Royal Citadel Junior Ranks Club

The Royal Citadel Junior Ranks Club is a junior ranks mess built between 1898 and 1900 by architect T Rogers Kitsell, who worked for the War Office. The building is constructed from Plymouth limestone and features dry slate roofs with coped gable ends. It has an L-shaped plan with a 20th-century extension at the rear. The structure is primarily single storey, except for the two-storey rear wing. The front facade has five bays, with tall windows on the left that include eaves transoms and stone gabled dormers with alternating round and plain gables. To the right, there is a wide rusticated round-arched doorway and a slightly projecting front gable end of the cross wing at the far right, which has a gable ventilator above a pair of sash windows. All original windows are fitted with glazing bars. The right-hand side features an entrance porch on the left, followed by a two-bay open round-arched arcade leading to the two-storey section, which has a projecting gable end at the far right. The interior has not been inspected. Historically, a garrison has been based at the Citadel since the late 17th century. The old quarters were rebuilt under the 1890 Barracks Act, making this building, along with the Peninsula barracks in Winchester, a rare example of an architect-designed barracks. The junior messes were part of the late 19th-century improvements to barracks, and this building is a notable example.