There were at least two munitions factories in Burnley.
The other one, for sure, was at Stoneyholme Mill on Grosvenor Street and I think it was known as Aldergate. My Mother worked there as a teenager, and the building was owned by my Great Grandfather and Grandfather John and Billy Pickard. trading as J. Pickard and Son. That factory became part of Lucas after the war and remained so for some years. Later they even worked on what became the Rolls Royce Nene 10 engine components for Frank Whittle.
Whilst my mother Jean Pickard worked in the factory during the war on a turret lathe making brass shell cases, the men of the family were engaged on "Work of National Importance" part of which was the taking down of the iron railings locally, and shipping them by rail to the Ministry of War.
They also scrapped off old military equipment being returned to Burnley by train from the front. Things like damaged field guns, tank parts and gun carriages etc and we had photos in the family of them doing this work when I was kid. Their main job was to strip the things down to see if they could be repaired in the factory, and if not to scrap the metal to be reprocessed ready to go to the foundries for making new equipment.
They couldn't get enough petrol for their Leyland internal combustion engined wagons bought from Tillotsons at the top of Manchester Road, so they went up to Scotland and bought a load of Shirehorses and brought them back to Burnley. Grandad walked them back from Scotland with a couple of the lads.
They had previously obtained Old Hall Farm at the top of Stoneyholme near the gasometer, and they kept the horses there. Then they used the old horse drawn carts that had been stacked up on top of each other in the yard next to the gasworks wall when petrol wagons came in.
My Grandad and Great Grandad couldnt bear to part with the horse drawn equipment after the first war, when gasoline engines took over, and so they had mothballed the carts and harness and retrained the carters, as wagon drivers or labourers. (Great Grandad John Pickard donated a large silver trophy, I believe, as one of the prizes for Burnley Fair for the best "Heavy Horse" in show.)
It really paid off for them during the war, when they could reintroduce horses and put the men who had worked with them back on the carts. Many of the men in Stoneyholme were saved from going to the front because they could handle the horses and work on this important effort at home in Burnley. I often wonder how many would have been killed if they had gone to France in the trenches.
Incidentally when I was a young lad, I used to hang about the works during school holidays and had to work for my keep. I knew several of the very old men who still lived in Stoneyholme in the early 1960s (Joe Hindle, Billy (Tempo) Tempest, Johnnie Pilling,) and they told me that the farm at Old Hall, as well as keeping the horses for the firm, also provided meat and Eggs and Milk for half of Stoneyholme during the war. They used a barter system, work for food, or trade other goods, like bread and bacon or coal, in fact anything to help one another survive. From what they told me there was wonderful spirit of cameraderie in the area and everyone did their bit for each other.
The workers at the firm during the war years told me that they had a tremendous respect for my Grandfather and his Father for helping many families keep going in the hard times. Despite the fact that they were the "Bosses" they still lived alongside their workmen in terraced houses on Cromwell Street and Brougham Street.
Both of them went on to be Directors of Burnley Football Club in later years and in fact the firm paid the wages at BFC during the War to keep the club going......!
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