Royal Ordnance Factories (ROFs) weremunitions factories run by the UK government during and after theSecond World War. The three main types of factories were engineering, filling and explosives, and these were dispersed across the country for security reasons. ROFs were the responsibility of theMinistry of Supply and later theMinistry of Defence untilprivatisation in 1987.
Prior to the 1930s, Britain's ordnance manufacturing capability had been concentrated within theRoyal Arsenal,Woolwich. In the late nineteenth century, the term 'Royal Ordnance Factories' began to be used collectively of the manufacturing departments of the Arsenal, principally theRoyal Laboratory,Royal Gun Factory and Royal Carriage Works, which, though they shared the same site, operated independently of one another. This use of the term is seen in the name of the 1893Royal Ordnance Factories Football Club and it continued through theFirst World War.7h7n7nunh
The majority of the ROFs were built during there-armament period, just before the start of theSecond World War, to enhance the capacity of the three ordnance sites that had continued in operation after the end of the First World War: the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich, theRoyal Gunpowder Factory (RGPF)Waltham Abbey, Essex and theRoyal Small Arms Factory, (RSAF)Enfield. These three sites were in or near London and were considered to be vulnerable to aerialbombing from continental Europe.
The Royal Arsenal designed many of the ROFs and was also theagent for the construction of all of the Rifles ROFs, the Medium Machine ROF and the Small Arms Ammunition ROFs. The Ministry of Supply, theMinistry of Works, and two other private companies were agents for the construction of the remaining ROFs.[1]
A number of Second World Warmunitions factories were built, and owned, byImperial Chemical Industries (ICI). TheseICI Nobel Explosives owned factories were not considered part of the Ministry of Supply's Royal Ordnance Factory organization, and they were not called ROFs. ICI also managed munitions factories constructed with Ministry of Supply funding. These were known as "agency factories" and three of them became part ofRoyal Ordnance upon the ROFs' privatisation.
Some of the ROF filling factories built later, during the Second World War, were government-owned, but managed, as agency factories, by private companies unconnected with the explosives industry. For example,Joseph Lyons & Co ranROF Elstow throughout the war.[2] Other filling factories were run byImperial Tobacco,Courtaulds, theCo-operative Wholesale Society (CWS), Metal Closures andLever Brothers.
The new ROFs were to be built in areas regarded as "relatively safe". Until 1940, this meant fromBristol, in the south, and then west of a line that ran from (roughly)Weston-super-Mare, in Somerset, northwards toHaltwhistle, Northumberland; and then northwestwards toLinlithgow, in Scotland. The South, South East and East of England were regarded as "dangerous" and theMidlands area, includingBirmingham as "unsafe". This definition of "safe" area was later changed, and in 1940 ignored in the case of ROF Chorley.[3]
Siting of the individual ROFs north and west of this line was of vital importance. ROFs involved withexplosive manufacture or filling needed, on safety grounds, to be located away from centres of population. They needed access to good transport links, such as railways, the availability of adequate workers within reasonable travelling distance, and a plentiful guaranteed supply of clean process water. To avoid the danger of frozen explosives, they tended to be located at or just above sea level. Some ROFs located inWales and Scotland were the result of politicallobbying as these areas had high unemployment rates in the 1930s. The ROFs were guarded by what was to become theMinistry of Defence Police.
The Royal Ordnance Factories were set up with six generic types of factories:
The three main types were: engineering, filling and explosives.
The largest ROFs tended to be the explosive ROFs and the filling factories, as these needed an explosives safeguarding zone around theperimeter of the factory, as well as separation, or reduced separation and traverses between buildings.ROF Bishopton occupied over 2,000 acres (8.1 km2) andROF Chorley was 900 acres (3.6 km2).
Each ROF tended to be self-contained, apart from itsraw materials: with their own coal-firedpower stations, for generatingsteam for heating and process use, and electricity via high-pressure steamturbines if needed; engineering workshops;plumbers and chemical plumbers; leather workers; electricians; buildings and works departments;housing andhostels for workers;canteens;laundries and medical centres.
The UK's ROFs were set up and operated as production factories. The design ofexplosives,propellants andmunitions was carried out at separate government-owned research and development establishments such as the Research Department, which was initially based at theRoyal Arsenal,Woolwich and thenFort Halstead, inSevenoaks, Kent; and at PERME Waltham Abbey, Essex, which later moved to become RARDE Fort Halstead.
In 1942, Sir Andrew Duncan reported to the House of Commons that 300,000 people were employed in the 42 Royal Ordnance factories (24 engineering, 8 explosives, and 10 filling factories), of whom 60% were women. Many were girls with secondary school education. MPs voiced concerns about large numbers of workers occupying factories and workers' hostels designed with a lower capacity, and also stated the need to retain open spaces in the hostels in case workers' homes were destroyed in a blitz.[4]
A number of the ROFs were designatedtemporary, for use during the war's duration only. They closed shortly after the end of the Second World War. Other ROFs were designatedpermanent and they remained open into more recent times. In 1957, a Defencewhite paper led to a reorganisation of the aircraft industry, a restructuring of theBritish Army and a concentration onmissile systems. A number of thepermanent ROFs closed in the late 1950s, after the end of theKorean War. Others closed in the 1970s. The largest of these, based at theRoyal Arsenal inWoolwich, closed in March 1967.[5]
The temporary ROFs, or ROFs which closed in the 1950s and 1970s, tended to be taken over by other government departments. Some closed ROFs andAdmiralty explosive sites, such as theRoyal Navy Propellant Factory, Caerwent, were retained by the Ministry of Defence as ammunition storage areas. Others became government industrial estates or trading estates. Others were used asbrownfield sites to build prisons or open prisons.
Part ofROF Thorp Arch became theBoston Spa depository of theBritish Library. Three of the seven hostels that servedROF Swynnerton became a training school forGeneral Post Office (GPO) Telephones, which later becameBritish Telecom, and is now the Yarnfield Park Training and Conference Centre and run byAccenture.ROF Elstow was taken over by theCEGB and became a storage depot. The site has been cleared, and became the new town ofWixams.
In July 1974, the Royal Ordnance Factories were set up as atrading fund, under theGovernment Trading Funds Act 1973.[6]
As part of itsprivatisation process in the 1980s, the UK government transferred some of the, formerly separate, research and development capability of theDefence Research Establishments into the ROFs. Other parts of the UK's defence research and design capability were later closed down; remained with the UKMinistry of Defence, asDstl; or became part ofQinetiQ.
On 2 January 1985 the majority of the Royal Ordnance Factories were vested in the UK government-owned companyRoyal Ordnance plc. It was bought byBritish Aerospace in 1987.[7] TheMinistry of Defence Police left most of the ROFs on or within a few years of privatisation.
The small number of ROFs involved innuclear weapons production,ROF Burghfield andROF Cardiff, were removed from ROF management and did not pass over to Royal Ordnance upon privatisation. They were transferred to the control of AWRE, which later became theAtomic Weapons Establishment.