| AdminHistory | A desk-based assessment of Leconfield military base was carried out in 2004, by Wessex Archaeology, to determine its viability for excavation. Archaeologists had assessed the site to be of 'Medium Archaeological Potential' after a proposal was made to build a new hangar. An excavation was commissioned and a watching brief was undertaken during four weeks in July and August 2005 in a triangular area on the base, measuring 140m by 220m, named Roebuck Glade. Several factors limited the visibility of on-site archaeology: the wooded nature of previous land use; the variable depth of subsoil, meaning that the natural drift geology was not consistently exposed; and the use of a bulldozer with a toothed blade in the development groundworks on occasion. Several archaeological features were identified, the oldest of which were three furrows that may relate to medieval agricultural use of the site. Two features associated with the site's use as an airbase were a Second World War barrage balloon mooring block and a levelled concrete wall, that potentially dates to the airbase's first phase of construction in 1937. A concentration of pre-Quaternary spores, at least 1.5 million years old, were also identified in a hollow within the natural drift deposits.
Sources: Oxford Archaeology North. |