It was a damp day when we made our way back for our third day in the Dockyards.
We caught the 11am boat across to Priddys Hard in Gospel to visit the Explosion museum. Had great views of the aircraft carrier Queen Elizabeth on the way. It came past us as we were walking up to the Dockyards, it was very close to the shore.
This was the old ammunitions store before they changed to the one in the middle of the harbour. They used to store tonnes of gunpowder in barrels in the Grand Magazine
They wore special clothes and shoes to avoid accidentally causing sparks.
There are great displays of various ships guns.
And shells
Lots of mines and torpedoes
Some missiles
There was also a display of the Motor Torpedo Boats. These were the Spitfires of the sea during WW2. They would nip in at speed, launch their torpedoes and beat a hasty retreat. They were very vulnerable as they had no armaments apart from a small calibre gun.
Had a rush trip through the Naval Museum. This place was packed with interesting displays and audio visual sites. Could have spent a few hours here but ran out of time. One of the fascinating things they had was an Enigma coder taken from the Germans. This had baffled the Allies for ages but they finally cracked it. They made the film The Imitation Game which is set in Benchley park, based on breaking this code.
They were often deployed at night and used to drop and retrieve agents into occupied Europe and also to pick up downed pilots and seamen. They were light enough to pass over minefields and so attack German ships in port.
Another interesting shed was The Dockyard Apprentice it was Sean’s all time favourite of Portsmouth.
It took you through the skills needed to build a wooden sailing ship, all the carpentry specialised tools like curved planes and wooden pegs.
Saw a cooperage where they made the 100’s of barrels required to store gunpowder, water, salted meat, rum etc.
The forge required to make the metal bits – hinges, braces, brackets etc
Rope making was fascinating, just strands of hemp twisted into cordage then twisted into ropes, then these twisted into thicker ropes. They had to make miles of rope each year.
They made all the blocks (pulleys for you non-nautical) starting with just a block of wood to make blocks of all sizes for the big sailing ships. They’d make 130,000 of these each year.
Early firefighting gear was very scary, relying on others to pump air into the suit and water into the hose.
They had a foundry that cast huge anchors and chain, massive steam hammers that would have been great to see in action. All sorts of things were made in the Dockyard.
Traveling Further 