THE ROYAL ARTILLERY INSTITUTION, 
235 
Gunwharfe at Woolwich,” and 8th May 1664, “ That Mr Scott take care 
to repair y e Crane at Woolwich and y e Gate at y e Wharfe.” The Admiralty 
seems to have borne part of the expense of maintaining this gun-yard wharf, 
for Mr William Bodham, writing to Mr Samuel Pepys, from the Woolwich 
Pope Yard, 6th May, 1665, having ventilated, as much as possible, 
Edw. Rundell's estimates, can but pronounce him a prevaricating knave, 
and admires the audacious impudence of a bold mechanic who dares affront 
his superiors with such a piece of plain derision. He encloses the estimates 
by Edw. Rundell for a gallery from the old hemp loft to the street ; total, 
£15. Is. for repairing 38 feet of wharfing in the gun yard at Woolwich; 
total, £18. 2s. 4d. for altering and raising the shed at Woolwich ropeyard, 
£25. 18s. Also enlarged estimates for the same works, the prices being 
£27. 5s., £22. 16. 3d., and £23. 11s. 4d. 
The proof of ordnance was transferred from Moorfields to Woolwich 
somewhere between the years 1665 and 1680, when Major Mathew Bayly 
w r as “ y e proofe master,” and George Brown, Esq. was “ his Majesty's founder 
of brass and iron ordnance.” Private founders were occasionally allowed 
to prove their guns in the Woolwich Tower Place, at their own expense. 
In 1684 Mr Western had a foundry at Moorfields (in the present City 
Road, near Einsbury Square) where he cast brass guns and mortars for the 
Ordnance: and, in 1695, Mr Eincher is recorded to have had “many 
considerable Contracts with this Office for Casting Iron Ordnance, Granadoe 
Shells, and Round Shott.” A return was drawn up, in that year, “of 
what unserviceable Morter peices &c. there are at the Tower or Woolwich 
to be recast, that Direcons may be given for delivering what shall be 
necessary thereof to the Rounders.” In 1704 Mr Mathew Bagley took the 
Moorfields foundry and, for twelve years, cast guns and mortars out 
of metal supplied for the purpose by the Board of Ordnance. An explosion 
which occurred at this foundry* in 1716 brought about the establishment 
of a government brass foundry in the Woolwich Tower Place where, 
according to the foregoing notes, there already existed the germs of the 
three great manufacturing departments of the present Royal Arsenal—the 
Royal Carriage Department, the Royal Laboratory, and Royal Gun Eactories. 
The following are the particulars of an event so important in the annals of 
the Royal Arsenal. 
After the peace of Utrecht in 1713, the guns captured from the Erench 
by Marlborough were placed outside the Moorfields foundry upon Windmill 
Hill. It was afterwards determined to utilize the metal by re-casting it in 
the form of English ordnance; and, on the appointed day—Thursday the 
10th May 1716—a large number of spectators attracted by the interest felt 
in the trophies, and in the manufacture of large ordnance, attended at the 
foundry to witness the operation. The Mercurius Toliticus of the 18th May 
states, “ Several Gentlemen were invited to see the Metal run, which being 
a very great and curious Piece of Art, a great many Persons of Quality 
came to see it, and some General Officers of the Army among the rest; but 
whether it was some unusual hinderance in the Work, or their better Rate 
* The site of this foundry was afterwards occupied by the farpous “ Tabernacle” of the Messrs 
Whitfield and Wesley, 
