W. Bro John Weeks

07976-181068

Date of Warrant, 5th November 1987

The Lodge meets: Third Friday, January, March, May, October and November (Installation November)

Lodge of Instruction meets:
at 8.0pm. 1st & 3rd Fridays in February, April, September & December and on 1st & 2nd Fridays in January, March, May, October and November. NB the 1st LOI night following a Lodge meeting will start at 7.30pm for officers to discuss that Lodge meeting.

The Chapter Scribe-E is: Click here for further details

Masonic Relief for the Queen’s Gurkha Engineers ... Click here

History of the Monckton Lodge No: 9236

The origins of the Lodge are to be found in a number of Officers of the Army Medical Services who were members of what was then called 220 
(1st Home Counties) Field Ambulance, Royal Army Medical Corps (Volunteers) based at Ditton near Maidstone. 
The unit is still there but is now called “B” Squadron, 4th Medical Support Battalion. Many were already members of the Royal Army Medical Corps Lodge “In Arduis Fidelis No 3432”, which meets at Great Queen Street, and between them seeds of a military medical lodge were sown.

Early on Belvidere Lodge No 503, in Maidstone, agreed to sponsor the new lodge and it was agreed that membership should be primarily for members and ex-members of the three Armed Services. The lodge is named after Surgeon Lieutenant Colonel D. H. Monckton, VD, at one time Superintendent of the Maidstone St John Ambulance Corps and the first Commanding Officer of the 5th Division Volunteer Medical Staff Corps in 1887.

This unit was the antecedent of the present unit which celebrated its centenary in 1987 and was granted the Freedom of the Borough of Maidstone in March 1998. The lodge therefore owes its origins to members of the oldest medical unit in the Defence Medical Services. 
The lodge was consecrated at the Maidstone Masonic Centre, Tovil on the 5th November 1987. The lodge Banner was dedicated on the 27th September 1997.

Traditions of the Lodge

At the Installation Meeting Worshipful Masters or there representatives occupy the following chairs:-

Senior Warden - Belvidere Lodge No 503 – our sponsor lodge
Junior Warden - Robinson Lodge No 2046 (*)
Inner Guard - In Arduis Fidelis Lodge No 3432 (*)

(*) A number of the Founder Members and First Joining Members were also members of these two lodges.

At the Festive Board the Second Official Toast is to The Colonel in Chief of the Royal Army Medical Corps.

Members who are entitled to have official Mess Kit are invited to wear it on the Installation Meeting – it adds colour to the event.

At the January Regular Meeting a “Rabbie Burns” Festive Board is held, complete with Haggis and a Piper.