Former School Room, Royal Artillery Barracks (also known as Le Cateau Barracks)

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TM 9924 SW 584/18/10019

COLCHESTER LE CATEAU ROAD Former School Room, Royal Artillery Barracks (also known as Le Cateau Barracks)

(Formerly listed as Former School Room, Le Cateau, Colchester Garrison, LE CATEAU ROAD)

GV II School room, latterly office, built in 1874-75 to a design by Lieutenant General Charles Brisbane Ewart RE, Deputy Director of Works for Barracks at the War Office

MATERIALS: red brick with yellow brick and limestone dressings, and a slate roof.

PLAN: single-depth plan.

EXTERIOR: single storey, six-window range. Yellow brick plinth, cill and lintel bands, and brick eaves cornice, with coped end gables. Round-arched windows with small-paned metal frames, and a central flat-headed doorway. Windows to end gables with upper oculus. Blind rear elevation.

INTERIOR: not inspected.

HISTORY: one of the earliest school rooms at an English barracks, with that at Lower Barracks, Winchester. They were first provided in the 1840s, to raise the standard of education of the troops, and to provide schooling for soldiers' children. Le Cateau Royal Artillery Barracks were the second permanent barracks built at Colchester after the adjoining Calvary Barracks which were built in 1862-64. The school is included as part of the complex, and as a rare early school room.

SOURCES: PSA Drawings Collection, NMR, Swindon: CTR 130-158; Dietz P: Garrison: Ten British Military Towns: London: 1986, pp 3-22.

Listing NGR: TL9925824429