Royal Citadel

The Royal Citadel stands at the eastern end of Plymouth Hoe, overlooking Plymouth Sound. It was built in the late 17th century to designs by Sir Bernard de Gomme, incorporating parts of an earlier fort started by Sir Francis Drake in the 1590s. The site remains a Scheduled Monument, and many of its buildings are Grade II listed. A limestone gateway by Sir Thomas Fitz, now without its drawbridge, marks the main entrance. To the south-east lies Fisher’s Nose Blockhouse, dating from about 1540, while Queen Anne’s Battery nearby was added in 1667. The Citadel was the country’s most important coastal defence for more than a century. Its 21-metre walls bristled with 113 guns by the 1750s, and it later served as an artillery training school for the Royal Garrison Artillery. During the Second World War it became headquarters of the Coast Artillery Training Centre, and today it houses 29 Commando Regiment, providing artillery support to the UK Commando Force. The Royal Chapel of St Katherine, rebuilt in the 1660s and extended in the 19th century, still holds services inside the base. Visitors on guided tours see the Baroque gateway, the dry moat and the irregular outline shaped by Drake’s earlier fort. The chapel’s galleries and transepts give it a cross-like plan, and the 1666 foundation stone remains visible in the wall. Beyond the walls, Plymouth Sound stretches out, and the site links to the former victualling yard that once supplied the fleet. The Citadel’s military role continues, though plans exist to hand the site to civilian use.