Forton Barracks

Forton Barracks was a military installation near Gosport in Hampshire, which served first as an Army barracks and then as a divisional headquarters for the Royal Marines. It subsequently served as a Royal Navy training establishment. Today, the site is occupied by St Vincent College.

Towards the end of the 18th century the owner of Forton Mill sold an adjacent parcel of land to the Board of Ordnance, to serve as the site for an Army General Hospital. Forton Military Hospital was begun in 1797; by 1800, however, soldiers were being treated at the nearby Naval hospital at Haslar, so the decision was taken to alter the proposed hospital buildings to serve as a barracks instead. The Barracks opened in 1807, consisting of four tall pavilions connected by arcades . The pavilions faced the main entrance gate across a sizeable parade ground, believed for a time to have been the largest in the country. Over the next forty years the barracks housed a succession of different regiments. The pavilions were capable of accommodating 832 men plus 48 sergeants; however by the 1840s one pavilion was still serving as a hospital, another had had its ground floor converted into the officers' mess and elsewhere space was taken up by school rooms, workshops and stores.

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