The Marines in Chatham: Research and photos
Nov 22, 2014 17:42:33 GMT
QueueMistressMags, HMSCody, and 1 more like this
Post by Sharpiefan on Nov 22, 2014 17:42:33 GMT
Despite the weather yesterday, I went out on a wee bit of an explore in Chatham to (re)discover the remains of the Royal Marine barracks, which were demolished in the 1950s - the changing of their role from sea-soldiers to Commandos meant that their presence in Medway was outdated.
The Royal Navy left Medway in the 1980s after the closure of the Dockyard, part of the land of the Royal School of Military Engineering (the RSME) was recently sold off to become the new site for MidKent College, and the Kitchener Barracks closed two or three years ago.
The site of the Royal Marine barracks was sold off, and the current building was built in the 1970s as the new offices for Lloyds of London, the shipping insurance firm (my mum worked in the building when it was new). Currently the building is used as offices by Medway Council.
If you walk past the Council offices, you will come to a Shell petrol station on the corner of Dock Road and a dead-end road called simply New Stairs. Walk down that road a little way and you will come to a yellow-brick wall with an information board on it.
The board (if you can read it) tells you that you are on the Great Lines Heritage Trail. A little further down, you will find this little green door:
This leads from the Marines' side of the Dockyard wall into the Dockyard itself and (I think) has a small guardhouse on the other side - or at least, I have seen that there is a guardhouse somewhere in that area inside the Dockyard, though I don't have a photo of that. Yet.
If you follow the footpath round, past the blank brick wall where the New Stairs to the river still are, you will walk onto the land that was originally part of the Marine Barracks. This is, I believe, the only part of the original wall from the Georgian era still in situ - it is contemporary with the red brick of the Dockyard wall itself, or at least the redbrick bit is; it looks as though it's suffered damage and been repaired later, judging by the yellow London Stock brickwork mixed in. The building is one of the massive storehouses in the Dockyard.
Looking downstream past the dockyard - the bit sticking out beyond the wall is part of the Dockyard wharf. In the eighteenth century, the River Medway would have been full of Navy ships laid up in Ordinary and hulks used to house prisoners of war, not to mention barges, wherries and bumboats - we don't realise how much a traffic the rivers of England used to carry, in the days when road transport was slow, expensive and uncomfortable.
Taken on a previous visit to the Dockyard, the last photo is of the guardhouse inside the Main Gate, which was one of the most important sentry posts the Marines ever held.
Coupled with a very successful research trip yesterday, I am feeling pretty pleased with how my week's gone! I apologise for the slightly blurred quality of some of the pics; they didn't reduce clearly, for some reason, though the originals were in focus.
on a previous trip up to The National Archives in Kew, one of the items I looked at was what is known as a Description Book - a list of men, their ages and heights when the enlisted, with a (very brief) description, generally limited to hair colour and complexion, though later entries also include eye colour. The picture below is of some entries in ADM 158/1, the Chatham Division Description Book of 1755-1762. (From left to right the columns are: the man's name, his age on enlistment, his height and the start of the hair colour and complexion column.)
SF
The Royal Navy left Medway in the 1980s after the closure of the Dockyard, part of the land of the Royal School of Military Engineering (the RSME) was recently sold off to become the new site for MidKent College, and the Kitchener Barracks closed two or three years ago.
The site of the Royal Marine barracks was sold off, and the current building was built in the 1970s as the new offices for Lloyds of London, the shipping insurance firm (my mum worked in the building when it was new). Currently the building is used as offices by Medway Council.
If you walk past the Council offices, you will come to a Shell petrol station on the corner of Dock Road and a dead-end road called simply New Stairs. Walk down that road a little way and you will come to a yellow-brick wall with an information board on it.
The board (if you can read it) tells you that you are on the Great Lines Heritage Trail. A little further down, you will find this little green door:
This leads from the Marines' side of the Dockyard wall into the Dockyard itself and (I think) has a small guardhouse on the other side - or at least, I have seen that there is a guardhouse somewhere in that area inside the Dockyard, though I don't have a photo of that. Yet.
If you follow the footpath round, past the blank brick wall where the New Stairs to the river still are, you will walk onto the land that was originally part of the Marine Barracks. This is, I believe, the only part of the original wall from the Georgian era still in situ - it is contemporary with the red brick of the Dockyard wall itself, or at least the redbrick bit is; it looks as though it's suffered damage and been repaired later, judging by the yellow London Stock brickwork mixed in. The building is one of the massive storehouses in the Dockyard.
Looking downstream past the dockyard - the bit sticking out beyond the wall is part of the Dockyard wharf. In the eighteenth century, the River Medway would have been full of Navy ships laid up in Ordinary and hulks used to house prisoners of war, not to mention barges, wherries and bumboats - we don't realise how much a traffic the rivers of England used to carry, in the days when road transport was slow, expensive and uncomfortable.
Taken on a previous visit to the Dockyard, the last photo is of the guardhouse inside the Main Gate, which was one of the most important sentry posts the Marines ever held.
Coupled with a very successful research trip yesterday, I am feeling pretty pleased with how my week's gone! I apologise for the slightly blurred quality of some of the pics; they didn't reduce clearly, for some reason, though the originals were in focus.
on a previous trip up to The National Archives in Kew, one of the items I looked at was what is known as a Description Book - a list of men, their ages and heights when the enlisted, with a (very brief) description, generally limited to hair colour and complexion, though later entries also include eye colour. The picture below is of some entries in ADM 158/1, the Chatham Division Description Book of 1755-1762. (From left to right the columns are: the man's name, his age on enlistment, his height and the start of the hair colour and complexion column.)
SF