Biography:
1. James Wright, Snr. was appointed at Woolwich on the 1st July 1758 by Lt .General His Grace the Duke of Malborough. He was appointed Extra Clerk at Woolwich on the 13th May 1760, and Clerk of Stores in Portugal on the 30th April 1762. He became the Clerk of Cheque at Priddy's Hard, a major Navy armaments department at Gosport, Hants., on the 28th February 1777, and was appointed Storekeeper at the newly acquired Gunpowder Mills at Waltham Abbey on the 1st November 1787, with an annual salary of £150 (Supply 5/216 dated the 23rd August 1792).
2. His salary was still £150 per annum plus £25 per annum for house rent, and he became a Captain in the Voluteer Company formed at the Mills in 1794 (Report on Pay and Allowances for Artificers and Labourers - Supply 5/217 - dated the 3rd July 1795).
3. Supply 5/222 dated the 8th May 1804 recorded that his salary had risen £300 per annum, plus £25 per annum for house rent, and a further allowance of £25 for coal and candles.
4. While at Waltham, Wright carried out a series of experiments on the manufacture of charcoal for Major Congreve, the Comptroller of the Royal Laboratory at Woolwich, using the cylinder method which the mills operated at Farnhurst and Fisher Street in Sussex.
5. A Report made on the 15th December 1804 in Winters' Centenary Memorial (p.62) recorded, "the Storekeeper's accounts are shamefully behind and renders the office liable to all censure which the Board intimate." Wright in his defence replied, "I am employed every day (Sundays included) from 9 o'clock in the morning until 6 or 7 at night (one and a half hours excepted for dinner-time) in the duty of my office, and ever was my wish to discharge my business with care and faithfulness".
6. In spite of the remonstrance of Mr Wright on the 15th January 1805, he retained the same salary and allowances on the 28th March 1805, but by the 6th May 1805, he was refered to as "James Wright, late storekeeper who was paid £11.14.4d as travelling expenses for travelling 178 miles (chase hire and turnpike fees) to the cylinder works in Sussex and back." (Winters' Centenary Memorial, pp.62/63).
More information on the Wright family can be found in the Faversham Gunpowder Personnel Register 1573-1840, p.90.
