Staffordshire Regiment Museum's future under threat

The Staffordshire Regiment Museum's future is under threat unless millions of pounds can be raised.

The museum, at Whittington Barracks, near Lichfield, needs more than £3 million. Brigadier Jim Tanner, regimental colonel of the 3rd Battalion of the Mercian Regiment, the former Staffords, says fundraising will be launched.

The first phase of the campaign will seek to raise £350,000 from within the regimental family by appealing for help from former and serving soldiers, their wives, widows and friends.

The museum trustees also plan to bid for Heritage Lottery funding towards the project.

Retired Major Mike Simpkins, chairman of the Staffordshire Regiment Museum Trustees, said: "Whilst the Staffordshire Regiment itself no longer exists in name, it remains part of the regular army in the form of 3rd Battalion, The Mercian Regiment (Staffords)."

He said the museum, which attracts school groups as well as military enthusiasts and former soldiers, has enough funds for its short-term future, but said more was needed to cover long-term running costs and to pursue future plans to "considerably enhance" the existing museum buildings and attractions or to move to a purpose-built site.

The museum at Whittington Barracks, the spiritual home of the regiment, near Lichfield, celebrates and keeps the story of the Staffordshire soldier alive.

The Staffords will be deployed to Afghanistan next year for their first tour there since the re-organisation that created the Mercian Regiment.

The museum tells the story of the regiment which can traces its origins back to 1705.

It had a collection of more than 9,000 items of equipment, uniforms, photographs and other memorabilia.

There is a display of armoured vehicles and a recreation of a World War One trench.

The museum details the 13 Staffordshire soldiers who won the Victoria Cross.

It is open Monday to Friday 10am to 4.30pm and Saturdays and Sundays from 12.30pm to 4.30pm.

The new headquarters of Defence Medical Services is now at Whittington Barracks. The site is now known as Defence Medical Services Whittington and will be the home of both headquarters of Joint Medical Command and the Surgeon General's headquarters.

The barracks was the home of the Staffordshire Regiment for many years and then the Army Training Regiment.