Office, Stores And House (Building 10) At Former Marsh Gunpowder Works

This building comprises an office, stores, a house, and a pump house, located at the former Marsh Gunpowder Works in Faversham. Constructed between 1810 and 1815, it is built of yellow Flemish bond brick, with brick stacks and a tiled hipped roof.

The building has a double-depth plan, with a house attached to the northwest end and a small pyramid-roofed pump house at the opposite end. The two-storey house has a three-window facade, featuring a central round-arched doorway with a panelled door, flat-headed windows, and half-dormers containing mid-20th century glazing. The rear elevation contains two dormers and a flat-headed doorway. The main office and store range is a single storey, with four openings on each side. The southwest side features three windows and a doorway between the end two; the northeast side has two windows with a door between, and a large central carriage entrance. The narrower pump house is five stories high, with single-window elevations to the east and west, featuring 3/6-pane sashes and a doorway on the northeast side. A small lean-to is adjacent to the doorway, and the roofs are steep with corbelled eaves.

The interior reportedly has a softwood roof, with the central part divided between the office and store.

The Marsh gunpowder works were part of the Royal Gunpowder Factory, established in 1786 following an explosion in Faversham. This works played a key role in improving British gunpowder production, particularly during the Napoleonic Wars, under William Congreve. The saltpetre refinery was built in 1789 as part of Congreve's efforts to improve gunpowder ingredients. The works were privatised after the war and closed in the 1920s. The offices, stores, and accommodation formed the final phase of refurbishment under government control, representing an important component of the works’ operation. This building is part of a distinct and cohesive group of late 18th and early 19th-century industrial buildings used for saltpetre refining, which is the best preserved of its type in the country and comparable with examples in France and Sweden.