T.C. Barker & J.R. Harris 
A Merseyside Town in the Industrial Revolution [PDF ebook] 
St Helens 1750-1900

First published in 1994. This book is an outstanding product of St Helens, as remarkable in its way as sheetglass and Beechams pills. It is the first full scale nineteenth century history of a small industrial town as distinct from the bigger and better-known cities and as such it deserves to be very widely read and studied.