Setting up Siemens Industrial Museum at Woolwich in the 1950s

Setting up Siemens Industrial Museum at Woolwich in the 1950s

Ian Lovell describes potential exhibits which they found in the vaults

The Siemens Water Meter which we exhibited was not a genuine historic item but a reproduction built to demonstrate the principal. Its appearance bore scant resemblance to the original. It consisted of a simple turbine connected to a mechanical revolution counter.  It came with an electric pump and plastic pipes to make connections

There was a Siemens W 40 Magneto Electric Machine about 3 feet long and 2 feet high painted black and immensely heavy.  It was an A.C. generator using permanent magnets for its field; it could still produce a deflection of an AVO meter when turned by hand

The Original Swan Lamp had been the size and shape of a cigar with a carbon filament.  The original our research showed, has been insured for £2,500 but accidentally broken some years before. A copy was made said to be identical. It certainly looks exactly like the photographs we saw of the original. It was insured for £1,500. The insurers made it a condition that the copy should be kept sealed in a mahogany case with heavy beveled glass sides - not ideal for the exhibition purposes.  The Victoria Lamp as we named it was a green glass bulb the size of a Christmas tree light in the form of a bust of Queen Victoria. Dr Sutton had checked the filament and found it to be good. He was particularly anxious that there should be a power supply for this for the Duke of Edinburgh to light up. He felt he (the Duke) would be especially interested in the exhibit as he was related to Queen Victoria by marriage.  I was set the task of determining the operating voltage as there was nothing on the bulb to indicate this and arrange for a suitable transformer to be built if necessary.  I built a simple rig with a voltmeter and variable transformer and starting at zero applied voltages increasing in steps of 0.2v to it. It was a very nerve wrecking experience. At 3.2v there was the faintest detectable global from the filament, At 3.6v it blew.  I thought it would not be astute from a career point of blew to tell the director that I had destroyed an irreplaceable historic relic on which he had set his heart, courteous and charming that he was.  I therefore told him I had tested it and found it blown and he believed he had done it himself

There were also a number of other carbon filament and early tungsten bulbs, none working and some early thermionic valves.  I remember one bulb which had two long strips of brasses terminals. Its holder was a piece of polished wood which fitted between the strips. The bulb was screwed with a wooden nut and bolt passing through holes in the terminal strips which lined up with one in the wooden support

The Sound Powered Telephone, built in 1893, resembles an elegant brass and mahogany mushroom. It had an elaborately turned brass base on which was mounted a leather covered brass column which acted a handle. This was surmounted by a tamed mahogany earpiece which also served as a microphone. Mounted on the side of the handle was a small crank connected through a gear chain to a magneto inside. When not in use a metal bead rested on the diaphragm which rattled loudly when the magneto was cranked to call the other user.  The bead was threaded on a bootlace connected to the telephone to prevent it being lost

The Master Clock was  a very accurate wall mounted long case instrument designed for  factory use, powered by a battery. It was driven by magnetic pulses applied to the pendulum by a solenoid. An ingenious device ensured that the pulse was applied only when the amplitude of the pendulum had dropped below a certain distance, usually one every six or seven oscillations. Once a minute the clock would transmit an electric pulse from each of the two terminals.  The pulses on alternate terminals being 30 seconds apart.  These pulses had been used to drive slave clocks round the factory enabling a number of relatively inexpensive instruments to achieve the same accuracy as the master instrument.  This instrument was not displayed in the museum

Siemens had been associated with a number of other artifacts not exhibited but referred to in pictures reproduced from books.

The Super Regenerative Furnace. The exhaust gases instead of being directly released into the air were passed through a honeycomb of firebricks, heating them. When the honeycomb was sufficiently hot the exhaust gases were re-directed by metal door to a second honeycomb and the air inlet to the furnace through the previously heated bricks. The brick honeycombs were then ‘switched’ at appropriate intervals as one cooled and the other heated.  This resulted higher temperatures and lower fuel use being achieved by reusing heat which would otherwise run to waste

The Super Regenerative Steam Engine invoked a similar principal. Steam exhausted from the engine was used to heat the feed water before it was pumped into the boiler making a considerable saving of energy. This was done with a simple heat exchanger consisting of two concentric pipes

Siemens Engine Speed Governor was said to govern the speed of a steam engine more accurately than the centrifugal engine governor. It comprised two shafts one of which screwed into the other and one of which could move longitudinally.  One shaft was connected to the load the other rotated at a reference speed controlled by a pendulum. If the shafts turned at the same speed there was no longitudinal movement .if there was a difference of speed one shaft would move along lengthways and a collar on it would operate a lever to adjust the steam Inlet. I’m still puzzled as to how a shaft running at constant velocity could be regulated by a pendulum

Memoirs of a Royal Ordinance Factory apprentice

 Memoirs of a Royal Ordinance Factory apprentice

By John Day

I cannot remember whether working closed week earned me overtime or a week off later.  An apprentice’s wages in the first year was 12/- a week from which unemployment and friendly society contribution were deducted.  I think the first was 10d. or 12d. and the second 2d or 3d.  As a result I received just under 11/- . My friendly society stamped card had to be sent to the Secretary every six months. I belonged to the Ancient Order of Foresters whose secretary was Bro. Moss of Verdant Lane, Hither Green.  There was a rise of 2/- at the end of the year and the wages on up until, when I was 21, I got 63/- as a young journeyman - the union rate.

1935 saw the beginning of the short lived Royal Arsenal Sports Association Motor Cycle Club I began in the Electrical Shop with Bill Beresford (03 Norton), Bill Croft (Enfield Twin and side car), Percy Harris (649cc vertical twin Triumph and sidecar), Meredith Smith (o.h.v. Norton), Len Shum (o.h.v. Raleigh), Charles Day (Scott) my father (1150 cc Brough Superior and sidecar), Len Dent (MAC Velocette) and myself (model 9 Sunbeam). 

Bill Croft ran the battery shop that charged and repaired all the dilly and other accumulators in the Arsenal. Percy Harris rewound small armatures - it was said that he did more private vacuum cleaners than official motors. Merry Smith was in the drawing office, as were Len Shum and Len Dent and was responsible for the heating in the about to be re-opened Nottingham Ordinance Factory

The club met on Sunday mornings at the Prince Imperial Monument facing the Royal Artillery Institution and went to run round the Kent lanes or to a local motorcycle sporting event.  They ran a road trial which entailed following route cards at a set speed, there being time checks at unknown points. I would have done quite well in this my first motorsport event, had I not thought I knew better than the organisers in how to get from a to b! The club only lasted a couple of years eventually joining up with the local group of the Civil Service Motoring Association.

After my spell in the western D.C. area I was stationed at substation No.4 (Sub 4) presided over by Andy Clements, with Syd Freeman (electrician’s mate) and Bill Nunn (motor cleaner). Sub 4 was east of the Sales Ground where unwanted bits and materials were sold off by auction and served the Danger Buildings, the F shops where all the woodwork was done and Crossness Explosives Pier. The substation was divided into two areas - one held the voltage reducing transformers and associated switchgear and the other was the rest room where we made tea and waited for the next phone called to say something had gone wrong. While Syd brewed the first cup of the day, Andy pushed the newspapers of the table and produced a bit of chalk and proceeded to introduce the then resident apprentice in the deeper intricacies of electricity distribution of three-phase current.

One day the phone rang and Andy told me to take Syd and sort out the trouble.  I forget what the trouble was but I that remember I hadn’t a clue how to solve the problem. Syd suggested a course of action sp I took it (after all Syd was three or four times my age) and all went well.   When I returned to the Sub Andy asked me what I had done I told him Syd had suggested a solution. Oh dear! Andy really went for me.  The gist of his tirade was if you’re in charge of a job you do not follow the instructions of a subordinate and you take responsibility. One learnt more than various trades with that kind of apprenticeship.

The Sub being well out of sight and out of mind of the main part of the Arsenal Andy had acquired a garage on the other side of the road for the benefit of engineering apprentices who wanted to work on their cars or motorcycles particularly on Saturday mornings.  I suggested a lathe might be useful so Andy took me on a scrounging trip on the dilly and returned with a ½ inch centre late from a ‘mothballed’ shop.  This was set up in the Sub, driven by a motor similarly acquired. News of the lathe reached the shop steward of the main shop and he began to raise great objections (he would, he was the shop turner) and he was soon told to be quiet. The lathe would only be used by an apprentice and it was only for ‘foreigners’.

Being in the woodworking area (F Buildings) there is a lot of high-speed machinery. One interesting motor that came our way for a vertical spindle router and it ran at 5.750 r.p.m.  The trick was to use the first rotor as the stator for an inner (output) rotor reversing the connections to the inner rotor; one could hold the shaft with the motor taking full current.

A Greenwich Turret Clock

A Greenwich Turret Clock

The church of Christ Church, now the centre of the Christchurch Forum, until the mid nineties had in the tower a mechanical clock operating on two faces.  It having stood idle for decades before the birth of the Forum, the guiding lights of that organisation decided on restoration.  A campaign resulted in enough money for the work to be undertaken. 

The result was a new clock driving two new faces by the well known firm of John Smith and Sons of Derby. Perhaps disappointingly the new clock proved to be electrically driven accompanied by striking stimulated by electronics.

However the Forum having some feeling for antiquary wished to have the old mechanism on display and during a chance meeting on a bus between Mick Hayes, councilor, and driving spirit of the Forum and myself, Mick asked me casually if I knew anything about clocks.  Having reparsed some half dozen tower clocks I said ‘yes’ and volunteered to help.  My first visit to the turret – somewhat ankle deep in pigeon droppings – convinced me that repairs were possible to the movement but arranging for the weights and wire ropes to be replaced would be very difficult.  A further difficulty would be to arrange for access for the weekly winding required.  There latter producing people to undertake this task which involves scaling ladders to reach the turret would always be a problem. 

The consequence was, as already stated, an electric version

There then shortly after appeared on my doorstep the two train movement and a massive wooden pedestal on which it sits.  A closer inspection showed the movement to have been made famous makers Thwaites and Reid of Clerkenwell in 1858.  There was of course some wear in parts.  The gear teeth (brass) were in good order.  One of the two pinions (steel) had been moved axially to present the unworn portion to their mating wheels. The only repair needed was to replace two teeth on the string rack.

The current position is that the movement is in good working order and the wooden pedestal has been tightened up in the joints and well cleaned up. A simple superstructure has been made to support the original pulleys and new wire lines fitted. Reamai ing task apart from the act of installing the whole thing are the design and making of the necessary weights and some painting.  Sadly the original bell could not be removed from the turret - not yet anyway

After installation the Forum wishes but some suitable form of striking and time indication could be assessed, using as much of the original mechanism as possible

Jack Vaughan

The original version of this article appeared in the April 1998 issue of the Greenwich Industrial History Newsletter

A few years later a new regime of the forum threw the clock out. It is understood that it was picked up by enthusiast – does anyone know where it is now?

Deptford Strand - the middle ages

Deptford Creek. 

This is an extract from Dr. Christopher Philpotts assessment of Deptford Creek. This section describes industry in the medieval period

The fundamental feature of the history of all the manors and parishes along the banks of the Thames below London in the medieval and early modern periods was the struggle to reclaim or ‘inn’ the marshes from the River.  Earthen banks or ‘walls’ were constructed along the Riverside and the land behind was drained by ditches.  This was enclosed and drained in a series of parcels divided by cross-walls which were built out from the gravel uplands and ran perpendicularly to the River, advancing the river front over a period of time.  The level of each parcel related to the date at which it was first ‘inned’ - the lower the level the earlier the ‘inning’.

The method of constructing the river walls is not known with any certainty, but they are likely to have consisted of simple earthen banks perhaps founded on hurdles. By the 16th century timber groynes probably formed the foundation and the earth may have been mixed with reeds taken from the marshes in front of the wall.  The reclaimed land behind the wall was used for meadow and pasture and also for sowing corn. The unenclosed marshes in front of the walls were used for fishing and fowling. The remains of two timber revetments recently recorded on the west and east sides of the Creek bed to the south of the railway bridge may represent the lines of medieval and early modern river walls.  By the end of the Middle Ages the River walls had been raised to 2.7mOD as excavated at Limehouse.  They were often breached and behind them there was frequent flooding of the fields up to 1.8mOD.

By 1515 there are references to Stowage Marsh and in the late 16th century repeated repairs of the River walls here.  The Creek was also mentioned  The earliest spelling is the same as the modern street name at in the 16th century the variants ‘Stowedge’. ‘Stoage’ appeared and in the 18th century ‘Stoad’. The location of the house appears to have been between Hoy Inn Stairs and a street called The Stowage.  By the 18th a wharf 104 feet long beside the Ravensbourne., dwelling houses, warehouses, sheds and a substantial area belonged to ‘Stowidge House’. The name of the street therefore derived from this property and not from the later storage facilities at the East India company as has often been stated

Interspersed in these strips of arable cultivation and marshlands where the properties of several religious houses including Saint Thomas’s Hospital.  The Hospital accumulated much land in the area including a length of the Thames bank called Skinners Place between Deptford Green and Deptford Strand on which stood a dovecote by 1414 and several tenements were built by the early 16th century
The Deptford Strand area along the river walls of the Thames was certainly populated by the 13th century and increasingly so in the later medieval period.  It was called the ‘vill of Westgrenewich on  the Stronde’.  Walter the Archer and his wife Christina were found murdered at their house in ‘West Greenwic’ in 1227.  A wharf had recently been made on land of Deptford Strand manor in 1463-4.  Medieval pottery has been found on the Thames foreshore between Watergate Street and Deptford Green.  At Deptford Bridge another wharf was added shortly before 1471.  In 1381 a wharf was mentioned at Deptford where a cargo of 4,000 short faggots of firewood, called ‘ovenfagotes’ was to be delivered, presumably for the bread ovens of the village.

In the Domesday Book survey of 1086 four mills were noted within ‘Grenviz’ and a further 11 in ‘Levesham.  In 1157 Walkelin de Haminot granted an annual rent of 10 shillings for the watermill in Deptford town to Bermondsey Abbey probably in compensation for his father’s failed gift of the manor in 1145.  The Abbey collected this rent until the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the 1530s.  This mill must have been the tide mill or ‘Flodmell’ known to have been established on the west bank of the Ravensbourne to the north of Deptford Bridge by at least the 14th century.  It had a continuous existence until it was closed after a fire in 1970.  In 1326 and 1342 the tidal waters to drive it were held back by a ‘Flodmellware’.

Other water mills operated on the Ravensbourne, including one at Brookmill Road on the site of the Kent Water Works established by 1586 and the Armoury Mills at Lewisham. Another tide-mill operated in Pot Mead, later the site of Deptford Wharf/Borthwick Wharf

The initial bass of the economy of the Deptford Strand settlement was probably fishing in the Thames.  in 1279 there was a dispute over fishing rights in the pond on the site of the Dockyard and in 1349 Greenwich fishermen were found guilty of using nets with too fine a mesh. There are also have 14th and 15th century references to  fishermen and fisheries along the Strand shore.
Indications of wider range trade have been found in Greenwich in the form of an inscribed 13th century brass seal and a bronze steel yard weight of the 13th or 14th century.  A Greenwich mariner was licensed to trade in Gascony as early as 1229.  In 1326 the men of  Greenwich were exempted from military service on land because they had sent ships to serve with ‘The King’s Admiral’.

The shipbuilding industry at Deptford Strand is known to have begun in 1420 with the rebuilding and refitting of royal ships and the digging of the dock for one of them in a former garden belonging to William Ramessy (the precise location has not been traced).  There had probably been earlier  activity for which the evidence no longer survives.  ‘The Thomas’ had been waiting there on the stocks since 1418. The dock was retained to hold the dilapidated Katerine until March 1425 when she was sold for scrap.  By the end of 15th century this activity was well established at this settlement. 

In the 1460s Sir John Howard, Edward IV’s commander at sea laid up his ships at Deptford.  In 1487 William Rose purchased timber from The Bridge House store at Southwark to build a ship at Deptford Strand.  Ten years later a tenement was rented by the Bridge House estate there to repair a royal ship called the Anthony Camfere.  In 1487 Henry VII rented a storehouse for naval gear at Greenwich (possibly West Greenwich)  and sent shipwrights and caulkers from Deptford to rig and repair his ships laid up in the Hampshire ports. A shipwright was buried in St. Nicholas’s church in 1494.

Other late medieval industry is known from the area.  On the Bridge House land at Deptford Strand here was tile and brick making for the London market from 1418 onwards for which a Dutch craftsman was hired to test the quality of the local clay. A small dock was dug to assist in the transport of the products.  Brick making continued at Deptford which supplied nearly two million bricks to Henry VIII for his new manor house at Dartford.

There was a lime kiln in ‘Lez  Brokes’ with a wharf on the east bank of the Ravensbourne by 1481.  This was operated by Thomas Waller, limeburner of Deptford, who acquired a cottage and garden nearby in 1488.    The plot of land on which the lime kiln stood was at the south end of ‘Lez Brokes’ in the former ‘Flodmede’ on a site now occupied by Mumford’s Mill and the Booker Cash and Carry. The kiln had been removed by 1535.  There were other lime kilns to the east at Deptford at the west end of Blackheath near the junction of Greenwich South Street and Blackheath Hill.  These existed before 1432 and continued to operate into the 16th and 17th centuries.  They probably used raw materials derived from which the chalk quarry at Blackheath Cavern.  In the 15th century the Prior of Sheen as Lord of the Manor of Greenwich, leased to John Beleham of West Greenwich ‘le chalkepytte under Blackheth with all the sand there.’

References to gravel pits along the Ravensbourne also occur from 1458 onwards, one immediately to the east of Deptford Bridge next to the road on the north side and others near the Bridge.
By the beginning of the 16th century gravel was probably being dug to provide ballast for ships.  In 1515 the river wall of ‘Stowage Marsh’ had been broken down by the ‘transport of ballysse’ in a horse and cart.  By the 15th and 16th centuries Deptford increasingly felt the influence of Greenwich Palace on its economy.  The site had always been the Abbey of Ghent’s manorial centre and therefore the place to which the east bank of Deptford Creek owed its rents and suit of court. The site was granted to Humphery, Duke of a Gloucester in 1417.  He enclosed and laid out Greenwich Park in 1434 and built a tower at its centre.  This was later the site of the Royal Observatory.  Duke Humpheries' residence passed to the crown in 1447 and was expanded by Henry VII and Henry VIII as Greenwich Palace.  With the great expansion in the number of courtiers there, the pastures pf  Deptford came to be used for the maintenance of cattle to supply the royal household. Its proximity to Greenwich palace probably explains Henry VIII’s decision to exploit Deptford shipbuilding tradition in expansion in his Royal fleet.

This article was first published in the April 1998 issue of the GIHS Newsletter

Greenwich Marine Engine Builders

GREENWICH MARINE ENGINE BUILDERS

We have been contacted by Dr. Ian Buxton of the Department of Marine Technology at the University of Newcastle.  He says that the British Shipbuilding Database covers all British built or engined vessels from the mid 19th century, plus the shipyards and engine works and has enclosed a partial print-out of marine engine builders in the Greenwich area. He asks for additions or locations of the exact sites on a map.

Appleby Bros Ltd.

                                        East Greenwich.  From 1866. Previously at Southwark.

Humphrys and Tennant

                                        (also Humphrys, Tennant & Co.) Deptford.  1857-c.1865. Admiralty use from c.1860

                                        Known as Humphrys and Tennant in early years 1852-1857.

William Joyce & Co.

                                        Greenwich Ironworks. 

                                       

Charles Lungley

                                        Deptford. C. 1863.

Henry Maudslay

                                        Maudslay Sons and Field. (boiler works) East Greenwich, Tunnel Avenue. c.1870-1900.

Merryweather & Sons Ltd.

                                        Tram Locomotive Works.  1876

John Penn

                                        John Penn and Sons Ltd. Greenwich. C.1845-1889

                                        Boiler works at Deptford.

                                        Taken over by Thames Iron Works. July 1899.

G.Rennie & Co.

                                        Deptford.  Works to Humphrys Tennant c. 1852.

This article first appeared in the GIHS  Newsletter in May 2003

The Chemical /Department at Woolwich Arsenal

THE CHEMICAL DEPARTMENT AT

WOOLWICH ARSENAL

The autumn meeting of the Historical Group of the Royal Society of Chemistry was held on Friday 8 November 2002 to commemorate the centenary of the death of Sir Frederick Abel. This was held jointly with the Gunpowder and Explosives History Group. The meeting started with the first Wheeler Lecture by Professor Sy Mauskopf (Duke University) on Long Delayed Dream: Sir Frederick Abel and the Development of Cordite.  The text of this lecture has been published copies can be got from Dr Gerry Moss, Department of Chemistry, Queen Mary.  We hope, in any case, to publish extracts (with permission) in future newsletters.

Four other papers given at the conference have an interest to historians in Greenwich and Woolwich – these were:

The Chemical Laboratories at the Royal Arsenal Woolwich by Wesley Harry, historian of the Royal Arsenal Woolwich.

Wesley talked about the Chemical Laboratories at the Royal Arsenal Woolwich. Some time after 1665 the proof of ordnance moved from Moorfields to Woolwich. By 1695 many new buildings had been erected including a laboratory originally attached to the Tilt Yard at Greenwich. Various aspects of the manufacture and testing of ordnance were concentrated onto the Woolwich site in the 18th century. Frederick Abel was a professor of chemistry at the Royal Military Academy and was appointed in 1854 Ordnance Chemist at the Royal Laboratories at Woolwich. Another notable name there was James Marsh who developed the Marsh test for arsenic. The chemical laboratories built in 1864 were the first custom built chemical laboratory at the Arsenal. The room on the west side was the full height of the two storey building. It was designed like this to disperse fumes and gases produced at the benches.

From the gallery, off which were the offices, Frederick Abel would lower a wicker basket containing samples and instructions to the Assistant Chemist. The east wing contained a photographic department and library. In addition to the ordnance work the laboratory was also concerned with forensic science.

The Chemical Archaeology of Explosives, Wayne Cocroft, English Heritage

Wayne’s talk mainly concerned production at the Royal Gunpowder Mills, Waltham Abbey, where guncotton was first prepared in about 1846. In 1863 Frederick Abel had developed a process for its production using cotton waste that was used at Waltham Abbey. Later nitroglycerine was developed which, when combined with guncotton and a mineral jelly, were blended to form the propellant cordite; patented by Abel in 1889. Some buildings involved in these processes survive although the nitrating plant was demolished in the 1990s. Cordite needs a solvent in its production. During the First World War supplies of acetone were lost so Woolwich developed cordite production using ether.

Sir Charles Frederick (1709-1785), FRS FSA, Comptroller of the Royal Laboratory at Woolwich, 1746-1782, Brenda Buchanan

Sir Charles Frederick became Comptroller of the Royal Laboratory at Woolwich and Surveyor General to the Board of Ordnance in the mid-eighteenth century, at a time when gunpowder making was still a craft industry, and the government was reliant on private contractors. In the theoretical vacuum that then existed he had to undertake a process of self-education, serving what may be described as an apprenticeship with the learned societies of London, and presenting a dramatic 'masterpiece' in the form of the great firework display of 1749 in celebration of peace and victory, before becoming an acknowledged master of his subject Portraits of Sir Charles illustrate these three stages of his career. Plans and paintings of the Royal Laboratory also shown in the presentation of this paper raise questions about the work undertaken there. This is especially the case with the production line of workmen filling round shot of varying diameter with powder, and sealing the shell with a plug that was presumably to be replaced by a fuse before firing. Proof testing was also carried out here but this was notoriously unreliable and it seems likely that the standardization of formula and of gram size was used as a way of setting the minimum qualities required. 

The central pavilions of the old Royal Laboratory still survive at Woolwich, but these once fine buildings of the late seventeenth century have fallen into a sad state of dereliction. When Sir Charles retired in the early 1780s he had nudged the industry towards the more consciously scientific approach of the last decades of the eighteenth century, through his close attention to the processes of manufacture and his encouragement of experimentation. But today he is not so much underrated as unknown, perhaps because the end of his career was marked by the political difficulties associated with the loss of the American colonies and the criticisms then being voiced of the powerful and independent Board of Ordnance, and because his successors were able to benefit from insights not available to him. Historians too have not served him well, being generally more interested in weapons and campaigns than in the critical matter of the supply of gunpowder. 

Sir Charles's contemporaries however had no doubts about its significance, for as a distinguished military man at the Board of Ordnance wrote to him in 1757, with campaigns underway in Europe, North America, India and at sea, 'all Hope of Success. . Is Gone for nothing Without this material'. It is to Sir Charles's credit and a matter of historical record rather than triumphalism, that in the third quarter of the eighteenth century, despite difficulties of supply and a lack of understanding of the problems of internal ballistics, gunpowder was produced in Britain on a scale and of a quality that enabled the country to emerge on the world stage as a naval, colonial, and trading power.

Oswald Silberrad, superintendent of research, Royal Arsenal, Woolwich, 1901-1906. Simon Coleman

The paper resulted from the speaker's work at the National Cataloguing Unit for the Archives of Contemporary Scientists, Bath, on the archive of this little-known industrial consulting chemist and the research laboratory that he founded. The paper highlighted some of Silberrad's important contributions to munitions research at the Royal Arsenal while he was still in his early twenties. An experimenter of rare ability, Silberrad discovered a new means of detonating high explosive shells by using a substance known as 'tetryl'. He also demonstrated that TNT worked well as a high explosive shell filling, possessing advantages over the Lyddite then in use, and successfully developed and tested a 'flameless' artillery propellant for small calibre guns. The archive contains part of Silberrad's unpublished memoirs, which document this period of his career, in particular his difficult relations with the War Office, which resulted in his resignation as Superintendent of Research. The paper sought to show the value of an archival cataloguing project such as this in 'rescuing' a scientist and his work from relative obscurity. The Silberrad Papers are held by the Science Museum Library.

This article appeared in the GIHS Newsletter May 2003

More thoughts on the Penn site

MORE THOUGHTS ON THE PENN SITE

by Richard Cheffins

In the March 2003 issue of Greenwich Industrial History (Vol. 6, No. 2), it is twice stated wrongly that the Engine Works of John Penn and Sons were on Blackheath Hill (on p.9 ‘…the old John Penn site (Wickes site Blackheath Hill)…’ and in the heading on the back page (p.12) ‘Remains of Penn’s Works at Blackheath Hill’).  This repeats the error of Peter Trigg in the October 1999 issue (Vol.2, No.5), which I corrected in April 2000 (Vol.3, No.3).  Blackheath Hill would have been far too steep to have been negotiated by horse-drawn wagons, heavy-laden with marine engines, and Blackheath Road is presumably intended.  Indeed, later on p.9, reference is made to the ‘… marine engineering works established in Blackheath Road in 1825 by John Penn.’ Even this is questionable on two counts.

The business was founded in 1799 by John Penn Snr.  John Penn Jnr made his first marine engine in 1825 though it is probable that this did not become the principal work of the firm until he took over from his father in 1843. Until 1861, the Works had no entrance, indeed no frontage at all, on Blackheath Road.  The Works originally occupied land at the rear of properties in Blackheath Road accessed from Bath (or Cold Bath) Street renamed John Penn Street in 1873/75.  This remained the main entrance even after the Works expanded and is clearly shown on the sketch-plan reprinted on p.12.  The Penns originally leased or rented the site of their Works from the Holwell (or Rand) Charity and in 1861 they purchased the whole of its estate in Greenwich for the sum of £21,500.  This enabled them to expand considerably their original Works east of Ditch Alley, to acquire an even larger site west of it, and to acquire frontages on both Blackheath Road and Lewisham Road.

None of this invalidates the point made by the Greenwich Conservation Group about any surviving relics of the Penn Works.  However, I think George Arthur is unwise to dismiss 10 Lewisham Road as not being part of the Penn Works.  The matter is complicated.  Before the expansion of the Engine Works, the Penn family occupied the corner property in Blackheath Road the garden of which ran the whole length of Lewisham Road as far as the present John Penn Street (see my article in Vol.3, No.3).  At that time there were no houses at all fronting that stretch of Lewisham Road, at least not on that side of the road.  The Simms (Poor Law Commissioners’) map of c. 1838 shows the corner site of Blackheath Road to be vacant; the Tithe map of 1844 and the undated Holwell estate map that I referred to in my previous article both show a building on the Blackheath Road corner, the latter identifying the Penn family as occupiers.  All three show a single property occupying the whole length of that stretch of Lewisham Road and show a couple of out-buildings at the rear (John Penn Street end) which the Holwell estate map identifies as ‘sheds’ and which occupy the site of the future No.10.

There are no further large-scale maps of the area, so far as I know, for over 20 years.  By the time of the Ordnance Survey maps (25’’ and 5”) of 1867, the situation had changed.  The corner house and its garden now occupied only 40% of its former length and the sheds had gone; the rest was taken up by five houses fronting Lewisham Road, four single-fronted houses and a double-fronted one which correspond exactly with the present Nos. 2-8, evens, and No. 10 (the present No. 2a and the so-called Studio 2a are very recent and correspond to the garden plot of the corner house).  The boundaries of the Holwell estate in this area were Blackheath Road and Lewisham Road and so, whether the row of five houses (Nos. 2-10, evens, Lewisham Road) were built before or after 1861 (certainly before 1867), the properties belonged to John Penn and Sons from that date.

But belonging to the firm and being part of the Engine Works are not the same thing and one is hampered in resolving which is the case by the deficiencies of the reprinted sketch-plan.  This is only that - a sketch plan, more than adequate, no doubt, for its purpose but not exactly to scale, especially along Lewisham Road.  By a mixture of pacing the street and using a ruler with the 5” O.S. map, I estimate the total length of that stretch of Lewisham Road to be approximately 63 yds or 189 ft and the frontage of No.10 to be about 32 ft or a shade less (about 1/6th of the whole).  However, as Mr Arthur states, No.10 is not quite on the corner.  I estimate the waste ground between it and John Penn Street to be rather less than he does - perhaps 17 ft.  If this and No.10 are taken together, they occupy a little over a quarter of the street front which corresponds well enough with the sketch plan.  

Certainly the added dotted ‘site of N^o 10’ there has been displaced too far northward, it is shown near enough in the middle of the block whereas the real No. 10 is near the corner with John Penn Street, if not actually on it.

There are further complications.  What I have called the waste ground at the side of No.10 (part of the Wickes loading area) is screened from Lewisham Road by a modern wall set back somewhat and with an angle in it.  This alignment has remained unchanged for at least 165 years.  What is less clear is whether there was ever a building on this constricted site (because John Penn Street forms an obtuse angle with Lewisham Road, such a building would be wedge-shaped with its narrow front facing the latter).  Even the largest Ordnance Survey maps are not entirely clear on this point and I had hoped to clarify the matter by reference to Goad’s Insurance Plans (c.1893) for the area at a splendid 1:480 scale and indicating the number of storeys of buildings and their roofing material.  Sadly though several local industries  are included (the Norfolk Brewery, Holland’s Distillery, Robinson’s and Mumford’s Mills, Trenchard’s Saw mills, Corder & Haycraft’s Maltings, the London Tramway Co’s Granary and Fodder Mill, and Merryweather’s, in Deptford Bridge and Greenwich (High) Road), Penn’s Engine Works and anything in Blackheath Road are conspicuously absent. 

Whether or not there was a building to the south of No.10 and, on the balance of probability, I think there was,  it is reasonably clear that there was a footpath, with an entrance where the angle of the present wall is, which went down the side of No.10 (or between it and the adjacent building), behind it and then under an arch in a range of buildings at right angle to John Penn Street (fairly obviously the building marked ‘O O O O’ on the sketch plan).  The description of Robert Smiles quoted by Mr Arthur - ‘… from [this entrance] the natural contour of the ground dips by a rather steep incline.  Passing through the outer door and down it a few steps a hall is reached, with on each side a range of well lit offices …’ sounds more like a footpath than a corridor.

That leaves the question was No.10 Lewisham Road part of the offices for the Engine Works?  Houses in both Blackheath Road and Lewisham Road owned by Penn but not part of the Works are not outlined but simply indicated as   ‘shops and houses’.  The inference is that any building that is outlined is part of the Works.  I interpret what is shown in the angle of John Penn Street and Lewisham Road, not as a corridor in the middle of one building, but a footpath between two, both outlined on the plan and therefore, by inference, both part of the Works and the right-hand one of which is No.10.  The evidence is circumstantial and not completely conclusive (the two buildings were in reality more asymmetrical than shown and the path more crooked) but, unlike Mr Arthur, I think No.10 is a surviving part of the Penn Engine Works, though not, perhaps, part of its industrial heritage.

This article first appeared in the GIHS Newsletter May 2003