This Easter weekend marks 40 years since our Royal Naval Dockyard Chatham closed, ending 400 years of service to the Royal Navy.
Chatham in its heyday being the most important shipbuilding and repair dockyard in the country. The closure had a profound impact on the people of our towns, changing lives and the futures of local people. Our maritime, military and industrial capabilities had shaped the development of our Medway Towns over the centuries.
I was only 5 at the time, living in Chatham and I remember the impact on the people around us. My mum’s family being from Chatham with ancestors who had worked, and served our country from the dockyard, with my Nan as a young women being the last member of my family to have worked there, Cynthia Thompson (picture at her desk in the Dockyard) when I was growing up you would always meet people who had worked at the dockyard or had apprenticed there, a familiar tale of local people over the years.
We have seen the transformation of the Dockyard estate over those 40 years, delivering a world class living museum the Chatham Historic Dockyard, major regeneration such as St Mary's Island and inward investment form businesses and Kent universities. This has protected our heritage and delivered on growth of opportunities for local people. A new era, which celebrates the resilience and greatness of the people of our Towns and all those past and present who have worked so hard to aid our recovery from those days.
