An interesting job for The Daily Telegraph last week at the site of Britain's first commercial oil well. Back in 1939, at the outbreak of WWII, 50 'roughnecks' arrived from america to secretly drill for oil at Dukes Wood in Nottinghamshire.
Their efforts were crucial to the war effort and oil supplied by the well and shipped via 'Pluto' helped supply the tanks used in the D-Day landings.

Now Egdon Resources has erected a derrick on the site and is conducting tests to see if drilling for oil again would be a viable commercial enterprise. Unfortunately I didn't have permission to get closer to the current drilling platform where work is going on 24-7, but it can be seen from the road.

Further into the wood the old 'nodding donkeys' can still be seen and there is the Dukes Wood Oil Museum where I met two of the former oil drillers. The one in my photo is Kevin Topham who worked there for British Petroleum in the 1950's and who is now curator at the museum. The Dukes Wood drilling ended up as a test for the UK's first foray into North Sea oil and gas.
Kevin himself worked there, on the ill fated 'Sea Gem' which collapsed two days after Christmas in 1965. 13 men from the rig died, 13 survived including Kevin who jumped into the sea and was lucky to make it to a life raft in the freezing cold water.