Description

TQ 76 NE CHATHAM EAST ROAD
(East side) Chatham Dockyard
762-1/8/51
The Brunel Saw Mills
24.05.1971

GV I

Sawmill. 1810-1814, designed by Marc Brunel, with Jeremy Bentham and Edward Holl; later extensions mid C19. Brick with stone dressings and a hipped slate and corrugated-iron valley roof.
PLAN: I-shaped plan with central saw mill, W engine house and chimney, E workshop, and mid C19 NW offices; a ramp leads N from the mill.
EXTERIOR: single-storey saw mill; 9-window range, with 2-storey; 3-window blocks at each end, and 3-storey, 4-window range to the NW end. Saw mill has a matching front and back, with cornice and parapet and coped end gables to the valley roof. Round-arched end doorways with radial fanlights, and continuous central ranges of 7 bays with cast-iron posts and mid C20 glazing with central double doors. End blocks have parapets and string course, with first-floor central doorways and flanking 8/8-pane sashes. At the S end of the engine house is a notably large battered square chimney in 3 stepped stages, each with sunken panels divided by ashlar bands, clasping buttresses to the base and a round opening extending through. A domed iron pressure vessel is just to the S. Tall, narrow former offices attached to the engine house have round-arched windows with C20 casements, flat-headed 12-pane second floor windows with similar windows to 1-bay N end.
INTERIOR: a remarkably unaltered and complete interior for an industrial building of this period. The mill has timber queen post trusses with prince posts, those on the N side strengthened by later iron trussing. Cast-iron posts in the basement support a timber floor. The cast-iron frames of the reciprocating saws rise up from the basement, some inscribed JOHN MCDOWALL AND SONS, JOHNSTONE. The E section has a complete 2-storey fireproof frame with columns to bridging beams, fishbelly joists and a flagstone floor, and a water tank forming the roof of cast-iron plates bolted together. Similar tank in the W section, over the engine house with similar fireproof details.
HISTORY: the sawmill was powered by a Maudslay, Sons and Field beam engine. It was connected by a canal and tunnel 550 feet long to the mast pond. The timber was lifted by a floating platform up an oval shaft N of the E block. An overhead rail carried it to long ranges of timber stores extending N of the mill, from where it could be retrieved in the same way. Logs were delivered to the mill and converted to planks by 8 reciprocating saws in cast-iron frames, the planks being then transported to the Timber Seasoning Sheds (qqv) situated in front and behind the existing Mould Loft (qv).
The first use of steam at Chatham, and the earliest fireproof construction in the dockyards, using the same frame which Holl afterwards employed at the Devonport spinning house and Chatham lead mill (qqv). The whole works is a notable early example of mechanisation.
Part of a fine assemblage of Georgian naval buildings. (Sources: Coad J: Historic Architecture of Chatham Dockyard 1700-1850: London: 1982: 175 ; Coad J: The Royal Dockyards 1690-1850: Aldershot: 1989: 236-239; The Buildings of England: Newman J: West Kent and the Weald: London: 1976: 206; Holl E: 1814: ADM 140/19).

Listing NGR: TQ7617169302

External Links

• Historic England Listing
• Wikidata Q17533421

External links are from the relevant listing authority and, where applicable, Wikidata. Wikidata IDs may be related buildings as well as this specific building. If you want to add or update a link, you will need to do so by editing the Wikidata entry.

Recommended Books

• 
  Old House Handbook: A Practical Guide to Care and Repair by Hunt. Roger ( 2008 ) Hardcover
• 
  The Listed Buildings and Other Principal Structures at the Royal Gunpowder Mills Waltham Abbey
• 
  Dorset (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  London 4: North: North v. 4 (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  Hertfordshire (Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England)
• 
  [(Cumberland and Westmorland)] [By (author) Nikolaus Pevsner] published on (January, 1967)