Monkey's Cave

Monkey's Cave
Monkey's Cave
	Abandoned Monkey’s Cave Convalescent Hospital
Coordinates	36°7′15.94″N5°20′31.49″W / 36.1210944°N 5.3420806°W Coordinates: 36°7′15.94″N5°20′31.49″W / 36.1210944°N 5.3420806°W

Last updated October 02, 2019

Monkey's Cave is a cave in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. It has been used as part of the Fortifications of Gibraltar and in 1942 there was a convalescent hospital here. This building was later used as the HQ of the Royal Electrical & Mechanical Engineers.

The British Overseas Territories (BOTs) or United Kingdom Overseas Territories (UKOTs) are fourteen territories under the jurisdiction and sovereignty of the United Kingdom. They are remnants of the British Empire that have not been granted independence or have voted to remain British territories. These territories do not form part of the United Kingdom and, with the exception of Gibraltar, are not part of the European Union. Most of the permanently inhabited territories are internally self-governing, with the UK retaining responsibility for defence and foreign relations. Three are inhabited only by a transitory population of military or scientific personnel. They all share the British monarch as head of state.

Gibraltar is a British Overseas Territory located at the southern tip of the Iberian Peninsula. It has an area of 6.7 km² (2.6 sq mi) and is bordered to the north by Spain. The landscape is dominated by the Rock of Gibraltar at the foot of which is a densely populated town area, home to over 32,000 people, primarily Gibraltarians.

The fortifications of Gibraltar have made the Rock of Gibraltar and its environs "probably the most fought over and most densely fortified place in Europe, and probably, therefore, in the world", as Field Marshal Sir John Chapple has put it. The Gibraltar peninsula, located at the far southern end of Iberia, has great strategic importance as a result of its position by the Strait of Gibraltar where the Mediterranean Sea meets the Atlantic Ocean. It has repeatedly been contested between European and North African powers and has endured fourteen sieges since it was first settled in the 11th century. The peninsula's occupants – Moors, Spanish, and British – have built successive layers of fortifications and defences including walls, bastions, casemates, gun batteries, magazines, tunnels and galleries. At their peak in 1865, the fortifications housed around 681 guns mounted in 110 batteries and positions, guarding all land and sea approaches to Gibraltar. The fortifications continued to be in military use until as late as the 1970s and by the time tunnelling ceased in the late 1960s, over 34 miles (55 km) of galleries had been dug in an area of only 2.6 square miles (6.7 km²).

Description

Blocks of Quaternary Monkey's Cave Sandstone are said to be "still visible in gun embrasures fringing the cliffs of the southwest Europa coast."^[1] This cave was described as Batterie de la Caverne in a French map of 1811^[2] and Monkey Cave in 1859 and it was itself one of the few fortifications on the east side of Gibraltar, although the details of its armament are not given.^[3]

Monkey's Cave was used during the Second World War as an entrance to the artificial tunnel named AROW Street, which was used for storing ammunition and supplies. Within the cave entrance a convalescent hospital was constructed.

AROW Street is a tunnel in Gibraltar that was excavated in 1942. The tunnel, like Gibraltar's Great North Road, was large enough to take Army ammunition trucks.

Soldiers in 1953 who were in the Royal Electrical & Mechanical Engineers would enter AROW Street through this cave and make their way to their instrument workshop located in the Rock. The engineers would get to their cave along one of the many internal roads that run within the Rock of Gibraltar. Their cave had windows which allowed the engineers to work with natural light and they were able to see views across the Straits of Gibraltar to Africa.^[4]

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References

↑ Bennett, Matthew R.; Doyle, Peter, eds. (1998). Issues in Environmental Geology: A British Perspective. Geological Society. p. 97. ISBN 978-1-86239-014-0.
↑ Plan de Gibraltar / par J.D. Barbié du Bocage Barbié Du Bocage, accessed 22 May 2013
↑ "1859 Map of the Fortifications of Gibraltar". UK National Archives MPH 1/23. Retrieved 15 May 2013.
↑ Staples, George. "Monkey's Cave to Instrument Workshops, REME,". georeme.co.uk. Archived from the original on 17 August 2013. Retrieved 29 April 2013.

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[BennettDoyle1998-1] Bennett, Matthew R.; Doyle, Peter, eds. (1998). Issues in Environmental Geology: A British Perspective. Geological Society. p. 97. ISBN 978-1-86239-014-0.

[2] Plan de Gibraltar / par J.D. Barbié du Bocage Barbié Du Bocage, accessed 22 May 2013

[map1859-3] "1859 Map of the Fortifications of Gibraltar". UK National Archives MPH 1/23. Retrieved 15 May 2013.

[staples-4] Staples, George. "Monkey's Cave to Instrument Workshops, REME,". georeme.co.uk. Archived from the original on 17 August 2013. Retrieved 29 April 2013.