The importance of the war work carried out at the cable works made it a target for German bombers a stick of bombs intended for the factory fell on nearby Bishops Wood and it was reported on a propaganda broadcast by lord Haw Haw on German radio that "the cable works at Lydbrook in the Forest of Dean had been destroyed". Two air raid shelters were constructed in the woodland between the factory to protect the companies workers. Following the end of the war the factory returned to the production of power cables for industrial and domestic use, the whole of the AEI group was focused on an "every thing electric" policy and was well placed to benefit from the post war consumer electronics market. The factory at Lydbrook did not benefit as much as other divisions of the company. In 1954 an unsuccessful appeal was made to the Ministry of Supply to make the factory a preferred supplier and protect industrial jobs in the Forest of Dean.

By the end of the 1950's AEI was experiencing financial difficulties and following its purchase of Siemens Bros in 1955 the group consisted of four different companies operating independently and competing with one another. The Company set about a program of modernisation to streamline the company, Edison Swan was merged with Siemens Bros in 1967 to form a new division branded as Siemens Edison Swan and the cable works was merged into a single operational unit alongside the former Siemens Cable works at woolwich. In 1960 AEI embarked on further restructuring and re branding abandoning the separate identities of its component companies Siemens Edison Swan and its factory at Lydbrook became part of the AEI (woolwich) Ltd traiding as AEI cables. The re branding exercised only exacerbated the companies problems demand of its products dropped as familiar brands were replaced with the unknown AEI name. The company was also hampered by its large management structure with many departments duplicated between its different divisions as the company attempted to streamline itself areas of overlap were identified and many of its factories were closed. Lydbrook itself was closed in 1966 with the loss of 650 jobs. AEI itself would only survive for another year its declining share price lead to its take over by GEC in 1967 and it to disappeared as a brand shortly after.

The Lydbrook cable works remained empty for a few years until AEI's successors GEC sold the site on to the Reed Corrugated Cases who refitted the factory for the production of corrugated paper packaging better known as the humble cardboard box. Reed went on to produce its range of packaging products at Lydbrook for nearly thirty years until it was taken over by the Swedish paper and forestry group SCA in 1991. Three years later lydbrook was the victim of another rationalisation exercise for the second time when it was closed as the company concentrated production at its other more modern facilities. Since then the lydbrook site has sat empty attempts to revitalise the site as an industrial estate have failed and it now awaits complete demolition.

I visited the old cable works towards the end of 2008 over a decade since it closed for the final time. The years haven't treated it very kindly as I walked along the river Wye adjacent to the site the first thing I noticed was the vandalised condition of the factory buildings nearly every window in the two 1920's factory buildings has been smashed hardly a pane of glass survives intact. Near the back of the factory a small railway viaduct crosses the river. The viaduct once carried a private railway siding from the GWR at Lydbrook Junction right into the factory site. The railway long disused has been lifted and the viaduct now carries the foot path to the opposite bank of the river. Once inside the factory site we followed the outside of the 1916 brick buildings and headed towards the first of the new 1920's factory floors. At the back of the factory building a later extension towered above the factory roof at its base an open loading bay door led us inside. Scattered all over the loading bay and hanging between supports were the remains of police tape at first we were concerned the factory had been the scene of some grizzly crime, but it has just been used on many occasions since it closed for Police dog and major incident training the officers just haven't tidied up behind them. from the loading bay door we move out into the factory floor a huge empty space stretching out before us interrupted only by the supporting iron columns.

Behind us a second large door way opened out in to the extension we had seen from the outside. The ground floor was dominated by a concrete machine base what ever it supported now removed leaving the stub of a metal feeder pipe hanging from the ceiling. In the corner a metal lattice stairway lead into the dark upper floors. On the first landing the feeder pipe split into in to five inter twisted pipes like an aluminum tree. Carrying on upwards the pipes sprouted out into five hoppers all over the floor were scraps of brown paper the raw materials for the factories cardboard boxes. Looking out from a hole in the plasterboard wall we were now up in the metal supports for the roof its glass skylights allowing light to flood in. Once back on the factory floor we found a stairway which lead down below the factory floor down here we passed through an empty storage space which led on to a tiny engineering office scattered with abandoned engineering notes and some graffiti left behind by some of the workers. another stairway lead back up into the center of the factory floor not far from the remains of a pumping system which fed the buildings fire sprinklers.

We headed out of the factory building over a small court yard into the original factories 1916 extension. Once again we found ourselves in another loading bay overhead a crane was still mounted on its rollers along the length of the loading bay a wooden partition area was seperated out into a few workshops and offices.This area of the factory had been home to the engineering department within the office a few discarded engineering diagrams for paper handling machinery dated back to the sites conversion from cable work to cardboard box factory. On the outside of the office wall an empty clocking in machine had stamped the workers time cards for the last time. Climbing a small flight of stairs we move on to another wide open space which looked very much like the factory floor we had left behind us but here there were no marks on the floor where machinery would once have stood leaving nothing behind to mark the rooms former purpose except for a sign on one of the walls. Along one of the rooms wall a huge sliding blue door was marked "Stores only authorised staff allowed." along side the door a small glazed counter window and intercom would have allowed the ordinary workers to communicate with the privileged few allowed into the stores " i'll av a box of screws please".

Deciding that the sign was long out of date we all decided we were authorised to enter the inner sanctum of the store room and see what treasures it was hiding. Slipping past the sliding door were walked into another long room illuminated with skylights. Along the length of the room blue half panel door opened into small store rooms, each was jammed full of shelves but the only treasures left behind were a few "Mazda" light bulbs a trademark used by the buildings former owners GEC. Behind the empty store rooms were a few empty offices the administrative office still lined with empty filing racks and a few folio folders another door lead what once must have been a comfortable office with the first carpet to be seen in the building its heavy floral pattern along with the hideous brown pattern wall paper came straight out of the 60's the office must have been like ever since it started producing cardboard boxes.

Heading back out of the stores building and onwards towards the original 1912 factory building we reached the base of the factories huge chimney at least 10' square and tapering up out of its ceiling. At the back of the chimney some shiny and almost new ducting pipes ran from the chimney through the adjacent wall along side a red painted heavy closed door. Another sign marked with the logo of Dalkia a facilities management company warns us against entering the room beyond which is obviously the boiler house and plant room. Ignoring the sign we pushed the door open and find a dirty and decayed room. Machine beds and pipe runs in the floor again mark out where machinery once stood but these have been removed leaving the factory cold and powerless. Up and till now the factory floors we had walked through were quite sterile and modern looking, but leaving the 1916 building behind we came across some of the factory's true edwardian character. After dashing across another open passage way between the two buildings a small flight of stone stairs lead upwards into another factory floor. Unlike the previous buildings where the the floors were covered in painted concrete here we stood upon wood block parquet. The ceiling was much lower in the factory building supported by a forest of cast iron pillars, the afternoon sun flooded in through the wide windows which covered most of the walls. On the far side of the room an open folding door exposed a wooden lift car for moving material up to the first floor next to it there was a painted wall sign of lettering typical of the 1930's and earlier, the lift has been there for most of the factories life unfortunately with now power in the building we had to take the stairs.

Up on the first floor there was an almost identical factory floor but it seemed much taller topped off by skylights rather than the cast iron lattice below our feet on the ground floor. Passing through we headed for the door to the office block. Passing along a long corridor of doors opening into empty rooms the office block was initially disappointing, the only thing of interest was a few punch cards on the floor. I picked one of these up and was surprised to see the Edison Swan name printed in the corner, they had escaped the bin for 30 years while the factory was in another companies hands. At the end of the corridor though we finally entered a more interesting room through a half paneled wooden door. it too was empty but all over the floor were hundreds of pieces of paper, many more of the punch cards but also original order forms picking a few up I found myself looking at original orders from the admiralty dating from 1943, each piece of paper traced the path of the cable through the factory noting the amount of man hours and time spent to produce the cable. The most surprising thing was the sheer quantity of the cable being produced.

The factory held one more surprise for us, opening half paneled door within the office we found ourselves in a wood paneled hall at the top of a beautiful carved wood imperial staircase. the windows were decorated in delicate green and blue stained glass. As impressive as the staircase was we were drawn towards an elegant glass lined wooden arch which opened out in to a fantastic pastel blue hall which would have been more at home in a stately home than a factory, the companies functions must have been impressive events to attend. Heading down the stairs we found the entrance hall equally impressive complete with tiled flooring and more well carved wood paneling especially around the receptionist window, the company offices had defiantly set out to impress and even after a decade of disuse it still achieved its goal. It's a shame to thing that the whole site including the impressive office building is soon to disappear.