This unusual ceramic hand grenade was made at John Dwight's pottery in
Fulham, around 1673. It is made of stoneware. Stoneware is a hard pottery
produced by firing clay at very high temperatures.
How did it work?
Ceramic grenades were filled with gunpowder and sealed with a wooden plug.
They were lit with a fuse pushed through a hole in the plug. This grenade
was never used and seems to have been an experiment by John Dwight. He may
have planned to supply grenades to the government during the Third Dutch
War (1672-4). But there is no evidence that he ever did.
John Dwight's pottery
John Dwight founded a pottery in Fulham around 1671. It stood between New
King's Road, Burlington Road and Fulham High Street. Until 1675 he
experimented with different types of pottery before settling down to make
stoneware tankards, bottles and other household items. Although Dwight
died in 1703, the factory continued until the 1960s. From 1971-9 the
Fulham and Hammersmith Historical Society excavated the site as it was
being demolished to build an office block. This grenade was the only one
they found during the excavations.
Fulham and Hammersmith Historical Society website
