Building No 19 (Sergeants' Mess)

Details

FIGHELDEAN

1382/0/10009 AIRFIELD CAMP (FORMER RAF NETHERAVON) 01-DEC-05 Building No 19 (Sergeants' Mess)

GV II Regimental Headquarters building, formerly Sergeants' Mess. 1913. Architect DM Franklin, drawing counter-signed by Col A M Stuart, Assistant Director of Fortifications and Works. Softwood framing with asbestos-cement panel facings and linings, joints covered with painted softwood battens, and set to concrete levelling-slab with plinth offset. Asbestos-cement diagonal slating to roofs.

PLAN: A single-storey block for 46 sergeants, having a long S front, towards the airfield and parade ground, with inset symmetrically-placed gables. Door offset to the right opens into a lobby, with mess-room to left and recreation-room, to right. The cookhouse is in a long wing to the rear left, with smaller wing to the right across a narrow courtyard; later flat-roofed extension to the east. At the time of survey
(June 1998) subdivided and in use as offices.

EXTERIOR: Built to the same design philosophy as the Officers' Mess group (qv), with sash windows having an overlight to transom, set to a grid of vertical and horizontal battens framing openings, and with a sole-plate, sill and head-bands. The sashes generally have a 6-pane fixed overlights; the two slightly projecting canted gables have 8:12:8-pane sashes with overlights, flanking the central section with 2 deep sashes and, to the right, a pair of part-glazed panelled doors under a multi-pane overlight. The left-hand gable-end has a plank door, and a vent at the ridge, and beyond this is a set-back wing with hipped outer end, having plank doors to a plant-room, and paired or single sashes. A lower wing is also hipped, with 3 sashes, and there is a later pebble-dashed extension.

INTERIOR: This is much divided for current uses, but retains many original panelled doors; no fireplaces were seen.

HISTORY: The Sergeants' Mess, with related store and service buildings (qv Buildings 15 and 17), was located between the officers' quarters to the west and the airmen's barracks to the east (qqv). The building is one of a significant early group of a standardised pattern and construction. The mess, which included reading and writing rooms and a billiard room, accommodated 46 NCOs, a rank that just been given its own facilities separated from the regimental institute.

With Upavon and Larkhill, Netheravon comprises one of three sites around the Army training ground at Salisbury Plain which relate to the crucial formative phase in the development of military aviation in Europe, prior to the First World War. It was the first new squadron station selected and developed by the RFC's Military Wing, the second being Montrose in Scotland where original hangars (listed grade A) have survived. It was also the second new site built by the Royal Flying Corps, the first being the Central Flying School at Upavon which was established in June 1912. A first move was made here prior to Christmas 1912, and in June 1913 the men and machines of the Royal Flying Corps' 3 and 4 Squadrons were relocated from Farnborough to Netheravon; at that time the technical buildings were ready, but tented accommodation was still used as the barracks had not been completed. Netheravon, being one of the stations developed by the Military Wing of the RFC, also hosted a general mobilisation of the RFC's squadrons, from Montrose in Scotland to Farnborough, before going to France with the Expeditionary Force in August 1914. From autumn 1914 the base was increasingly used for training, playing an important role in preparing some of the first squadrons for aerial combat; from June 1918 it was used as a Training Depot Station, and special hangars (qv Building 38A) were provided for the Handley-Page 0/400 bombers which were the cornerstone of Trenchard's Inter-Allied bomber force. No 1 Flying School remained here, with some interruptions, until 1942, after which it was largely used by RAF Transport Command, for airborne exercises and the preparation of gliders for the invasion of Europe in 1944. The Army Air Corps have been based here from 1966, including TA units from 1995.

For further details on the history of this site, see the Officers' Mess and Chalets. (gv)

(C S Dobinson, RAF Netheravon, a short structural history (report for English Heritage), 1998; Operations Record Books, PRO AIR 28/ 582, 1090)

Legacy

The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.

Legacy System number:

495426

Legacy System:

LBS

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