00:00So this is Fort Brockhurst, one of the Palmerston forts on the Gosport lines. It was originally
00:07built in the 1850s and 60s to defend against the French from a land assault. Now it's a community
00:14asset for everybody to enjoy in the Gosport area with various events taking place over the years.
00:20Not all sites like this have been so lucky. Some like Fort Blockhouse and Fort Elson have been
00:26left to water and are currently degrading. And because of this many of these sites are turning
00:31into an eyesore and are not used as community assets such as this one. It is hoped that Fort
00:35Brockhurst can be a major example of what can be done when everything lines up. Can you give us a
00:41little bit of a rundown about the historical importance of Fort Brockhurst? Yes so it's a
00:46Victorian port and would have been part of the chain of forts within the area as a defensive structure
00:53about the during the Victorian times and its importance is as a fort itself as a defence
01:01structure within the community but now it's also a community asset so its uses have been changing
01:08as time has gone on. It's been closed for a number of years. It has been used by English Heritage as
01:14our archaeological store so it has been cared for and looked after. It has in its previous life been a
01:21pay to enter site and a couple of years ago about four or five years ago the free sites team as we
01:29were then came in and reopened the site and our aim really is to embed the site into the heart of the
01:36community. It's their space, it's their place and we want them to have a say on how we actually use
01:42this site now and we've got some fantastic examples where we've connected and reached out to the community
01:48and formed some wonderful partnerships as a result.
01:53So we have three cells that are there for anyone who has committed some sort of misdemeanor
02:00which could range from things like stealing fish from the fish cart to assault where they're held for
02:07a short period of time before being decided if they're seeing the commanding officer or moving on.
02:12There's also within the guard room opposite a short-term cell that could be people held there for a few hours.
02:20Moving on we went into a room that has all of the cannon facing across into the parade ground.
02:29This is part of the defensive feature of the fort where they were anticipating the French to
02:37attack by land from the west. All of these are within the keep building and Fort Brockhurst is special
02:44because this is one of the last three forts that are built with a medieval style keep at the back of
02:51the structure as a place of last resort. We have one casemate that is left as it was when it was bombed in
03:01April 1944. The good thing about it being left is that you can see the eight layers of brick
03:09that make up the top of the casemates and are part of the reinforcement along with the groundworks
03:15and the bricks that are used are fair and red bricks so a local type of brick. The best well-known
03:22structure made of fair and bricks is the Royal Albert Hall in London. Within the fort as far as possible
03:31they would be making and covering things as much as they could themselves. So there is an armourers
03:40workshop, a blacksmith's workshop that could do repairs, armaments that needed sorting out.
03:47We also now have a barrack room which has got the Victorian style telescopic beds in so that they
03:55can sleep with them at night but then push them back in to have space in the day to also eat in the room
03:59and as of July we've been able to refurbish that to show what it actually would have looked like
04:05with bed linens and mattresses and uniforms within it and then also we have although there's nothing
04:12in it we have the tailor's workshop within the keep which is a room that the men who were on discharge
04:20who came here during the Boer War period would have gone in there to get their civilian clothing in
04:29order to then leave and go home.
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