The Royal Military Academy was founded in 1741 in Woolwich, south-east London. It was intended to provide an education and produce good officers of Artillery and perfect Engineers. RMA Woolwich was commonly known as "The Shop" because its first building was a converted workshop of the Woolwich Arsenal.
The RoyalMilitaryAcademy (RMA) at Woolwich, in south-east London, was a British Army militaryacademy for the training of commissioned officers of the RoyalArtillery and Royal Engineers.
A second academy, known as the RoyalMilitary College (RMC), was opened at Sandhurst, Berkshire in 1799 to train officers for the infantry and cavalry.
The RoyalMilitaryAcademySandhurst opened in 1947 as an amalgamation of both institutions.
The Academy straddles the border between the counties of Hampshire, Berkshire and Surrey, marked by a small stream known as the Wish Stream, after which the Academy journal is named.
In overall charge of the RMAS is the Commandant, usually an officer of Major-General rank, while the Academy Sergeant Major (AcSM) is the most senior individual warrant officer in the British Army (only Conductors of the Royal Logistic Corps rank higher than the AcSM, but there are several of them at any one time).
RMASandhurst was formed in 1947, from the RoyalMilitaryAcademy in Woolwich (which trained officers for the RoyalArtillery and Royal Engineers from 1741 to 1939) and the RoyalMilitary College at Sandhurst.