Uplees

Human settlement in England

Oare

District

Swale

Kent

Region

South East

CountryEnglandSovereign stateUnited KingdomPost townFavershamPostcode districtME13 0PoliceKentFire Kent Ambulance South East Coast

List of places: UK; England; Kent

51°20′36″N 0°52′10″E / 51.3434°N 0.8694°E / 51.3434; 0.8694

Uplees is a remote hamlet north of Faversham, Kent in southeast England. It was a key part of the Faversham explosives industry during World War I, with the Cotton Powder Company importing raw materials via the deepwater channel of the Swale, and the associated Explosives Loading Company exporting completed bombs and shells. Employees came to work from Faversham on the Davington Light Railway of which Uplees was the northern terminus. It is in the civil parish of Oare.

At 2.20pm on Sunday 2 April 1916, a huge explosion ripped through the gunpowder mill at Uplees, when 200 tons of TNT ignited. The blast killed 105 people and many were buried in a mass grave at Faversham Cemetery.^[1]

References

^ "Tales of horror and heroism after the Great Explosion". Faversham Times. 30 March 2012. Archived from the original on 9 April 2014. Retrieved 8 April 2014.