Memorial tribute to navvies who built ship canal

TWO SPECIAL PROJECTS WILL COMMEMORATE LABOURERS WHO RISKED THEIR LIVES

- NEAL KEELING

HE STANDS proudly astride his labour - the cutting of the “Big Ditch” - in waistcoat and neckerchief.

Now, finally, Lawrence Hannan, and the other navvies who put their lives on the line to deliver an engineering feat of colossal importance to the prosperity of the twin cities of Manchester and Salford, will be remembered.

Of the 17,000 who built it over six years more than 1,000 died - mainly due to landslides.

A memorial to the labourers whose graft created the 36 miles waterway from Salford to the Irish Sea is to be created with a grant from Historic England.

To Lawrence’s great-granddaughter, Ellen Hannan, it is a matter of such pride she has got her own hands dirty - helping create a tiny forest in the middle of MediaCityUK, as a living memorial to the navvies, 135 years after the excavations began.