Welcome to the Vickers Photographic Archive

The Vickers Photographic Archive is a collection of approximately 10,000 glass plate negatives donated in 2000 by Marconi Marine.

Barrow's shipyard has had a number of changes of owners and of their name: Barrow Shipbuilding Company, Naval Construction and Armaments Company, Vickers Sons and Maxim, Vickers, Vickers Armstrongs, Vickers Shipbuilding Group, VSEL, Marconi Marine and BAE Systems.

The majority of our archive dates from the 1910s to 1950s. You can find images of warships built for the Royal Navy and navies from Japan, Argentina, Peru, Brazil and Thailand; Latvian, Turkish and RN submarines from Holland to X Craft liners built for world-famous companies such as P&O, the Orient Line and the Donaldson Line; vessels such as oil tankers and cargo ships ; and also Vickers engineering department : there are images of engines and armaments.

Use the search facility to look for vessels or engines, for example HMS Sheffield, HMS Hermes, HMS Dreadnought, HMS Ambush, HMAS Melbourne, HIJMS Mikasa, Strathnaver, Oriana, Orion, Oxley, British Admiral, Awatea, Queen of Bermuda, Spyros Niarchos, Eva Peron, or Oruc Reis.

For a more general search use the Categories. By using the Categories you can find an even more eclectic mix of images from World War II bomb shelters at the shipyard, St Albans test tank, Sulzer engines, tyre mould machinery and World War I shell assembly line.