Listed Building: INNER BREAKWATER WITH VICTUALLING STORE (382003)

PORTLAND SY67SE PORTLAND HARBOUR, H.M. Naval Base 969-1/1/159 Inner Breakwater with Victualling Store 21/09/78 II Breakwater, jetty, and former victualling store. Begun 1849, completed 1872. Stone and brick. Designed by James Meadow Rendel and carried out by contractor J.T.Leather. Total length c 750m inclusive of jetty, which also returns to the E in The Camber. The breakwater S face is strewn with large boulders; the N face, which carries Prince Consort Walk, is in a series of casements to segmental heads on broad buttresses, brick vaulted and stone faced. Small fort at outer (E) end at the South Ship Channel. Breakwater wall carries on to W as jetty retaining wall and to south side of Victualling Store in large bolstered stone blocks, to a battered face. The extent of this revetment to the east concealed by later structures. The Victualling Store of c 1850 is a long 11-bay stone structure in two parallel ranges to gabled ends W and E; roof corrugated iron, broken by two raised and coped 'party divisions', which do not correspond with the main bay articulation. The S side has 11 sunk panels, divided by a high band, series of segmental-headed openings near ground level, and 4 larger openings, in bays 3,4,6 and 8. West gables over large lunettes, and similar panelling; N front as S, but two staircases to upper doors; and E gables are in brick above the eaves line. This building is said to have been used as a railway terminal. At the south-west end of Prince Consort Walk is a carved commemorative stone, with the Royal Arms and inscription: "From this spot on the 25th July 1849 His Royal Highness Prince Albert, Consort of Queen Victoria, sunk the first stone of this breakwater. Upon the same spot Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, on the 18th August 1872 laid this last stone and declared the work complete. 'These are imperial works and worthy Kings' ". [The last line is a quotation from Alexander Pope’s ‘Epistle to Robert Boyle, Earl of Burlington.’] NE face of stone has:"James Meadow Rendel designed this work and directed its execution till his death in 1856. John Coode, the resident engineer from its commencement, then succeeded to its charge and completed it. J.T. Leather was the contractor for the work". (Royal Commission on Historical Monuments: Dorset: London: 1970-: 253). Listing NGR: SY6980174314

Record last edited

Feb 7 2011 12:21PM