Enclosure Walls And Piers To Sw Of Buildings 17, 25, 26 And 27, Rnad Bull Point

740-1/0/10045 BULL POINT 17-APR-09 Enclosure walls and piers to SW of Bui ldings 17, 25, 26 and 27, RNAD Bull Po int

GV II Walls and gatepiers at ordnance store. 1851-4. Plymouth limestone squared rubble and ashlar piers. The walls bound the magazine enclosure, the magazines and associated traverse walls being a Scheduled Ancient Monument. Wall with capped piers, with gateways at N and S ends. The altered gateway at the S end has a smaller segmental-arched pedestrian doorway with raised granite surround to one side, the lintel inscribed B(oard) O(rdnance).

HISTORY: This wall encloses the magazines (Scheduled Ancient Monument) at Bull Point, located just to the north of the Royal Navy's new Steam Yard at Keyham. Bull Point was the last great project of the Board of Ordnance, which was abolished in 1856. It provided storage for 40,000 barrels of powder in an integrated complex including a floating magazine where powder was unloaded and the 1805 St Budeaux laboratory where it was checked and processed, before being taken to the Bull Point magazines (SAM). In contrast to other yards, Bull Point was from the outset provided with a set of buildings planned and dedicated to the various functions for the processing as well as the storage of the new types of ordnance which had a revolutionary impact on the design of naval ships and fortifications. All the buildings - mostly in ashlar with rock-faced dressings and fronting an avenue to the S of the magazines - are stylistically coherent with the magazines themselves. They comprise both the finest ensemble in any of the Ordnance Yards, consistent with the high standards practised by the Ordnance Board in its designs for fortifications and barracks from the C17 and a remarkable example of integrated factory planning of the period.

For a full history of the site, see Building 13 (qv).