Foulness Island passing of the Ministry of Defence Act 1946 and the subsequent rationalisation of five agencies in 1971, ownership of the island passed from the War Office to the Ministry of Defence. In 2003, a contract to manage the testing of munitions was awarded to the defence contractors QinetiQ, and they also control access to the island. In the 1850s, the South Essex Estuary and Reclamation Company proposed a grand scheme to reclaim around of land on the Essex coast, which would have included most of Foulness Sands and Maplin Sands. The civil engineer Sir John Rennie produced the plans, and
Saint Mary the Virgin, Foulness Island who died on 27 April 1698, which carries a skull and crossbones motif. There are also three War Graves from the First World War containing the remains of unidentified Royal Navy sailors whose bodies were found on the coast of the island. Inside the main gate of the churchyard is the island’s War Memorial. On one face are listed the names of seven Islanders who gave their lives in the “Great War”, and on an adjoining face the names of the three who died in the Second World War. Saint Mary the Virgin, Foulness Island Saint Mary the Virgin is