The building was decorated with a golden bald eagle, the national symbol of the United States and a reassuring sign to American sailors or travellers arriving at Liverpool docks.

[11] Hawthorne described in his journal the American seamen with whom he dealt as "most rascally set of sailors that ever were seen - dirty, desperate, and altogether pirate-like in aspect".

It appears that he often found his consular duties to be a burden: Hawthorne was retired from the position in 1857, having apparently discharged his duties in a "prudent and efficient manner" [13] During the American Civil War (1861–65), consul Thomas Haines Dudley made strenuous efforts to prevent ships from Liverpool from breaking the United States Navy blockade of Confederate ports.

[15] The commerce raider CSS Alabama was a screw sloop-of-war built for the Confederate States Navy at Birkenhead in Merseyside in 1862 by John Laird Sons and Company.

[20] Surratt had fled to Europe with the help of Confederate agents, booking passage under an alias and landing at Liverpool in September 1865, where he went into hiding in the oratory of the Church of the Holy Cross.

[21] Curiously, the United States Government chose not to pursue Surratt any further, despite having offered a $25,000 for information leading to his arrest, and no request was ever made to the British authorities to detain him.

[20] In any event Surratt did not stay long in Liverpool, but went on to serve for a brief time in the Ninth Company of the Pontifical Zouaves in the Vatican City under the name John Watson.

[24] After World War II, Liverpool declined in importance as a trading partner with the United States, and the consulate was eventually closed down.

Once derelict and empty, it was the first building purchased by The Grosvenor Group in preparation of "The Paradise Street Project", an extensive redevelopment of Liverpool's central business district.