c.1862-4 The Wagon Shed and Commissariat Reserve Store (SUP 3) and Commissariat Reserve Stores (SUP 2) now form one long building, but part is to be demolished, to form two buildings again. The two previously separate but now linked buildings which both have north-western walls built into the Cavalry Barracks boundary wall. Both buildings have much altered doors and windows with some inserted and some filled in. Based on information from Colchester Garrison: Historic Building Assessment, Ingram Consultancy (Ingram 2000) which considers this to be a building with high group significance within the Cavalry Barracks group of buildings. [Garrison Buildings Group 3] Ingram: building quality D Ingram: group value A ----------- Chbf: ----------- From CAT Report 606, p.2 :'... The barracks comprised over 40 structures: these included four two-storey blocks of Soldiers’ Quarters housing 16 NCOs and 288 men, four Troop Stables for 224 horses, and four two-storey Troop Stables for another 224 horses with Soldiers’ Quarters Above. A Staff Sergeants’ Quarters and the Sergeants’ Mess, Library and Reading Room flanked the parade ground itself. Officers were well catered for in a three-storey building accommodating Quarters, Mess and Billiard Room for two commanding Field Officers, two Field Officers and 32 other officers. Their horses were stabled separately in two blocks of Officers’ Stables, with their own yard, and each block holding stalls for 88 mounts. Two Infirmary Stables were included, one being of loose boxes for eight horses, and the other being of stalls for 16 horses. The Infirmary Stables had its own exercise ground, two Infirmary Forges and a Shoeing Shed. A Riding School with an outdoor manège (riding arena), based on a model prepared by the Inspector General’s office in 1862, was included for exercising the horses and practising manoeuvres. The barracks also had its own water supply, provided via a circular Water Tower on brick piers. Separating the barracks from Layer Road (now Butt Road) was a brick boundary wall approximately 10 feet high topped with semi-circular bricks, with a main gate of four brick piers forming a central wide opening flanked by two outer, narrower openings. The main opening was double gated while the outer openings each contained a single gate. The piers were capped with York stone. The remainder of the barracks' ancillary buildings were ranged along this boundary wall. They varied greatly in function and included offices for the Barrack Sergeant and Barrack Master, the Utensil Store, the Bedding Store, the Straw Store, the Coal House, the Ablution House, the Soldiers’ Latrines, the Pay Master’s Office, the Orderly Room, the Cells and Lock-up, the Guard House, the Shoemaker’s, Saddler’s and Tailor’s Shops, the Quartermaster’s Office and Store, the Armoury, the Forge and Shoeing Shed, a Granary on staddle stones, the Hay Store, the Bread and Meat Stores, the Tap Room, the Canteen, the Sergeants’ Room and the NCOs' Room. The Magazine Store, located at a distance to the accommodation, was also along the boundary wall ...' Cavalry Barracks buildings demolished during the 1970s to create Circular Road West: 2 blocks of Soldiers’ Quarters; 1 block of Troop Stables; 1 block of Latrines; the Wicket Gate; (and the eastern boundary wall??) - all dating to 1862-4??. Cavalry Barracks buildings demolished between 2000 and 2010: - - - Cavalry Barracks buildings demolished after August 2011: small building of unknown purpose attached to Wagon Shed and Commissariat Reserve Store; 1 block of Officers’ Stables; 2 blocks of Troop Stables; Ablution House; building of unknown purpose - all dating to 1862-4??. Cavalry Barracks surviving buildings in October 2013: Wagon Shed and Commissariat Reserve Store; Commissariat Reserve Stores; northern boundary wall and two gates; [parade ground]; ?? ----------- Ref. in Pevsner: '... CAVALRY BARRACKS, SW of Le Cateau Barracks, now bisected by Circular Road West. 1861-3. CApt. Douglas Galton R.E., Assistant Inspector-General of Fortifications, was at least partly responsible for the design, which includes the large, rectangular Riding School, with office and viewing gallery at one end and complex roof trusses with wrought-iron ties and paired struts. Other surviving buildings from the original barracks include three blocks of troops' stables with soldiers' quarters over, two further blocks of soldiers' quarters, officers' quarters, and single-storey stables ...' etc, p. 282, in "The buildings of England: Essex", by Bettley and Pevsner. [Dr James Bettley is a member of the Colchester Historic Buildings Forum. The series of Pevsner volumes on the architecture of England are a famous and authoritative guide to the best examples of architecture in the country, by county, which are in the process of being updated (2012).] Plan of the Cavalry Barracks from CAT Report 97. See CAT Report ?? The Cavalry Barracks were built in 1862-4 by the famous 19th-century firm of builders and contractors, Messrs Lucas Brothers of London, who had also erected the hutment camp at Mersea Road in Colchester in 1855-6. The Lucas Brothers constructed a large number of significant buildings in the 19th century, eg CLIVEDEN (famous stately home), THE OXFORD UNIVERSITY MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY, THE ASHMOLEAN MUSEUM, BETHLEM HOSPITAL (now Imperial War Museum), ROYAL OPERA HOUSE at Covent Garden, THE LONDON,CHATHAM AND DOVER RAILWAY, CHARING CROSS STATION AND HOTEL, THE ROYAL ALBERT HALL, LIVERPOOL STREET STATION, THE GREAT EASTERN HOTEL, THE ASSAN DAM in Egypt. [Part of the original Cavalry Barracks, built 1862-4, the first permanent barracks built at Colchester; this was designed on the Aldershot model for cavalry barracks and Colchester is the only surviving example in Britain of the new barracks planning of the 1850s. The plans for 'Cavalry Barracks' at Colchester were signed off by General Burgoyne in 1861 (Douet 1998). The buildings, therefore, form a unique group, of local and national significance; they are monuments to British military and imperial history and stand as a memorial to all the men who were stationed here over 150 years of use. These buildings were also built with public money. As a building with designated uses, and designed for those uses as part of the plan of the barracks, the Wagon Shed and Commissariat Reserve Store and Commissariat Reserve Stores represent the important 19th-century reforming initiatives, by the War Office and the Army, to improve conditions for the non-commissioned officers and other ranks. In 1855, the Barracks Accommodation Report commissioned by Lord Raglan was completed. In 1857, after the scandal of the Crimean War, there was a Royal Commission into Army conditions followed, in 1858, by the establishment of a Commission for Improving Barracks and Hospitals (later the Army Sanitary Commission, led by two reformers who were associates of Florence Nightingale). In 1858-61, 162 barracks in Britain were inspected by the Commission, including the barracks at Colchester which then consisted of a hutment camp on the land between Military Road and Mersea Road. The Commission found the existing accommodation for soldiers in Britain to be inadequate and unacceptable. In 1859, Sydney Herbert was appointed Secretary of State for War, and funding for improvements for the Army increased. In 1860, the government bought the Abbey gardens and St John's Farm in Colchester. In 1861, the Commission made recommendations for the improvement of barracks which were accepted by Parliament, including day rooms for the men, heating and ventilation, kitchens, laundries, workshops, married quarters, gymnasiums, and libraries and reading rooms for the men. The brick Cavalry Barracks at Colchester were built at Butt Road in 1862-4, to accommodate about 2,500 men, and married quarters were built to the south of the Abbey gardens. The barracks included blocks of stables with troop accommodation above. In 1864, the Army Sanitary Commission decided that accommodation for men over the stables of their horses was unacceptable (Douet 1998). However, progress was slow in British barracks, and recommended improvements were only fully instituted with the funding for and requirements of the Army's radical localisation programme of the 1870s. However, in 1866 Colchester did become the headquarters of the Army's newly-formed Eastern District, and it was one of the Army's four 'great camps' in Britain (with Aldershot, Shornecliffe, and the Curragh near Dublin). In 1872, the Military Localisation Bill provided the blueprint for the reorganisation of the British Army, with 66 districts for infantry regiments, 12 for artillery and 2 for cavalry (Douet 1998); infantry, artillery and cavalry regiments were stationed at Colchester camp. The Cavalry Barracks at Colchester were built in two phases in 1862-4. The Artillery Barracks were built next to the Cavalry Barracks in the early 1870s. The infantry in Colchester were housed in the hutment barracks until 1896, from which date the huts were replaced by brick barracks (Douet 1998).] References: Douet 1998 VCH 9