St Lucia Barracks, Omagh

St Lucia Barracks
Omagh
A helicopter landing at the base in the 1960s
St Lucia Barracks Location within Northern Ireland
Coordinates	54°36′14″N 07°18′25″W / 54.60389°N 7.30694°W / 54.60389; -7.30694Coordinates: 54°36′14″N 07°18′25″W / 54.60389°N 7.30694°W / 54.60389; -7.30694
Type	Barracks
Site information
Owner	Ministry of Defence
Operator	British Army
Site history
Built	1875-1881
Built for	War Office
In use	1881-2007

St Lucia Barracks, Omagh is a former military base in Omagh, Northern Ireland.

History

The War Department (now the Ministry of Defence) leased the 5-acre (20,000 m²) and twenty seven perches from a prominent family on 10 April 1875 for sixty pounds per annum. The lease ran for 999 years or until the War Department/MOD ceased to use for military purposes or sublet, assigned the premises for use other than military. The original lease is still held by the now MOD and copy held with the Archdale family (per copy of lease between Member of Archdale family and Secretary Dept of war). The barracks were originally established as the depot of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers and opened in 1881.^[1] In 1924 the barracks also became the depot of the Royal Irish Fusiliers.^[2]

An Auxiliary Territorial Service camp was established on the site during the Second World War and Lisanelly Barracks was built on an adjacent site around this time.^[1]

The base was the subject of a botched proxy bomb attack on 24 October 1990, when the main charge of the bomb failed to explode.^[3] The barracks closed in 2007 as part of the demilitarisation of Northern Ireland according to the Belfast Agreement. Eventually, an environmentally friendly PSNI station was built on the grounds next to the existing St Lucia barracks site in 2010.^[4]

References

Sources

• English, Richard (2005). Armed struggle: the history of the IRA. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-517753-3.