The building has an inscription ‘V R 1898’ in an oculus in the pediment over the main entrance porch, commemorating the year it was built and the monarch whom the Army served. The 1910 plan, which identifies it as the Officers’ Mess and Quarters, shows this structure to be a large collection of buildings occupying an essentially square plot. By far the largest rooms are the Mess Room and the Ante Room although the Billiard Room is of a comparable size. The plan illustrates the luxury that officers enjoyed compared to the smaller quarters issued to enlisted men. Sixteen officers lived in the building, each with their own private bedroom, six on the ground floor in the south wing and the remainder on the first floor. The First Officer alone had a sitting room, but all the officers were catered to by a Mess staff. Behind the imposing two-storeyed façade of the accommodation, the plan shows a complex of service rooms, including a kitchen, pantry, plate closet, scullery, larder, outhouses and coal sheds. Rooms for servants are located conveniently close to the kitchen and the bathrooms, and the First Officer’s servants have their own room. The Mess manager has private apartments above the kitchen area. The modernisation of the barracks in 1958-61 increased the size. An extension was added to the north, between the Mess Room and the Mess manager’s apartments, and a long extension projecting south has been added to the east end of the south wing. The original service rooms have been demolished and a new range constructed behind the Mess Room and Ante Room.<1><2>
It is a large two-storey building with its principal range aligned N to S, parallel to Mersea Road and built to the same general design as the Hyderabad Barracks Officers’ Mess and Quarters (MCC3056) to the south. E to W aligned wings project from the north and south ends of the principal range and an additional wing, aligned north-south, projects south from the east end of the south wing. The main range, south wing and part of the north wing are the original Officers’ Mess and Quarters for Meeanee Barracks, with the remainder of the building dating to the 1958-61 modernisation. The original structure is constructed from red brick laid in Flemish bond and has hipped roofs covered in asbestos tiles. Only one of the many chimney stacks has survived, the others removed when the building was re-roofed. The fenestration of the main range and the south wing has survived predominantly unaltered and consists of horned sash windows of one-over-one lights and York stone sills. Those on the first floor of the west elevation and all of the windows of the south wing have square heads surmounted by shallow brick arches, but the ground floor windows of the west elevation have arched heads in the Italianate style. The west elevation has a centrally located main entrance, a projecting porch with a balustraded balcony above. This is flanked by bow windows. Above the porch, the roof has a large pediment containing an oculus with the inscription ‘V R 1898’. There is a second entrance in the west elevation surmounted by a plaster relief of the Royal Coat of Arms of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
The south wing has an entrance located two thirds of the way along the elevation. To the right of this entrance there is a boot scraper built into the wall. An identical boot scraper can be found by the entrance to the servants’ rooms on the north elevation of the south wing. It is also possible to see original air bricks in the south elevation. As well as being functional, these are also aesthetically pleasing. The north wing is a combination of a single-storey extension from 1958-61 and a two-storey building rendered in concrete. The latter has a fully hipped roof and is the original living quarters for the Mess manager. In addition to the concrete render the original windows have been replaced with metal-framed versions.
The east side of the main range has the original building partially obscured by a single-storey extension from 1958-61, a service range that replaced the original service areas of the Mess. This has been built up against a tall single-storey structure with a lantern on the roof, the Billiard Room for the Mess.
At the east end of the south wing, the N to S aligned structure is an extension dating to 1958-61. This has metal-framed windows and an entrance located in the west wall. The windows of the east wall each have simple decoration over them in the form of four projecting brick headers. This decoration is continued on the brickwork to the south.

This building is locally listed: http://www.colchesterhistoricbuildingsforum.org.uk/drupal/node/1530 [accessed 12/07/17]