North Benfleet’s Great War Mystery
Did you know Woodside Park hides a century-old secret? Beneath the canopy of North Benfleet Hall Wood lie winding earthworks believed to be WWI practice trenches. While their exact origin remains a mystery, records of soldiers training nearby in 1915 make these hidden "serpentine" banks a fascinating local landmark to explore.
DID YOU KNOW? Hidden among the trees in North Benfleet Hall Wood (adjacent to Woodside Park) are what could be First World War practice trenches?
Next time you’re walking through the woodland at Woodside Park, take a closer look at the ground beneath your feet.
Running through the wood are considerable winding, or “serpentine”, earthworks which have historically been attributed to WWI practice trenches although exactly who dug them, and when, remains something of a local mystery.
What makes the story particularly interesting is that we know soldiers really were practising trench digging nearby during the First World War. Records show troops were sent to Rayleigh for trench-digging training in 1915, while the surviving diary of another WWI soldier who trained in this part of Essex also specifically mentions time spent “trench digging at Rayleigh”.
Does that prove they dug the mysterious earthworks at North Benfleet Hall Wood? No, but it certainly makes the old local story rather more intriguing.
Today Castle Point Wildlife Group volunteers help manage the woodland in partnership with Castle Point Borough Council.
So next time you’re wandering through North Benfleet Hall Wood, look out for those strange banks, hollows and winding earthworks. Are they really the remains of trenches dug by soldiers preparing for the battlefields of the First World War?
More than a century later, the woods are still keeping that secret.
