Building 10 (Station Sick Quarters) And Decontamination Annexe

Building 10, Station Sick Quarters, and the Decontamination Annexe date to 1933 and 1939 respectively. They were constructed by the Air Ministry’s Directorate of Works and Buildings, with drawing numbers 213/30 and 7503/37. The buildings are constructed of stretcher bond brickwork with a slate roof.

The Station Sick Quarters is a single-storey building with a T-plan. It features a central arched entrance flanked by symmetrical frontages. The rear wing is set to the left. The plan includes rooms for consultation, a dental surgery, a waiting room, medical stores, a dispensary, and a kitchen. The building connects to the Decontamination Annexe via a high-walled passageway. The Decontamination Annexe, built to a design evolved in 1937, comprises undressing, showering, and clean clothes sections. It has its own water tanks above a flat roof and was originally protected by earth abutments, though these have been cut away at the southwest corner for an access road.

Externally, all windows are now replacements in uPVC, set in plain reveals to concrete sills. The front façade features a group of three windows on each side, followed by a pair of openings with brick mullions. A wide central arch is topped with brick voussoirs and a painted keystone bearing the date "1933." Low walls with coping frame the entrance landing to a recessed doorway. Each return has a pair of windows, and a small, three-light, flat-roofed dormer sits above the entrance. The hipped roof has a tight eaves detail. At the rear, there are similar windows, followed by a short diagonal link with a large steel casement window to the rear wing. The rear wing also has three doors with deep overlights, various windows, and a brick stack centrally positioned.

Inside the Station Sick Quarters, original doors and joinery remain. The Decontamination Annexe retains its original plan form, with steel-shuttered openings for discarding contaminated clothing.

Despite the loss of its original windows, the building retains its essential fabric and represents a characteristic example of designs implemented during the expansion of the RAF after 1923. It occupies a significant position within the domestic site at Duxford, near the Pilot's Block and Sergeants' Mess and facing into the main barracks square. The Decontamination Annexe was built to treat wounded personnel who also required decontamination for the effects of gas. Duxford exemplifies a fighter base representative of the period up to 1945 and includes First World War technical buildings alongside buildings typical of the inter-war expansion periods of the RAF. It also has notable associations with the Battle of Britain and the American fighter support for the Eighth Air Force.