Chatham Dockyard (38 page)
Authors: Philip MacDougall
In those early years of redeveloping the historic enclave I was provided with the opportunity of photographing every aspect of this area. More than anything, it resembled a latter-day
Mary Celeste
, with workshops simply abandoned and trade tools seemingly awaiting the return of those who had most recently used them. This was particularly so in the colour loft, where row upon row of Singer sewing machines were simply gathering dust while in the No.1 Smithery an eclectic collection of heavy industrial machinery was beginning to rust itself out of existence. Poignant in its simplicity was a note that had been chalked onto the sail loft wall. Reflecting the family atmosphere that had once pervaded the yard it declared, ‘this happy place was once the home of the painters C243. But thanks to Thatcher and Nott, it is now no more.’ And further down the wall was added: ‘Jobs they can axe; memories they cannot.’
Only with the permanent showcasing of a number of warships, these now occupying several of the dry docks, did visitor numbers begin to increase. In particular, the historic enclave, the most complete example in the world of an eighteenth-century dockyard, is now the home of three such vessels. While none date to the eighteenth century, they are the clear crowd pullers and include
Cavalier
, Britain’s last Second World War destroyer, and
Ocelot
, a submarine that was also the last Royal Navy warship built at the yard. More recently, July 2010, with work on renovating the No.1 Smithery, which had lain derelict for a number of years, by then completed, this too was opened to the public. A joint venture with both the Imperial War Museum and the National Maritime Museum, and put together at a cost of £13 million, the building now houses more than 3,500 official Navy
ship models together with a number of important maritime paintings and a gallery to display international touring art. In addition there is the much longer established ‘Wooden Walls Exhibition’ and a sizeable museum that makes full use of artefacts collected by those early pioneer members of the Chatham Dockyard Historical Society. As a consequence of this much more all-encompassing visitor experience, further enhanced by a restaurant in the historic setting of a former wheelwrights’ shop and a full educational programme, CDHS has now boosted its annual visitor numbers to that of 250,000.
A final component to the three-way redevelopment jigsaw is the use made of the No.3 Basin by Medway Ports. A commercial port complex, it handles in excess of 1 million tonnes of cargo per year. In looking into the No.3 Basin, the vessel to be seen is the
Sand Heron
, a Lloyd’s-registered aggregates vessel.
Chatham Maritime has now also made considerable strides forward, with extensive housing having now been constructed on the north-west side of St Mary’s Island. Of equal significance is that of the large-scale entertainment and shopping complexes, these to the south of the No.1 Basin. Here are to be found the Dockside Outlet Centre, an Odeon Cinema, the Dickens World visitor attraction, a Ramada Hotel, and the Ship and Trades public house. Helping to further preserve some of the dockyard’s history is use that has been made of some of the former buildings of the yard, with the Dockside Outlet Centre housed in the former Boiler Shop No.1 (a former Woolwich dockyard building slip) while the Ship and Trades public house occupies former dockyard offices and an engineering shop that dates to 1875. A further building in this area, but one with no clear future, is Pump House No.5. A handsome red-brick building, it once contained the nine boilers that connected to the pumps that emptied the basin dry docks. A Grade II listed building, it has been refurbished by the South East England Development Agency but is currently unoccupied. As for the No.1 Basin itself, this serves purpose as a yachting marina, owned and operated by Marina Developments Limited.
While all of these developments might not have brought anything like the scale of jobs to the area that the dockyard was once able to boast, the various replacement schemes, projects and complexes have brought a degree of employment. Unfortunately, and when compared with the dockyard, the relative pay levels (when inflation is taken into account) are often much lower. This is an inevitable consequence of a changeover from the considerable skill levels required by the dockyard as compared with the service industries that now predominate within the former area of the yard. Furthermore, while the dockyard was a flagship industry with a long and proud history, it is difficult to suggest that any of its replacement products with the exception of CDHS (as a keeper of the yard’s heritage) have anything approaching a similar prestige level. Nevertheless, in having gone through a good many years of suffering, the end of the tunnel has been reached and the dust created by the need to regenerate the Medway Towns in their virtual entirety has now begun to settle.
Chapter 1
1
Pipe Office accounts, 1547. The terms ‘Jillingham’ or ‘Jillyngham’ appear interchangeable at this time.
2
Among the earliest to make such a claim was the Revd Scammel, this made in a series of lectures that he had published at the beginning of the twentieth century and in which he staked a claim for the year 1514. Later, both Presnail (1952) and Baldwin (1998) suggested not dissimilar dates while the Chatham Maritime Trust website (2011), David E. Hughes (2009) and Roberts (1992) all lean towards the year 1547.
3
TNA AO1/2588. Pipe Office Declared Accounts quoted in Cull (1958), p76.
4
Acts of the Privy Council re-quoted from Cull (1972), p76.
5
Loades (1992), pp150–3.
6
Ibid
.
7
Oakum was formed out from fibres picked from old rope.
8
Terms such as careening and breaming are also explained in the glossary.
9
TNA E351/2194, 28 June 1550 – 29 September 1552.
10
For further explanation of the careening process see the glossary.
11
B.L. Rawlinson Ms A.201, f.106.
12
Loades (1992), p187.
13
Pipe Office Accounts for 1569–70.
14
Cull (1958).
15
Pipe Office Accounts, 1572–79.
16
Oppenheim (1896), p150.
17
Oppenheim (1902).
18
See Chapter 5 of this book for a detailed discussion of this major problem and how it was ultimately solved.
19
SRO GD51/2/964/2. Extracts from Pepys Vol.10 f.463.
20
Ibid
.
21
Ibid
.
22
Ibid
.
23
KAO U1311 O1. ‘A booke of Lodging for the Midsomer Quarter’, 1611.
24
Ibid
.
25
McGowan (1971),
passim
.
26
Perrin (1918), p116.
27
Much more attention to the growth of Chatham as an urban conurbation can be found in an earlier book by the author; see MacDougall (1999).
28
Diary, August 1665.
29
Diary, 11 June 1667. Pepys later blamed Commissioner Pett for the loss of
Royal Charles
, a first rate warship captured by the Dutch. According to Pepys, Pett should have moved the vessel higher up river ‘by our several orders, and deserves therefore to be hanged for not doing it’.
30
Diary, 14 June 1667.
31
Rogers (1970), p138.
32
Ibid
.
Chapter 2
1
Wilson (2009), p54; Stenholm (undated), p2.
2
Unger (1978), p10.
3
Tsar Peter also made a brief visit to Portsmouth dockyard. Among those known to have worked under Peter the Great were Joseph Nye and Richard Cousins, both formerly of Portsmouth dockyard. At the time of Peter the Great’s visit, Nye had established his own small shipbuilding yard on the Isle of Wight.
4
The report submitted to Maurepas is now readily available in translated form, see Roberts (1992). In addition to Ollivier’s written submission, this chapter has been informed by several maps, including those of 1688 (BL Kings 43), 1698 (BL Kings 43), 1719 (C.R.E. Library, Chatham) and 1746 (BL Add Ms 31323).
5
BL Kings 43; BL Add Ms 31323; Roberts (1192), pp78–9.
6
Coad (1989), pp114–6.
7
Roberts (1992), p79; BL Add Ms 31323.
8
Roberts (1992), p80.
9
Ibid.
, p114.
10
Ibid.
, p161.
11
Ibid.
, p117.
12
Ibid.
, p115.
13
Ibid.
, p116.
14
Fiennes (1901),
Through England on a Side Saddle in the Time of William and Mary
.
15
Roberts (1992), p100.
16
Ibid.
, p102.
17
Wilkinson (1998).
18
Roberts (1992), p102.
19
BL Add Ms 31323.
20
Ibid.
, p109.
21
Ibid
.
22
Ibid.
, p111.
23
BL Add Ms 31323.
24
Falconer (1780). William Falconer completed his highly regarded
Universal Dictionary of the Marine
while ensconced in the captain’s cabin of
Glory
, a thirty-two-gun frigate laid up in the Chatham Ordinary. This was during the 1760s, with the then resident Commissioner at Chatham, Jonas Hanway, providing the necessary authority for this arrangement. Born in 1730, Falconer, who also served at sea, was additionally noted for his poems.
25
Defoe (1971 edition), pp123–4.
26
Ibid.
, p109.
27
Ibid.
, p109.
28
Ibid.
, p109.
29
In 1774, there were exactly fifty-four river moorings. See BL Kings 44, map of river Medway.
30
Ibid.
, p111.
Chapter 3
1
Mahan (1908), p7.
2
Ibid.
, p10.
3
John Markham, re-quoted in Pope (1981), p252.
4
TNA ADM2/215, 10 November 1749.
5
TNA ADM3/61, 6 July 1749.
6
TNA ADM7/662, 1775.
7
TNA ADM7/659, 13 May 1771.
8
TNA ADM7/659, 13 May 1771.
9
Science Mus. neg 4254.
10
TNA ADM7/661, 25 June 1774.