page_title: Rock Ferry
section_title: Ferry service and shipping
hierarchical_section_title: Rock Ferry / Ferry service and shipping
caption_attribution_description: English: HMS Conway School Ship at Rock Ferry (Mersey) 日本語: HMSウィンチェスター（訓練艦Conwayと改名後の姿）
context_page_description: Rock Ferry is an area of Birkenhead on the Wirral Peninsula, England. Administratively it is a ward of the Metropolitan Borough of Wirral. Before local government reorganisation on 1 April 1974, it was part of the county of Cheshire. At the 2001 Census, the population of Rock Ferry was 13,676, increasing to 14,298 at the 2011 Census.
context_section_description: There are records of a ferry service from Rock Ferry pier to Liverpool from 1709 onwards, until being discontinued on 30 June 1939. The ferry landing stage was removed in 1957 and the terminal building demolished. The pier became part of Tranmere Oil Terminal and modified for use as a berth for tanker cleaning and degreasing. It has since fallen into disuse and become very dilapidated. 
  A stone slipway originally used by the ferry service also remains.
  The Royal Mersey Yacht Club was founded at a meeting held in the Mersey Hotel, Old Church Yard, Liverpool on 26 July 1844. The club opened the doors of its present premises in Bedford Road, Rock Ferry, on 31 May 1901.
  Rock Ferry was home to a number of boat builders including the famous yard of Samuel Bond and the lesser known Enterprise Small Craft Company. Between 1906 and 1935 both yards built Royal Mersey Restricted Class boats, including Mefanwy and Phyllis.
  Bonds built many fine boats including Mersey Canoes.
  Enterprise built a number of notable boats. Among these were 11 Seabird Half Rater one design sailing yachts in 1924, Robinetta and Fairwind in 1937 and 18 Hilbre One Design craft between 1959 and 1962.
  The Naval training school vessels HMS Conway and TS Indefatigable were moored at the Sloyne, in the River Mersey, between Rock Ferry and New Ferry. These were ships converted for the purpose of training boys for a life at sea. During the nineteenth century, the reformatory ships Akbar and Clarence were also moored there.
  In the early years of the Second World War, both the Conway and Indefatigable were moved from the Mersey to avoid damage.
  Isambard Kingdom Brunel's SS Great Eastern was beached at New Ferry for breaking up in 1889, which took eighteen months to complete.
caption: HMS Conway at Rock Ferry
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