Silvertown War Memorial

[2] The Silvertown factory was owned by the Brunner Mond chemical business, a forerunner to ICI, and had been used for the manufacture of caustic soda.

The factory was mothballed before the war, and the government decided to use its spare industrial capacity for the purification of TNT, using a process that was acknowledged to be dangerous in a built-up residential area.

At about 7pm on Friday 19 January 1917, after most of the workers had left for the night, an accidental fire spread and ignited over 50 tons of TNT, killing 73 people in and around the factory (69 immediately, and four later from their injuries), and injuring hundreds more; it also destroyed the factory and hundreds of local houses, and damaged thousands more.

JANUARY 19TH / 1917" with a further list of 18 names, including Andrea Angel, who was posthumously awarded the Edward Medal.

A further inscription on the south face reads "ALSO TO THE MEMORY OF THOSE WHO FELL IN THE SECOND WORLD WAR 1939 – 1945" with another 7 names.