World War Two Dorset (Warmwell airfeild)

I'd visited Knighton Wood on the edge of the Warmwell quarries, maybe 15 years ago or so, in the pursuit of Second World War remains, as Warmwell had been an important airfield during the war. On that visit I'd identified plenty of interesting remains, and had intended to return for further and fuller investigations. Well, I never did, that's often the way with intentions. Anyway, I thought I'd rectify that situation today as we'd be passing Warmwell on our way to prehistoric Dorset. I thought we'd recon the site in order to see how much remained.

The first thing that struck me was that a lot more quarrying has taken place over the intervening years and Knighton Woods is now greatly reduced in size and many of the airfields features no long exist. Still though, there's plenty of archaeological evidence visible in the remaining woodland, although the other thing I was struck by was how some of the more ephemeral features had degraded in 15 years.  Although, after thinking about, 15 years is nearly 20% the features 72 year life, so no wonder. I wonder if the increase in severe weather we experience will accelerate their deterioration.  We spotted several trench works around there woodland, and I suspect there are more to find. One trench I remember from my initial visit, two sections of zig zag trench with a corrugated iron covered central dugout, was certainly in worse condition than I remembered, and the central dugout was unrecognisable.

Several of the earthen banked fighter pens which lined Knighton Wood remain to a good height, although erosion has left them untidy and years of leaf litter have filled them some. Whether any of their dispersal track remained is uncertain. By the time of my initial visit to warmwell much of the airfield had been quarried away, although from the sections of concrete dispersal tracks I assumed it had been of the common 'A' plan of three interlocking runways as with most of the World War Two airfields I'd visited at the time. This assumption was incorrect, and although the dispersal tracks and other tracks around the airfield were concrete or metalled, the airfield itself was in fact grass. A fact which may explain the main area of the airfield being quarried so quickly. There are a couple of buildings in the area of the fighter pens which I remembered, and amongst the beech stands we identified more building remains. I'd not ventured into the woodland on my last visit, so all that was new and very cool.

During our short investigation we identified several other features and not all of the woodland was explored. There was one other rather groovy feature identified, it was a mystery at the time but I know what it is now (I'm not going to say though, that's for another post). All round our visit to Knighton Wood was a success and very cool. Certainly worth that further and fuller investigation I'd planned, and will complete...soon.