Retrenched Barracks
   HOME
*





Retrenched Barracks
The Retrenched Barracks was a fortified barracks located at Windmill Hill in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. It stands to the north of the southern tip of Gibraltar, Europa Point, which was long felt to be potentially vulnerable to a surprise attack from the sea and was heavily fortified with gun batteries, perimeter walls and scarped cliffs. In 1841, Major General Sir John Thomas Jones recommended in a report on Gibraltar's fortifications that a line of retrenchments should be built at the head of Windmill Hill to block an invader's line of advance from Europa Point up the peninsula. The hill provided a formidable defensive position which enfiladed the road from Europa; as Jones put it, "Two hundred men on Windmill Hill and Europa Pass ought to hold as many thousands at bay." The barracks, which Jones himself designed, was originally intended to be accompanied by a citadel which would serve as a central rallying point. This, however, proved too expensive and was n ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Fortifications Of Gibraltar
The Gibraltar peninsula, located at the far southern end of Iberia, has great strategic importance as a result of its position by the Strait of Gibraltar where the Mediterranean Sea meets the Atlantic Ocean. It has repeatedly been contested between European and North African powers and has endured fourteen sieges since it was first settled in the 11th century. The peninsula's occupants – Moors, Spanish, and British – have built successive layers of fortifications and defences including walls, bastions, casemates, gun batteries, magazines, tunnels and galleries. At their peak in 1865, the fortifications housed around 681 guns mounted in 110 batteries and positions, guarding all land and sea approaches to Gibraltar. Hughes & Migos, p. 91 The fortifications continued to be in military use until as late as the 1970s and by the time tunnelling ceased in the late 1960s, over of galleries had been dug in an area of only . Gibraltar's fortifications are clustered in three main a ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Windmill Hill, Gibraltar
Windmill Hill or Windmill Hill Flats is one of a pair of plateaux, known collectively as the Southern Plateaux, at the southern end of the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. It is located just to the south of the Rock of Gibraltar, which descends steeply to the plateau. Windmill Hill slopes down gently to the south with a height varying from at the north end to at the south end. It covers an area of about , though about at the north end is built over. The plateau is ringed to the south and east with a line of cliffs which descend to the second of the Southern Plateaux, Europa Flats, which is itself ringed by sea cliffs. Both plateaux are the product of marine erosion during the Quaternary period and subsequent tectonic uplift. Windmill Hill was originally on the shoreline and its cliffs were cut by the action of waves, before the ground was uplifted and the shoreline moved further out to the edge of what is now Europa Flats. Rose, Mather & Perez, p. 239 Military usage T ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Gibraltar
) , anthem = " God Save the King" , song = " Gibraltar Anthem" , image_map = Gibraltar location in Europe.svg , map_alt = Location of Gibraltar in Europe , map_caption = United Kingdom shown in pale green , mapsize = , image_map2 = Gibraltar map-en-edit2.svg , map_alt2 = Map of Gibraltar , map_caption2 = Map of Gibraltar , mapsize2 = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = , established_title = British capture , established_date = 4 August 1704 , established_title2 = , established_date2 = 11 April 1713 , established_title3 = National Day , established_date3 = 10 September 1967 , established_title4 = Accession to EEC , established_date4 = 1 January 1973 , established_title5 = Withdrawal from the EU , established_date5 = 31 January 2020 , official_languages = English , languages_type = Spoken languages , languages = , capital = Westside, Gibraltar (de facto) , coordinates = , largest_settlement_type = largest district , l ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Barracks
Barracks are usually a group of long buildings built to house military personnel or laborers. The English word originates from the 17th century via French and Italian from an old Spanish word "barraca" ("soldier's tent"), but today barracks are usually permanent buildings for military accommodation. The word may apply to separate housing blocks or to complete complexes, and the plural form often refers to a single structure and may be singular in construction. The main object of barracks is to separate soldiers from the civilian population and reinforce discipline, training, and ''esprit de corps''. They have been called "discipline factories for soldiers". Like industrial factories, some are considered to be shoddy or dull buildings, although others are known for their magnificent architecture such as Collins Barracks in Dublin and others in Paris, Berlin, Madrid, Vienna, or London. From the rough barracks of 19th-century conscript armies, filled with hazing and illness and bare ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Government Of Gibraltar
His Majesty's Government of Gibraltar is the democratically elected government of the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. The head of state is King Charles III who is represented by the Governor. Elections in Gibraltar are held every four years, with a unicameral parliament of 18 members of which 17 members are elected by popular vote and one, the Speaker, appointed by Parliament. The executive The leader of the majority party (or majority coalition) is formally appointed by the governor as the Chief Minister (head of government). The legislature The Cabinet (Council of Ministers) is generally formed by 10 of the 17 elected Members of Parliament, through choice made by the Chief Minister with the approval of the Governor. The seven remaining members constitute the Opposition ( Shadow Cabinet). The last general election was held on 17 October 2019. Cabinet The Cabinet (elected as from December 2011) and after the reshuffle, as announced by the Chief Minister after the 2 ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Ministry Of Defence (United Kingdom)
The Ministry of Defence (MOD or MoD) is the department responsible for implementing the defence policy set by His Majesty's Government, and is the headquarters of the British Armed Forces. The MOD states that its principal objectives are to defend the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and its interests and to strengthen international peace and stability. The MOD also manages day-to-day running of the armed forces, contingency planning and defence procurement. The expenditure, administration and policy of the MOD are scrutinised by the Defence Select Committee, except for Defence Intelligence which instead falls under the Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament. History During the 1920s and 1930s, British civil servants and politicians, looking back at the performance of the state during the First World War, concluded that there was a need for greater co-ordination between the three services that made up the armed forces of the United Kingdom: t ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Limestone
Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms when these minerals precipitate out of water containing dissolved calcium. This can take place through both biological and nonbiological processes, though biological processes, such as the accumulation of corals and shells in the sea, have likely been more important for the last 540 million years. Limestone often contains fossils which provide scientists with information on ancient environments and on the evolution of life. About 20% to 25% of sedimentary rock is carbonate rock, and most of this is limestone. The remaining carbonate rock is mostly dolomite, a closely related rock, which contains a high percentage of the mineral dolomite, . ''Magnesian limestone'' is an obsolete and poorly-defined term used variously for dolomite, for limes ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Barracks
Barracks are usually a group of long buildings built to house military personnel or laborers. The English word originates from the 17th century via French and Italian from an old Spanish word "barraca" ("soldier's tent"), but today barracks are usually permanent buildings for military accommodation. The word may apply to separate housing blocks or to complete complexes, and the plural form often refers to a single structure and may be singular in construction. The main object of barracks is to separate soldiers from the civilian population and reinforce discipline, training, and ''esprit de corps''. They have been called "discipline factories for soldiers". Like industrial factories, some are considered to be shoddy or dull buildings, although others are known for their magnificent architecture such as Collins Barracks in Dublin and others in Paris, Berlin, Madrid, Vienna, or London. From the rough barracks of 19th-century conscript armies, filled with hazing and illness and bare ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


British Overseas Territories
The British Overseas Territories (BOTs), also known as the United Kingdom Overseas Territories (UKOTs), are fourteen dependent territory, territories with a constitutional and historical link with the United Kingdom. They are the last remnants of the former British Empire and do not form part of the United Kingdom itself. The permanently inhabited territories are internally Self-governance, self-governing, with the United Kingdom retaining responsibility for Defence (military), defence and foreign relations. Three of the territories are inhabited only by a transitory population of military or scientific personnel. All but one of the rest are listed by the Special Committee on Decolonization, UN Special Committee on Decolonization as United Nations list of non-self-governing territories, non-self-governing territories. All fourteen have the Monarchy of the United Kingdom, British monarch as head of state. three territories (the Falkland Islands, Gibraltar and the Akrotiri an ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Europa Point
Europa Point (Spanish language, Spanish and Llanito: Punta de Europa or Punta Europa), is the southernmost point of Gibraltar (the southernmost point of the Iberian Peninsula being Punta de Tarifa 25 km southwest of Gibraltar). At the end of the Rock of Gibraltar, the area is flat and occupied by such features as a playing field and a few buildings. On a clear day, views of North Africa can be seen across the Strait of Gibraltar including Ceuta and the Rif Mountains of Morocco; as well as the Bay of Gibraltar and the Spain, Spanish towns along its shores. It is reached from the old town by Europa Road. Overview There are five notable buildings, Harding's Battery, the Ibrahim-al-Ibrahim Mosque, the Roman Catholicism in Gibraltar, Roman Catholic Shrine of Our Lady of Europe, the Europa Point Lighthouse and the Nun's Well, Gibraltar, Nun's Well. Europa Point is also the location of Gibraltar's only dedicated cricket oval where the Gibraltar national cricket team play and since 20 ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

John Thomas Jones
Major General Sir John Thomas Jones, 1st Baronet (25 March 1783 – 26 February 1843) was a British officer in the Royal Engineers who played a leading engineering role in a number of European campaigns of the early nineteenth century. Jones was revered by the Duke of Wellington and asked to advise on fortifications including the modernisation of the defences in Gibraltar. He was also notable as an English amateur cricketer who made six first-class appearances. Biography Sir John Thomas Jones was eldest of five sons of John Jones, esq., general superintendent at Landguard Fort, Felixstowe, Suffolk, and of Cranmer Hall, Fakenham, Norfolk, by his wife Mary, daughter of John Roberts of the 29th foot. He was born at Landguard Fort on 25 March 1783. Sir Harry David Jones was his brother. He was educated at the grammar school at Ipswich, joined the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich in the spring of 1797, received a commission as second lieutenant in the Royal Engineers on 30 August 17 ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Enfilade
Enfilade and defilade are concepts in military tactics used to describe a military formation's exposure to enemy fire. A formation or position is "in enfilade" if weapon fire can be directed along its longest axis. A unit or position is "in defilade" if it uses natural or artificial obstacles to shield or conceal itself from enfilade and hostile fire. The strategies, named by the English during the Hundred Years' War, use the French '' enfiler'' ("to put on a string or sling") and ''défiler'' ("to slip away or off") spoken by English nobility of the time. Enfilade fire—gunfire directed against an enfiladed formation or position—is also commonly known as "flanking fire". Raking fire is the equivalent term in naval warfare. Strafing, firing on targets from a flying platform, is often done with enfilade fire. It is a very advantageous, and much sought for, position for the attacking force. Enfilade A formation or position is "in enfilade" if weapon fire can be directe ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]