Rope Lore

The Rope Yard was a huge longe building and is today also known as Rope walk. Originally there were two long timber single-storey buildings – one used for spinning, the other for rope forming and closing. The present building is a Double Ropehouse where spinning took place on upper floors with the Rope Walk, where the rope was made, on the ground floor. There they manufacture vast quantities of various thicknesses of rope, from 1cm to 61cm circumference. The Chatham yard for example was constructed in 1790, has an internal length of 346m, allowing it to produce complete ropes in standard Royal Navy lenghts of 305m. 

Above, a part of the HMS Victory's anchor cable

First of all, the yarn had to be spun. Raw hemp, manila hemp or sisal was broken down into individual long strands or fibres in a process called hatchelling, then spun into yarn. Only then it was brought to the rope walk to be twisted into rope. With the thickest anchor cables a number of ropes were twisted together to produce one extremely thick cable. Because of their extreme weight, it required hundreds of men to form the largest ropes. 

A 51cm rope took over 200 men and the largest of all with 61cm took over 300. It is therefore not surprising to learn that hauling in the anchor and cable required the entire crew to handle it. All Dockyard rope was produced with a single coloured strand woven through it to identify it as goverment property, to prevent pilfering : the custom continues to this day.