Brick storehouses and timber mast houses stand inside dockyard walls on the River Medway, used by Sherlock Holmes for Victorian London streets.
What Chatham Historic Dockyard looks like
Brick storehouses four storeys high line Anchor Wharf in warm red brick with stone detailing, rows of sash windows looking out over the yard below. Cobbled streets run between them, closed to ordinary traffic, with iron bollards and coiled chain laid along the kerbs.
The is a long weatherboarded range painted cream, its name lettered across the ground floor in black capitals. Its gabled roofline repeats down the block, and a modern glazed pavilion links it to a neighbouring shed where the yard narrows.
runs 1,140 feet along its own wharf, a single run of brick dating from 1786 to 1791 where rope is still spun today. stands closer to the Main Gate, its brick front broken by round headed windows.
Three preserved warships sit in dry dock along the waterfront. is a Second World War destroyer, and is a Victorian sloop still under standing rigging a short walk away. The submarine sits nearby on a dry berth, its narrow interior open below decks past the crew's quarters.
Near the river edge, the excavated brick walls of a former dock basin sit in a shallow pool behind a retaining wall. Red brick coursework survives along two sides, with modern stone gabions shoring up the rest.
Shot in Chatham Historic Dockyard
Sherlock Holmes used the dockyard's Main Gate as the entrance to Pentonville Prison and its cobbled streets and sheds for a hansom cab chase. The Mast Houses and Mould Loft, a long weatherboarded range around its own yard, played the Norwegian port of Trollesund in The Golden Compass.
The Golden Compass, 2007
The Mast Houses and Mould Loft
Played the harbour at Trollesund, Trollesund, a fictional Norwegian port
For The Golden Compass, the production dressed the Mast Houses and Mould Loft as the Norwegian port of Trollesund. The long weatherboarded range and the open yard facing it needed little alteration to stand in for a working harbour street.
Portsmouth's Georgian storehouses Number 9 to 11 share the same red brick walls and three storey scale as Chatham's own Anchor Wharf range, built within a few decades of each other for the same navy. Portsmouth leans more heavily on stone, its storehouse fronts dressed in ashlar stone bands and cornices rather than Chatham's plain brick with limited stone trim. The stone dressings around Portsmouth's storehouse doors and windows are heavier than Chatham's, so close shots need care to avoid them giving away the difference. Try searching red brick storehouses now.
Charlestown Navy Yard in Boston, Massachusetts, United States
The Charlestown Navy Yard's own long granite ropewalk runs close to the same length as Chatham's, a single run built for spinning rope for the navy. Its walls are granite and brick rather than Chatham's brick alone, a paler, coarser stone surface in a tight shot. Keep the granite blockwork out of close frames if the period calls for Chatham's plainer brick coursing. Try searching long granite ropewalk now.
Bermuda's Royal Naval Dockyard has the same Victorian naval functions, a victualling yard, storehouses and fortifications built for the Royal Navy on a working waterfront. Its walls are cut from pale Bermuda limestone and granite rather than brick, which changes the colour and grain of every close shot. Limestone block coursing looks a different colour from brick under most lighting, so this only holds up in wide shots or with a muted colour grade. Try searching victualling yard now.
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