Royal Arsenal

The Royal Arsenal, Woolwich carried out armaments manufacture, ammunition proofing, and explosives research for the British armed forces at a site on the south bank of the River Thames in Woolwich in south-east London, England, United Kingdom. It was originally known as the Woolwich Warren, having begun on land previously used as a domestic warren in the grounds of a Tudor house, Tower Place. Much of the initial history of the site is linked with that of the Board of Ordnance, which purchased the Warren in the late 17th century in order to expand an earlier base at Gun Wharf in Woolwich Dockyard. Over the next two centuries, as operations grew and innovations were pursued, the site expanded massively; at the time of the First World War the Arsenal covered 1,285 acres and employed close to 80,000 people. Thereafter its operations were scaled down; it finally closed as a factory in 1967 and the Ministry of Defence moved out in 1994. Today the area, so long a secret enclave, is open to the public and is being redeveloped for housing and community use.

The Royal Arsenal had its origins in a domestic warren at Tower Place in Old Woolwich. Tower Place was a Tudor mansion built in the 1540s for Martin Bowes, a wealthy goldsmith and merchant, later Lord Mayor of London. The house with its octagonal tower stood nearby Gun Wharf . After the Dockyard moved west in the 1540s, Gun Wharf was acquired by the Board of Ordnance and mainly used for gun storage.

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