Main Guard (Gibraltar)

Main Guard
1830s painting by Dibdin depicting Commercial Square, with the Exchange and Commercial Library (center, left) and the Main Guard (right, side view).
Location of the Main Guard in Gibraltar.
General information
Type	Guardhouse
Architectural style	Georgian
Address	13 John Mackintosh Square
Country	Gibraltar
Coordinates	36°08′26″N 5°21′15″W / 36.14062°N 5.354147°W / 36.14062; -5.354147Coordinates: 36°08′26″N 5°21′15″W / 36.14062°N 5.354147°W / 36.14062; -5.354147
Current tenants	Gibraltar Heritage Trust
Owner	Government of Gibraltar

The Main Guard is a historic, 18th-century guardhouse in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar. While the exact date of its construction is unknown, it is the oldest building in John Mackintosh Square. The French artist Henri Regnault produced three paintings while a visitor at the Main Guard. After being displayed at the guardhouse for many years, they are now kept at the Gibraltar Museum. The building's function has changed with the centuries. The Main Guard first served as a guardhouse; in the 20th century, it functioned as a fire station, bath house, and government offices. Since 2001, the building has housed the Gibraltar Heritage Trust and underwent restoration in 2011.

The Main Guard is a historic building in Gibraltar, the British Overseas Territory at the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula. It is located on the south end of what is now known as John Mackintosh Square, near Gibraltar City Hall, formerly referred to as Connaught House. While the exact date of its construction is unknown, the Main Guard building is the oldest in the square. The first references to the building are found in documents which date to the mid-18th century. In 1748, a Gibraltar visitor who stayed at an inn on the Parade, a former name for John Mackintosh Square, wrote that the "grand guard house" was near his hotel and that it was "one of the neatest buildings" in the area. He described it as "but one storey high" which, based on his observation, was the usual height of the buildings in Gibraltar. He further related that in front of the guardhouse, on the Parade, was a "whipping post, where almost every day soldiers are brought to feel the scourge."Floggings were meted out at the Parade as a form of military punishment.