Cambridge Barracks, Portsmouth

Cambridge Barracks was a military installation at Portsmouth, Hampshire.

Cambridge Barracks
Portsmouth
Cambridge Barracks
Cambridge Barracks
Location within Hampshire
Coordinates50.79204°N 1.09975°W / 50.79204; -1.09975
TypeBarracks
Site history
Built1856–1859
Built forWar Office
In use1859-1991

History

Soldiers' barracks of 1858 glimpsed through the arch beneath the officers' mess.

The barracks were created by converting some late-18th century warehouses into military accommodation in 1825.[1] The site had previously been a large timber-yard and carpenters' workshops; it was purchased by the government during the Napoleonic Wars and converted into an 'immense' stores complex for the Commissariat (responsible for supplying food, fuel and forage to the troops).[2] These former warehouses are still in place, forming an asymmetrical open courtyard at the south-west end of what is now Portsmouth Grammar School: they stand three storeys high and originally contained open-plan store rooms accessed through external hoist doors on each storey.[1] In October 1825 each floor was converted to form barrack rooms; the 9th Regiment (Fusileers) was the first to occupy the new barracks.[3] At that time a guard-house formed the fourth side of the quadrangle.[2]

In 1856-58 the barracks were extended and enhanced to create accommodation for regiments in transit for operations overseas. An officers' quarters was built, fronting on to the High Street, with a large officers' mess on the first floor.[4] At some distance behind it (so as to form a sizeable parade ground) a long, three-storey soldiers' barracks was erected, containing a series of back-to-back barrack rooms either side of a central office section, with a cook-house at the south-west end linking it to the older barrack blocks.[5] It was at around this time that the barracks were named after Prince Adolphus, Duke of Cambridge who had recently died.[6] Subsequently a two-storey block was built, between the old barracks quadrangle and the new officers' quarters, containing offices for the Commanding Officer and others.[1]

In January 1887 there was a serious gas explosion at the site in which five members of the Worcestershire Regiment died and fourteen were injured.[7][8] The 1st Battalion, the Northumberland Fusiliers was in transit at the barracks when the First World War broke out in August 1914.[9]

The barracks became disused and fell derelict after the First World War.[7] The officers' quarters were acquired by Portsmouth Grammar School in 1926.[10] The soldiers' barracks blocks were initially amalgamated into the adjacent Clarence Barracks; later, they too were acquired by the school, which now covers the entire former barracks site.[1] The school library occupies the former officers' mess.[4]

References

  1. Historic England. "Outbuildings to South West of Portsmouth Grammar School (1333200)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 17 September 2017.
  2. Slight, Henry; Slight, Julian (1828). Chronicles of Portsmouth. London: Lupton Relfe. p. 61.
  3. [according to Slight & Slight in 1828 - perhaps 7th (Fusilier) Regiment?]
  4. Historic England. "Portsmouth Grammar School and attached railings (1333199)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 17 September 2017.
  5. Historic England. "Former barracks to rear of Portsmouth Grammar School (1104363)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 14 August 2019.
  6. "Cambridge Barracks". Retrieved 17 September 2017.
  7. Groombridge, Garth (2017). Portsmouth in 50 Buildings. Amberley Publishing. ISBN 978-1445664064.
  8. "Explosion of gas at Cambridge Barracks, Portsmouth (1887)". Worcestershire Regiment. Retrieved 17 September 2017.
  9. "First Alnwick man to fall in the war". Northumberland Gazette. 7 June 2014. Archived from the original on 17 September 2017. Retrieved 17 September 2017.
  10. "Derelict barracks was sold to become leading school". Portsmouth. 13 November 2012. Retrieved 17 September 2017.

Further reading

  • Smith, Catherine (2001). A History of Cambridge Barracks.
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