23 listed buildings, 4 of them Grade II*

Church of St MaryGrade II* listedWidnes North Railway StationGrade II listedGossages TowerGrade II listedWidnes Town HallGrade II listedPair of Cemetery ChapelsGrade II listed+4See all photos

Photos from Wikimedia Commons and Geograph, copied to our own server, each credited to its photographer with its licence; names open the building’s page or its official list entry.

Historic England lists buildings in three grades: Grade I for buildings of exceptional interest (about 2.5% of all listed buildings), Grade II* for particularly important buildings of more than special interest (about 5.8%), and Grade II for buildings of special interest (about 91.7%). Listing protects the whole building, inside and out.

Every entry on the National Heritage List for England whose point lies inside the ONS 2022 built-up-area boundary. One list entry can cover a terrace or a group of buildings. Neighbourhood dots: the population-weighted centre of each Census 2021 output area, coloured by its neighbourhood’s (LSOA’s) share of homes built before 1919 (Valuation Office Agency, March 2025).

Historic England’s conservation areas layer, supplied by councils (incomplete in places, so a page fact, never graded). Hectares are the part of each area inside the built-up area.

The first 3 entries were listed in 1963. 13 came in 1983, in the national resurvey of the 1970s and 80s. Only 3 have been added in the last 15 years.

1 scheduled monument

Nationally important archaeological sites and monuments, protected by law; work on them needs consent from the Secretary of State, advised by Historic England.

Standing cross in St Luke's churchyard, Farnworth, beside the south porch

Two measures, each ranked against every UK town of 1,000 or more, with protected heritage counting twice as much as the age of homes. Protected heritage counts each listed building by its grade (Grade I three points, II* two, II one), each scheduled monument and battlefield two, and each registered park or garden by its grade; it is ranked both per 10,000 residents and as a total, so a village with one fine church doesn’t outrank a historic city. The second measure is the share of homes built before 1919, from the Valuation Office Agency’s council tax records. History is a character grade: it describes the town and isn’t part of the overall grade.

William Smyth

Mary Dennett

Robert Mond

Alfred Young

Charles Glover Barkla

Arthur Rudd

Arthur Johnson

Thomas Mottershead

William Dickson

Thomas Wilkinson

1500165018001950

Charles Glover Barkla1877–1944 · English physicist (1877-1944)

Robert Mond1867–1938 · British chemist and archaeologist (1867–1938)

Alfred Young1873–1940 · British mathematician and rector of Birdbrook (1873–1940)

AR

Arthur Rudd1890–1968 · American soccer player (1890-1968)

William Smyth1460–1514 · Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield

TM

Thomas Mottershead1892–1917 · British pilot, recipient of the Victoria Cross (1892-1917)

Thomas Wilkinson1898–1942 · English recipient of the Victoria Cross, died 1942 (1898–1942)

Mary Dennett1730–1781 · Prioress of the Holy Sepulchre, Liège (1730–1781)

Everyone born in Widnes → Birthplaces from Wikidata; portraits from Wikimedia Commons.

Widnes has 23 listed buildings, including St Mary's Church. Its older streets lie in 3 conservation areas, the first designated in 1990. Of the 10 people born here before 1900, the best known include Charles Glover Barkla (1877), Robert Mond (1867) and Alfred Young (1873).

More than half went on the list in a single year, 1983: 13 of 23. Most towns its size have more Grade I buildings: the typical one has 1. The rest is about typical: per resident it sits near the middle of UK towns; it also has a scheduled monument; and 11% of its homes were built before 1919, close to the 15% in the typical UK town.