Page 7 - Bulletin 11 2007

4

The Duke’s Speech

In opening the Dock, H.R.H. said:
We have passed far beyond the old conception of the Cape Peninsula as
nothing more than a convenient Naval base, of which the occupation found its
justification and its necessity in the safeguarding of the communications between
India and the West. In the number and loyalty of her people, in area and in natural
wealth, South Africa forms no inconsiderable portion of the Empire in which she
has now taken her part as a single and united Dominion. She is willing and able to
take her share both in her own defence and in the defence of the Empire, and her
contribution to the Navy is evidence of her appreciation of the interdependence of
her interests in this matter with the wider responsibilities of Whitehall. But though it
would argue an almost ludicrous want of the sense of proportion to regard her any
longer as merely a link in the chain of Imperial communications, her importance as
a Naval base survives: and of this importance the Dock which I am opening to-day
is the practical recognition.
The Dock itself, which has cost half a million, is part of a larger scheme on
which approximately £2,000,000 in all has been expended, consisting of a graving
dock, a sheltered tidal basin of 281 acres, formed by the erection on the east of a
breakwater 800 yards long, and on the west a pier of about half that length, and in
the rear the factories and shops necessary for repairing ships in dock, grouped on an
area of 35 acres reclaimed from the sea.
The main operations were commenced in January 1901, and it is due to
those concerned in them that I should mention a few details to show the magnitude
of the work. The breakwater forming the eastern wall of the basin was built of
concrete blocks, weighing 30 tons and over, partly on rubble mound foundation, and
partly on foundations out of the solid rock. The West Pier is formed of a mound of
typed stone on the surface, and a wall of dovetailed concrete on the basin side.
For the dock itself, the excavation was almost entirely blasted out of the
solid granite. The foundation stone was laid by Lord Selborne, whose name the
dock bears, on November 15, 1906, and for the whole time of construction building
operations were carried on almost continuously day and night.
The total length of the dock is 750 feet on the blocks; its width at the
entrance is 35 feet, and its general width 120 feet at the coping. The depth over sill
is 30 feet at low and 35 feet at high water; when full the dock contains
approximately 22,000,000 gallons, which can be pumped out by the main pumps in
four hours, and it is capable of taking the largest ships in the British Navy.
I am glad of the opportunity of congratulating the contractors, Sir John
Jackson, Ltd., and all those responsible for the design and construction of the works,
on the consummation of their arduous, skilful and unsparing labours.