234 
MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS OF 
In December 1682 “y e number of 1000 canon 10000 D. Canon Round 
Shot were taken out of y e unserviceable By ns upon Tower Wharfe, each 
side Traitor's Gate, and sent down to Woolw cl1 ." Two or three years later, 
a regular “Shott Yard" seems to have been established, as shown in the 
accompanying Plan No. 1. 
It was ordered, 4 October 1684, that “A Wooden Butt shall be Built 
at Woolw ch according to Cap*. Leake's direcons y e Ma r Gun r . of England," 
who, at this time, occupied a house in the Woolwich Tower Place. In 
1681, the Board of Ordnance acknowledged its liability to keep in a 
proper state of repair the bank of the river Thames forming the water 
boundary of the Tower Place at Woolwich. 
Before the year 1716 all ordnance, for the military and naval services, 
was obtained from private manufacturers; but proved, before receipt by the 
Board of Ordnance, at the Government proof grounds. A memorandum 
dated “ y e 3 ffeb. 1662," in the old Tower records, mentions “ a building 
in the Artillery Garden late y e City Armory, adjoining which are y e old 
proofe house and y e Butt." And in July 1663, it was ordered “that 
certain doe forthwith build a sliedd in y e old Artillery Ground by y® proofe 
house." Mr Pepys mentions, in his diary for the 20th April, 1669, “ the 
old Artillery Ground near the Spitalfields, where I never was before, but 
now, by Captain Dean's invitation did go to see his new gun tryed, this 
being the place where the officers of the Ordnance do try all their great 
guns." The old Artillery Garden or Ground here mentioned extended 
between the Devonshire and Spital squares, and the City armoury above 
named was built therein by James I. in the year 1622. Stow's “ Survey 
of the Cities of London and Westminster in 1598," chronicles that “ in 
Moorfields is the New Artillery Ground; so called, in distinction from 
another Artillery Garden,* near St Mary Sjpital, where formerly the 
Artillery Company exercised. Who, about the latter end of King James I. 
his Reign, were determined to move thence; and to hold their Trainings 
and Practice of Arms here; being the third great Eield from Moor gate, 
next to the six Windmills. Which Eield Mr Leat , one of the Twenty 
Captains, with great pains, was divers years a preparing to that purpose." 
Stow also mentions the “Artillery Yard, whereunto the gunners of the 
Tower do weekly repair, namely, every Thursday; and there, levelling 
certain brass pieces of great artillery against a butt of earth made for that 
purpose, they discharge them for their exercise." 
The guns were stored, after proof, at the Tower and Woolwich. In the 
Record Office there is a warrant, dated 31st July 1663, “to Sir William 
Compton, master of ordnance, to order delivery to George Browne, gun- 
founder, of certain defective brass guns in the Tower and at Woolwich, 
that they may be recast towards furnishing the new frigate lately ordered." 
In the Ordnance journal books is a similar order, dated October 1663, 
“for new casting all old and unusefull ordnance in y e Tower and 
Woolwich." There is likewise mention, on the 16th April 1663, of “ the 
* Burton in Ms “ Anatomy of Melancholy,” published in 1660, speaks of the following pastimes 
as common to both town and country, namely “ bull-baitings and bear-baitings, in which our 
countrymen and citizens greatly delight, and frequently usej dancers on ropes, jugglers, comedies, 
tragedies, artillery gardens , apd cock-fighting.” 
