Summary
Two former stable blocks (now offices, stores and bookshop) and perimeter wall, probably designed by Frederick William Porter in 1859 for the Cornwall Rangers Militia. The stables were altered in the 1870s, 1881 and later for the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry, who were resident until 1962.
Reasons for Designation
The perimeter wall and former stable blocks at The Keep, Bodmin, Cornwall, probably designed by FW Porter in 1859 and with later alterations, are listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:
Architectural interest:
* as part of the first phase of construction at the site, alongside the former militia stores (The Keep), designed by FW Porter;
* the former stables are confidently designed, and the later-C19 alterations reflect the rapidly changing use of the buildings;
* the local stone and granite used for the construction of the perimeter wall are a continuation of the confidence and pride represented in the architecture of The Keep.
Historic interest:
* as structures related to the county’s response to the Militia Acts of 1852 and 1853;
* as part of the sole Localisation depot in the county which resulted from the Cardwell and Childers Reforms;
* for their place, alongside The Keep, in British and Cornwall’s military history, and particularly as the headquarters of the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry from 1881 to 1962.
Group value:
* with The Keep which is listed Grade II, the DCLI War Memorial which is listed Grade II*, and the later-C19 buildings which made up Victoria Barracks and are listed Grade II.
History
Between 1847 and 1869 Britain was living with a fear of French invasion and of the country’s inability to defend itself. The 1852 Militia Act was a direct result of the ‘second panic’, through which British volunteer forces regained their statutory existence for the first time in 20 years, and the lord lieutenants of each county were encouraged to raise 80,000 volunteers over the following two years. A further Act in 1853 ordered the county lieutenants to find or construct a storehouse for the militia’s armaments, kit and other materials; barracks for a sergeant major and a minimum of six NCOs to form a permanent guard; and a parade ground for mustering and drilling the troops, and where arms, clothing and equipment could be issued or collected. In many cases, these requirements created a new building type: the combined barracks-armoury.
At this time, there were no military buildings in Cornwall which suited these requirements, the closest being in the Plymouth area. In April 1859 a County Militia Stores Committee agreed to build a new storehouse in Bodmin for the Cornwall Rangers Militia, located on agricultural land at Plas Newyd, to the south of Bodmin town centre. An 1859 conveyancing plan shows the footprint of storehouse (The Keep; listed Grade II), two small parallel buildings to its north-west, and a perimeter wall around these buildings and a parade ground to the south. The architect was Frederick William Porter FRIBA (1821-1901). Whilst no plans survive from the date of construction it is considered that the two buildings to the north-west of The Keep were contemporaneously constructed as stables, with a room at the centre of each block for a stable hand, evidenced by fireplaces. The stables and perimeter wall were constructed from local stone and granite, the former perhaps from a quarry on Castle Canyke Road, the latter probably brought in from Bodmin Moor, with roofing slate for the stables from Delabole.
Under Edward Cardwell’s Military Localisation Bill of 1872, regular and militia battalions were brought together to create territorial regiments based at existing depots, with the aim of forming bonds between the units and making army service more attractive. As such, in 1874 the Bodmin site came to house the 32nd Regiment of Foot (Cornwall Light Infantry) and 46th (South Devonshire) Regiment of Foot, alongside the Cornwall Rangers Militia.
On 1 July 1881, under the Childers Reforms, a continuation of the Cardwell Reforms, the two Regiments of Foot and the Cornwall Rangers Militia were amalgamated to form the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry (DCLI). Further land to the south-east of The Keep was purchased from the Borough, and barracks for the soldiers and officers (1874-1878) and married quarters and a hospital (1881) were built to standard War Office designs. The completed site became a localisation depot and was named Victoria Barracks. These later-C19 buildings are individually listed at Grade II.
During the 1870s restructuring, the stables were put into new uses, obliterating evidence of their original purpose. The 1881 Ordnance Survey (OS) Town Plan shows that the north-east building was converted to a cell (for temporarily-holding disorderly infantrymen), a fumigating room (for treating unsanitary personnel), and a carpenter’s shop; and the building on the south-west side contained a guardroom, an armourers’ store, and workshop. Latrines and urinals are also marked on the OS map, the latter being to the north-east within a walled area separate to the stable buildings, with separate facilities for the prisoners and the staff, including the infantrymen. It is thought that the one cell was subdivided into three with brick partitions in the late C19 or early C20.
At the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, the barracks became a training base and home to around 2,000 soldiers; many were sent straight to the Western Front. The Keep remained in use as the depot’s headquarters. A war memorial designed by LS Merrifield was erected outside The Keep in 1924 (listed Grade II*) to commemorate the 4,282 DCLI men lost during the conflict. The DCLI also significantly increased in size following the outbreak of the Second World War. In preparation for D-Day in late 1942 the entire site was handed over to the US Army and became home to a large number of GIs, including several infantry regiments. The Depot and barracks were returned to the DCLI in 1949. The carpenter’s shop may have been converted into a recruitment office at the outbreak of either the First or Second World War, when half-brick thick partitions were added. During the Second World War and in the post-war years small alterations were made to the buildings, including the reinforcement of the internal doors to the cells, and their ceiling structure may also have altered at this time, with a vaulted lining. The cell closest to the former carpenter’s shop was used as a munition store until the mid-1990s. A storeroom was built between the perimeter wall and the north-east stable block, utilising an existing jib wall on the south-west elevation. The guardroom became an ammunition store with the windows blocked in, a galvanised mesh added below the ceiling, and the external timber door reinforced with steel.
The DCLI merged with Somerset Light Infantry in 1959, becoming the Somerset and Cornwall Light Infantry (SCLI). They moved out from the site in April 1962. At around this time, a blockwork boundary wall was added across part of the former parade ground to the south-east creating a small car park and garden; an access point was inserted through the north-east perimeter wall from Castle Canyke Road.
The Delabole slate roof covering on the former stables was replaced with fibre-cement slates in 1986 and the chimneys reduced in height. The Army Reserve Centre office in the north-east building was also updated in the later C20 with new partitioning and flush doors.
Details
Two former stable blocks (now offices, stores and bookshop) and perimeter wall, probably designed by Frederick William Porter in 1859 for the Cornwall Rangers Militia. The stables were altered in the 1870s, 1881 and later for the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry, who were resident until 1962.
MATERIALS: the former stables are constructed of coursed and squared local killas stone with local granite dressings. The roofs to the former stables are covered in C20 fibre-cement slates with grey clay ridge tiles, and each stable block has a red-brick chimney stack. Alterations are mainly in concrete and brick. The perimeter walls are of a darker local killas stone.
PLAN: the former stable blocks are rectangular in plan, parallel to each other and the main axial carriageway to The Keep (north-west / south-east), continuing the powerfully-defined symmetry across the site.
EXTERIOR: the former stable blocks are single storey, with their principal elevations facing onto the main carriageway to The Keep. Each has a hipped roof covered in C20 fibre-cement slates, and a truncated central red-brick chimney stack. 1859 window openings have chamfered granite lintels, slate cills, and each doorway has a granite lintel and threshold. Some sash windows are hornless and date to the 1859 construction of the building; others are later C19 or mid-C20. All windows have external C20 steel security bars. A granite drainage channel runs along the ground in front of each former stable block. Rainwater goods are largely cast iron.
The principal elevation of the north-east former stable block comprises two bays of a door and window; to the left there is a further blocked opening, and an inserted timber door to a concrete and brick mid-C20 store. The north-east elevation shows evidence of three blocked-in high-level windows to the cells; one opening has granite jambs and cill, the other two, brick and concrete. A doorway and two window openings towards the left end of the elevation have concrete lintels, probably added or altered in the mid-C20; at the far end are boarded timber doors to WCs. The south-east elevation is blind.
The principal elevation of the south-west former stable block has two doorways to the right and two windows to the left; the lintel and jambs to the far-left window are C20 concrete, as are short ramps to the doorways. The south-east elevation has a C19 timber-panelled door and sash window, and on the south-west elevation there are two granite lintels marking blocked-in windows; the other window openings on this elevation appear to be later insertions, and at the far-right end there is a mid-C20 door and weatherboarding to a WC. The north-west elevation is blind.
INTERIOR: the north-east former stable block comprises three identical mid-C20 temporary-holding cells at the north-west end. Each has an inserted arch-vaulted ceiling, brick partition walls, a concrete floor, ventilation grills in the outer wall, flanking a blocked-in high-level window, and a timber door reinforced with steel. The corridor outside the cells was created in the mid-C20; there is a concave alcove adjacent to the entrance door, its purpose is unknown, but it probably dates to 1859. The remainder of the building has mid- and late-C20 partitions and is in use as offices. The internal partition wall to the WCs at the south-east corner is late-C19.
The south-west former stable block retains its late-C19 layout. At the north-west end the former guardroom, then mid-C20 ammunition store (now storage), has brick partition walls to the north-west with one relocated C19 timber panelled door, the others C20 with steel reinforcements; a mid-C20 suspended galvanised-mesh ceiling; and blocked-in fireplace on the south-east wall. The former armourer’s store (now storage) has an inserted vaulted ceiling with a hatch. On the north-west wall there are various jib walls of unknown purpose, a hearth with a mid-C20 stove, and a timber workbench which may be mid-C20. A door to the south-east is blocked. The former armourer’s shop (now bookshop) also has an inserted vaulted ceiling with a hatch. It is accessed through a small lobby to the south-east, adjacent to which is a small room with a rough concrete-slab ceiling; it is thought this may have been a sentry post.
Floors in both buildings are mid-C20 concrete slab, and walls are plastered and painted. Internal timber doors remain their historic furniture. There are some traces of war-issue-colour wall paint in the former armourer’s store. Some mid-C20 hand-painted ‘No Smoking’ signs survive in the cells and former ammunition store, as does a noticeboard in the cells corridor.
PERIMETER WALL: the perimeter wall is an inverted U-shape in plan, with its rounded corners and entrance gateway at the north-west end. The gateway opening has granite quoins and dressings and is surmounted with a steep gable resembling a pediment and containing a carved regimental crest with the Cornish (Duchy) coat of arms. Flanking the gateway are ten narrow musket loops at regular intervals, five on each side, with chunky granite dressings. The musket loops have splayed openings on the inside face of the wall. A steel gate was inserted in the entrance arch in the late C20. There are also two slate remembrance plaques either side of the gateway: one to the US Army soldiers stationed at The Keep and lost in the Second World War, and the other recounting the history of the regiments based at The Keep and Victoria Barracks.
The south-west and north-east walls are continuous, apart from at the south-east end of the north-east perimeter wall where a vehicular access point was inserted in the 1960s; the south-west boundary wall is blockwork of the same date.
The boundary wall attached to the south-east elevation of The Keep is described in the List entry for that building, as it is part of the historic circulatory route between the former parade ground and The Keep.
SUBSIDIARY FEATURES: detached L-shaped stone wall to the south-east of the north-east stable block, part of the C19 urinals.
