Torpedo boats at the Thames Ironworks, Blackwall (1906)
The Thames Ironworks and Shipbuilding Company was a shipyard and iron works straddling the mouth of Bow Creek beside its confluence with the River Thames.
The main activity was shipbuilding but the company notably produced ironwork for Isambard Kingdom Brunel's Royal Albert Bridge over the Tamar in the 1850s, and the world's first all-iron warship, HMS Warrior, launched in 1860.
Employees at the Ironworks formed a works football team, called the Thames Ironworks Football Club. This club was later renamed West Ham United, whose emblem of the crossed hammers represents the large riveting hammers used in the shipbuilding trade. West Ham are also known as 'The Hammers' for this reason.
