Fort Amherst is / was a Napoleonic era Fort defending the Chatham docks.
At its peak it held a compliment of 125 guns, most of which would have been 24 pounders.
It's situated next to an existing army barracks.
To quote from Amherst's own website.
"Fort Amherst was not modified during Victorian times and is therefore probably the best surviving example of Georgian military architecture."
"There is much to see in the "wild" area's of the Fort which are not open to the public."
The areas listed at being not open to the public,well one section of them, are where went on our expedition:
There's a large ditch, that could be described as a sunken courtyard. In this ditch is the remains of Prince Williams Barracks:
Inside it's quite dark, so I had to mess with flash photography (and got lots of specks of dust) or run sans flash and pray.
A little nearer the areas open to the public there was another building that tunneled into the hillside. Whether it was originally part of the same building I don't know.
The first room is minus it's roof, and most of the walls, so is getting overgrown.
After that it goes into the hillside is gets darker. One side has few or now windows, while the other side's windows look out onto shrubbery.
The floor has definitely seen better days.
Where the flooring and door joists were sat in the walls is still visible, clear as day.
Some areas are full of garbage. Whether it's been dumped by workmen in clearing the site for the trust, or by the same people who've left graffitti here I couldn't begin to guess.
Gratuitous doorway / tunnel shots:
Again quoting form the website:
"Who took the timber floors? Was it, as folk-lore tells, removed by an Army officer to build a summer house? Or did it burn down sometime in the years after 1860 when the surface works of the Fort ceased to be important."
I propose it was the latter:
OK maybe not, but the single burnt piece of timber there is a little odd.
OK, that's my first full report filed. All constructive criticism will be taken on the chin (until no one's watching, when I'll cry like a girl
)
The full set of pics is on my photobucket:
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v485/nitebytes/Scenes/AmherstMay08/?start=all
At its peak it held a compliment of 125 guns, most of which would have been 24 pounders.
It's situated next to an existing army barracks.
To quote from Amherst's own website.
"Fort Amherst was not modified during Victorian times and is therefore probably the best surviving example of Georgian military architecture."
"There is much to see in the "wild" area's of the Fort which are not open to the public."
The areas listed at being not open to the public,well one section of them, are where went on our expedition:
There's a large ditch, that could be described as a sunken courtyard. In this ditch is the remains of Prince Williams Barracks:
Inside it's quite dark, so I had to mess with flash photography (and got lots of specks of dust) or run sans flash and pray.
A little nearer the areas open to the public there was another building that tunneled into the hillside. Whether it was originally part of the same building I don't know.
The first room is minus it's roof, and most of the walls, so is getting overgrown.
After that it goes into the hillside is gets darker. One side has few or now windows, while the other side's windows look out onto shrubbery.
The floor has definitely seen better days.
Where the flooring and door joists were sat in the walls is still visible, clear as day.
Some areas are full of garbage. Whether it's been dumped by workmen in clearing the site for the trust, or by the same people who've left graffitti here I couldn't begin to guess.
Gratuitous doorway / tunnel shots:
Again quoting form the website:
"Who took the timber floors? Was it, as folk-lore tells, removed by an Army officer to build a summer house? Or did it burn down sometime in the years after 1860 when the surface works of the Fort ceased to be important."
I propose it was the latter:
OK maybe not, but the single burnt piece of timber there is a little odd.
OK, that's my first full report filed. All constructive criticism will be taken on the chin (until no one's watching, when I'll cry like a girl
)The full set of pics is on my photobucket:
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v485/nitebytes/Scenes/AmherstMay08/?start=all
