BUILDING 15, HAWKINGE BLOCK, WEST CAMP

BUILDING 15, HAWKINGE BLOCK, WEST CAMP, A233

Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places

Overview

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1391604
Date first listed:: 01-Dec-2005
List Entry Name:: BUILDING 15, HAWKINGE BLOCK, WEST CAMP
Statutory Address:: BUILDING 15, HAWKINGE BLOCK, WEST CAMP, A233

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Official list entry

Heritage Category:: Listed Building
Grade:: II
List Entry Number:: 1391604
Date first listed:: 01-Dec-2005
List Entry Name:: BUILDING 15, HAWKINGE BLOCK, WEST CAMP
Statutory Address 1:: BUILDING 15, HAWKINGE BLOCK, WEST CAMP, A233

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.

For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.

Understanding list entries

Corrections and minor amendments

Location

Statutory Address:: BUILDING 15, HAWKINGE BLOCK, WEST CAMP, A233

The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.

County:: Greater London Authority
District:: Bromley (London Borough)
Parish:: Non Civil Parish
National Grid Reference:: TQ 41140 60760

Details

785/0/10108 A233 01-DEC-05 Former RAF Biggin Hill, Westerham (East side) Building 15, Hawkinge Block, West Camp

GV II Barrack block. Dated 1934. By the Air Ministry's Directorate of Works and Buildings. Dark red brickwork in stretcher bond, hipped (originally slate) concrete tile roof.

PLAN: Dormitory rooms on each side of central entrance and staircase.

EXTERIOR: Single-storey. Three 12-pane sashes each side of central entrance, flanking a central pair of 3-panel doors in a cast stone heavy pilaster surround with moulded flat cornice Windows set to brick voussoirs, and with stooled sills. Roofs are all slightly swept to the box eaves with deep soffits. Six sashes to rear elevation. Smaller 8-pane sash to small service annexe to left of front.

INTERIOR: retains original doors and joinery.

HISTORY: This barracks block, constructed to designs established during the post-1923 expansion of the RAF, has been externally little-altered since the Second World War.

Biggin Hill acquired a reputation as the most famous fighter station in the world, primarily through its associations with the Battle of Britain, the first time in history that a nation had retained its freedom and independence through air power. It was developed as a key fighter station in the inter-war period, playing a critical role in the development of the air defence system - based on radar - that played a critical role in the Second World War. Of all the sites which became involved in The Battle of Britain, none have greater resonance in the popular imagination than those of the sector airfields within these Groups which bore the brunt of the Luftwaffe onslaught and, in Churchill's words, 'on whose organisation and combination the whole fighting power of our Air Force at this moment depended'. It was 11 Group, commanded by Air Vice Marshall Keith Park from his underground headquarters at RAF Uxbridge, which occupied the front line in this battle, with its 'nerve centre' sector stations at Northolt, North Weald, Biggin Hill, Tangmere, Debden and Hornchurch taking some of the most sustained attacks of the battle, especially between 24 August and 6 September when these airfields and later aircraft factories became the Luftwaffe's prime targets.

For further details of the history of the site, see advice and description for Station Headquarters.

Legacy

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

Legacy System number:: 495996
Legacy System:: LBS

Legal

This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.