Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

Chart Mills is the only above-ground survivor of the Home Gunpowder Works and was an incorporating mill. Partly demolished in the 1920s, it was restored in the 1960s by the Faversham Society and is open to the public.

Monument Types

• GUNPOWDER WORKS (Demolished 1920, Post Medieval to Modern - 1760 AD? to 1920 AD)

Full description

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OS card and NAR index entries (1-18).

Chart gunpowder Mills is one of the Home Works, a generic name applied to a group of four mills close to Faversham town centre, the others being Ospringe, Kings, and Lower and Bennetts. The Chart Mills have the only standing remains of a processing building within the Home Works (19)

The Home Works may have originated in the 16th century. Chart became part of the Royal Gunpowder Mills 1759. Substantially rebuilt around 1815 from which the two pairs of mills date (20).

Originally two pairs of water-powered incorporating mills; a circular stone or iron bed on the floor of a shed containing two stone edge runners revolving on a vertical axis to grind the powder. Demolished in the 1920s (closed 1934 according to source 20) but the stone beds of three of the mills were retained and the machinery and half of the fourth (northeasterly) building was later rescued and restored by the Faversham Society (21).

Open to the public.

The scheduled area of the monument was revised in 1999. Photographs relevant to the site and its structures (22-27).

From the National Heritage List for England:

Details
The monument includes part of a disused gunpowder factory situated in the western suburbs of Faversham. Chart mills are the best surviving part of Faversham Home Works, which originally comprised four groups of gunpowder mills located along the formerly wooded Westbrook valley. Chart mills survive as a standing building with intact milling machinery, associated structures and buried remains. Part of the associated water management system is also included in the scheduling. The Home Works were established in around 1560. Raw materials such as sulphur and saltpetre, and the finished gunpowder, were transported to and from the mills by way of Faversham and Oare Creeks and the Swale estuary. The works underwent several phases of alteration and redevelopment, and the visible remains at Chart mills date to the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. These are twin pairs of adjacent, north east-south west aligned, water powered incorporating mills, where the processed ingredients were mixed and blended. Each pair of mills was powered by a centrally placed waterwheel. The north eastern mill building has an original brick blast wall at its outer gable end. The weather boarded mainly timber building, largely rebuilt during 1970s restoration for public display, houses in situ wooden and iron milling machinery. Some components have been renewed, and the edge-running, limestone millstones have been reused from the nearby Oare gunpowder works. The south western end of the building houses a wheel pit containing a breastshot iron waterwheel. To the north is part of the now dry head race which fed the waterwheel. This has been partly relined in modern materials. Running away from the mill to the north east, the partly stone lined tail race is culverted under Nobel Court road by way of an original, brick lined tunnel. Several mature yew trees situated along the south eastern edge of the monument may represent the remains of a planted blast screen. The three remaining mill buildings, containing original, centrally placed bedstones, and the south western wheel pit, were excavated during the early 1970s and are visible as exposed brick footings, with some modern consolidation. The mills are thought to date mainly to around 1815, incorporating some earlier, 18th century machine components. Two mill stones lying on the western edge of the monument were moved here from the nearby Ospringe gunpowder mills. Traces of buildings, structures and associated features dating to earlier periods of use may survive in the form of below ground remains. Three 19th century boundary marker stones within the monument, which are Listed Grade II, are included in the scheduling. A number of features are excluded from the scheduling; these are all modern railings, telegraph poles, lampposts, street furniture, signs, fixtures and fittings, a resited Victorian lamppost, and the modern surfaces of all roads, paving and steps; the ground beneath all these features is, however, included.

Reasons for Designation
Gunpowder was the only explosive available for military use and for blasting in mines and quarries until the mid-19th century. Water-powered manufacturing mills were established in England from the mid-16th century, although powder had been prepared by hand for at least 200 years. The industry expanded until the late 19th century when high explosives began to replace gunpowder. Its manufacture declined dramatically after the First World War with British production ceasing in 1976. The technology of gunpowder manufacture became increasingly complex through time with the gradual mechanisation of what were essentially hand-worked operations. Waterwheels were introduced in the 16th century, and steam engines and water turbines from the 19th century. Pressing and corning were also introduced between the 16th and 19th centuries to improve the powders. Pressing improved the explosive power of the mill cake and corning broke the pressing cake into different sizes and graded it with respect to its fineness. Additional techniques were developed throughout the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries to improve the quality and consistency of the finished product, and this in turn resulted in a variety of types of powders; ranging from large coarse-grained blasting powders used in mines and quarries, to fine varieties used, for example, in sporting guns. Gunpowder manufacturing sites are a comparatively rare class of monument with around 60 examples known nationally. Demand for gunpowder centred on the London area (for military supply), other ports (for trade), and the main metal mining areas. Most gunpowder production was, therefore, in Cumbria, the south west, and the south east around the Thames estuary. The first water-powered mills were established in south east England from the mid-16th century onwards, and many of the major technological improvements were pioneered in those mills. All sites of gunpowder production which retain significant archaeological remains and technological information and survive well will normally be identified as nationally important.

Faversham was one of the most important centres of gunpowder production nationally between the early 17th century and the closure of the gunpowder works in 1934. The incorporating mills at Chart represent one of the best surviving parts of the disused works. Although subsequent development has caused considerable disturbance to their original extent, the mills retain rare machinery and parts of the original water management system. Part excavation has shown that the monument also contains below ground remains, providing important evidence for the earlier development of the works. (28)

Historic England archive material (29)

The Cranstone Consultancy, 1993, Monuments Protection Programme: The Gunpowder Industry Combined Steps 1-3 Report (Unpublished document). SKE17244.

English Heritage Monuments Protection Programme, 1998, Monuments Protection Programme: Gunpowder Industry (Unpublished document). SKE7298.

<1> Industrial Arch Guide 1971 73 65 (ed N Cossons and K Hudson) (OS Card Reference). SKE44292.

<2> OS 25" 1907 (OS Card Reference). SKE48258.

<3> Arch J 126 1969 252 (A J Percival) (OS Card Reference). SKE36554.

<4> KAR 20 1970 4-7 photo (A Percival) (OS Card Reference). SKE45259.

<5> KAR 33 1973 89-92 (A H Osborne) (OS Card Reference). SKE45302.

<6> Industrial Arch 1976 220 (K Hudson) (OS Card Reference). SKE44291.

<7> Industrial Arch of SE England 1978 40 photo (A J Haselfoot) (OS Card Reference). SKE44295.

<8> National Trust Guide to our Industrial Past 1983 207 (A Burton) (OS Card Reference). SKE47519.

<9> DOE SAM Record Form 3 Nov 1986 Record Map 22 Nov 1972 (OS Card Reference). SKE40802.

<10> Industrial Arch Guide 1971-3 65 (N Cossons and K Hudson) (OS Card Reference). SKE44293.

<11> Wayne Cocroft/18-NOV-1991/RCHME: Faversham's Explosives Industry. (OS Card Reference). SKE51278.

<11> RCHME/NMR, 1996, RCHME : Faversham Explosives Industry (Collection). SKE6479.

<12> Crocker, G. 1988. Gunpowder Mills Gazetteer SPAB (OS Card Reference). SKE39493.

<13> West, J. 1991. Gunpowder, Government and War in the mid-eighteenth century. The Royal Historical So (OS Card Reference). SKE51315.

<14> Percival, A J. 1967. Faversham's Gunpowder Industry. Faversham paper no. 4 (OS Card Reference). SKE48506.

<15> Selkirk, A. 1967. The Faversham Gunpowder Mills. Current Archaeology 2 51-2 (OS Card Reference). SKE49436.

<16> Public Record Office MPH/857 Plan of the Gunpowder Manufactory at Faversham 1806. (OS Card Reference). SKE48902.

<17> Public Record Office W055/2466 PFNFP 58 Plan of the Gunpowder Manufactory at Faversham 1821 (OS Card Reference). SKE48903.

<18> London, Chatham and North Kent Railway 1846 Plan of the Gunpowder Works. (OS Card Reference). SKE46175.

<19> Eve, D., 1999, A guide to the Industrial Archaeology of Kent (Monograph). SWX9293.

<20> English Heritage, 1998, Monuments Protection Programme: Gunpowder Industry (Unpublished document). SWX6799.

<21> Bennett, C. E., 1977, The watermills of Kent, east of the Medway (Article in serial). SWX7608.

<22> BASAL MILLSTONE OF SOUTHWESTERLY MILL. Types: MILLSTONE (Photograph). SKE874.

<23> DETAIL OF GEAR WHEEL, NORTH EASTERLY MILL. Types: MILL (Photograph). SKE842.

<24> WHITE HOUSE (TR0044 6114) LOWER ROAD, FAVERSHAM. FORMER GUNPOWDER MILLMANS HOUSE. Types: HOUSE (Photograph). SKE838.

<25> "KOSICOT" (TR 00865 61194) LOWER ROAD FAVERSHAM. (Photograph). SKE839.

<26> STONEBRIDGE LODGE (TR 01105 61500) WEST STRUT, FAVERSHAM. Types: BUILDING (Photograph). SKE837.

<27> Royal Air Force, 1946, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX9548.

<28> English Heritage, Register of Scheduled Monuments (Scheduling record). SKE16191.

<29> Historic England, Archive material associated with Faversham Gunpowder Mill (Archive). SKE54492.

Sources and further reading

Related records

Related thematic articles

• Industrial Kent (Thematic Essay)