Hospital, Attached Blocks I-J, And Attached Front Walls, Shoebury Garrison

The building is a hospital and attached staff quarters, dated 1856, with drawings signed by Captain R S Beatson, Royal Engineers. It is constructed of yellow stock brick with rubbed brick dressings, brick gable stacks, and a slate roof. The hospital features a double-depth plan with a rear service and kitchen block, and double-depth plan wings on each side with a rear service block attached.

The exterior is two stories high with a five-window range and a single-storey, five-bay left-hand staff wing. The symmetrical front of the hospital has overhanging bracketed eaves, a porch with a stucco cornice and pilasters, double four-panel doors with an overlight, and sash windows on the sides. There is a central gable above a first-floor Venetian window with a stucco surround, and flat-headed six-over-six pane sashes. A passage with WCs connects to the rear, which includes a central square, single-storey cook house and ablution block topped with a louvred ridge lantern flanking a central stack. The staff wing has flat-headed four-over-four pane sashes and a mid-20th century door with an overlight.

The interior has not been inspected, but drawings indicate a central stair hall with wards on either side. The attached front wall, featuring capped piers and metal railings, encloses the forecourt. Attached buttresses on the rear wall extend from the hospital, enclosing the rear section.

Historically, this is one of only two regimental military hospitals in barracks from this period, the other being in Fulwood, Preston. Beatson was part of a significant group of Engineer officers, and the double-depth planning of the wards predates the pavilion plan that became prevalent in hospital design from the 1860s. This building was one of the first constructed at the British School of Gunnery, authorized in 1856 for the Royal Artillery, and is part of a group with the NCO terraces on each side, within a complete mid-19th century barracks.