Catalogue description Board of Ordnance Office and successors: Royal Gunpowder Factory and successors, Waltham Abbey: Maps and Plans

The Royal Gunpowder Factory lies north west of Waltham Abbey on the River Lee. The first formal evidence exists for the presence of a gunpowder mill on the abbey site or nearby in the 1640s. In 1689 the mill's owner was awarded a contract to supply the Ordnance Office and in 1783 the government purchased the mill; it was to become one of what were later known as the Royal Ordnance Factories. From around 1862 the output of the factory began to diversify as more potent chemically based explosives such as cordite were produced. Gunpowder production ceased at the factory in 1941 following enemy bombing and production ceased altogether in 1943.

The factory was formally closed as a Royal Ordnance Factory on 28 July 1945 and re-opened two days later as the Chemical Research and Development Department where research into explosives was carried out. In 1948, the department became the Explosives Research and Development Establishment and later became part of the Royal Armament Research and Development Establishment.