The St Mary's Road drill hall is a former military installation in

Southampton Southampton () is a port city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. It is located approximately south-west of London and west of Portsmouth. The city forms part of the South Hampshire built-up area, which also covers Po ...

. It is a Grade II

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

History

The building was designed by W H Mitchell as the headquarters of the

1st Hampshire Artillery Volunteers The 1st Hampshire Artillery Volunteers and its successors were part-time coast defence units of the British Army from 1860 to 1967. Although the units saw no action, they protected the Portsmouth area in both World Wars and supplied trained gunne ...

and completed in 1889. It was an initiative of Colonel Edward Bance, former Mayor of Southampton, and was opened by

Edward Stanhope Edward Stanhope PC (24 September 1840 – 21 December 1893) was a British Conservative Party politician who was Secretary of State for War from 1887 to 1892. Background and education Born in London, Stanhope was the second son of Philip Sta ...

Secretary of State for War The Secretary of State for War, commonly called War Secretary, was a secretary of state in the Government of the United Kingdom, which existed from 1794 to 1801 and from 1854 to 1964. The Secretary of State for War headed the War Office and ...

, in 1890. With the formation of the

Territorial Force The Territorial Force was a part-time volunteer component of the British Army, created in 1908 to augment British land forces without resorting to conscription. The new organisation consolidated the 19th-century Volunteer Force and yeomanry i ...

in 1908, the 1st Hampshire AV became the Hampshire Royal Garrison Artillery, but the drill hall also became the home of the

Hampshire Royal Horse Artillery The Hampshire Royal Horse Artillery was a Territorial Force Royal Horse Artillery battery that was formed in Hampshire in 1909. It saw active service during the First World War in Egypt and Palestine from 1916 to 1918, initially as field artil ...

in 1908.Norman E.H. Litchfield, ''The Territorial Artillery 1908–1988 (Their Lineage, Uniforms and Badges)'', Nottingham: Sherwood Press, 1992, , pp. 89–95. Both units were mobilised at the drill hall in August 1914, with the Hampshire RGA manning coast forts and the Hampshire RHA being deployed to the Middle East.''Army List'', various dates. After

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, the Hampshire RGA resumed its coast defence role while the Hampshire RHA amalgamated with the

Hampshire Yeomanry The Hampshire Yeomanry was a yeomanry cavalry regiment formed by amalgamating older units raised between 1794 and 1803 during the French Revolutionary Wars. It served in a mounted role in the Second Boer War and World War I, and in the air defenc ...

and evolved to become 378 (Hampshire RHA) Battery with its base in Southampton. It was renamed 218 (Hampshire RHA) Battery in 1937 and served as part of 72nd (Hampshire) Heavy Anti-Aircraft Regiment, RA, during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. The heavy regiment formed three coast artillery regiments during the war that manned the Portsmouth and Southampton defences. Postwar, the drill hall was decommissioned and converted for leisure use in 1974.

References

{{reflist Drill halls in England Buildings and structures in Southampton