Pembroke Dockyard - An overdue update.

 NOTE: This item was due to be posted in 2022, but other matters postponed its publication. I post it now , with some slight amendments. A further update will follow!

Since I last posted about the fate of Pembroke Dockyard things have, quite as expected, moved on and work on the demolition and burial of the monuments I have discussed before is underway.[Edit: Indeed, completed?]

Way back in 2019 I contacted Cadw to ask about preserving some of the monuments from demolition or burial. This was before the plans had been considered by Pembrokeshire County Council, or indeed any planning application put forward.

When I wrote the first email, I had it in mind to ask for the listed monuments to be scheduled as ancient monuments. As the only naval dockyard to survive in Wales, with some monuments that are unique survivals to the UK and given that "The Yard" was the reason for Pembroke Dock's existence it may be thought appropriate that at least some part of the story of the industry that founded Pembroke Dock should be told using the buildings and features that were actually used in producing well over 200 ships for the Royal Navy.

The plan below shows the dockyard as it was in c1925. The plan has some later overprints, but it gives some idea of  the layout of  "The Yard" at closure.

Pembroke Dockyard c1925

Granted, some of the offices, houses and a glorious chapel were to remain, but the buildings, slips and docks that defined the processes involved in building these ships would all be destroyed, buried or grossley disfigured.

The main periods of destruction took place over three distinct periods.

The first was when "The Yard" was closed in 1926. Then all the equipment and fittings were auctioned off, largely to distant purchasers. Local businesses were, allegedly, given little opportunity to benefit from this sale and legend and rumour has it that this was pay-back for the local workforce unwillingness to cooperate in the urgent repair of a vessel in the First World War. Indeed, one would imagine that such an operation would be publicised in local newspapers, but I have been able to find any publicity about the auction of equipment. It would be interesting to find out the truth of this story.

Of course, a major loss occurred before the closure of the dockyard when, in 1922, a fire in the mould loft destroyed many of the records of the yard and numerous ship figureheads. 

Since closure as a construction yard, part of the premises had been used by Thomas W Ward Ltd for the breaking up of ex-naval vessels. See:

https://military-history.fandom.com/wiki/Thos_W_Ward#List_of_ships_broken_up_at_Pembroke_Dock

and:

Youtube Video

The second episode of destruction and, it must be said, much rebuilding and reinvention, came about in the 1930s when Pembroke Dockyard became a Royal Air Force flying boat base. Much to the relief of the local population the it was announced in 1929 that the Royal Air Force would take up residence in the dockyard. 

Pembroke Dockyard in 1964 - seven years after the RAF departed

The Royal Air Force built two large hangers, barrack blocks, slips and various other buildings. They were to stay in residence for about a quarter of a century. 

An overview of RAF pembroke Dock

As part of the transformation of Pembroke Dockyard into a busy flying boat base, many of the old industrial buildings from the naval ship building days were demolished - The smithery, the remains of the mould loft and other structures that the Royal Air Force could not make use of. Storage buildings and houses were adapted for other uses - Operations room, control tower, sick bays, theatres and messes. Comparing the two plans above will reveal the number of changes that took place between 1925 and 1964.

The third period of major loss of the historic fabric of the the old naval dockyard took place when a local farmer turned entrepreneur, Mr Govan Davies, built a deep water quay over the eastern part of the dockyard. This buried all the eastern slips and the boat camber. The dredging of the berth also damaged and made unusable the public hard at Front Street. The berth has been used intermittently to accommodate heavy lifting vessels in transferring large industrial units to local refinery sites as well as providing a berth for vessels engaged in work on the various other jetties and facilities in the haven. There are also fairly regular shipments of animal feed, and sometimes aggregate, that get stored in one of the flying boat hangars.

The creation of the ferry terminal has also wrought some destruction to the slips in the centre of the yard, but the terminal has also made use of some of the former stone dockyard buildings for office space. It has given them a raison d'etre.The continued use of the dockyard by the ferry company (B&I) post-Brexit is quite fragile and the impression gained is that the freight traffic to and from Ireland has reduced drastically with many goods using direct ferry routes from France to Ireland.

More to follow in my next post. which will hopefully bring the story up to date.