Thorp Arch Royal Ordnance Filling Factory Number 8 – (Picture Heavy)

[TK421]

Hi all.

Situated near the North Yorkshire village of Boston Spa, lies the Thorp Arch trading estate. However a simple drive through this estate reveals that it once had a most secretive past, that of the 8th in a line 16 of filling factories for the Royal Ordnance Corps, hastily built during WW11.

I have had my eye on this place for a while, and indeed there have been a few good reports on the site over the years, it was time to see it for myself. Apologies for the volume of pictures, but as you will see, there are a lot of interesting features.

History:

It was constructed for the Ministry of Supply, with the Ministry of Works acting as agents. Thorpe Arch ROFF opened in March 1940 was built over a 450 acre site. It took 18 months to build and cost £5.9 million. Thorp Arch was considered to be an ideal site, away from the large centres of population, good water supply, rail links and the proximity of the A1 trunk road. Workers were brought in from Leeds, Selby, York and all surrounding areas, 10,000 people, mainly women were employed there at the height of production and it is believed to have had 619 buildings at its height. The North Eastern side of the site covers an old Roman Road, which I intened to return to find at some point.
The factory produced munitions for both the Army and the RAF. It was divided into a number of different filling groups which occupied different areas of the site. Each ROF tended to be self-contained, apart from its raw materials with their own coal-fired power stations, for generating steam for heating and process use, and electricity via high-pressure steam turbines if needed; engineering workshops; plumbers and chemical plumbers; leather workers; electricians; buildings and works departments; housing and hostels for workers; canteens; laundries and medical centres, so a real self contained community. A key feature of ROF's was that of the explosives safeguarding zone around the permiter of the factory; as well as separation, or reduced separation and traverses, between buildings to limit the devastation of an explosion. Many of the buildings are still fitted today with lightening conductors, as this is the last type of place you would want any sort of lightening strike tomfoolery!
In World War II it produced light gun ammunition, medium gun ammunition, heavy ammunition, mines and trench mortar ammunition for the Army; medium and large bombs for the RAF; and
20 mm and other small arms ammunition for all three services.
ROF Thorpe Arch closed twice; once after World War II and then finally after the Korean War in April 1958.
Once production had halted, the site was gradually de-contaminated. In the early 1960s George Moore a local businessman bought most of the site and the development of the area as a trading estate began. The estate was later owned by Thorp Arch Limited Partnership, but is now known as Thorp Arch Estate, and is owned by the trustees of Hanover Property Unit Trust. It comprises an area of over 100 businesses, including the Thorp Arch Retail Park. The most notable additon's to the estate is the Northern Reading Room, Northern Listening Service and Document Supply Centre of the British Library, occupying what was the locomotive shed and engineering department areas, now long gone, and also another part is a prison, originally HMP Thorp Arch, now HMP Wealstun.

In preparation for my explore I wanted to get a feel for the place, and by using both Google maps, and an original map I found whilst surfing I spent a few hours drawing the layout, it's not to scale and I have spotted a few errors, but it was really handy for visiting the bits that looked interesting. The red lines indicate the original internal rail systems, it was great to see bits of track here and there dotted around the site.

My sketch of the site:



Original ariel photograph. Of interest, at the left of the photo is the main railway line, (Tadcaster – Wetherby), with sidings into the factory, top of the photo is the engineering section and locomotive sheds, now the site of the British Library, in the centre is the main magazines and storage warehouses, which formed the bulk of my explore, slightly left off centre are 2 large dark rectangles, which were the factory's reserviours, they are still there, now under control of Yorkshire Water, finally, in the bottom right of the photo is the river Wharfe, and I believe the dark line heading towards the factory is the site of the Roman Road:



So, with the history lesson over, lets have a look at some of the remaining relics form my explore today:

Magazine number 20, with rail lines still in evidence:



Loading bay and railway lines inside one of the warehouses:



Warehouse interior shots:



Some great light in these places:







More loading bay goodness:



Next warehouse:



Electric supply & DB:



Light fitting:


Nature takes over:



Original door, seen better days:



OK, its a hook, but look at the effort someone went to, chamfered corners the lot!





Door to bunker with original signwriting:



Original loading platform and track still in situ:



Loads of these little tunnels dotted around the site:



Love this, it's a pipe holder for the many water and steam fed pipes that would have been the lifeblood of the site, the banding round it makes it look a bit S&M!



And here is one of the original control wheels for the system:



Orginal light fitting dumped in a pile of rubbish, that looked rather interesting!



Inside one of the only remaining huts that is acutally disused, nearly all of the others have found industrial use:



Magazine number M1:



Magazine number M3:



Box:



Air pipes from a blast bunker:



Rear of one of the workshops, complete with notice about the Explosives act:



Final one from me, more tunnels and workshops in the disused section:



Hope you enjoyed the tour, I fully intend to revist to see what remains of the external railway system that surrounded the site, and the Roman road may be worth a look too.

Cheers

[boxfrenzy]

Wonderful place to visit isn't it? There is a surprising amount of stuff to wander around, and I love the little station platforms and loading bays. Good shots mate, and a nice report too

[judderman62]

nice one fella - looks a nice way to pass some time, nicely captured

[TK421]

Thanks guys, much appreciated, it is a great place, (if you avoid the retail park bit!)

[sqwasher]

Looks a good mooch TK421, still some interesting bits remaining!

[superkev]

Nice bit of research, and well written up! Nice pics

[TripleSix]

Very nice report, I've done a bit of wandering around on here years back.

Is there still secca on here? Years ago if you parked somewhere you shouldn't a pair of blokes dressed like the "men in black" complete with shades etc woud come and move you on... Weird.

[Bunkerkid]

Brings back good memories of ROF Elstow to me(now demolished), nice report did you find any pillboxes on the site?

[TK421]

Thanks guys. Triplesix, yes there is security, some old codger in a car driving round, I thought at one point he might stop me as my car had been parked at various sections of the site, but when I passed him he nodded to me!

Bunkerkid, I did not see any pill boxes, but I guess they might be on the permimter, and I concentrated on the mains sections in the estate. There were loads of concrete blast bunkers though, I must have counted at least
15, with a door at one end and a really narrow gap at the other.

[S&R B n wee C]

Lovely pics. Reminds me of my days with the Army Cadets on various army training camps across the UK, Their training areas are full of places like this. Very similar to the buildings at Swynnerton Camp in Staffordshire.