River Wall to former Royal Dockyard, Deptford

River Wall to former Royal Dockyard, Deptford

This wall forms the river frontage of the former Royal Dockyard at Deptford, running from the base of the river stairs at the end of Watergate Street for approximately 475 metres north-westwards along the shoreline to the boundary wall of the former Naval Victualling Yard. The wall is constructed in brown brick laid in English bond with horizontal ashlar bands, and features vertical timber fenders at regular intervals. The upper stone band originally served as the coping, though some sections have been replaced in engineering brick. Above this level, the wall has been raised in concrete as a flood defence measure, which is not considered of special interest. The wall survives broadly as the lower 10 to 13 feet (3 to 4 metres) above foreshore level, with late-19th-century infill marking the former entrances to docks, slips and other features.

At the south-east end, the blocked entrance to the early-18th-century great or double dry dock for ship repair is framed by granite ashlar quoins, which may date from a circa 1806 reconstruction or alternatively from the 1840s. About 16 metres further along, similar quoins mark the downstream side of a former landing in front of the great storehouse, now infilled. A long stretch of wall continues for approximately 80 metres beyond this, terminating at the infilled entrances to ship-building Slips Nos. 4 and 5.

The next section dates from John Rennie's 1815–16 remodelling of the Great Basin and is distinguished by a band of Dundee or Craigleith stone ashlar positioned about 2 metres above the foreshore. The entrance, originally set at an oblique angle to the walls with quadrant curves where it turned to meet the river wall, was blocked around 1900 with engineering bricks. The quadrant curves survive. Rennie's documented engineering comprised sheeting piles sunk to 4.5 metres depth in front of three rows of bearing piles with Kentish ragstone rammed into the interstices. The river walls rise from a 2.5-metre-wide platform in a banana-section curve 1.95 metres deep, with counterforts extending a further 1.37 metres back. The wide elliptical inverted entrance also has deep counterforts. This design followed a precedent set by Rennie and Ralph Walker at the slightly smaller entrance to the East India Docks in 1804–6.

North-west of the basin entrance, a break and canted setback in the wall are consistent with the shape of the mouth of No. 1 Slip, now infilled. Further along, the wall may date from the 1840s but may retain earlier fabric; a section which breaks forward appears to be from a later period, probably the dockyard's final years. The canal connecting the river to the dockyard's large mast pond survives as a broad inlet flanked on its north side by a massive curved pier, which now extends inland only to the south ends of stone-lined recesses for outer lock gates. At the head of the inlet's mouth, the position of a swing bridge is evident. This work was executed around 1830 to the design of George Ledwell Taylor, Navy Architect. A final short section of plain brick walling abuts the former Naval Victualling Yard's river wall.