Fort Regent
| Fort Regent | ||
|---|---|---|
 Fort Regent 2008 |
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| Creation time : | 1806 | |
| Castle type : | Coastal fort | |
| Conservation status: | well preserved | |
| Construction: | Ashlar | |
| Place: | Saint Helier | |
| Geographical location | 49 ° 10 '58.8 " N , 2 ° 6' 19.9" W | |
| Height: | 23 m ASLTemplate: height / unknown reference | |
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Fort Regent is a 19th century fortress and recreation center on Mont de la Ville (Eng .: city mountain) in Saint Helier on the Channel Island of Jersey . The fort is adjacent to fortified South Hill , the engineering barracks on La Colette, and above the 16th century Elizabeth Castle on the harbor to the west.
The most important details on the fort are the extensive curtains , trenches , a glacis , redoubts , bastions and V-bastions. A parade ground was in the middle; today it is built over and has a roof.
Early history of the Mont de la Ville
There was a dolmen on the hill before Fort Regent was built . In 1785 workers who leveled the area as a parade ground discovered the dolmen. The dolmen was left to Henry Seymour Conway , who had it moved to his country house Park Place near Henley-on-Thames in 1788 .
Middle Ages and 16th century
In the Middle Ages, the Mont de la Ville and the nearby Petit Mont de la Ville (Eng .: small town mountain) were common land . The Chapelle de Notre Dame des Pas was at the foot of the hill at the time, but was demolished in 1814 at the behest of the Board of Ordnance .
1550 ordered the English King Edward VI. the relocation of the city on the hill, because it would then be easier to defend. However, the city was never moved.
In 1591 the endeavor to fortify the hill manifested itself in an agreement of the procurators of the Vingtaine de la Ville to buy the commons from the people with their consent so that a fortress could be built. The document is based on letters from Queen Elizabeth I of England , in which she promised to fortify the hill as a defensive device for the city. However, there is no evidence of work carried out there during the 16th century.
17th century
In October 1651, the third English civil war , besieged the parlamentaristische Colonel James Heane Elizabeth Castle, where he shells from mortars made use up, on a terrain elevation between the Mont de la Ville and the South Hill were placed. This bombardment forced the later surrender of George Cateret at Elizabeth Castle in December 1651.
18th century
An illustration by J. Heath from 1757 shows the first signs of fortifications on Mont de la Ville in the form of lines, possibly earthworks rather than stone walls. A map based on surveys conducted in 1787 under the aegis of Charles Lennox, 3rd Duke of Richmond , supports this assumption.
A later map made by James Stead as the Bouillon Map of 1799 shows that the main citadel at that time was on South Hill and not on Mont de la Ville .
In 1781, during the Battle of Jersey , the hill served the 78th Regiment of Foot as a suitable position to prevent the retreat of the invading French army .
19th century
The construction of the fortress, which can be seen today on Mont de la Ville , began on November 7th, 1806, during the coalition wars ; George Don , Lieutenant Governor of Jersey , laid the foundation stone. Local workers and people from the Royal Engineers were used to build the fort ; an average of 800 people work on the construction site. The extensive work was completed just eight years later, in 1814.
The new fort was named "Fort Regent" in honor of the then British King George III , the Prince Regent.
The fort's design is attributed to Lieutenant-General "John Humfrey" and it is believed that Lieutenant-General John Evelegh also worked on the final plans.
West flank and ramparts
Along the upper edge of the cliffs on the west side, between the western bastion and the northwestern V bastion, a 5.5 meter thick curtain extends, which offered protection from attacks from this side. Quarrying work also made the cliffs steeper.
Eastern ramparts
A curtain wall, similar to the one in the west, offers protection from bomb apartments on the east side. The eastern bastion and the southern V bastions were placed behind this wall. The height of this rampart allows a view of the southeast coast of Jersey and of the Icho Tower , a Martello tower that was built around 1811.
Bastions, V-bastions, ditches and glacis
There are two bastions on the fort, one facing west and the other facing east, as well as four V bastions, two facing south and two at the north end. Cannons placed in these locations could have repelled forces that attacked the fort from whatever side. The V-bastions are atypical because they have more than two sides; they are more like half-bastions like those found in horn works .
The fort has a 210 meter long glacis on the south side, a flat, sloping, open grassy area, called Glacis Field . The only driveway and access to the fort is on this side; all other sides consist of very steep or vertical cliffs.
The eastern trench has a masonry- clad Contrescarpe with another, outer trench cut out of the rock. The Jersey Eastern Railway enlarged this incision in the rock in 1907 to use it as a train station.
Cannons
There are locations and loopholes for 100 cannons in the fortress. A March 8, 1810 report counts only 55 cannons and six mortars on Fort Regent.
Fountain
There was no well on the hill, so between December 1806 and October 1808 a deep well shaft was blasted 71 meters deep into the notoriously hard Jersey granite. The shaft blasted with gunpowder has an average diameter of 2.4 meters. Fort Regent's well shaft is said to be the deepest on the island (with the exception of artesian boreholes); it is a splendid tribute to the perseverance and ingenuity of military engineers in Georgian times. When the sappers and miners to the source at a depth of 66.3 meters below the edge of the well in the underground well room, they did so unexpectedly and the water rose quickly in the shaft. The miners hung in a basket halfway up the shaft. The major of the engineers, who was in charge of overseeing the work, reported that there were "great difficulties in bringing the men from the shaft back to the surface before they were drowned by the water ingress from the spring." Bau's records, including the commandant's diary, are now in the Kew National Archives . They were searched for useful information by the architect and the main contractor of the fort's conversion into a recreation center in the 1970s - CG Dumond (Builders) Ltd. The granite was drilled with rotary hammers that were struck with sledgehammers . As originally instructed, the water was pumped up to the level of the parade ground with an above-ground horse-wind, but this proved both too time-consuming and unpopular with the soldiers; this facility operated for only one year after the fort officially opened in 1814. The first piston pumps, operated in series down the well shaft with a long piston rod powered by a hand winch through a straight shaft and gearbox, were supplied by Henry Maudeslay and Son in 1815 and fitted with a double, circular, underground chamber that directly was hollowed out under the parade ground. One chamber contained the winch and was connected to the adjoining chamber which housed the well machinery and from which the well shaft extended. Later on, the hand-operated winch was switched to operate with donkeys . However, this method also turned out to be less effective than desired. It turned out that it was difficult to get the donkeys into and out of the chambers through the long, sloping tunnel that started at ground level in the eastern bastion. So the drive system was changed again and a small steam engine was used. The steam engine, in turn, was later replaced by a gasoline engine that is still on site today, a rare example of late Victorian technology, along with the original fountain mechanics by Henry Maudeslay and Son from 1815. During the renovation work in 1970, the county government organization - the fort Regent Development Committee (FRDC) - suggested that all well shaft access ladders, cast iron gratings (originally supplied by Ironbridge on orders from the Department of War), and pump rods and valves should be scrapped because “the fort needed well water for commercial and domestic supplies at the new recreation center and one could not risk contamination of the water by the old machine parts ”. This act of "cultural vandalism" was carried out under the supervision of the Clerk of Works , Mr Greenwell , against which some sensible people protested at the time, but the renovation contract was politically sensitive: the knowledge about the destruction and scrapping of the well mechanics was on employees of the FRDC, the architect and the main contractor. The people of Jersey, for example, who might have expressed concern, did not learn of the destruction long after it was carried out. Not even today is it known to everyone who is trying to preserve as much of Jersey's historic past as possible. Even though the main contractor rescued all of the preserved machine parts and handed them over to the committee, as stated in the renovation contract for "all antiques found on the site," the authorities had all parts scrapped two years after the work was completed because they were "Of no historical interest and not worth fuss". The access to the underground well head and the machine chambers via a series of steep concrete steps and a steep tunnel is considered too dangerous from a modern safety and health point of view and so the well machinery will probably remain hidden from the public forever. While tidying up and cleaning the well shaft in 1979, the main contractor discovered a 12-meter-high, flat piece of granite that was created by a natural fracture pattern and formed one side of the well shaft about 30 meters below the surface. It was so hot that water that dripped onto the granite piece from further up immediately evaporated and blistered the skin of a hand that accidentally came into contact with it. This is arguably the only example of geothermal heat on the island.
Signal station
Since the end of the 18th century, before the construction of Fort Regent, the Mont de la Ville served as a commercial signal station.
20th century
The last British troops to garrison Fort Regent were the Royal Militia of the Island of Jersey , which left the fort on June 20, 1940; she then served in the UK as part of the Royal Hampshire Regiment . The militia was re-established in 1987 as the Jersey Field Squadron and is stationed in the engineering barracks on La Colette .
German occupation
During the German occupation of the Channel Islands, the Germans added some facilities to the fort, e.g. B. the anti-aircraft guns . Some of their concrete structures have been preserved to this day.
camp
After the German occupation, the fort was used as a storage room for potatoes, wine and coal. The nearby power station on La Colette was coal-fired at the time.
Recreation center
In December 1967, the States of Jersey decided to convert the site into a recreation center. The indoor pool on Glacisfeld, which opened in 1971 and closed in 2009, was the first modern extension to the fort.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Fort Regent facilities, bookings and opening hours . In: gov.je . Retrieved April 10, 2018.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o A Conservation Statement for Fort Regent . Education, Sport and Culture. September 2006. Retrieved April 10, 2018.
- ↑ David Plant: 1651: Jersey and the Channel Isles . January 17, 2010. Retrieved April 10, 2018.
- ^ The Signal Station . Friends of the Jersey Maritime Museum. Retrieved April 11, 2018.
- ↑ Historic Environment Detail - Historic Document Reference: HE1195 . Mygov.je. September 2, 1939. Retrieved April 11, 2018.
- ↑ Roy Travert: The Future Use of Fort Regent - the Jersey Sports Village and Community Center - a basis for change . The Fort Users Association. September 2003. Retrieved April 11, 2018.
- ↑ Fort Regent swimming pool might finally return . In: Jersey Evening Post . September 2, 2014. Archived from the original on March 5, 2016. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved April 11, 2018.
