The Royal Artillery Museum
round brick building with a tent-like roof
The Rotunda, Woolwich: home of the museum from 1820 to 2001
Established4 May 1820 (1820-05-04)
Dissolved8 July 2016 (2016-07-08)

The Royal Artillery Museum, which was one of the world's oldest military museums,[1] was first opened to the public in Woolwich in southeast London in 1820. It told the story of the development of artillery through the ages by way of a collection of artillery pieces from across the centuries.

The museum had its roots in an earlier institution, the Royal Military Repository (established in Woolwich in the 1770s as a training collection for cadets of the Royal Military Academy); items which were once displayed in the Repository form the nucleus of the Royal Artillery Museum collection.

Following the closure in 2016 of the museum, branded since 2001 as 'Firepower – The Royal Artillery Museum', its collection has been placed in storage pending the establishment of a new Royal Artillery Museum.[2] The Royal Artillery Museum collections are designated as being of national and international significance by Arts Council England.[3]

History

The museum has its origins in 18th-century Woolwich, in the Royal Arsenal (which at the time was known as the Warren). Two permanent companies of field artillery had been established here by the Board of Ordnance in 1716, each 100 men strong; this became the "Royal Artillery" in 1720.[4] Also in the Warren, in 1741, the Board had established a Royal Military Academy to train its artillery and engineer cadets.[5]

The Royal Military Repository

The former Royal Military Academy building in the Royal Arsenal housed the museum's collection from 1802 to 1820

In 1778 Captain William Congreve set up a training establishment within the Warren, as an offshoot of the Royal Military Academy, to instruct officers in handling heavy equipment in the field of battle. His 'Repository of Military Machines' (soon given the title of Royal Military Repository ) was housed in a long two-storey building alongside the Carriage Works: cannons used for field training were stored on the ground floor while smaller items and models used for teaching purposes were displayed upstairs. Training initially took place on land to the east of the Warren and later moved to the woods to the west of Woolwich Common, close to the new Artillery Barracks, which are known still as 'Repository Grounds'[6] or Repository Woods.[7]

The Repository building itself was seriously damaged by fire (probably arson) in 1802. Those items that were saved or salvaged soon found a new home in the old premises of the Royal Military Academy, which itself moved from the Arsenal to Woolwich Common in 1806.[8]

The Museum of Artillery in the Rotunda

John Nash's Hyde Park Rotunda was rebuilt on Woolwich Common in 1820 to house the Royal Artillery Museum collections until 1999

In 1820 the Repository collection found a new home in a building of unusual provenance, secured for this purpose by the son of the Repository's founder (also named William Congreve). The Rotunda was initially erected in London in 1814 as an elaborate temporary marquee in the grounds of Carlton House. It was built for a ball given by the Prince Regent in honour of the Duke of Wellington in anticipation of victory over Napoleon Bonaparte; designed by John Nash, it was made to resemble a military bell tent.[9] After the victory celebrations were over the building languished without a use; but in 1818 the Prince Regent authorised the Rotunda's removal to Woolwich "to be appropriated to the conservation of the trophies obtained in the last war, the artillery models, and other military curiosities usually preserved in the Repository" and it was rebuilt on the eastern edge of the Repository Grounds.[10]

In its new accessible location the Repository became 'an early and free permanent public museum'.[10] Inside, trophies and weapons were arranged around the central column with display cases all around containing models and smaller exhibits;[11] larger artillery pieces were displayed outside.[12] In 1988 responsibility for the collection was vested in the Royal Artillery Historical Trust (which had been established in 1981 'as a mechanism for the Regiment to consolidate legal ownership of elements of the Regimental heritage').[13]

The museum continued in the Rotunda through to the very end of the 20th century, despite attempts at various times (including in 1932, 1953, in the 1960s and 1980s) to move it elsewhere. Eventually accommodation was secured for a new museum within the old Royal Arsenal (the Army having left the site in the 1990s). The Royal Artillery Museum in the Rotunda closed in 1999 (though the Rotunda continued to house the museum's reserve collection until 2010).[14]

Royal Artillery Regimental Museum

Independent of the museum in the Rotunda, the Royal Artillery Institution (founded in 1838) had established its own museum collection related to the history of the regiment, including uniforms, medals and other items.[6] The Institution's headquarters (within the Royal Artillery Barracks) was severely damaged in the Blitz, but everything that could be salvaged from its museum, library and archives was moved in 1941 to the central block of the recently vacated Royal Military Academy building on the common (the academy having transferred in 1939 to Sandhurst). The Institution and its museum remained there until 1999, whereupon its collections were combined with those of the Rotunda to form the new Firepower museum.[10] (The library and archives of the Institution were moved at the same time to an adjacent building in the Arsenal, the James Clavell Library).[15]

Firepower: The Royal Artillery Museum

Part of the museum collection as presented in Firepower's Gunnery Hall, with 20th-century pieces on the ground floor and older items above

Between 2001[16] and 2016 the combined museum was branded as Firepower: The Royal Artillery Museum and was housed in some of the former buildings of the Royal Arsenal. All Firepower's buildings were once part of the Royal Laboratory Department, which controlled the manufacture of ammunition; they are for the most part Grade II listed. The adjacent Greenwich Heritage Centre told the story of the local people of Greenwich who worked in the Arsenal and made the guns.[17]

Closure

Firepower closed in July 2016[18] and its buildings were acquired by Greenwich Council, which had hopes of establishing a "significant new cultural and heritage quarter" on the site.[19] The relocation of the museum was described by a board member as a "missed opportunity".[20][21] Later that year, Greenwich Heritage Centre filled part of the gap by creating a new exhibition Making Woolwich: The Royal Regiment of Artillery in Woolwich. The project was supported amongst others by the Royal Regiment of Artillery, Royal Artillery Museums Ltd, Friends of the Royal Artillery Collections and the Royal Artillery Historical Trust.[22]

Future of the buildings

In 2017 it was announced that the Royal Borough of Greenwich had acquired five historic buildings around No 1 Street to create a £31 million cultural district including buildings 17, 18 and 41, which were all used by Firepower. The plan included a 450-seat black box theatre to be built on the site of the former museum entrance. Building 17 (and other listed buildings nearby) would house rehearsal studios for resident companies such as Academy Performing Arts, Dash Arts, Chickenshed Theatre, Protein Dance, Greenwich Dance and Greenwich+Docklands International Festival. The Greenwich Heritage Centre was intended to move to the former James Clavell Library, until 2016 part of Firepower,[23][24] but closed in July 2018.[25]

The following buildings were leased to Firepower by Greenwich London Borough Council:

Plans

It was planned that the Royal Artillery Museum collection would be displayed in a new museum on Salisbury Plain, at Avon Camp West, south of Netheravon.[27] However, in 2020 the Army withdrew its support for the lease of proposed site, leading to a "strategic re-appraisal" of the project.[28] In the meantime, the exhibits are being stored and conserved in a museum stores nearby with limited public access.[18]

References

  1. ↑ Michelin Green Guide: London. Michelin Travel & Lifestyle. 2012.
  2. ↑ "The Royal Artillery Museum". Retrieved 25 July 2020.
  3. ↑ "Designated Outstanding Collections" (PDF). Arts Council England. Retrieved 10 August 2016.
  4. ↑ History and Traditions of the Royal Artillery
  5. ↑ Saint, Andrew, Guillery, Peter (2012). Survey of London; Woolwich Volume 48 (PDF). Yale University Press. pp. 26–28. ISBN 978-0300187229.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  6. 1 2 "Museum History". Royal Artillery Museum. Retrieved 29 April 2021.
  7. ↑ Historic England. "Repository Woods (1001717)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 14 November 2023.
  8. ↑ Binney, Marcus (21 March 2008). "Royal Military Academy in Woolwich is turned into luxury apartments". The Times. London. Retrieved 15 April 2011.
  9. ↑ Historic England. "Repository Woods (1001717)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 16 December 2022.
  10. 1 2 3 "Survey of London, volume 48: Woolwich, chapter 7" (PDF). Bartlett School of Architecture. Yale Books. Retrieved 14 August 2016.
  11. ↑ "1828 illustration". British Museum. Retrieved 15 August 2016.
  12. ↑ "Large gun mounted outside the Royal Artillery Museum, Woolwich, South-east London". Alamy. Retrieved 26 July 2020.
  13. ↑ "The Royal Artillery Historical Trust". The Royal Artillery Historical Trust. Retrieved 29 April 2021.
  14. ↑ Stamp, Gavin (2013). Anti-Ugly: Excursions in English Architecture and Design. Aurum. p. 195. ISBN 978-1781311233.
  15. ↑ "James Clavell Library – Royal Arsenal, Woolwich, London, UK". Waymarking.com. Retrieved 27 February 2017.
  16. ↑ "Collections level description" (PDF). National Museum of Scotland. Retrieved 15 August 2016.
  17. ↑ "Welcome". Greenwich Heritage Centre. Retrieved 2 June 2018.
  18. 1 2 "Press release" (PDF). Firepower museum. 8 July 2016. Archived from the original (PDF) on 10 September 2016.
  19. ↑ "Royal Borough of Greenwich launches London's newest cultural destination". Royal Borough of Greenwich. Retrieved 13 August 2016.
  20. ↑ "Woolwich Firepower Royal Artillery Museum 'to leave by 2017' – former board member hits out". Retrieved 26 May 2014.
  21. ↑ "A statement by the Chairman of the Royal Artillery Museum Board". Retrieved 8 July 2014.
  22. ↑ "'Making Woolwich' – a new exhibition". Royal Greenwich Heritage Trust. 2016. Archived from the original on 7 March 2018 – via Internet Archive.
  23. ↑ "New creative district for London in the heart of Woolwich". Royal Borough of Greenwich. 29 March 2017. Retrieved 4 April 2017.
  24. ↑ Hill, Liz (30 March 2017). "Go-ahead for Woolwich creative district". Artsprofessional.co.uk. Retrieved 4 April 2017.
  25. ↑ "The Museum Collections & Archive is undergoing a period of redevelopment". Greenwich Heritage Centre. Retrieved 5 January 2019.
  26. ↑ Survey of London vol. 48: Woolwich. Yale. 2012.
  27. ↑ Griffin, Katy (13 March 2020). "Plans for new museum to preserve regiment's history". Salisbury Journal. Retrieved 25 July 2020.
  28. ↑ "Army Headquarters removes support for lease of land at Avon Camp West for the development of the Royal Artillery Museum". Figheldean Parish Council. 30 May 2020.
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