Royal Engineers Museum, Brompton Barracks

GILLINGHAM

TQ76NE PRINCE ARTHUR ROAD, Brompton 686-1/7/38 (West side) Royal Engineers' Museum, Brompton Barracks

II

Also known as: Ravelin Building PRINCE ARTHUR ROAD Brompton. Electrical engineer's school, now museum. 1904, by Major E C S Moore RE, converted to a museum 1987. Red brick with Portland stone dressings and a slate roof. PLAN: quadrangular. EXTERIOR: 2 storeys; 11-bay range. A symmetrical front has 3-storey square towers set forward flanking the entrance and outer corner bays broken forward, a rock-faced stone plinth, the facade divided by cill and lintel bands, cornice and coped parapet, and pilaster strips and narrower jamb strips between the windows; the parapet ramps up to the corners and over the pilasters, and the matching towers have cornices between the floors. Corner and central towers have drums with ashlar domes and finials. An elaborate entrance bay has a 3-bay ground-floor with thick Doric columns on tall plinths to heavy brackets and a full-width balcony and balustrade, to round-arched doorway with panelled double doors and fanlight, and a wide first-floor lunette divided by mullions and transom. Windows have metal frames. A late C20 barrel-vaulted lantern to the central quadrangle visible above the entrance. 11-bay sides with rear, slightly taller, corner towers and domes, the left-hand return has a central round-arched carriage entrance. Rear has a full-width lower range with coped end gables, ridge lantern, round-arched windows connected by a hood mould, a left-hand carriage entrance and 2 altered mid C20 vehicle entrances. INTERIOR: includes a fine entrance hall with large Imperial stair each side with moulded soffit, elaborate moulded newels and balusters and curtail, Jacobethan-style strapwork panelling, 5-panel doors with eared architraves and pediments with scrolled tympana, and plaster ceiling in panels; a 3-bay screen of thick columns on tall plinths has carved terms above. HISTORY: formerly with a square chimney to the inner courtyard, now glazed-in; the domes were designed to mount searchlights. A large and decorative institute, illustrative of the Royal

Engineers' extensive architectural work. (A Guide to the Royal Engineers Museum: RE Museum: 1993-).

Listing NGR: TQ7635168979