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For
over 300 years the dockyard played a highly important role in supporting
the Royal Navy, building over 400 ships including HMS Victory, Nelson’s
flagship at Trafalgar and repairing and maintaining thousands more.
During
this time the Royal Navy achieved and maintained an unrivalled mastery
of the seas - a crucial factor in the development of Britain’s
global influence.
Its
significance is enhanced by close proximity to other historic sites,
in particular the dockyard’s defences (the Chatham Lines and
Upnor Castle), the Edwardian naval barracks (HMS Pembroke) and the
Georgian military barracks at Brompton and with strong associations
with many historical literary and artistic figures.
 The
Royal Dockyards provided the Royal Navy with the shore support facilities
it required to build, repair and maintain the fleet. Central to
any Royal Dockyard were, as the name suggests, their dry docks and
it was the provision of these expensive structures that set the
Royal Yards apart from their civilian counterparts until well into
the 19th century.
By
the mid-18th Century the Royal Yards had developed into the largest
industrial organisations in the world with complex facilities supporting
thousands of skilled workers in a wide number of trades.
It
was the level of the facilities and skills provided in the Royal
Dockyard’s, particularly at Chatham that underpinned the Royal
Navy’s success at sea – from victory in battle; through
the epic voyages of discovery made by Cook, Darwin and others; to
the ceaseless anti-slavery patrols of the 19th century and the imposition
of Pax Britannica.
In
the 20th century the Royal Navy began to embrace the submarine as
a new weapon of war and the construction of the C17 submarine heralded
a new era for the dockyard. In all, 57 submarines were built at
Chatham between 1908 and 1960.
 The
last nuclear submarine to be refitted, HMS Churchill, and the last
frigate, HMS Hermione, left the dockyard during 1983 and the dockyard
and naval base finally closed on 31st March 1984.
Encompassing
an area of around 80 acres, with approximately 100 buildings and
structures the site is now the most complete Dockyard of the Age
of Sail to survive in the world.
Nelson
and Chatham >>
The
naval dockyards remembered >>
The
dockyard workers >>
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