There are
considerable number of remains a Woolwich Dockyard - some of which remain on
site and in place and in various uses and others which are in use elsewhere
ON SITE IN WOOLWICH
Apprentice School. Built 1849 as part of Woolwich Royal Dockyard Steam Factory complex. Built for the education of apprentices in steam engine manufacture from all the royal dockyards. Now the Co-op Chapel of Rest. See Appendix 3. [1]
Chimney. Built probably in the early 1840s by ‘a specialist chimney engineer, now anonymous’. It vented all the flues for the Woolwich Dockyard Steam factory. It is shown on an 1843 plan adjoining a since demolished boiler shop. It is 180 feet in height, octagonal and built of stock brick. It is said to have underground tunnels connecting with the River. It was later used by the Royal Arsenal Co-operative Society in the 20th century. Listed Grade II.[2]
Clock House. Mid 18th
century building. clock tower for four large clock faces. Flight of steps in
centre, forked to reach two enclosed wood porches, one at either side of centre
section. Grade II Listed. See Article appended with detailed of the
history of the building.[3]
Gateway with piers and abutting walls.
This entrance from Woolwich Church Street is the most easterly of the entrances and is opposite the and all I wanted it to do was to
end of Francis Street. It was built mid 19th century. It has two
tall square stone piers with anchor and rope carved in on friezes. Two other
stone piers. Grade I II Listed. [4]
Gateway. This is the western gateway,
by the Co-op funerals and built as the entrance to the Steam Factory. The
central gates are missing, the pedestrian gates survive and are topped with
distinctive concentric circle motifs. Decoration may have been added by the
Co-op.[5]
Graving docks. Two dry docks at the north east end of site. Two parallel 19th century stepped docks of granite, on the site of earlier docks. Later concrete sea-walls with mechanical sluices. Listed Grade II. These are the earliest extant dry docks associated with the steam navy. Modern steel caissons seal both docks, which are permanently flooded. They are or were used for fishing and recreation as the South-East London Aquatic Centre.[6]
Guard house. Built 1788 at the main gates. Originally single-storey with a Portland stone Tuscan loggia. designed possibly by S. P. Cockerell, the Admiralty’s Inspector of Repairs. The former guard house and lodgings were converted into a pub in 1981 called ‘The Gatehouse’. Reconverted to flats in 2007–8, with a steel-and-glass upper storey and a rear block to the Guardhouse.[7]
Gun emplacements. On the riverside on what was the central
landing place and set on the granite sea wall as
a brick fortification built 1847. With two gun embrasurers lined with sandstone
and topped with granite blocks. Immediately behind them is a circular platform
with steps and floor of granite. In the centre is a round block as a turntable.
These were for naval guns on wood carriage platforms able to turn and made in
the Royal Arsenal, remade in wrought iron in 2005. There are two posts made of
filled gun barrels sunk into the ground. Listed Grade II. [8] Defence Cannon on the Riverside.[9]
Master Warder’s lodgings. Buildings of 1788–9. extension of c. 1840 and wooden porch was removed in the 1970s.[10]
Pedestrian underpass.
Built under Woolwich Church Street from Kingsman Parade area as part of
Dockyard Estate. Decorated in 2000 with mosaics about the dockyard’s history
including the Henri Grace a Dieu. Greenwich Mural Workshop’s Steve Lobb.[11]
Police building. This is at the east side of the entrance gateway. Former police station now offices. Built in 1843, with date on hopper. Two stone porches. Part of the Thames Barrier and Bowater Road Conservation Area. Grade II listed.[12]
Railway Tunnel. This runs under under Woolwich Church Street and is now a pedestrian subway between Boneta Road and Prospect Vale. Part of the railway network constructed 1873-80 for youths with a military store depot, it connected the Dockyard with the North Kent Line and the Royal Arsenal. Part narrow gauge, designed by Arsenal’s Inspector of Works, Major Peter Scratchley RE. Deep sloping walls lead into an elliptical tunnel. Converted for pedestrian use in the 1970s as part of the Dockyard Estate. Only surviving element of War Office phase of use. A small section between the railway main line and Prospect Vale survives in a derelict condition. [13]
River Wall. Built in several phases. Follows from West to East. Long section of granite ashlar wall bordering former Cable Depot was built 1831-7 along with Trinity Stairs . Then oldest section from slipway to eastern end of Riverhope Mansions on Harlinger Street, built 1817-19 with concrete covered brick. Then the section up to Gun Emplacements which was built 1835-8, in concrete-faced brick.[14] . In 2000 the floodwall at the north-east corner of the estate was bridged for a continuation of the riverside walk with a steel footbridge, which includes a viewing platform. A Millennium Commission Lottery project, commissioned by Sustrans.[15]
Shipbuilding Slip No. 5, Mast Quay. Dated from 1855-6, replacing a smaller slip. Granite-paved rectangular basin with stone-coped side walls, curved at entrance to river. Refills at high tide.The last surviving naval structure and one of the last elements to have been in service.[16]
Shipbuilding Slip No. 6, Mast Quay. Easternmost and oldest surviving Royal Dockyard slipway. Lengthened and straightened 1844-6 forc larger ships. Used during 1970s (See Appendix 4); forms a feature within Mast Quay housing development Design & Materials Granite-lined, rectangular basin with stone-coped side walls, curved at entrance to river mouth Features Refills at high tide; crossed by Thames Path Degree of Alteration None known Significance Represents the last surviving naval structures that once punctuated Woolwich’s industrial and military riverfront; rare and intact landscape feature and important reminder of Woolwich’s Dockyard history, one of the last elements to have been in service Qualifying criteria: Historical Interest; Architectural Interest: i) sole-surviving example Environmental Significance: i) characterful, locally valued feature iii) group value with Slip No.5 and Former Royal Dockyard River Wall
Smithery, Erecting Shop and Brass Foundry.
This is part of what was once the Co-ops’ Commonwealth Buildings.(see Appendix
2 for more detail) Erecting shop from 1838; smithery and brass foundry
added oh in 1846.. Designed by the Royal Engineers working for the Board of
Ordnance. The earliest naval establishment for installation and repair of
maritime steam engines. The erecting
shop was originally the boiler shop and was converted c.1843.
Erecting
shop situated near to the inner
basin. Steam engines were assembled here and installed into ships using large
cranes.
Smithery. Built to use
for the manufacture of metal parts. Partially glazed roof and inside aee cast
iron tapering columns and a metal roof with king post truss.
Brass
foundry added in 1846.[17]
Wall. Long stretch of Dockyard boundary wall built 1833 along Woolwich Church Street. Impressive height and mostly intact. Yellow stock brick with with plain stone coping. [18]
Woolwich Store Warehouse. Block 1 Built 1914 and only surviving element of the ‘Woolwich Store’, military store depot used during the 1870s. Three-storey warehouse, using Hennebique system of ferro-concrete construction. Wall crane on south elevation. Concrete posts, in each bay shuttered concrete floor. Loading bays bricked up, otherwise intact. Building still in industrial use. [19]
ELSEWHERE
Anchor forge or smithery - iron framed and steam powered, erected in 1814–17. Designed by John Rennie to make the largest anchors and ironwork. It was the first industrial use of steam power in a naval site and the first machine-driven facility of its kind in England. Built to manufacture and assemble marine steam engines it was a key part of the Royal Navy's steam factory with 48 hearths and Nasmyth steam hammers powered by two Boulton & Watt engines. In 1973–4 it was re-erected at the Blists Hill Ironbridge Gorge Museum.[20]
A correspondent writed "The building at Blists Hill was the smithery at Woolwich Dockyard. .It was ordered by The Commissioners of the Navy in 1814. A detailed plan of the building is shown is in Pierre Charles François Dupin' book Voyages dans la Grande Bretagne. pub 1825 in 3 volumes. Since Bouton and watt supplied the two steam engines a copy of Dupin's plan is the B&W collection in Birmingham.. this is reproduced in Jennifer Tann's book The development of the Factory. The iron structure was designed by John Rennie but I do not know who made the ironwork. When the Dockyard site was being cleared in the early 1970s Ron Fitzgerald then at the London Museum investigated the site. He asked Denis Smith for advice and Denis got his newly set up Goldsmiths IA class to survey the building. That would have been 1974. . At that time S** H*** was planning to write up the survey and we went up to Birmingham to inspect the original B&W papers on the Dockyard. Denis introduced (Sir) Neil Cossons to the smithery building. Neil agreed that the recently opened Blists Hill Open Air Museum would be a suitable home for the structure . The museum had opened on1 April 1973. I guess Neil got the demolition team to carefully remove the building and move it to Ironbridge. I remember seeing the ironwork lying in long grass on many number of visits I led to Ironbridge in the 70 & 80s. The Building now houses what was Walmsleys Atlas Forge. Walmsley's were in Bolton and were the last wrought iron factory in Britain. I photographed them at work in around 1980 It was a great if somewhat dangerous place. I think they closed in 1984 and their equipment was acquired by Ironbridge. Visited Blists hill earlier this year and there was little evidence of the works in recent use.
Shipbuilding slips - metal roofs that covered slips at Woolwich in the 1840s and 1850s were taken apart after the Dockyard closed and were built at Chatham Dockyard.[21]
Iron slip cover built to cover Woolwich No. 6 Slip in 1844–45. In 1880 this was moved to Chatham Dockyard, for use as a machine shop.[22] It is thought to be one of the oldest surviving examples of a wide metal frame structure..[23]
Iron slip cover built 1846–47. Moved to Chatham in 1876 and became the main boiler shop for the steam factory. It was restored in 2002–03 and serves as the mall of Chatham's Dockside Outlet shopping centre.[24]
Iron slip cover built in 1856–58. Moved to Chatham in the 1870s to be used asthe main Engineering Factory of the Dockyard. Taken down around 1990.[25]
Former Dockyard Church. Rebuilt in Eltham 1932 as St Barnabas's Church. It was built between 1856 and 1858 and for 74 years stood just inside the main gate. It could seat 1,200 people and was for the officers, workers, and Royal Marines. It church was bombed in 1944 and restored in 1956 with a new roof and remodelled interior.[26]
APPENDIX
1.Clock
House. The SELIA entry is very short. It says “Superintendent’s offices. These
date from the 18th century and now look somewhat dwarfed by new flats’.[27]
Discover Woolwich says: “The Clockhouse. Formerly the Admiral Superintendents’
offices now a Community Centre. This is a
pleasing building of 1783 “handsome and well-proportioned with a fine
ornamental clock tower and two wooden porches on either side of front steps
added in the mid-19th century are an unusual feature.. and ……on the ground
floor two ceramic tiles showing old cannon; one in the large room to the left
and the other in the coffee bar opposite. They were brought here in 1980 from
the demolished Clarence Arms pub in Plumstead.” [28]
The Clockhouse
replaced a previous building also called the Clockhouse – which was a timber
structure with a tower containing a large clock. The need to have a clock
in a central position is to regularise time management within the Dockyard
where labour relations were often not easy. It was important to understand
‘time’ and how it was used.
In the late 18th century
the Dockyard took over more land beween =the main gate/Francis Street to the
roundabout at Warspite Road. There were plans for a considerable expansion of
work at the Dockyard using this new section. Before this was done it was
decided to find a way of joining the old and new sections together, a new
entrance at the point where the old and new areas..
Upon entering the
new gateway immediately ahead and clearly to be seen, was a large office
block with a prominent central timber clock tower with clock faces to be
seen from all directions. This is one of the dockyard’s earliest surviving
buildings and is still known as ‘The Clockhouse’, It was built in 1783 and designed as the
administrative headquarters for the Dockyard. It put the office block at the
centre of the enlarged Dockyard and the Survey of Woolwich says it is ‘an almost cubic block that stood in
isolation, a beacon of supervision and control’. From its windows all
aspects of the dockyard would be seen.
The Survey speculates
on who designed it. It is likely that all the work on it would have been done
in house. Construction is likely to have been the responsibility of John
Johnson, Master of a staff which included forty-three house carpenters, and
fifteen bricklayers.
It housed offices
for the yard’s most senior officials, all resident in a ‘handsome row of
double-fronted houses’ nearby, built around 1750. At that time the most
important men in the Dockyard were the Master Shipwright, the Storekeeper, and
the Clerk of the Cheque, the Master Attendant and the Clerk of Survey. Each of
them, of course, had a considerable number of subordinate staff.
Each department had its own suite of rooms off a central staircase. This
staircase was in itself revolutionary in that previously these departments
would have had their own front doors.
Woolwich, unlike
most other dockyards, did not have an Admiral Superintendent in charge.
In the 1780s when Clockhouse was built Woolwich Dockyard was directly under the
control of the Navy Board in Central London. Then, from 1806 it was
administered by someone with the lower rank of Captain
Superintendent.
The ‘Master
Shipwright’ was the chief superintendent in charge of the Dockyard. Over the
time period when the building was in use as the administrative centre there
were 10 master Shipwrights. All of them had come up through the ranks of
skilled dockyard workers, getting various supervisory roles around all the
Dockyards until they reached the top. All of them were responsible for the
design and construction of numerous ships of all sorts.
‘The Storekeeper’’s
role should be obvious. ‘The Clerk of the Cheque’ was responsible for mustering
the workmen, looking after expenses and keeping account of wages. ‘The
Master Attendant’ was there to 'hasten and assist' the fitting out, or the
dismantling and removal, and securing ‘vessels of war’- and making sure that
they were moored and maintained in a suitable way. ‘The Clerk of the Survey’
checked the details of all stores received and issued and also surveyed
materials. In the 1960s Greenwich Council built the housing estate which now
stands around the Clockhouse. As part of this scheme the Clockhouse
was largely rebuilt internally in 1977 – 8. This involved support of the
interior and later, in the 1980s, a new bell cupola was added. It opened as a
Community Centre in the late 1970s.
2 Commmonwealth Buildings. In 1926 Royal
Arsenal Co-operative Society bought freehold land, once part of the
Woolwich Royal Dockyard from the Admiralty. They named it
Commonwealth Buildings and by 1937 nearly 1,900 staff were employed there.
They mainly handled grocery and provisions warehousing - bacon
smoking, tea blending etc. There was also a pharmaceuticals laboratory, shoe
repairs, clothing manufacture, general engineering, and motor maintenance,
along with a garage and depot for transport. In 1929 a Co-operative
Exhibition was held there attended by the Prince of Wales and over
200,000 members of the public. It was said that queues to get in
were a mile long. It included “a model bungalow. the theatre of
fashion, home cookery demonstrations, concerts, arts and crafts, cornet and
hosiery making, working exhibits of machinery, sweet boiling,
cigarette making, etc. Famous bands will provide music and Admission is Free.” Conversions of
numerous buildings were carried out under the supervision of the Society’s
architect, and completed by 1932. Entry to it was from the old Steam
Factory Gate, where RACS installed is own ironwork. There were workshops for
repairing motor vehicles, tailors and boot-repairers and warehouses and much
else along the main road. On the waterfront the three storey metal-framed
buildings at slips 1 & 2 became a butter department, pharmacy and tea
store, and the adjacent quayside became a range of grocery warehouses. By 1937
the site employed 1,426 workers and housed twenty-one industries and
departments. It became an important regional distribution centre - RACS
covering a vast hinterland beyond Woolwich over much of Kent and Surrey. RACS
operations were gradually run down and wound up By 1984 most of Commonwealth
Buildings had been demolished. he site was
closed in 1985 and developed in the 1990s for housing.
3, Apprentice School.
What did SELIA have to say about it? “Few people could guess the
Co-op Chapel of Rest was in fact built as the first school for the apprentices
employed in the Dockyard. Before this school was built the apprentices were
taught in hulks moored close the yard”. [29]
The Survey of Woolwich says that the site was a very late part of the Dockyard
and part of the expansion of the steam factory in the mid-19th century.[30]
So – the site we are looking at is the Co-op Funeral buildings which are at the
far end of Woolwich Church Street before you get to Warspite Road. There
are huge windows with vehicles on show. Church Street – then called Albion Road
- was built in the early 1840s and the Dockyard expanded up to the road in 1844.
Beason is also thought to have designed the school buildingsl They are on the
left-hand side of the West Gate as you go in. The Woolwich Dockyard
School for Apprentices opened in 1844 in the wake of a Dockyard education
scheme that the Admiralty had introduced the previous year when little, if any,
technical education was available.. These specialist premises are said to be
for the teaching of marine engineering to apprentices drawn from the Royal
Dockyards’ steam factories. Also that Woolwich was the first establishment in
the country devoted to training for service in the steam navy and was important
in establishing Woolwich’s reputation for engineering expertise. the
Woolwich school was set up in 1843. A Royal Commission in 1844 said that an
Apprentice School was set up at Woolwich which specialised in engineering
training and that it was a great success. These schools seemed to consist of
discovering and fostering an elite. The boys were given an academic style
introduction and gradually weeded out until one lucky lad is chosen from
Deptford and Woolwich combined and allowed to go on to higher education and
presumably a future as a master shipwright. The others fell by the wayside, one
by one. Apprentices of all trades were expected to learn English, mathematics,
mechanics and later move on to technical drawing and electricity in future
years. Eventually they would do professional stuff like engine fitting -
or, for the few, naval architecture. Many of these reports give a vast amount
of attention to detail, alongside complaints about the low pay of the lone
schoolmaster. This sometimes includes stuff like the exact time of the dinner
gong every day. Regardless of who attended it and who learnt what there, the
School survives much as it was built. It in yellow brick with stone
dressings. The former school on the gate’s west side had become a
mortuary chapel for RACS funeral-furnishing establishment. In 1961 it was
enlarged, to plans by A. L. Foreman, the Society’s architect, with a road side
showroom and large sheds to the west of the former school. It subsequently
spread to the former police barracks and other buildings to the east and
continues as Co-operative Funeral care. I note the address is still 2
Commonwealth Buildings.
4. CUBOW. One of the
oldest parts of Woolwich Dockyard was sold by auction in 1872. It is the
site which is now covered by flats known as Mast Quay. In the 1870s this was
Royal Dockyard Wharf used by E. Arnold & Co., timber and slate merchants.
They had steam sawmills and roadside offices.[31]
Tenants came and went but from 1919 W. R. Cunis Ltd, dredger,
tug and barge owners had the site. By 1968 other adjacent wharves and
their slips had been taken over by Cunis for building and repairing of tugs,
trawlers and coasters.[32] In
1971 it became Cubow Ltd, a joint venture for Cunis with Hay’s Wharf Ltd.,
including Greenwich boatbuilders Humphries and Grey and Bowker and King
Ltd. One slip was covered, for building boats ‘the like of which were not being
made anywhere else on the Thames’ – yachts, fishing boats and other vessels up
to a thousand tons.[33]
One example in 1973 was the sail yacht Eagle which could accommodate 14 guests
and six crew members ‘waiting on their every need’. Another boat from
1973 was Suffolk Monarch built as a fishing trawler and then chartered by the
Ministry of Defence as HMS David and converted into a minesweeper - eventually
renamed Britannia Monarch she was scrapped in India in 2011. One of the last
ships built here was a cargo vessel, Ambience, operated by Crescent shipping
and sadly scrapped in 2012.[34]
There were many others. Beagle – built in 1973 which today- offers trips round
the Galapagos Islands.[35] There
was a last brief revival of repair work here in the early 1990s. I well
remember this revival and seeing a boat on the slips. I also remember how many
people seemed so happy with this and saying to each other that ‘we are building
ships again on the Thames’
[1] https://www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk/media/3586/download?inline=1
[2] https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1288806?section=official-list-entry
[3] https://www.clockhousecc.co.uk/ . https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1289605
[4] https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1212293
[5] https://www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk/media/3586/download?inline=1
[6] https://historic england.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1212422?section=official-list-entry. Survey.
[7] Survey
[8] https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1289552?section=official-list-entry
[9] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Defence_cannon_at_Woolwich_Dockyard_-_geograph.org.uk_-_1454771.jpg
[10] Survey of London, Woolwich. Bartlett School. University College London
[11] Survey
[12] https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1213983
[13] https://www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk/media/3586/download?inline=1. Survey
[14] https://www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk/media/3586/download?inline=1. Survey
[15] https://www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk/media/3586/download?inline=1. Survey
[16] https://www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk/media/3586/download?inline=1. Survey
[17] https://www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk/media/3586/download?inline=1. Survey
[18] https://www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk/media/3586/download?inline=1. Survey
[19] https://www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk/media/3586/download?inline=1.
[20] Survey. Additional information RJM Carr
[21] Hawkins, Butler & Skelton. Iron slip cover roofs of Deptford & Woolwich Royal Dockyards 1844-1855. London's Industrial Archaeology No 13 2015
[22] Sutherland, R.J.M. Shipbuilding and the Long-Span Roof: Journal of the Newcomen Society, London, 1989.
[23] Hawkins, Butler & Skelton. Iron slip cover roofs of Deptford & Woolwich Royal Dockyards 1844-1855. London's Industrial Archaeology No 13 2015
[24] Hawkins, Butler & Skelton. Iron slip cover roofs of Deptford & Woolwich Royal Dockyards 1844-1855. London's Industrial Archaeology No 13 2015
[25] Hawkins, Butler & Skelton. Iron slip cover roofs of Deptford & Woolwich Royal Dockyards 1844-1855. London's Industrial Archaeology No 13 2015
[27]‘Industrial Archaeology of South-East London (SELIA).
[28] Spurgeon ‘Discover Woolwich and its
Environs’. Survey. https://www.royalgreenwich.gov.uk/media/3586/download?inline=1. Survey
[29] SELIA
[30] Survey
[31] Survey
[32] https://www.facebook.com/liquidhighway/posts/cubow-ltd-built-ships-in-this-dock-at-mast-pond-wharf-woolwich-and-built-yachts-/10158536984905186/
[33] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woolwich_Dockyard
[34] https://www.shipphotos.co.uk/ship/?ship=ambience
[35] https://www.boatinternational.com/yachts/the-superyacht-directory/beagle--45141
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