THIS week in Down Memory Lane we investigate press gangs and explosions related to the delivery of gun powder from the Royal Waltham Abbey gun powder mills to the Royal Gunpowder magazines in Purfleet.

Various types of gun powder barges were used to transport dangerous loads of gun powder in wooden barrels, to be stored at Purfleet Garrison and then issued out to the Royal Navy and coastal forts like East Tilbury Battery (1799 and 1855 phases) and Tilbury Fort.

I noticed an entry relating to Press Gangs operating in the Purfleet area, who had made attempts to get hold of the gun powder barge captains and crews, which resulted in a request for protection on May 12, 1790.

Worse fate happened on October 2, 1874. at around 5am when a tremendous blast shattered the dawn across North London, in the Regent’s Canal near the North Gate to Regent’s Park, beneath the Macclesfield bridge.

The Tilbury, a barge hauling nuts, coffee and “the perilous combination of two or three barrels of petroleum and about five tons of gunpowder”, exploded without warning.

Three bargees aboard The Tilbury died, but no other deaths or serious injuries occurred.

The inquest which followed concluded the blast was caused by the bargees striking a match to light a morning pipe or cook their tea, the flame igniting the “vapors” of the benzoline.

Canal managers were condemned for gross negligence in permitting the practice of carrying petrol and gunpowder aboard the same barge.

My featured image shows a reconstruction of the extensive damage after the explosion on the barge in Tilbury.