Building 12 (Officers Mess) South Barracks

TR 35 SE DEAL DOVER ROAD, Lower Walmer (North West side)

860/5/248 Building 12 (Officers' Mess), South Barracks 8.2.74

GV II

Officers' quarters and mess, now Royal Marines barracks. 1795, by J Johnson and J Sanders, Barrack Department architects; Royal Marines barracks from 1869, altered mid C19, and extended early C20. Yellow Flemish bond brick with rubbed brick headers, brick lateral and ridge stacks, and hipped slate roof. Double-depth axial plan. Late Georgian style. 3 storeys and attic; 19-window range. EXTERIOR: the original 13-window range has a 7-window central section broken forward under a wide pediment with dentil eaves cornices and a clock set in a semi-circular recess, and a square louvred cupola. Mid C19 pedimented porches at each end have vermiculated keys, and imposts to round-arched doorways and mid C20 doors, with sashes each side; segmental-arched rubbed brick heads to ground-floor plate-glass sashes, blind windows alternate with 6/6-pane sashes on the first-floor and 3/6-pane second-floor sashes, most with horns. Flat-headed lead-clad dormers to front and back. Early C20 3-window extensions each side in matching style and fenestation, each have rendered parapets and flat roofs, with a central lateral stack. Similar rear elevation with 4 central dormers; below extends a former kitchen wing including a tall lantern to one section. INTERIOR: largely reconstructed mid C20 with mouldings and other fittings replaced; original transverse dogleg stairs have column newels and stick balusters. HISTORICAL NOTE: The C18 range is one of only two officers' quarters that survives from the first English army barrack-building campaign of the 1790s, and part of a group with the men's accommodation to the right, and the former cavalry barracks to the NE (qqv).

Listing NGR: TR3677351934