BOMBPROOF POWDER AND PROJECTILE MAGAZINE

Artillerymen have a patron saint. With such dangerous work, that can't hurt. Traditionally, Saint Barbara assists the artillery. But a quick prayer is not enough. It is wise to be especially careful. And that starts with the storage place for the gunpowder.

Safely hidden

This building was by far the most dangerous place within the fortress. It was not for nothing that this was the most solid building on Front I-II. The serious fireworks were under 3 meters of ground and a roof vault of more than 1.20 meters.

In wartime, the guns on Front I-II consumed as much as 70,000 kilograms of gunpowder. Packed in copper barrels, it was safely stored in the bombproof powder and projectile magazine. There were also more than 1,500 empty shells. And stacks of cartridge bags for the so-called drive charges. In this warehouse, soldiers filled the grenades and cardoons. The ammunition went to the storage places on shore in carts. Ready to repel enemy ships.

Behind the façade are 2 rooms for the ready-to-use ammunition. The filled grenades could be moved with heavy cranes. The rest of the building is hidden under the ground cover. Here are the 3 powder rooms and the filling room. A wide corridor provides access. The light corridor runs along the back. Like a cavity, but also the way to the niches. Behind thick glass were kerosene lamps to illuminate the powder chambers. Open fire near the gunpowder was of course out of the question.

Brick on steel

The construction of the powder magazine made the international trade press. It is not on piles. It has a foundation 'on steel'. That's what it's called in the language of construction when a building stands directly on a layer of sand. That sand was not there. So a layer of more than 4 meters thick has been poured. On top of that was a layer of concrete. And then a large mountain of soil that was slightly heavier than the building itself.

After a while, this so-called test load was excavated again. Surveyors checked whether the concrete layer had subsided. Or not, of course. Everything turned out to be in order, so that the bricklayers could start their work. This method was not new. But it was not every day that a building weighing almost 50 million kilograms was put on a new layer of sand. Certainly interesting enough to write an article about it for an architectural magazine.

Supervision

The construction was good. It was sturdy enough. But then you didn't have to light a pipe or cigar inside! And you didn't want to walk out with a handful of spilled gunpowder in your trouser wraps. Iron fittings under the clogs were also not handy. That can spark on the floor. For the same reason, the hinges were made of copper, because copper does not spark either.

There was always strict supervision of the work. Nothing was left to chance. Because one spark, a little powder and Hellevoetsluis would have been wiped out.