Castle Armoury | |
---|---|
Bury | |
Coordinates | 53°35′39″N2°17′55″W / 53.59422°N 2.29859°W |
Type | Barracks |
Site information | |
Owner | Ministry of Defence |
Operator | British Army |
Site history | |
Built | 1868 |
Built for | War Office |
In use | 1868- |
Garrison information | |
Occupants | W company 5th Battalion, Royal Regiment of Fusiliers B Detachment, 207 (Manchester) Field Hospital Bury Detachment ACF 1036 (Bury) Squadron ATC |
The Castle Armoury is a military installation in Bury, Greater Manchester, England.
The armoury was designed as the headquarters of the 8th Lancashire Rifle Volunteer Corps and built on the remains of Bury Castle in 1868. [1] An extension exhibiting the same architectural features was opened by the Duke of Connaught in November 1907. [2] The 8th Lancashire Rifle Volunteer Corps evolved to become the 1st Volunteer Battalion, the Lancashire Fusiliers in 1883 and the 5th Battalion, the Lancashire Fusiliers in 1908. [3] The battalion was mobilised at the armoury in September 1914 before being deployed to the Suez Canal, then to Gallipoli and ultimately to the Western Front. [4] The armoury remained the home of the 5th battalion, the Lancashire Fusiliers through the inter-war period. [5]
A major fire took hold at the armoury in January 1943 during the Second World War, in which a fireman died and the building was seriously damaged, and it was not until summer 1952 that the restoration was complete. [2] After the war the armoury continued to be used by the 5th battalion the Lancashire Fusiliers until the battalion was disbanded in 1967. The armoury was then used by a company of the 5th Battalion the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, a unit which evolved following amalgamations to become the Lancastrian and Cumbrian Volunteers in July 1999 and 4th Battalion the Duke of Lancaster's Regiment in July 2006. [2] It is a Grade II Listed building. [1]
The building closed in June 2022 with the owners, a trust, citing safety grounds. [6] The leaser, the Ministry of Defence's Reserve Forces' and Cadets' Association stated that funding was not available to carry out the estimated £2 million of urgent repairs, with further work required to modernise the building. [7] [8]
The following units were based at the armoury immediately before its closure: [9]
British Army
Community Cadet Forces
The 42nd Infantry Division was an infantry division of the British Army. The division was raised in 1908 as part of the Territorial Force (TF), originally as the East Lancashire Division, and was redesignated as the 42nd Division on 25 May 1915. It was the first TF division to be sent overseas during the First World War. The division fought at Gallipoli, in the Sinai desert and on the Western Front in France and Belgium. Disbanded after the war, it was reformed in the Territorial Army (TA), in the Second World War it served as the 42nd Infantry Division with the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) and fought in Belgium and France before being evacuated at Dunkirk. The division was later reformed in the United Kingdom and, in November 1941, was converted into the 42nd Armoured Division, which was disbanded in October 1943 without serving overseas. A 2nd Line duplicate formation, the 66th Infantry Division, was created when the Territorials were doubled in both world wars.
The Royal Regiment of Fusiliers is an infantry regiment of the British Army, part of the Queen's Division. Currently, the regiment has two battalions: the 1st Battalion, part of the Regular Army, is an armoured infantry battalion based in Tidworth, Wiltshire, and the 5th Battalion, part of the Army Reserve, recruits in the traditional fusilier recruiting areas across England. The Royal Regiment of Fusiliers was largely unaffected by the infantry reforms that were announced in December 2004, but under the Army 2020 reduction in the size of the Army, the 2nd Battalion was merged into the first in 2014.
The Lancashire Fusiliers was a line infantry regiment of the British Army that saw distinguished service through many years and wars, including the Second Boer War, and the First and Second World Wars. It had many different titles throughout its 280 years of existence.
The Lancastrian and Cumbrian Volunteers was a Territorial Army unit of the British Army.
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The 42nd Infantry Brigade, also known as 42 Brigade, was a brigade of the British Army.
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108 Regiment Royal Armoured Corps (The Lancashire Fusiliers) (108 RAC) was an armoured regiment of the British Army's Royal Armoured Corps during World War II.
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The Lancashire Militia was an auxiliary military force in Lancashire in North West England. From their formal organisation as Trained Bands in 1558 and their service in the Williamite War in Ireland and against the Jacobite Risings, the Militia regiments of Lancashire served during times of international tension and all of Britain's major wars. They provided internal security and home defence but sometimes operated further afield, including Ireland and the Mediterranean, relieving regular troops from routine garrison duties, and acting as a source of trained officers and men for the Regular Army. All the infantry battalions went on active service during the Second Boer War and all served as Special Reserve training units in World War I, with one battalion seeing considerable action on the Western Front. After 1921 the militia had only a shadowy existence until its final abolition in 1953.
The Lancashire Fusiliers War Memorial is a First World War memorial dedicated to members of the Lancashire Fusiliers killed in that conflict. Outside the Fusilier Museum in Bury, Greater Manchester, England, it was unveiled in 1922—on the seventh anniversary of the landing at Cape Helles, part of the Gallipoli Campaign in which the regiment suffered particularly heavy casualties. The memorial was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens. He was commissioned in light of a family connection—his father and great uncle were officers in the Lancashire Fusiliers, a fact noted on a plaque nearby. He designed a tall, slender obelisk in Portland stone. The regiment's cap badge is carved near the top on the front and rear, surrounded by a laurel wreath. Further down are inscriptions containing the regiment's motto and a dedication. Two painted stone flags hang from the sides.
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The 7th Royal Lancashire Militia (Rifles) (7th RLM) was an auxiliary regiment raised in the county of Lancashire in North West England just before the Crimean War. It later became part of the Lancashire Fusiliers. Although primarily intended for home defence, its battalions saw active service during the Second Boer War. Following conversion to the Special Reserve (SR) under the Haldane Reforms it supplied reinforcements to the fighting battalions during World War I. After a shadowy postwar existence the unit was finally disbanded in 1953.