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The Ferry House, Wilford: back view
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WILFORD BRIDGE was erected in 1870, and Wilford-road was formed in 1853. Before that time there had been a short road which in 1829 terminated at the Navigation Inn, and the rest of the journey across the delightful open meadows, which in the spring were blue with the haze of crocus, was accomplished by a bridle track marked by white posts for guidance during the all too frequent floods until the banks of the Trent were reached, and its crossing accomplished by means of a cumbrous ferry. This ferry was the scene of a disaster in 1784, when in the midst of a gale an overcrowded ferry boat capsized, and six unfortunate passengers were drowned.
The Ferry House at Wilford was a popular resort of our forefathers. Cherry eating seems to have been a speciality, and truly, cherries or no cherries, a walk across the meadows in their pristine beauty, and the mild excitement of Wilford Ferry, must have formed a pleasant diversion before industrialism came to its hideous own.
Even to-day Wilford is a pleasant enough place, preserving to a remarkable degree its rural amenities. Apart from the somewhat morbid memories of Henry Kirk White, it offers ratter more stirring stories of the life of Captain Deane, and his adventures at the capture of Gibraltar, of the wreck of the Nottingham Galley, and the twenty-six days of cannibalism on the lonely rock off the coast of New England.
He built the two dignified houses at the entrance to the village, and died in one of them in 1761, having spent eighty-two as adventurous years as anybody could wish to attain to.