Ringstead Patrol

The OB is located near the northern edge of a small unnamed copse on the eastern edge of the Ringland Downs nature reserve, near Ringstead Road.

We found a clearly defined depression in the ground, with a small heap of bricks, shards of ceramic field pipes and several length of rusty angle iron having been dumped on the woodland’s edge which is only a few metres distant from the OB site. We presume the items to be related to the adjoining OB site, perhaps having once formed a drop-down entrance shaft. However, we failed to find any trace of entrance and exit, if an exit existed.

The depression is of rectangular shape and about 1 metre deep. The OB was dug into a thick layer of chalk, deposited here during the ice age. Orientation is N/S – 68ft ASL.

The chalk deposit consists of small-sized tightly packed fragments that at first sight look like a purpose-built wall.

The layer of top-soil above is only about 20 centimetres thick, and the straight and unbroken line between the two layers all the way around the exposed walls of the main chamber indicate that its roof might have been flat rather than curved.

Rubbish has been dumped in the depression (old water tanks and other unrelated materials), making it difficult to establish what lies underneath.

The rubbish appears to rest on corrugated sheets that in all probability formed the roof of the structure, which appears to have suffered a collapse rather than having been dismantled.

Four weathered and overgrown wooden corner posts are still in place.

We failed to find any indication as to where entrance and exit (if an exit existed) would have been.