Prince Ferdinand’s 12-pdr Battery perilously mounted two 12-pdr 12 cwt Q.F. guns on pedestal mounts. The battery was built between the 8th June 1896 and 31st August 1896. This battery was built just before the building of the detached moles at Gibraltar Harbour and was intended to handle Motor Torpedo Boats attacking shipping in the anchorage. The two gun each had a small magazine built to the rear, cut out of the rock face. These magazines were built between the 10th August, 1897 and 31st December 1897, An additional cartridge store was built behind the A (No.1) gun between 4th October 1899 and 31st March 1900. This additional cartridge store was built further into the rock face behind the Number 1 (North) gun.
Returns from 1905 show that these two guns had a Royal Garrison Artillery crew of one officer and twenty one men. Accommodation for this crew was built at Ince’s Farm between 1899 and 1900.
The Coastal Defence Battery was decommissioned in 1906 and the site was handed from the War Department to the Royal Navy in 1912.
Reference:
TNA WO 78.4270 original plans and dates
TNA WO 192 Fort Log