HMNB Portsmouth

HMNB Portsmouth
Portsmouth, Hampshire, England
An aerial view of HMNB Portsmouth taken in 2005
HMNB Portsmouth Location in Hampshire
Coordinates	50°48′15.91″N 1°6′8.71″W / 50.8044194°N 1.1024194°W / 50.8044194; -1.1024194
Type	Naval base
Area	122 hectares (300 acres)
Site information
Owner	Ministry of Defence (Defence Equipment and Support)
Operator	Royal Navy
Controlled by	Naval Base Commander, Portsmouth
Condition	Operational
Website	www.royalnavy.mod.uk/our-organisation/bases-and-stations/naval-base/portsmouth
Site history
Built	1194 (1194)
In use	1194–present
Events	International Festivals of the Sea (1998, 2001 & 2005)
Garrison information
Current commander	Commodore John Voyce OBE[1]
Garrison	Portsmouth Flotilla

His Majesty's Naval Base, Portsmouth (HMNB Portsmouth) is one of three operating bases in the United Kingdom for the

From the 1970s, the term 'Naval Base' began to be used for Portsmouth (and other Royal Dockyards), acknowledging a greater focus on personnel and support elements alongside the traditional industrial emphases.[3] In 1984 Portsmouth's Royal Dockyard function was significantly downsized and downgraded, and was formally renamed the 'Fleet Maintenance and Repair Organisation' (FMRO).^[4] The FMRO was privatised in 1998;^[5] in 2002, shipbuilding (which had not taken place on site since the late 1960s) resumed in the form of block construction, but this again ceased in 2014.^[6]

Today, Portsmouth is the home base for two-thirds of the

Portsmouth naval base is home to two-thirds of the Royal Navy's surface ships, and employs up to 17,200 people.^[when?]^{[citation needed]}

Senior personnel

The

In 1836 the

Some of the following ships (e.g. the patrol vessels) are not based in Portsmouth, but form part of the Portsmouth Flotilla.[9]

First-rate ship of the line

• HMS Victory

Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers

• HMS Queen Elizabeth
• HMS Prince of Wales

Type 45 destroyers

• HMS Daring – in refit
• HMS Dauntless
• HMS Diamond
• HMS Dragon – in refit
• HMS Defender
• HMS Duncan

Type 23 frigates

• HMS Argyll (currently in life extension refit)
• HMS Lancaster (Currently forward deployed to Bahrain for 3 years from 2022)
• HMS Iron Duke (completed LIFEX refit in 2023)
• HMS Westminster (inactive; planned to transfer to HMNB Devonport post-life extension refit but refit suspended as of May 2023)^[10]

In changes to base porting arrangements announced in November 2017, HM Ships Westminster, Richmond, Kent and St Albans were to move to the HMNB Devonport by 2023; HM Ship HMS Argyll moved in the opposite direction. HMS Monmouth and HMS Montrose were also to move to Portsmouth. However, under terms of the 2021 defence white paper Monmouth retired in that year and Montrose decommissioned in 2023. Richmond became a Devonport ship on completion of her refit. St Albans moved to Devonport in July 2019 in preparation for her major refit.^[11]

Hunt-class mine countermeasures vessels

• HMS Ledbury
• HMS Cattistock
• HMS Brocklesby
• HMS Jufair in Bahrain^[12]
• HMS Chiddingfold – assigned to 9 Mine Countermeasures Squadron operating from HMS Jufair
• HMS Hurworth

River-class patrol vessels

• HMS Tyne - Fishery protection vessel
• HMS Severn - Fishery protection vessel
• HMS Mersey - Fishery protection vessel
• HMS Forth^[13] – forward deployed to the Falklands as guard ship since 2019
• HMS Medway – forward deployed to the Caribbean since 2020
• HMS Trent – forward deployed from Gibraltar since 2021^[14]
• HMS Tamar – forward deployed to the Indo-Pacific region since 2021, with primary logistics hub at the British Defence Singapore Support Unit in Singapore^[15]
• HMS Spey – forward deployed to the Indo-Pacific region since 2021, with primary logistics hub at the British Defence Singapore Support Unit in Singapore^[16]

Cutlass-class patrol vessels

• HMS Cutlass - Gibraltar Squadron^[9]
• HMS Dagger - Gibraltar Squadron^[9]

Archer-class patrol vessels

• HMS Blazer – Southampton Universities Royal Naval Unit
• HMS Exploit – Birmingham Universities Royal Naval Unit
• HMS Puncher – London Universities Royal Naval Unit
• HMS Ranger – Sussex Universities Royal Naval Unit
• HMS Smiter – Oxford Universities Royal Naval Unit

Experimental vessel

• XV Patrick Blackett (since 2022) – experimental vessel in RN service^[17]

Defence Dive School/Fleet Diving Unit Portsmouth

• 3× Sea-class 15 m diving support boats^[18][19]

Portsmouth Historic Dockyard

Portsmouth Historic Dockyard is the name given to the portion of the base which is open to the public; it plays host to:^[20]

• The raised wreck of the Tudor carrack Mary Rose viewable in a new (2013) Mary Rose Museum building.
• in commission
  ) is also open to the public
• Ironclad (built at Blackwall on the River Thames
  in 1860 and now moored in the dockyard).
• HMS M33, a World War I monitor (opened to the public in 2015)
• The National Museum of the Royal Navy, Portsmouth, one of the world's leading maritime museums. Exhibits include the Trafalgar Sail (the foretop sail of Victory used at the Battle of Trafalgar, 1805)
• Action Stations, a centre containing interactive exhibits demonstrating various aspects of naval science as well as a number of simulators
• The Dockyard Apprentice exhibition, telling the story of the Dockyard itself and working life within it.^[21]
• Portsmouth Harbour Tours
• Boathouse 4 (opened 2015), which tells the 'forgotten story' of the small boats of the Navy and is an active boat building and restoration site.

The Portsmouth Naval Base Property Trust has long sought to extend the area of the Historic Dockyard to cover Dry Docks 4 and 5 and the historic Block Mills building among others. In 2015 an architectural design competition for the project was won by Latz+Partner;^[22] however, the Ministry of Defence subsequently indicated that property to the north of the Mary Rose will not be ceded for several years at least, due to the site's proximity to the berth of the new Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers.^[23]

History

Along with

Medieval period

The first recorded dry dock in the world was built in Portsmouth by Henry VII in 1495. The first warship built here was the Sweepstake of 1497; of more significance were the carracks Mary Rose of 1509 and Peter Pomegranate of 1510—both were rebuilt here in 1536. The wreck of the Mary Rose (which capsized in 1545, but was raised in 1982) is on display in a purpose-built museum. A fourth Tudor warship was the galleass Jennett, built in 1539 and enlarged as a galleon in 1558.

The appointment of one Thomas Jermyn as Keeper of the Dock at Portsmouth is recorded in 1526, with a Clerk of the Stores being appointed from 1542.^[25] Contemporary records suggest that the dry dock was enlarged and rebuilt in 1523 in order to accommodate the Henry Grace à Dieu (the largest ship of the fleet at that time); but a hundred years later it is described as being filled with rubble.^[26]

Following the establishment of Chatham Dockyard in the mid-1500s, no new naval vessels were built here until 1648, but ships from Portsmouth were a key part of the fleet that drove off the Spanish Armada in 1588. There are no on-site remains of the Tudor dock and yard.

Seventeenth century

Naval shipbuilding at Portsmouth recommenced under the

By 1660 the dockyard had, in addition to these large-scale facilities for shipbuilding and repairs, a new

The work was entrusted to Edmund Dummer, naval engineer and surveyor to the Navy Board. His new dry dock (the "Great Stone Dock" as it was called) was built to a pioneering new design, using brick and stone rather than wood and with an increased number of 'altars' or steps (the stepped sides allowed shorter timbers to be used for shoring and made it much easier for shipwrights to reach the underside of vessels needing repair). Extensively rebuilt in 1769, the Great Stone Dock is now known as No.5 dock.^[31]

Along with the new dock, Dummer proposed that two

In 1699 Dummer adapted the channel leading to the Upper Wet Dock, enabling it to be closed off at each end by a set of gates, thus forming a second dry dock (called the "North Stone Dock" after it was rebuilt with stone altars in 1737, and known today as No 6 dock). Severed from the harbour, the Upper Wet Dock became a reservoir into which water from various nearby dry docks could be drained; it was vaulted and covered over at the end of the eighteenth century, but still exists today underground.[3] By 1700 a shipbuilding slip had been constructed off the (Lower) Wet Dock, parallel with the dry dock (roughly where No 4 dry dock is today).^[32]

Eighteenth century

Between 1704 and 1712 a brick wall was built around the Dockyard, following the line of the town's 17th-century fortifications; together with a contemporary (though altered) gate and lodge, much of the wall still stands, serving its original purpose.^[33] A terrace of houses for the senior officers of the yard was built at around this time (Long Row, 1715–19);^[34] later in the century it was joined by a further terrace (Short Row, 1787).^[35] In 1733 a Royal Naval Academy for officer cadets was established within the Dockyard, the Navy's first shore-based training facility and a forerunner of Britannia Royal Naval College in Dartmouth.^[36]

The 'Great Rebuilding'

The second half of the eighteenth century was a key period in the development of Portsmouth (and indeed of the other Royal Dockyards). A substantial planned programme of expansion and modernisation was undertaken from 1761 onwards, driven (as would be future periods of expansion) by increases both in the size of individual ships and in the overall size of the fleet. In the 1760s the Lower Wet Dock (by then known as the Great Basin) was deepened, the Great Stone Dock was rebuilt and a new dry dock (known today as No 4 dock) was built alongside it over a five-year period from 1767. During 1771-76 the former Upper Wet Dock was reconfigured to serve as a reservoir into which water from the dry docks could be drained by way of culverts (enabling ships to be dry docked much more speedily). From 1789 work was begun on replacing the old wooden South Dock with a modern stone dry dock (known today as No 1 dock, it currently accommodates the museum ship HMS M33).

North of the reservoir a channel was dug leading to a new boat basin, beyond which several

Several of Portsmouth Dockyard's most notable historic buildings date from this period, with several older wooden structures being replaced in brick on a larger scale. The three great storehouses (Nos 9, 10 & 11)[38]^[39][40] were built between 1764 and 1785 on a wharf, alongside a deep canal (or camber) which allowed transport and merchant vessels to moor and load or unload goods; the camber was rebuilt in Portland stone between 1773 and 1785.^[28] On the other side of the camber, on newly reclaimed land, two more sizeable brick storehouses were built to serve as a sail loft and a rigging store; the reclaimed land was later named Watering Island after a fresh water supply was provided for ships mooring alongside.^[3]

The Great Ropehouse, a double ropery over 1,000 ft (300 m) in length, dates from the same period. It is, however, the sixth ropehouse (since 1665) to have stood on the site. Both its immediate predecessors were destroyed by fire (in 1760 and 1770) and the current building was itself gutted by fire in 1776 as the result of an arson attack.^[41] It was called a 'double' ropery because the spinning and laying stages took place in the same building (on different floors) rather than on two separate sites. Other buildings associated with ropemaking (including hemp houses, a hatchelling house, tarring house and storehouses) were laid out alongside and parallel to the ropehouse; they largely date from the same period.^[6] (Ropemaking was discontinued at Portsmouth in 1868, since when the ropery has functioned as a storehouse).

Later, in 1784, a large new house was built for the Dockyard Commissioner.^[42] Unusually for the time it was designed by a civilian architect (Samuel Wyatt, with Thomas Telford as clerk-of-works); most other dockyard buildings were designed in-house. The dockyard chapel, built eighty years earlier, was demolished to make way for the new Commissioner's house and a new chapel (St Ann's Church) was built nearby.^[43] At the same time a set of offices for the senior officers of the yard was built (in place of an earlier office block), overlooking the docks and basin; it continues to provide office space to this day.^[44]

After the old Commissioner's House had been demolished, four identical quadrangular buildings were built, flanking the timber ground east of the Basin; as well as providing storage space, they accommodated workshops for a variety of trades, including joiners, wheelwrights, wood-carvers, capstan-makers and various other craftsmen.

Samuel Bentham and industrial revolution

In 1796

To deal with the increasing number of docks, Bentham in 1797 proposed replacing one of the horse pumps above the reservoir with a steam engine. His plan was that the engine should be used not only to drain the reservoir (by night) but also to drive a sawmill and woodworking machinery (during the day); he also envisaged linking it to a freshwater well, to enable water to be pumped through a network of pipes to various parts of the dockyard. A

In 1800, the Royal Navy had 684 ships and the Dockyard was the largest industrial complex in the world. In 1805 Horatio Nelson toured the newly opened block mills before embarking from Portsmouth on HMS Victory, leaving Britain for the last time before his death at the Battle of Trafalgar.^[48]

From 1814 wooden covers were built over some of the slips and docks, to designs by Robert Seppings.

From 1815 the system of Dockyard apprenticeship was supplemented by the establishment of a

Therefore, in 1843, work began in Portsmouth on further

Three new dry docks were constructed over the next 20 years, opening off the new basin, and another was built on reclaimed land west of the basin, immediately north of the shipbuilding slips. The slips were now five in number, with Nos. 3-5 being covered by interlinking metal roofs (believed to have comprised the widest iron span in Britain when built in 1845).^[6] Meanwhile, facilities for building wooden hulls continued to be updated with a large sawmill having been built behind the slips in 1843.

Developments in shipbuilding technology, however, led to several of the new amenities having to be rebuilt and expanded (almost as soon as they were finished).^[3] A much larger Iron Foundry was opened in 1861, immediately to the east of its predecessor; it was further expanded in the following decade.^[54] In 1867 a very large Armour Plate Workshop was opened, filling the space between the new North and South dry docks on the eastern side of the basin.^[29]

In 1860 policing of the dockyard was also transferred to the new No. 2 Division of the Metropolitan Police, a role it fulfilled until 1933.^[55]

The 'Great Extension'

Technological change affected not only ships' means of propulsion, but the materials from which they were built. By 1860 wooden warships, vulnerable as they were to modern armaments, had been rendered largely obsolescent. The changeover to metal hulls not only required new building techniques, but also heralded a dramatic and ongoing increase in the potential size of new vessels. The Dockyards found themselves having to expand in kind. At Portsmouth, plans were drawn up in the late 1850s for further land reclamation north and east of the new Steam Basin, and from 1867 work was begun on a complex of three new interconnected basins, each of 14–22 acres. Each basin served a different purpose: ships would proceed from the repairing basin, to the rigging basin, to the fitting-out basin, and exit from there into a new tidal basin, ready to take on fuel alongside the sizeable coaling wharf there.

Three dry docks were also constructed as part of the plan, as well as parallel pair of sizeable locks for entry into the basin complex; the contemporary pumping station which stands nearby not only served to drain these docks and locks, but also delivered compressed air to power equipment around the edges of the basins:^[56] five cranes, seven caissons and forty capstans were run on compressed air from the pump house.^[29]

The "Great Extension" of Portsmouth Dockyard was largely completed by 1881.

In 1876 a railway station was built on what became known as South Railway Jetty on Watering Island (west of the Semaphore Tower).

A small railway station and ornamental cast-iron shelter served in particular the needs of Queen Victoria and her family, who would often transfer from yacht to train at this location; this line soon became the main arrival/departure route for personnel.^[59] The swing bridge and viaduct were damaged in the wartime blitz and subsequently dismantled in 1946. The Royal Naval Railway Shelter has recently been moved to the other side of the island and restored.^[6]

Twentieth century

By the end of the 19th century No 5 Slip had been uncovered and extended (to a length of 666 feet (203 m)) to become the yard's principal shipbuilding slip. At the same time the adjacent dry dock (No 9) was filled in to provide space for stacking steel plates, alongside which a further smithery (No 3 Engine Smithery) was erected in 1903.

In 1900 the Third class cruiser

Dreadnoughts

The first modern battleship,

The largest Naval ships were now too large for the interlocking basins, so to guarantee access to the new dry docks the intervening walls between the basins were removed to create a single large non-tidal body of water (No 3 Basin), with a pair of 850 ft entrance locks being built at the same time. These (C & D locks) were operational from 1914, and they, together with the enlarged basin and docks, have remained in use, largely unaltered, ever since.^[3] On 8 April 1913, Portsmouth Dockyard opened the first of two new large 850 ft long drydock locks directly connecting Portsmouth Harbour to No.3 Basin, the first named 'C' Lock. A year later, 'D' Lock was opened in April 1914.^[60]

First World War

The largest vessel launched at Portsmouth during World War I was the 27,500-ton battleship Royal Sovereign in 1915. The only other launchings during the war were the submarines J1 and J2 in 1915, and K1, K2 and K5 in 1916. Some 1,200 vessels, however, underwent a refit at Portsmouth during the course of the War, and over the same period 1,658 ships were either hauled up the slipways or placed in dry-dock for repairs.^[61]

For the duration of the war significant numbers of women were employed in the yard, including in the erstwhile male domains of the Engineering Department, the Electrical Department and the Constructive Department. By the end of the war a total of 2,122 women were employed; 280 worked as clerks, the rest were manual workers.^[29]

Inter-war years

The period after the war was inevitably a time of contraction at the Dockyard, and there were many redundancies. In accordance with the Government's Ten Year Rule the Dockyard worked over the next decade and a half with a presumption of enduring peace rather than future conflict.^[63]

The majority of warships launched at Portsmouth following the end of the War were cruisers—

In 1922 HMS Victory was brought into No 2 Dry Dock (where she remains to this day). She was opened to the public on 17 July 1928, and ten years later a museum building (the

New Dockyard facilities in this period included a Steel Foundry, built in 1926, and the Central

The destroyer flotillas (the capital ships having been evacuated to

Portsmouth and the Naval Base itself were the headquarters and main departure point for the military and naval units destined for

There was much rebuilding, demolition and consolidation of bomb-damaged buildings in the aftermath of the Second World War. At the same time, a number of returning ships were refitted in the yard (while others were de-equipped, ready for scrapping).^[29] The Dockyard was kept busy with refitting and modernisation works through the 1950s and 60s. Private yards were used to a greater extent for shipbuilding, but five new frigates were launched at Portsmouth in this time. Numbers employed in the dockyard remained steadily above 16,000 through the 1950s and early '60s; but a Defence Review published in 1969 (after the withdrawal of British forces from east of Suez) signalled a significant reduction in the size of the fleet and a parallel downsizing of workforces in the Royal Dockyards.

In the decade that followed No 5 shipbuilding slip was taken out of commission; it was infilled (along with the other remaining slips at the north corner) and the adjacent buildings were demolished. Nevertheless, elsewhere in the yard a number of new workshops and other facilities were built in the 1970s, especially around Nos 12-15 docks (including a large Heavy Plate Shop, now the Steel Production Hall, built on the site of the Edwardian Boiler Shop).^[6]

In June 1981, however, the government announced that shipbuilding would cease at Portsmouth, that the workforce would be reduced from just under 7,000 to 1,225 and that the erstwhile Royal Dockyard would become a Fleet Maintenance & Repair Organisation (FMRO) with a minor support and repair role (Devonport and Rosyth would take over major refits and ship modernisation work).

Falklands Task Force

In 1982 Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands. In response a task force of British military and merchant ships was dispatched from Portsmouth Naval Base to the islands in the South Atlantic to reclaim them for the United Kingdom.

The task force consisted of the following ships:

• Two aircraft carriers
• Two landing ship docks
• Eight destroyers
• Fifteen frigates
• Three patrol ships
• Five submarines
• Three survey vessels
• Five minesweepers
• Ten fleet tankers
• Six logistic landing ships
• Five supply ships
• One helicopter supply ship
• Eighteen merchant ships including troop/cruise ships such as Queen Elizabeth 2 and SS Canberra

Following some losses, the majority of these ships returned to Portsmouth later that year.

Rundown of the Dockyard

Thereafter, some of the cuts that had been proposed in the 1981 Defence White Paper were reversed. The retention of a larger fleet meant that a larger workforce was retained at Portsmouth than had been envisaged (around 2,800); however the run-down of the old Dockyard went ahead, with dry docks 1–7 being closed, just under half the dockside cranes demolished and ten out of the nineteen major workshops on the site taken out of service.^[28] The dockyard's 'Edwardian piece de résistance',^[6] the Great Factory of 1905, ceased manufacturing in 1986 and was converted to serve as a warehouse (at the end of the century it was linked by monorail to other nearby buildings to create a large Central Storage and Distribution Facility).

In the older parts of the dockyard several buildings, ranging from storehouses to foundries, were converted for office use; this trend continued in later years. Similarly, the Great Steam Smithery (1852) adjoining the Steam Factory (aka No 2 Ship Shop) underwent conversion in 1993 to provide squash courts, offices, messrooms and a self-service laundry.^[6] In the same year, Victory Building, a new neo-Georgian office block, was opened on a prominent site facing the historic No 1 basin (just one of several new office blocks built across the dockyard site in each decade of the second half of the century); it accommodated staff of the Second Sea Lord, relocated there from London.^[66]

In 1998 the work of the FMRO was contracted out to the private sector in the shape of Fleet Support Limited.^[28]

Twenty-first century

In the summer of 2005 Portsmouth Naval Base and the Solent played host to two special events organised as part of the

In 2007 it was reckoned that the Royal Navy/MOD directly employed 9,774 people at Portsmouth, of whom 5,680 were ships' crew and the rest either service personnel or civilian employees working in the naval base. In addition, there were 3,834 private-sector employees on the base, including defence contractors, sub-contractors and heritage-related workers.[67]

Shipbuilding, maintenance and repair

Shipbuilding recommenced on the site in 2003 following the construction of a facility by

BAE Systems, having subsumed Fleet Support Ltd, continues to manage ship repair and maintenance facilities around No. 3 Basin at Portsmouth. As of 2016 the former shipbuilding complex was being used for repairing minehunters and other small craft.^[70]

New aircraft carriers

In 2013 a £100 million upgrade of the naval base facilities and harbour was begun, in preparation for the arrival of the two Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers (Portsmouth having been chosen to serve as their home base).^[28] These ships required the harbour to be dredged to allow safe entry and exit.^[71] Victory Jetty and the Middle Slip Jetty were strengthened and upgraded (the latter being renamed Princess Royal Jetty on completion of the works), so as to enable both carriers to lay alongside at the same time. HMS Queen Elizabeth arrived in Portsmouth in 2017, and HMS Prince of Wales followed two years later.

Civil and military administration of the Dockyard

From 1546 until 1832 prime responsibility for administering

The Naval Barracks (HMS Nelson)

In 1847 a barracks was built within the Duke of York bastion of the 18th-century Portsea fortifications, east of the dockyard, to house troops manning the town's defences. It was named Anglesey (or Anglesea) Barracks. The bastion was demolished in 1870-76.

In 1899 the Admiralty purchased these barracks from the War Office and constructed a Naval Barracks on the site, designed by Colonel Sir Henry Pilkington RE.^[6] (Prior to this, Royal Navy personnel in Portsmouth had been accommodated either on commissioned vessels or in hulks). Opened in 1903, the barracks were commissioned as HMS Victory (but renamed HMS Nelson in 1974 to avoid confusion with the flagship). A Wardroom (with accommodation for officers) was built across the street on the site of the old garrison hospital. In 1906 the nearby Holy Trinity Parish Church was purchased and brought inside the perimeter wall;^[6] for a time it functioned as the RN Barracks chapel, but it was destroyed by bombs in the Second World War. Just to the north-west, Anchor Gate House was built in 1898 to house the Commodore of the Barracks.

Several barrack blocks were demolished and rebuilt in the latter half of the 20th century, but a number of original buildings remain including the canteen (Eastney block),^[76] the drill hall and gymnasium,^[77] Jervis block (formerly Seamen's Quarters), Barham block (formerly Depot Offices)^[78] and the Wardroom.^[79] In addition, one barrack block remains, along with its adjacent canteen building, from the earlier Army barracks (Anglesey Barracks) which formerly stood on the site.^[80][81] Nearby, the associated garrison prison (which later served as the Naval Detention Centre) is now home to the Royal Marines School of Music.^[82]

In November 2016 the Ministry of Defence published A Better Defence Estate, which indicated that the HMS Nelson Wardroom would be disposed of by 2021;^[83] three years later, however, the disposal date was deferred.^[84]

Associated establishments in the Portsmouth area

The presence of the Dockyard and Fleet led to the establishment of a variety of other naval and military installations in and around Portsmouth over the years, some of which are listed below.

Naval

• Semaphore Tower
  ".
• Navy Command Headquarters together with a front-line Naval Training establishment operated by Babcock International (with all catering, front of house, cleaning and hotel services sub-contracted to Compass Group plc)). The name was formerly attached to the barracks and other facilities of the RN Gunnery Establishment (based on the island from 1891 to 1985); these now form part of the training base.^[85]
• HMS Temeraire: Burnaby Road, Portsmouth. Training of Naval Physical Training Instructors and sports grounds and facilities for Portsmouth-based personnel. RN School of Physical Training has been known as Temeraire since 1971, and moved to its current site in 1988.[86]
• HMS Collingwood: Fareham. Naval training provided mainly under contract to Babcock International (catering and cleaning services are sub-contracted to Sodexo). Commissioned in 1940 as a training establishment for 'new entry' seamen, it later housed the RN School of Electrical Engineering, but serves today as headquarters of the Maritime Warfare School.^[87]
• HMS Sultan: Gosport. Naval (and tri-service) training, home of the centre of excellence for mechanical and electrical engineering. Naval training provided mainly under contract to Babcock International (catering and cleaning services are sub-contracted to Sodexo); opened on this site in 1956.^[88]
• Institute of Naval Medicine, Gosport.
• Marchwood Military Port, Southampton Water. Royal Fleet Auxiliary base-port.

Decommissioned

• Southwick Park—Tri-Service Defence School of Policing and Guarding
• HMS Dolphin diesel electric submarine base—Now MOD Fort Blockhouse
• HM Gun Wharf, later HMS Vernon torpedo and mines establishment — Now in civilian use as Gunwharf Quays
• HMS Daedalus Fleet Air Arm base
• Royal Naval Hospital, Haslar
• Royal Marine Artillery
  barracks 1867–1923, Royal Marines barracks 1923–1995) — converted into housing.
• Royal Marine Light Infantry barracks 1848–1923, then HMS St Vincent boys' training establishment until 1968) — Now in civilian use as St Vincent College
• Royal Clarence
  Victualling Yard
  , Gosport
• RNAD
  Gosport: a composite site which included:
  • RNAD
    Explosion! Museum of Naval Firepower
  • RNAD Bedenham (1908) gunpowder stores were moved here from Priddy's Hard (judged to be dangerously close to the Dockyard).
  • RNAD Elson (now part of DM Gosport)
  • RNAD Frater (now part of DM Gosport)
• RNAD Marchwood (1811) closed 1961 – Converted for housing and use by Marchwood Yacht Club
• Haslar Gunboat Yard (opened 1859, closed 1973)
• HMS Mercury: RN Signals School 1941–1993, Leydene House, East Meon, near Portsmouth
• HMS Phoenix: Fire fighting training establishment 1946–1993, now part of HMS Excellent

Military

The

These fortifications required substantial numbers of personnel to man them and, from the mid-18th century onwards, they (together with other troops who were either stationed in the garrison or preparing to embark overseas) were accommodated in a variety of barracks in and around the city. By 1900 these included:

• Portsmouth Grammar School since 1926.^[90]
• Clarence Barracks (Royal Garrison Artillery) – established in 1760 as Fourhouse Barracks on land between St Nicholas Street and the fortifications (alongside an earlier Royal Marine Barracks);^[91] renamed in 1827; rebuilt around 1881, expanding across the old defensive lines into the field beyond; demolished c.1967.
• Colewort Barracks, St George's Road (Army Service Corps) – built as a garrison hospital, converted to barracks 1694, demolished to make way for expansion of nearby power station in the 1920s.
• Hilsea Barracks (Royal Field Artillery) – built 1854, Royal Army Ordnance Corps from 1921; closed 1962, site redeveloped for housing (the surviving 18th-century Gatcombe House served as the Officers' Mess).^[92]
• Milldam Barracks (Royal Engineers) – built late 18th century onwards, housed the Engineers responsible for upkeep of the fortifications; sold in 1969 and now occupied by the University of Portsmouth^[93] and Portsmouth Register Office.^[94]
• casemates.^[96]
• St George Barracks, Gosport (Infantry) – built 1856–59 as a transit barracks for troops, continuing in military use until 1991; several buildings remain, since converted to new uses.^[97]
• Victoria Barracks (Infantry) – built in 1888 alongside New Clarence Barracks; demolished 1967.

According to the

Naval Base Commander (Portsmouth)

This list is incomplete; you can help by adding missing items. (October 2020)

The head of HMNB Portsmouth is titled Naval Base Commander (Portsmouth).

• 2011-2012: Commodore Tony Radakin
• 2012–2018: Commodore Jeremy Rigby
• 2018–2019: Commodore Jim Higham
• 2019–2022: Commodore Jeremy Bailey
• 2022–present: Commodore John Voyce OBE

(decorations and ranks detailed at the time of being in Command, and do not reflect subsequent promotions, or honours and awards)

See also

• Portsmouth Dockyard (Tissot), 1877 painting

References

Bibliography

• Goss, James (1984). Portsmouth-built warships 1497–1967. Kenneth Mason.

Further reading

• Brown, Paul (2016). Maritime Portsmouth. Stroud, Gloucestershire:
  ISBN 9780750965132
  .
• Courtney, Stephen; Patterson, Brian (2005). Home of the Fleet: a century of Portsmouth Royal Dockyard in photographs. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Royal Naval Museum.
  ISBN 0-7509-2285-0
  .
• Hamilton, C. I. (2005). Portsmouth Dockyard Papers, 1852–1869: From Wood to Steel, a calendar. Winchester.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link
  )
• Johnston, Ian; Buxton, Ian (2013). The Battleship Builders – Constructing and Arming British Capital Ships. Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press.
  ISBN 978-1-59114-027-6
  .
• Knight, R.J.B. (2005). Portsmouth Dockyard Papers, 1774–1783: the American War, a calendar. Winchester.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link
  )

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to HMNB Portsmouth.

• Official website
• UKHO Charts of Portsmouth Harbour and Approaches
• Portsmouth Royal Dockyard Historical Trust website
• Portsmouth Historic Dockyard website
• Portsmouth Naval Base Property Trust
• Portsmouth D-Day Museum
• Queen's Harbour Master, Portsmouth
• A Geometrical Plan, & West Elevation of His Majesty's Dock-Yard, near Portsmouth, with Part of the Common, &c., dated 1754 (Pierre-Charles Canot after Thomas Milton and John Cleveley the Elder)