Bomber Oak – Image Credit – The Woodland Trust
Did you know one of the UK’s ‘Tree of the Year’ finalists is right here in Caldecott Rutland?
The remarkable Bomber Oak on Andrew Brown’s farm near Uppingham survived a military plane crash in 1945 and is now running for this prestigious national award from The Woodland Trust. It’s a great piece of local history and a symbol of resilience.
From a distance, this tree looks like many others in our countryside, but this 180-year-old oak, on a family farm in Rutland, knows a thing or two about survival. Up close, you can see it has a story to tell, with a slight dip in the top of the canopy and twisted, misshapen central branches that have clearly suffered damage. Incredibly, it is said to have been hit by a Lancaster Bomber in 1945, with the impact slicing the tree’s top off.
The Bomber Oak recovered from the collision, but decades later, was almost lost when a water company claiming statutory powers planned to install pipes in the field. Fortunately, objections from locals including Andrew, whose family have owned the farm for several generations, were successful. The pipes had to go around the field and the Bomber Oak lives on (The Woodland Trust)
Visit this link to vote for your tree of the year!
More on the story behind the tree
For those interested in finding out more about the history of the incident, Andrew Brown has provided the following documents about the flight and his Grandfather’s diary entries detailing the crash:
Bomber-oak-details
Bomber-oak-diary-entries