Additional reporting by KMTV's Sofia Akin

In the second part of our series to mark the 40th anniversary of the closure of Chatham Dockyard, we talk to some of the people who worked there and later returned.

We also hear from the first person to visit the site as a tourist attraction as it began a brand new chapter.

On March 30, 1984 the Royal Navy left Chatham, bringing to a close four centuries of history.

It was a major blow to north Kent as it had employed thousands of people in a variety of trades down the generations.

On hearing the news of the closure, former shipwright, John De Rose said: “I thought what am I going to do now? I thought I’d be here all my life, I’d been promoted once and was due for promotion again, and I went for a foreman of the yard.

“We heard early in 1981, and this was a year before the Falklands War, so we had jobs to do and we did those jobs.

“I didn’t feel there was a lessening of willpower to work. The people who worked for me got on with their job, and it was 1982 when I left.”

Things changed massively for him as he went to work abroad, which affected his family life.

He added: “It [the closure] never really made sense other than the government needed to save money.”

John organises a Dockyard workers’ reunion once a year.

“There aren’t many people who don’t want to visit the Dockyard,” he said.

“I’ve been a volunteer for the last 10 years working with school parties and then began a research project in the library.

“I love being here and I love the Dockyard. I love sharing that information to kids and visitors.

“I think the Chatham Historic Dockyard Trust has done a fantastic job - it’s a two or three-day visit for anyone, so people keep coming back.”

In June 1970, Linda Brown first walked through the Dockyard gates.

She said: “I started in HR/personnel department working with the drawing office and clerical office, and eventually worked directly to the Captain who worked as the nuclear power manager.”

A sensitive area, the nuclear power compartment was covered by the Official Secrets Act.

“I was the first woman to go into a nuclear reactor compartment on a nuclear submarine,” she remembered.

“Up to that time, most apprentices had been male, but in the 1970s we started getting applications from girls to do the apprenticeship courses - if they were to do this, they would need to go into sensitive areas like the nuclear reactor apartment and they wanted to know if it was physically possible for a woman to get in there!

“That kind of thing wouldn’t happen today - someone questioning whether a woman was physically able to do it.

“It wouldn’t happen in the trust now or over the last 40 years. I never ever encountered misogyny - apart from that occasion.

“My own experience there was that I could be strong, and I could speak my mind (and I did - frequently, and politely).”

Linda featured several times in the Dockyard’s very own newspaper called ‘Periscope’, even as ‘Maid of the Month’, a tradition that endured through the 1970s.

As a woman, her career progression wasn’t held back, she rose from clerical officer in 1970 to Higher Executive Office in 1978 before leaving to have a family.

She remembers how busy the ‘yard was: “There was always something interesting happening, always something going on - a ship coming and going, celebrations when a ship was finished being commissioned, you could get involved with the daily life, go up to Bull’s Nose and see the ships coming and going.”

She returned to the Dockyard in 2008 as a learning facilitator in a paid position, following 20 years of working in a school.

She explained: “The education department and visitor experience team gave the first tours of the Dockyard.

“I feel very fortunate to have been the first official dedicated learning facilitator at there.”

Although she retired last year, Linda still helps out at the Dockyard on a regular basis.

Patrick Boniface was the first visitor to step foot in The Historic Dockyard Chatham when it opened.

Now a journalist working within the naval and maritime sectors, and author of 14 books, he was a schoolboy at the time.

He said: “I waited patiently outside what was then the museum entrance for it to open for the first time.

“Back in the mid ‘80s, I was still at school with a passion for all things navy. Growing up in Maidstone I loved the idea that the Royal Navy was just over the North Downs and that every spring I pestered my dad to drive me to Chatham to look at all the wonderful warships on display.

“I was there on opening day - dropped off by my parents. I remember it being quite lonely at first and chilly, but four decades of forgetfulness may have clouded my memories.

“I do recall, however, that I was excited. Expectations were getting the better of me. Imagining what lay behind the walls that shielded the dockyard from the outside world for so long.

“That I was first in the queue surprised me. I was expecting it to be heaving with people who shared my fascination with what lay inside Chatham Dockyard.

“But there I was with some pennies in my pocket to find a phone box to call my parents when I was done so they could collect their naval enthusiast son and bring him home.

“Finally, the door to the old museum building opened and out stepped [dockyard trust chairman] Sir Steuart Pringle.

“He smiled at me and said something like ‘You must be keen you’ve been here hours’. And I had. But I didn’t mind. I was the first member of the public to see inside the new museum, sample what everyone else would eventually come to see.

“I saw industry, warfare, models and sails, surprising buildings, railways and beautiful boltholes that seemed out of place in an industrial landscape.

“Some 400 years of naval history in one place, but such a vast site. I was just 15 and staggered by the variety and complexity of the Dockyard.

“There were no preserved warships in the dry docks and the museum building was hidden away up by the main gate.

“All the attractions that we have today were years ahead in the future, but to feel the history of the place was something special and that I was now part of the history of Chatham Historic Dockyard, a permanent small part of the place I have visited every single year, both professionally and for fun, since then is an honour and a treat.”

For more on the history of the site, visit the Historic Dockyard Chatham’s website.

Tomorrow KentOnline looks at the films and TV shows which have been filmed at the Dockyard since it became a major tourist attraction.