership hereto-fore subsisting between us the undersigned, George Henry Horsfall and Hodgson Horsfall, carrying on business as Merchants, at 17, James-street, Liverpool, in the county of Lancaster, under the style or firm of Charles Horsfall and Son, has been this day dissolved by mutual consent.—Dated this 30th day of June, 1885. George. H. Horsfall. Hodgson Horsfall.

T71/885: British Guiana claim no. 645 (New Hope); T71/865: St Andrew claim no. 201 (Knowsley); T71/869: St George claim nos. 42 (Eden Estate) and 94; T71/864 Port Royal claim no. 33; For the Horsfall churches: [accessed/updated 05/11/2025].

1. Ancestry RootsWeb Community Trees; Ancestry.com, West Yorkshire, England, Baptisms, Marriages and Burials, 1512-1812 [database online].

2. Ancestry RootsWeb Community Trees [accessed 13/11/11] but no confirmation found.

3. Ancestry.com, Liverpool, Lancashire, England, Baptisms, Marriages and Burials, 1659-1812 [database online]; Jamaica Church of England Parish Register Transcripts 1664-1880, Kingston Baptisms 1722-1792

4. Ancestry.com, England and Wales Christening Records 1530-1906 [database online]; Charles Douglas Horsfall family tree (on Ancestry) [accessed 13/11/11, revised 5 November 2025]: sources cited.

5. He does appear in Gore's 1807 Directory (p. 39) as a member of the West India Association: Gore’s 1807 Directory for Liverpool on Family Search.

6. Robert Syers, The history of Everton : including familiar dissertations on the people, and descriptive delineations of the several & separate properties of the township (1830), p. 258, [accessed 13/11/2011] available on Google books

7. Isaac Fox will

8. Edward Baines, History, directory, and gazetteer, of the county … of Lancaster (3 vols., Liverpool, 1824-25), vol. 1, p. 268.

9. House of Commons Papers Corporate Offices and Charitable Funds 1834; Liverpool Poll Book 1832 (Google books). (Robert on p. 42; Thomas B. on p. 127.)

10. Peter Hyland, Herculaneum pottery: Liverpool's forgotten glory (2005) [Google books]

11. Liverpool Mercury Friday 22 November 1833 at Old Liverpool, Liverpool Council [accessed 11/11/2012].

12. Lancashire Archives [accessed 04/11/2011, revised 0611/2025].

13. 1841 census online.

14. Liverpool, Lancashire, England Deaths and Burials 1813-1970 online; Horsfall grave picture; William D. Rubinstein, Who were the rich? A biographical dictionary of British wealth-holders Volume Two 1840-1859 (MS) reference 1846/34; Martin Lynn, 'The Profitability of the Early Nineteenth-Century Palm Oil Trade', African Economic History, 20 (1992), pp. 77-97.

15. 1851 census online.

16. Samuel Lewis (ed.), A Topographical Dictionary of England (London, 1848), p. 192, at British History Online: Christchurch, Boundary Lane, Everton

17. Thomas Berry Horsfall (Wikipedia)

18. Charles Horsfall ship record, Aberdeen-built ships

19. Thomas Berry Horsfall portrait.

20. London Gazette, 3rd July 1885 [accessed 31/10/2025].