Discover the history of
Royal Arsenal, London SE18
Since about 1518 Woolwich had been the location of the Royal Dockyard and ordnance
storehouses but development of the present site of Royal Arsenal West, then known as
Woolwich Warren, began in 1671 when the Crown purchased the old mansion known as Tower
Place together with 31 acres of land, for
use as an ordnance storage depot. The change from storage depot to munitions factory began
in 1 696 when the Royal Laboratory was constructed for the purpose of manufacturing
ammunition, fuses and gun-powder. Up
to 1716 all guns for government service were cast at the foundry of Mr John Bagley in
Moorfields
in the City of London. In that year a very serious accident at the foundry which resulted
in the death
of 1 7 persons caused the Board of Ordnance to decide that the Government should have its
own
foundry and that this should be built at Woolwich Warren.
The new foundry, known as the Royal Brass
Foundry, was designed by Sir John Vanbrugh and
completed in 1717. It remains to this day in substantially original form. The urgency of
this project
gave the necessary stimulus to planning which started the true foundations of what was
later
to become known as Royal Arsenal Woolwich.
New development, also to the designs of
Vanbrugh, included the “Great Pile of Buildings” now
known as Dial Square and the rebuilding of Tower Place, later to become the Royal Military
Academy and last used as the Royal Arsenal West Officers’ Mess. By the end of the
18th century Woolwich Warren had developed, under the stress of the Napoleonic Wars, from
a series of small
rural workshops to a swiftly expanding modern factory. Its importance to the country was
acknowledged
in 1805 when, at the suggestion of King George III, the title of the establishment was
changed from Woolwich Warren to Royal Arsenal Woolwich.
Further expansion and the introduction of
substantial improvements in weapon design and
manufacturing techniques took place throughout the 19th and early 20th century culminating
in a peak of activity during the First World War when over 72,000 persons were employed.
During the 2nd World War, with the Royal
Arsenal Woolwich working to the limit of its capacity
there was little opportunity to undertake a careful and controlled expansion of
facilities. When
the war ended, demand for armaments dropped dramatically and in order to maintain
employment, alternative work for the civilian market was sought.
Over 11,000 railway trucks were produced
in the Arsenal together with automatic and multiple
head knitting frames for the silk industry. The rearmament policy of the early l95Os gave
a temporary
boost to production at Woolwich but a Select Committee on Estimates report in 1952
concluded that
the Arsenal in its existing form was uneconomic and that it should be reorganised and
rationalised.
Although some action to this end was
taken, the Arsenal continued to decline until the Woolwich
Review Committee under Sir Lewis Hutchinson finally recommended that only two small areas
should be retained and the remainder released for redevelopment. There then followed a
gradual
decline in activity to the point when it was decided that the Royal Ordnance Factory
should be
officially closed on 1 April 1967 and most of the 1200 acres which the Arsenal by then
embraced
sold to Greater London Council for their Thamesmead housing and industrial project.
Two small areas remained in MOD use though
known as Royal Arsenal West and Royal Arsenal
East up until their final closure in the early 1990s, the former including many of the
more important
historic buildings which are to be preserved for posterity.
Extracts taken from http://members.lycos.co.uk/RoyalArsenal |
