Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 7.djvu/330

312 DOCKYARDS Medway, flowing along it in a fine sheet of water, in some degree answered the purpose of one. Owing to the shallowiiess of the water and the crooked navigation from Chatham round Upnor Point, ships were obliged to take in their water and ballast at one place, their stores and provisions at another, their guns, yowder, and ammunition at a third ; in consequence of which, a ship was usually longer in getting out to sea from Chatham than even from Deptford. The necessity of improving the accommodation at Chatham forced itself upon the attention of those who were responsible for the navy many years before the opportunity came for effecting the improvements. Pepys records a visit to Chatham in July 1663, to inspect the site of a projected wet dock. It was estimated to cost .10,000, and Pepys remarked that "the place indeed is likely to be a very fit place when the king hath money to do it with." In effect, however, it was not taken in hand by the king, who allowed the Dutch, instead of docks, to be found in the Medway. It was not till 1867 that ground was broken for the extension works at Chatham, though the plans had been prepared and certain preparations made many months before, under the supervision of Colonel Sir Andrew Clarke, C.B. The extension works may be thus described. Three basins give access from Gillingham Reach, which formerly con nected the mainland with the salt marshes. These marshes were covered with water every spring tide. The Govern ment bought 150 acres of them, and proceeded to re-make the ground which forms the site of the new dockyard workshops and factories. The three basins communicate with each other by caissons, so that ships of the largest class can pass from the bend of the Medway at Gillingham to that at Upnor. Upnor Reach entrance, opposite Upnor Castle, is 80 feet wide, the others are 84 feet. The first (Upnor) basin is the repairing basin, which has an area of 22 acres, and a depth, in common with the others, of 33 feet at spring, and 30 feet at neap tides. On the south Bide of this basin, and opening into it, are four graving docks, each capable of receiving the largest man of war. From this basin a passage about 175 feet long leads to the " factory " basin, which has an area of 20 acres. Con tiguous to it are being erected the engine and boiler factories, and the principal workshops necessary for iron war-ship building. Next to the " factory " basin is the fitting-out basin, with an area of 28 acres. In this place ships are to receive their sea stores and be got ready for service. Here, too, they will be dismantled and paid out of commission. Very great engineering difficulties had to be contended against in prosecuting these works, owing chiefly to the soft mud and to the treacherous character of the ground on which foundations had to be laid. Convict labour was largely employed in the work of excavation, and in the manufacture of bricks, whereof 20,000,000 a year were turned out, at small cost, on the spot. The cost of these new works is reckoned at about 2,000,000. A considerable piece of new ground (about 2000 feet in length by 200 in breadth) was added a few years ago to the upper part of the present Chatham dockyard, on which Mr Brunei erected one of the completest saw-mills in the United Kingdom. It is supposed to be equal to the power of fifty saw-pits and nearly one hundred sawyers, and is capable of supplying the dockyards of Chatham and Sheer- ness with all the straight-sawn timber that they can require. But the great advantage of the plan is in its application of the steam engine to the management and arrangement of timber, by which the labour and expense of a great number of horses are saved, and the obstruction and impediments to the general services of the yard avoided. Since the introduction of iron as the material for shipa hulls, Chatham has taken a more prominent place amongst dockyards. Most of the iron ships built in the royal yards have been built at Chatham and Pembroke, the capabi lities being greater at Chatham, where the " Achilles," " Monarch," " Glatton," " Rupert," " Raleigh," " Bellero- phon," "Sultan," "Alexandra," " Temeraire," and many also of the Musquito fleet of gunboats were built. At Chatham and Devonport the whole of the cordage required for the navy is manufactured ; and, since 1869, the whole business of remanufacturiug copper and old iron for the navy has been concentrated at Chatham. The first division of royal marines, consisting of twenty-eight companies, is stationed at Chatham, in ex cellent barracks, situated near one of the extremities of the dockyard, and occupying nine acres of ground. There was formerly a small victualling depot, situated partly in the parish of Chatham and partly in that of Rochester, from which the ships at Chatham and at Sheerness and the Nore received a supply of provisions and water. Ships now obtain their supplies from Deptford, except fresh meat and vegetables, which are obtained on local contracts on demand. It may be found necessary to establish a fresh depot for victualling stores at Chatham when the port becomes developed as a place for fitting out and repairing as well as for building. This process of development is going on rapidly. In March 1873 the executive of the Sheerness steam reserve with their ship were removed to Chatham, and the steps necessary for transferring the principal powers and attributes of the exposed dockyard at Sheernesa to the strongly defended port of Chatham will be quickly taken. The great difficulties of navigation in the Medway, combined with the successive forts and torpedo stations which stud the river, are calculated to make Chatham unassailable. As Holliugshed said of Lundy Island, there will be " no entrance but for friends." When the Chatham works shall have been finished, the question will probably be revived whether Sheerness should not, as has been often recommended, be closed ; but the advantages of hav ing even a small yard whither ships only slightly injured by sea or by the enemy can run for repair, without having to thread the reaches of the Medway up and down, are so great that it is unlikely the place will be abandoned. In 1876 Chatham dockyard was raised to a rear- admiral s command. The number of workmen employed at Chatham yard in 1877 is 1478 established and 2022 hired men, at an aggregate cost of 220,138. SHEERNESS DOCKYARD. This dockyard is situated on a low point of land on the island of Sheppey, of which the soil is composed of sand and mud brought from the sea on the one side, and down the Medway on the other, and has so much contracted the mouth of that river as completely to command the entrance of it. The situation, in a military point of view, is a most important one, particularly from its vicinity to th e North Sea and to the anchorage at the Nore ; by which anchorage, and by the works of Sheerness, the mouths of the Thames and the Medway are completely defended. As a situation for a dock, the objections to which it was liable are now in a great measure removed. On account of the low swampy ground on which it stood, fevers and agues were at one time so prevalent that shipwrights and other artificers were literally impressed and compelled to work at Sheerness. In process of time, however, a town sprung up close to the dockyard, and with it some little improvement by drainage, embankments, and other measures. Still it continued, for a considerable time, an unhealthy and disagreeable place. As a dockyard it was

totally destitute of all convenience or arrangement ; and