Hurst St, close to the Liverpool docks, was the hub of Liverpool’s Basque and Galician communities from the 1870s until the area began to be cleared in the 1920s. Hundreds, if not thousands, of Basque and Galician sailors and migrants passed through its boarding houses and private homes.

No. 41 Hurst Street, just across from the Baltic Fleet pub, was a well known destination for Spanish (especially Basque) emigrants on their way to the United States. From 1881 until the 1920s, no. 41 was the home of Prudencio Clemencot and his wife Ygnacia Ansuategi, both from the Basque town of Elantxobe. Prudencio was a shoemaker by trade, and after his death in 1905, Ygnacia also ran a shop from the house. The family were agents for the White Star Line, which meant that when Basque migrants landed in Liverpool en route to the US, the Clemencots looked after them until their ship was ready to leave. The emigrants did not stay at 41 Hurst Street itself, but at boarding houses close by.

No. 41 contained several households. In 1881, Ygnacia's two sisters Martina and Segunda were staying with the family; ten years later, Segunda and her husband Francisco Aramburu, another shoemaker, were still there, along with a third household: tailor Antonio Urrutia and his wife Eduarda Bengoa, both from the Basque town of Ea.

Hurst Street in 1938. No. 41 is the second house along after the refreshment rooms on the corner, with a woman sitting on the staircase.
Image: Liverpool Record Office.

The Liverpool Basque

The Clemencot family and their boarding house were the inspiration for Helen Forrester’s novel The Liverpool Basque (1993), written as a result of Forrester’s friendship with Prudencio and Ygnacia’s grandson Vicente Elordieta. The novel depicts life in a Hurst Street boarding house through the eyes of young Manuel Echaniz, and his memories as an elderly man now living in Canada. Publisher's website | Obituary of Helen Forrester.

Museum of Liverpool

You can see the boarding house ledger, and a wedding photograph of Prudencio and Ygnacia's daughter Saturnina Clemencot and son-in-law Doroteo Elordieta (Vicente’s parents) in the 'People's Republic' gallery of the new Museum of Liverpool. In the ledger, the family recorded the names and destinations of dozens of Basque migrants who passed through Hurst St on their way to the New World. The Basque Library in Reno holds a second copy of the ledger.