GILBERT’S AND OTHER PITS AT CHARLTON
by Paul Sowan
At our December meeting we heard a presentation from underground historian and geologist Paul Sowan about Gilbert’s pit at Charlton. Paul has now sent part of an enormous dossier of information on these pits – some extracts are included below and, hopefully, more will follow
The village centre of Charlton (Old Charlton) is on high ground on the Lower London Tertiary beds in south-east London Thames to the north. Between the village centre and the area of the former Thames-side marshes the ground drops away northwards. Geologically this constitutes the escarpment formed by the Lower London Tertiary beds. The old village centre is about 150 feet above the level of the Thames- side marshes.
New Charlton had developed on the lower ground by the Woolwich Parish boundary, effectively a suburb of that town, by 1839, when two lime burners are recorded there - Sarah Cutts and Lewis Glenton. It later extended westward along the Woolwich Road Lower Charlton .
The North Kent Line of the railway was built along the foot of the escarpment between 1847 and its opening on 30 July 1849 . The formerly wooded escarpment has been eaten into by opencast mineral workings (principally for chalk and sand), and in part covered by 19th century and later residential development.
Interestingly, none of the four large chalk and sand pits between Charlton Station and Woolwich appears ever to have been equipped with standard gauge railway sidings into the pits. The Railway Clearing House's 1904 Handbook lists only Beadle Bros.' siding, which was perhaps associated with the Angerstein Wharf
Football Club's stand) converging northwards to run under the main east-west passenger line, and thence northwards to the Thames .
No such railways appear to have been provided for the other three pits further east. If only horses and carts were employed to distribute the materials from these, it may be concluded that they were largely consumed in the immediate locality, or alternatively carted to jetties on the Thames and shipped away.
Woolwich Dockyard was immediately downstream, within a kilometre of Charlton Station, and the large chalk and sand pits. England
There have been four major pits excavated at the foot of, and into, the escarpment at Charlton. These are referred to here, from west to east, as follows:
Charlton Station pit - Bounded by Charlton Hill on the west, the main railway on the north, and Charlton Lane
North pit - Lying north of the railway line and tunnel, and south of the Woolwich Road Maryon Park
East pit - Lying to the south and east of the railway line and Mount Street Tunnel. Now forming the eastern part of Maryon Park
The SSSI represents the eastern working face of Gilbert's pit. The western face of the East pit is only a few metres further to the east, the SSSI being thus positioned on a narrow ridge of unworked ground between the two pits.
In both the Charlton Station or West) pit and the North pit the excavation of Thanet Sand was carried downwards to exploit the underlying chalk. The upper surface of the Chalk, and base of the Thanet Sand is thus clearly above the level of the Thames in the immediate locality, although Dewey et al.
(1924) observed in connection with the riverside marshes further to the east that: The Chalk which forms most of the southern bank of the Thames between the Erith Marshes and Gravesend is thus saturated with water and numerous springs arise along this stretch. This fact is of paramount importance to engineers. During recent years the cement manufacturers endeavoured by heavy pumping to lower the water-level in the Chalk in order to make more chalk dry and so available for quarrying purposes, but the cost and want of success rendered the operation unprofitable, and it was abandoned. Previously it had been shown that over-pumping draws river water into the Chalk, where that formation is not protected by impermeable beds. Much of the alluvium, however, is permeable and the Chalk on which it lies, though at a depth of 70 ft. from the surface, is generally heavily charged with water
The operators of the chalk pits at Charlton would similarly have been limited in the depth to which they could excavate by the water table at shallow level. One such operator has been identified, and is the subject of a published article by Barbara Ludlow (2001) who informs us: “ For hundreds of years, chalk was dug at Greenwich Greenwich South Street Limekiln Lane Charlton Church Lane Frances Street
Lime was essential to the brick and tile making industries. It was also used when making mortar and manure, however, when Thomas Nichols left Dartmouth Devon to settle in New Charlton in the late 1840s nuch of the local chalk was built over or worked out. Even so he established himself as a carpenter and lime merchant in Hardens Manorway. Nichols' business prospered and in the mid-1860s, he moved to site between the North Kent Railway line and Woolwich Road Charlton Church Lane 444 Woolwich Road Surrey . The 1871 Census shows Nichols employed thirteen men and that they also lived close to the works... Eventually the business passed to Fred Nichols, and in the early 1920s, the then owner Eric Nichols sold the premises. Lime burning was finished in Charlton but the buildings and bottle kilns, with a chalk capital 'N' set in the neck of both, were purchased by the Crown Fuel Company to produce heating elements for gas fires. In 1950 the Festival of Britain [in 1951] seems to have inspired the Company to branch out into pottery and use the kilns for making decorated ware and small figures of animals, mostly dogs. These goods marked 'Greenwich
The Nichols's kilns, from this account, were close to the junction of Church Lane Woolwich Road Surrey , were the much shorter lived Whyteleafe chalk pits and kilns; the kilns have gone and the pits are now barely recognisable as the site has been developed for residential purposes. The Rose and Crown pit never had direct access to the railway, although the Oxted line (South Croydon to Oxted) crosses the open pit on a prominent viaduct. The Whyteleafe works further south did have a siding from Upper Warlingham Station, which would have made the transfer of chalk thence to Charlton relatively straightforward