Faversham explosives industry

The Faversham explosives industry: Faversham, in Kent, England, has claims to be the cradle of the UK's explosives industry: it was also to become one of its main centres. The first gunpowder plant in the UK was established in the 16th century, possibly at the instigation of Faversham Abbey. With their estates and endowments, monasteries were keen to invest in promising technology.

Faversham was well-placed. It had a stream which could be dammed at intervals to provide power for watermills. On its outskirts were low-lying areas ideal for the culture of alder and willow to provide charcoal — one of the three key gunpowder ingredients. The stream fed into a tidal creek where sulphur, another key ingredient, could be imported, and the finished product loaded for dispatch to Thames-side magazines. The port was also near the Continent where in warfare demand for gunpowder was brisk.

The first factories were small, near the town, and alongside the stream, between the London to Dover road (now the A2 road) and the head of the creek. By the early 18th century, these had coalesced into a single plant, subsequently known as the Home Works, as it was the town’s first.

At this time the British government was buying its supplies from the private sector; but the quality was often poor, and in 1759 it decided it needed its own plant. Rather than build a new one, it nationalised the Home Works, upgrading all the machinery. From this phase dates the Chart Gunpowder Mill, the oldest of its kind in the world (at grid reference TR009612). It was rescued from the bulldozer's blade, and then restored by the Faversham Society in 1966. (It is now open to the public on weekend and bank holiday afternoons from April until the end of October.)

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