The Drill Hall

Details

829-1/0/10002
23-NOV-06

WARE
AMWELL END
The Drill Hall

GII
Drill Hall.Built in 1899,with late C20 alterations.Designed by Vivian Young of Westminster and built by J Simpson and Son of Paddington.Built of brick with a slate roof.It has a roughly rectangular plan and can be divided into two distinct parts:a front section providing ancillary accommodation and the drill hall behind.DESCRIPTION:The frontage elevation of the front section facing onto Amwell End is of two storeys and three bays.A protruding central bay has a wide entrance doorway at ground level and a canted oriel window above,flanked by two windows.The left hand bay has two windows to the ground floor and three windows to the first floor and a narrower right hand bay has one window to each floor.The window and door openings, which have glazed brick surrounds, are all original but the windows and doors are modern replacements.Above the first floor is a stringcourse surmounted by a parapet,which rises into two small gables over the central and left hand bays.INTERIOR:Internally,the ground floor of this section of the building has a corridor,with a hardwood parquet floor,running between ancillary accommodation on either side.The accommodation originally comprised a sergeant's mess,billiards room,drum store,orderly room and male toilets.Although this has been altered to provide modern facilities,the original ground floor plan is largely intact.The second floor remains in its original use as a caretaker's flat.Behind this section of the building and accessed via the corridor is the drill hall,which is approximately 29m long,16m wide and 8.5m high.It is formed by elliptical cross-braced iron girders,supporting an underboarded mansard like roof structure with a slate covering.Roof lights run along the length of the upper slope of the roof and there are dormer windows at both ends of each side of the roof at the junction between the upper and lower slopes.This roof structure is of a particularly elegant and unusual design:most such roofs of the period 1870-1910 were framed using semi-circular trussed rib but this is an early example of a steel parabolic arch roof.Externally,the brick walls to the sides have slim buttresses running along the full length of the south elevation and along part of the north elevation.The north elevation also has a truncated chimney stack and,to its rear,a small brick annex with a slate roof.To the rear there is a high brick gable wall with three large windows,below which there are four window openings and a door to the south end.Internally,the front wall has four brick pillasters rising to the height of the ceiling and a first floor viewing gallery with a large window above flanked by two narrower windows.At low level this wall,including the pilasters and two recessed areas,are decorated with glazed brickwork.The side walls are partially covered in timber paneling with a glazed brick skirting below and exposed brickwork above.The lower half of the rear wall is separated from the rest of the hall by a timber partition behind which were originally housed a store, lecture room and armoury.The hall originally had a hardwood parquet flooring but this has been replaced with a modern sports flooring.To the rear of the north wall,a doorway provides access to the small annexe which originally housed the female toilets,fuel store and boiler room.This annexe has been updated and partially converted to provide updated facilities, but the original floor plan has been retained.HISTORY:The idea of building a drill hall in Ware came initially from Dr A J Boyd,who as well as being one of the town's doctors was also the commanding officer of of D Company of the first Hertfordshire Volunteer Battalian,the Bedfordshire Regiment.In addition to wanting to provide a military facility in the town he was also concerned with the unsanitary slum conditions of the narrow yards and courts in Amwell End, which he wished to see demolished.Money for the clearance of twenty-seven cottages and the building of the drill hall was provided by Edmund Smith Hanbury,who was the grandson and heir of Robert Hanbury, a wealthy brewer and evangelical churchman who had previously financed the building of a Mission Hall,which once stood on the west side of Amwell End.Edmund Hanbury also helped finance new houses to the north of the town to rehouse the inhabitants of the demolished cottages.The building was built at a cost of £5,250 and was intended for use by both the local community and D Company of the Hertfordshire Volunteers.A formal opening of the hall had been planned for October 1899 but had to be cancelled when the Second Boer War broke out in that month.However, the soldiers were able to move in and begin training prior to some of them being shipped to South Africa.In 1913 Edmund Hanbury sold the Hall to the Territorial Association of the County of Hertford.During the First World War it was the headquarters of C Company of the first Battalian,Hertfordshire Regiment and other regiments camped in or near Ware and also served as the enlistment centre for new volunteers.During the Second World War it became the headquarters of first the Local Defence Volunteers and then its successor,C Company of the first Battalian of the Hertfordshire Regiment of the Home Guard,and was used a major venue for the town's fundraising for the war effort.During the whole of its life the Drill Hall has continued to be used as a community facility and today is still used as a venue for concerts,plays,exhibitions,sports and other clubs.SUMMARY OF IMPORTANCE:Ware drill hall was designed by V.Young and erected in the last years of the C19.A formal opening was planned,but cancelled,for October 1899.The idea of building a drill hall in Ware came initially from Dr A J Boyd, who as well as being one of the town's doctors was also the commanding officer of D Company of the first Hertfordshire Volunteer Battalion,the Bedfordshire Regiment.The building comprises a two-storey front section with the hall behind. Although not as elaborate as some,this is a well detailed and interesting drill hall which makes a good contribution to the steetscape.It is particularly significant as an early example of the use of a steel parabolic arch roof structure,more commonly a C20 feature and in concrete.It has historic interest in that its construction was inspired by tensions leading up to the Boer War but also enabled the philanthropic replacement of slum housing.It has good internal detailing and is largely complete.Buildings erected after 1840 need to display a high level of architectural achievement and completeness to merit designation.This is a good example of a late-C19 drill hall with a particularly interesting roof structure.

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