Soon after America entered World War II, an Imperial Japanese Navy submarine attacked a refinery and oilfield near Los Angeles, the first attack of the war on the continental United States. The submarine’s deck gun fired about two dozen rounds, causing little damage — but it resulted in the largest mass sighting of UFOs in American history. 

The February 23, 1942, Imperial Japanese Navy submarine’s shelling of a Los Angeles refinery caused little damage but created invasion (and UFO) hysteria. Photo courtesy Goleta Valley Historical Society.

At sunset on February 23, 1942, Imperial Japanese Navy Commander Kozo Nishino and his I-17 submarine lurked 1,000 yards off the California coast. It had been less than three months since the attack on Pearl Harbor, and Los Angeles residents were tense.

Japanese submarine I-17 bombarded the Ellwood, California, refinery and oilfield visited by its commander before the war.

Soon after dark, the I-17 surfaced and began firing armor-piercing shells at the Bankline Oil Company refinery in Ellwood, a small oilfield community 12 miles north of Santa Barbara — and less than 70 miles from the state’s earliest oilfield discoveries.

The Ellwood oilfield, about five miles long and up to a mile wide, was discovered in 1928. Commander Nishino targeted oil storage tanks, piers, and other facilities he had toured before the start of World War II.

Several of the shells struck, while others passed over Wheeler’s Inn, whose owner reported the attack. “We heard a whistling noise and a thump as a projectile hit near the house,” recalled one witness. “I thought something was going wrong with the refiners.”

A Japanese postcard from World War II commemorated I-17’s shelling of the Ellwood refinery and storage facilities north of Santa Barbara. Image courtesy John Geoghegan.

The shelling continued for 20 minutes before I-17 escaped into the darkness. It was the first Axis attack on the continental United States of the war.

“Shell California! Enemy U-boat sends many shots into oilfields near Santa Barbara, entire area is blacked out,” declared the February 24 front page of the Chicago Tribune. Many newspapers began referring to the attack as the “Bombardment of Ellwood.”

Although there were no injuries and minimal damage (a wrecked derrick and pump house), the barrage led to a public panic that soon intensified. Witnesses claimed to see offshore enemy “signal lights.”

Discovered in 1928 by Barnsdall-Rio Grande Company, production from the California oilfield extended offshore from Ellwood. Photo courtesy Goleta Valley Historical Society.

Long after the war, Parade magazine in 1982 speculated that Commander Nishino targeted the Bankline Oil Company refinery because of a prewar affront.

While serving on an oil tanker docked near the refinery and being given a courtesy tour of the facilities, Commander Nishino slipped and fell. He apparently tumbled into a cactus — prompting laughter from his American hosts. The Parade magazine article speculated the sub commander would later seek his revenge by shelling the oil refinery.

After the attack, Nishino and his crew slipped away to new combat assignments in the Aleutians — unaware of the strange result of the attack on Ellwood’s refinery. Despite missing their targets and dropping into the sea, on the beach, and into nearby cliffs, the Japanese artillery shells brought dramatic results.

With U-boats sinking oil tankers in the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic (see Roughnecks of Sherwood Forest), the 1942 West Coast attack not only fueled invasion fears but led to the largest mass UFO sighting in U.S. history.

UFOs and Mass Hysteria

Commander Nishino’s I-17 fired about two dozen rounds before making its way to Alaskan waters. As the “Bombardment of Ellwood” ended, the self-inflicted “Battle of Los Angeles” began. At 3 a.m. on February 25, thousands of war-jittery California residents were awakened by sirens and anti-aircraft fire.

The Ellwood oilfield terminals and tanks along the coastline have disappeared — today occupied by the Sandpiper Golf Club, one of the top 25 courses in the country, according to Golf Digest.

“Scores of searchlights built a wigwam of light beaming over Los Angeles,” noted the Los Angeles Times. The U.S. Army’s 37th Anti-Aircraft Brigade fired at elusive “unidentified airplanes.” The brigade fired 1,340 rounds.

Expecting the worst after the refinery attack, residents watched the illuminated nighttime sky. Soon there were sightings of “unidentified flying objects” in addition to enemy aircraft. “It was huge! It was just enormous! And it was practically right over my house,” reported one UFO observer about the attack. 

“I had never seen anything like it in my life. It was just hovering there in the sky and hardly moving at all,” the witness added.

“Scores of searchlights built a wigwam of light beaming over Los Angeles,” noted a reporter about the 1942 panic from the refinery shelling. Anti-aircraft fire caused more damage than the Japanese attack.

Anti-aircraft fire fell within the city, damaging homes and cars and fraying nerves. Many Los Angelenos imagined enemy aircraft. Others became fearful of extraterrestrial attackers as fast-moving “red or silver objects” were seen high in the sky. Anti-aircraft shells burst around “a large object that hung motionless” in midair.

Conspiracy theories and rumors of a government cover-up began. Many historians have noted the “Great Los Angeles Air Raid” resulted in the largest mass sighting of “UFO events” in American history.

Following the shelling of the Bankline Oil refinery and the Ellwood oilfield, an “Avenge Ellwood” fundraising campaign began in early 1943 for a war bond drive. Historians have offered many explanations with detailed photo analysis of the “Battle of Los Angeles” and the panic that ensued. 

In 2012, the Goleta Valley Historical Society hosted a special exhibition commemorating the 70th anniversary of the Ellwood shelling. The exhibit noted the widely publicized panic sadly increased support for Japanese-American internment camps.

_______________________

Recommended Reading: The Battle of Los Angeles, 1942: The Mystery Air Raid (2010); Pico Canyon Chronicles: The Story of California’s Pioneer Oil Field (1985); Huntington Beach, California, Postcard History Series (2009). Your Amazon purchase benefits the American Oil & Gas Historical Society. As an Amazon Associate, AOGHS earns a commission from qualifying purchases.

_______________________

The American Oil & Gas Historical Society (AOGHS) preserves U.S. petroleum history. Please support AOGHS to help maintain this energy education website, a monthly email newsletter, This Week in Oil and Gas History News, and expand historical research. Contact bawells@aoghs.org. Copyright © 2026 Bruce A. Wells..

Citation Information – Article Title: “’Japanese Sub attacks Oilfield.” Authors: B.A. Wells and K.L. Wells. Website Name: American Oil & Gas Historical Society. URL: https://aoghs.org/petroleum-in-war/wwii-sub-attacks-oilfield. Last Updated: February 17, 2026. Original Published Date: February 24, 2015.

The post Japanese Sub attacks Oilfield appeared first on American Oil & Gas Historical Society.

As the United Kingdom fought for its survival during World War II, a team of American oil drillers, derrickhands, roustabouts, and motormen secretly boarded the converted troopship HMS Queen Elizabeth in March 1943. Once their story was revealed years later, they would become known as the Roughnecks of Sherwood Forest.

The 42 volunteers from Noble Drilling and Fain-Porter Drilling companies taken before they secretly embarked for the United Kingdom on March 12, 1943, aboard HMS Queen Elizabeth, which had been converted into a troop transport. Photo courtesy Guy Woodward Collection, American Heritage Center.

By the summer of 1942, the situation was desperate. The future of Great Britain — and the outcome of World War II — depended on the supply of petroleum. At the end of that year, demand for 100-octane fuel had grown to more than 150,000 barrels every day — and German U-boats ruled the Atlantic.

British Secretary of Petroleum, Geoffrey Lloyd in August 1942 called for an emergency meeting of his country’s Oil Control Board to assess the “impending crisis in oil.”

U.S. oil tanker Pennsylvania Sun was torpedoed by U-571 on July, 15, 1942, about 125 miles west of Key West, Florida, at a time when Britain’s oil reserves were 2 million barrels below safety reserves. Photo courtesy of National Museum of the U.S. Navy.

The United Kingdom’s desperate situation would lead to the “little-known, or at least seldom recognized, all-important role oil and oilmen played in the prosecution of the war,” according to two historians who extensively researched war archives there and the United States.

In 1973, Guy Woodward and Grace Steele Woodward published The Secret of Sherwood Forest – Oil Production in England During World War II. “The amazing and hitherto untold story, born in secrecy, has remained buried in the private diaries, corporate files and official records of government agencies,” the Woodwards explained.

“In the final analysis, oil was indeed the key to victory of the Allies over the Axis powers,” the authors concluded.

Dedicated in 2001, an Oil Patch Warrior stands in Ardmore, Oklahoma. The bronze statue is an exact duplicate of one erected 10 years earlier near Nottinghamshire, England. Photos courtesy of the Dukes Wood Oil Museum (closed in 2021).

Two identical bronze statues separated by the Atlantic Ocean commemorate the achievements of American roughnecks. The first seven-foot statue was erected in 1991 near the village of Eakring in Dukes Wood, about 15 miles north of Nottinghamshire, England. A decade later, a twin roughneck statue would greet visitors to Memorial Square in Ardmore, Oklahoma.

Separated by more than 4,605.05 miles (7,411.12 km), the bronze oil patch warriors commemorate Americans who produced oil during a critical time of the war — by drilling in Sherwood Forest.

The Unsinkable Tanker

The once top-secret story begins in August 1942, when Britain’s wartime secretary of petroleum, Geoffrey Lloyd, called an emergency meeting of the country’s Oil Control Board.

U-boat attacks and the bombing of dockside storage facilities had brought the British Admiralty 2 million barrels below its minimum safety reserves. The oil supply outlook was bleak.

A Republic P-47 in Italy is fueled in this February 1945 photograph “passed for publication” by Allied field press censors. Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress.

Meanwhile, German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel’s rampaging North African campaign threatened England’s access to Middle East oilfield sources. England’s principal fuel supplies came by convoy from Trinidad and America and were subjected to relentless Nazi submarine attacks.

Many at the Oil Control Board meeting were surprised to learn England had a productive oilfield of its own, first discovered in 1939 by D’Arcy Exploration. The company was a subsidiary of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, founded in 1908, a predecessor to British Petroleum, BP.

The obscure English oilfield was in Sherwood Forest, at Eakring and Dukes Wood. The field produced modestly from 50 shallow wells.

Noble Drilling Corporation financed a May 1991 trip for 14 survivors of the original crew to return to Duke’s Wood in Sherwood Forest. Photo courtesy of the Dukes Wood Oil Museum.

Extreme shortages of drilling equipment and personnel kept Britain from further exploiting the field. Perhaps America might help. Following the meeting — and under great secrecy — D’Arcy Exploration Managing Director Phillip Southwell was sent to the Petroleum Administration for War  (PAW) in Washington, D.C.

Southwell explained that England lacked the equipment and expertise for rapid drilling, even in shallow fields.  His secret mission was to secure American assistance for expanding production in the Eakring field, regarded as an “unsinkable tanker.”

“Ninety-four wells produced high quality oil, an amazing achievement,” the BBC would later note. Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress.

According to Jim Day, former CEO of the Noble Corporation, Southwell met with representatives from four oil companies, including Lloyd Noble, president of Noble Drilling, and Frank Porter, president of Fain-Porter Drilling. Officers from the two other companies, California contractors, “quickly bowed out, saying they would not be of any use.”

Noble and Porter remained at the meeting, “speaking at length to Southwell, (who still hadn’t divulged the location of the oil fields), but finally — reluctantly — said they couldn’t help. Porter’s company was too small for the task, and Noble had just committed his resources to the Northwest Territories of Canada.”

Pressing his case, Southwell pursued Noble to the CEO’s hometown of Ardmore to negotiate a deal.

American volunteer derrickhand Herman Douthit fell to his death. Photo detail from American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming.

Noble had purchased his first drilling rig in 1921 while living in Ardmore. Porter, originally from Brooklyn, New York, worked in Ardmore oilfields in 1916 before founding his Oklahoma City drilling company in 1939. Their two companies — like much of the U.S. petroleum industry — were already heavily committed to wartime production.

Ardmore Meeting

Southwell, mindful of England’s desperate situation and doggedly persistent, soon followed Noble to Oklahoma. Arriving in Dallas (the closest major airport to Ardmore), he rented a car and was allocated one tank of tightly rationed gasoline. Southwell made the trip on faith, trusting he would find fuel for the return trip to Dallas.

On September 13, 1942, a Sunday, Southwell arrived at Noble’s home in Ardmore at 10 a.m. Noble answered the door wearing pajamas.

Stirred by patriotic fervor, unable to resist the lure of a challenge or perhaps just impressed by Southwell’s persistence in chasing him across the country, Noble told Southwell that if Porter would join in, Noble Drilling would commit to the venture. Noble would purchase the necessary equipment for D’Arcy and recruit men to run the rigs. Noble surprised Southwell by telling him he wouldn’t expect any profit. The work would be Noble Drilling and Fain-Porter Drilling’s contribution to winning the war.

Noble then convinced Porter to join the mission and Southwell left for Dallas — after the famed oilman secured him a tank of gas.

— from “Oil Field Warriors,” by Jim Day, Noble Research Institute, Winter 2011.

Thanks to D’Arcy Exploration’s Phillip Southwell (later Sir Phillip), Noble Drilling joined with Fain-Porter Drilling on a one-year contract to drill 100 new wells in the Eakring field.

Oklahoma drillers Lloyd Noble (1896-1950) of Ardmore and Frank M. Porter (1892-1962), originally from Brooklyn, N.Y., helped Great Britain produce more than one million barrels of oil. Photo of Noble courtesy Noble Research Institute. Porter photo courtesy Frank P. Stone.

Noble and Porter volunteered to execute the contract for cost and expenses only. PAW approved the Ardmore deal, and a contract was signed in early February 1943.

The English Project: Secret Drilling

On March 12, 1943 a team of 42 newly recruited Noble and Fain-Porter drillers, derrick hands, motor operators, and other roughnecks embarked on the converted troopship HMS Queen Elizabeth.

Four drilling rigs for “The English Project” would be transported to England on four different ships. Although one ship was lost to a German submarine, another rig was subsequently shipped safely.

The Americans stayed at Kelham Hall. Isolated from the community, the Anglican monastery was ideal for the yearlong operation.

The American oilmen joined project managers Eugene Rosser and Don Walker at billets prepared for them in an Anglican monastery at the historic Kelham Hall, near Eakring. The influx of the Americans from Oklahoma was rumored to be for making a movie, probably a Western. It was said that John Wayne would soon arrive.

Within a month, sufficient equipment had arrived to enable spudding the first well. Two others quickly followed. Four crews worked 12-hour tours with “National 50” rigs equipped with 87-foot jackknife masts.

When the oilfield workers left to return to America on March 3, 1944, they had added more than 1.2 million barrels of oil to the output of the Eakring oilfield. Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress.

The roughnecks amazed their British counterparts with their drilling speed in the field, which had been producing oil from about 7,465 feet since the 1930s.

Using innovative methods, the Americans drilled an average of one well per week in Dukes Wood, while the British took at least five weeks per well. The British crews had made it a practice to change bits at 30-foot intervals. The Americans kept using the same bit as long as it was “making hole.”

By August, the Yanks of Sherwood Forest had completed 36 new wells, despite the challenges of wartime rationing of fuel, food, and other shortages.

U-Boat attacks on convoys threatened to cut off England’s oil supply. In 1942, Royal Air Force ground crewmen refueled a Supermarine Spitfire Mark II. Photo courtesy Imperial War Museum.

By January of 1944, the American oilmen were credited with 94 completions and 76 producing oil wells. But not without cost. While working Rig No. 148, derrickhand Herman Douthit was killed when he fell from a drilling mast.

Douthit was buried with full military honors at the Cambridge American Cemetery.

The English Project contract was completed in March 1944 with the Americans logging 106 completions and 94 producers. England’s oil production had shot from 300 barrels of oil a day to more than 3,000 barrels of oil a day.

Without fanfare, the roughnecks returned to the United States and the families they had left a year before. Their mission and success remained secret until November 1944, when the Chicago Daily Tribune ran a story, “England’s Oil Boom,” on a back page. Few took notice at the time.

Honoring Oklahoma Roughnecks

By the end of the war, more than 3.5 million barrels of crude had been pumped from England’s “unsinkable tanker” oilfields. Petroleum industry expertise would again come into action – solving the challenge of oil pipelines across the English Channel – read about the operation in PLUTO, Secret Pipelines of WW II. 

British Petroleum continued to produce oil from Dukes Wood until the field’s depletion in 1965.

Visiting Tulsa in 1989, a member of Parliament was fascinated by Guy and Grace Woodward’s book.

The story remained largely unknown until the 1973 University of Oklahoma Press publication of The Secret of Sherwood Forest – Oil production in England during World War II by Guy and Grace Woodward. Then, Tony Speller, a member of Parliament, in 1989 visited Tulsa for a speaking engagement. He was given a copy of the book.

Surprised and intrigued by the story it told, Speller joined with members of the International Society of Energy Advocates, Noble Drilling Company employees, and others who believed that the singular accomplishment of this handful of Americans should be remembered. Artist Philip Jay O’Meilia was chosen to create a bronze tribute to these men.

O’Meilia, born in 1927 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame in 1999. Interviewed for this article in 2012, he recalled ideas for the statue’s design quickly evolved.

“The notion of an ‘oil patch warrior’ soon developed…at parade rest with a roughneck’s best weapon – a Stillson wrench – instead of a rifle,” O’Meilia said. He also remembered how authenticity was critical, down to period gloves and hard hat.

“They even sent me a pair of original overalls so I would get it exactly right,” he explained in his interview with the American Oil & Gas Historical Society.

Those who look very closely will see the telltale impression of a pack of cigarettes in the oil patch warrior’s pocket. “Lucky Strike,” explained the artist with a laugh, because” Lucky Strike Green Has Gone to War!” was a advertising campaign at the time.

O’Meilia died in Tulsa on January 26, 2022, at age 94.

Artist Jay O´Meilia of Tulsa traveled to England for the May 1991 dedication of his statue.

Statues dedicated in 1991 and 2001

In May 1991, Noble Drilling Corporation funded the return of 14 surviving oilmen to the dedication of O’Meilia’s seven-foot bronze Oil Patch Warrior in Sherwood Forest. Ten years after the ceremony in England, the citizens of Ardmore discovered that the original molds remained in O’Meilia’s Colorado foundry.

“Our mission was to create a memorial park that would honor those who sacrificed their lives, those who served in the military during times of war and peace, and the oil drillers and energy industry that came to England’s rescue in World War II,” explained Jack Riley, chairman of the Memorial Square committee.

O’Meilia recast the Sherwood Forest Oil Patch Warrior for Ardmore from the original molds. The statue was dedicated on November 10, 2001, with representatives from Noble Oil and Fain-Porter joining veterans at the ceremony. A brick walkway through Memorial Square displays the names of Ardmore area veterans.

“Memorial Square honors veterans who are responsible for the freedom we enjoy today – and the energy industry, which is responsible for the economic strength of our community,” declared Wes Stucky, president of the Ardmore Development Authority.

Adam Sieminski and wife Laurie visited the Sherwood Forest statue in 2005. Photo courtesy Adam Sieminski.

Time has taken away many of those on both sides of the Atlantic who struggled to preserve democracy. Fortunately, in these two imposing bronze Oil Patch Warriors, separated by an ocean of history, the story of the roughnecks of Sherwood Forest can always be remembered.

Editor’s Notes – Dukes Wood Oil Museum closed in 2021. Jay O’Melia’s Oil Patch Warrior (a replacement copy made of resin and stainless steel to deter scrap metal thieves) can be found in the Nottinghamshire countryside at Rufford Abbey Country Park.

American Oil & Gas Historical Society supporting member Adam Sieminski, past director of the Energy Information Administration, visited the original Sherwood Forest statue in 2005 and provided AOGHS with photos — and The Secret of Sherwood Forest — Oil Production in England During World War II. In August 2009, he helped sponsor the society’s participation in a two-day history field trip to Titusville, Pennsylvania (see the “Energy Economists Rock Oil Tour”.

_______________________

Recommended Reading:  The Secret of Sherwood Forest: Oil Production in England During World War II (1973); The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money & Power (2008). Your Amazon purchase benefits the American Oil & Gas Historical Society. As an Amazon Associate, AOGHS earns a commission from qualifying purchases.

_______________________

The American Oil & Gas Historical Society preserves U.S. petroleum history. Please become an AOGHS annual supporter and help maintain this energy education website and expand historical research. For more information, contact bawells@aoghs.org. © 2025 Bruce A. Wells. All rights reserved.

Citation Information: Article Title – “Roughnecks of Sherwood Forest.” Author: Aoghs.org Editors. Website Name: American Oil & Gas Historical Society. URL: https://aoghs.org/petroleum-in-war/roughnecks-of-sherwood-forest. Last Updated: November 5, 2025. Original Published Date: November 28, 2012.

The post Roughnecks of Sherwood Forest appeared first on American Oil & Gas Historical Society.

During World War II, U-boats prowled the Gulf of Mexico to disrupt the flow of oil carried by tankers departing ports in Louisiana and Texas. Sixty years later, seabed surveys found U-166 — and its last victim.

Petroleum exploration and production companies operating in the U.S. outer continental shelf (OCS) typically provide government scientists with sonar data for areas with potential archaeological value.

A 2001 archaeological survey by BP and Shell before construction of a natural gas pipeline confirmed discovery of U-166 about 45 miles off the Louisiana coast.

Federal agencies review oil and natural gas-related surveys, and over the years the data have revealed more than 100 historic shipwrecks in U.S. OCS waters. In 2001, the Minerals Management Service (MMS) the noted that “a German submarine definitely got our attention.”

MMS in 2011 became the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) and the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE), which maintains offshore maps and statistics, including petroleum production.

U-Boat Scourge

In the months following America’s entering the war in 1941, Germany’s Kriegsmarine sank 56 Allied ships, including 17 tankers, while losing only one submarine, U-boat 166. Attacks extended from the East Coast to key ports in Texas and Louisiana.

Submarine attacks so threatened the war effort that the U.S. government and the petroleum industry launched the longest pipeline project ever undertaken. A joint project led to building the “Big Inch” and “Little Big Inch” from East Texas to Illinois and New York (see WW II Big Inch and Little Big Inch Pipelines).

But for the Nazi submarine U-166, the war was over. Its final resting place remained a mystery for almost six decades.

Commissioned on March 23, 1942, U-166 today is a war grave in the Gulf of Mexico. Photo courtesy National World War II Museum.

The last victim of the U-166 was the passenger freighter Robert E. Lee, sunk by a single torpedo on July 30, 1942, while on its way to New Orleans. Her Naval escort ship, PC-566, rushed in to drop ten depth charges. The U-166 was believed to have escaped. It did not.

Finding U-166

In 1986, a Shell Offshore vessel using a deep-tow system of the day recorded two close wrecks about 45 miles off the Louisiana coast in 5,000 feet of water. The identity of the vessels would surprise military historians.

At first thought to be the Robert E. Lee and cargo freighter Alcoa Puritan, it was May 2001 before an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) using side scan sonar revealed the U-166. The lost World War II submarine was separated from Robert E. Lee by less than a mile on the sea floor.

The AUV, which required no cable connection to its mother ship, found the Alcoa Puritan 14 miles away. Learn more about the petroleum industry’s offshore robotics in ROV – Swimming Socket Wrench.

The U.S. petroleum industry remains a principal user of advanced underwater technologies for seafloor mapping. Illustration courtesy BOEM.

Six other World War II vessels have been discovered in the course of Gulf of Mexico oil and natural gas surveys.

As a result of the U-166’s discovery, BP and Shell altered their proposed pipeline to preserve the site and government archaeologists notified the U.S. Navy Historical Center of the discovery.

“They, in turn, notified the German Embassy and military attaché,” the MMS article explains. “Since the remains of the U-166’s 52 crewmen are still on board, the German government has declared the site to be a war grave and has requested that it remain undisturbed.”

Managing Offshore Oil

In early 2024, BOEM managed more than 2,410 active oil and natural gas leases on about 13 million OCS acres.

“Offshore federal production in 2020 reached approximately 641 million barrels of oil and 882 billion cubic feet of gas, almost all of which was produced in the Gulf of Mexico,” the agency noted. “This accounts for about 15 percent of all domestic oil production and 2 percent of domestic natural gas production.”

The Kerr-McGee drilling platform Kermac Rig No. 16 in 1947 became the first offshore rig in the Gulf of Mexico that operated out of sight of land. The Gulf’s offshore industry would discover 11 oil and natural gas fields by the end of 1949. Learn more in Offshore Oil History; also see Women of the Offshore Petroleum Industry.

_______________________

Recommended Reading:  Torpedoes in the Gulf: Galveston and the U-Boats, 1942-1943 (1995); Offshore Pioneers: Brown & Root and the History of Offshore Oil and Gas (1997). Your Amazon purchase benefits the American Oil & Gas Historical Society. As an Amazon Associate, AOGHS earns a commission from qualifying purchases.

_______________________

The American Oil & Gas Historical Society (AOGHS) preserves U.S. petroleum history. Please become an AOGHS annual supporter and help maintain this energy education website and expand historical research. For more information, contact bawells@aoghs.org. © 2025 Bruce A. Wells.

Citation Information – Article Title: “Petroleum Survey discovers U-boat.” Authors: B.A. Wells and K.L. Wells. Website Name: American Oil & Gas Historical Society. URL: https://aoghs.org/petroleum-in-war/petroleum-survey-finds-u-166. Last Updated: July 27, 2025. Original Published Date: April 18, 2012.

The post Petroleum Survey discovers U-boat appeared first on American Oil & Gas Historical Society.

A government-industry partnership built two petroleum pipelines from Texas to the East Coast that proved vital during World War II. “Big Inch” carried oil from East Texas oilfields. “Little Big Inch” carried gasoline, heating oil, diesel oil, and kerosene.

The final weld on the “Big Inch” was made in July 1943, just 350 days after construction began. “Without the prodigious delivery of oil from the U.S., this global war, quite frankly, could never have been won,” proclaimed historian Keith Miller.

U-boats wreaked havoc from the Gulf of Mexico to the East Coast before construction of the world’s longest pipelines. Circa 1941 print by Adolf Bock courtesy Third Reich Collection, Library of Congress.

“Besides, without the outstanding cooperation of the Petroleum Administration for War with the numerous oil companies of America, World War Two very likely would never have been won by the Allies either,” Miller explained in a 2002 lecture at the George Washington University, Washington, D.C.

The Big Inches

Thanks to a combined effort of the government and the petroleum industry, two pipelines would be constructed to carry oil from Texas to Midwest and East Coast refineries…and win the war.

“The Big Inch and Little Big Inch pipelines, it should be stressed, aided almost beyond estimation the winning of World War Two by the Allies,” Miller added in “How Important Was Oil in World War II?” for the History News Network. 

Beginning in August 1942, War Emergency Pipelines, Inc., launched the longest petroleum pipeline construction project ever undertaken in the United States — two pipelines spanning 1,200 miles.

Welding a section of the Big Inch pipe by the “stove pipe” method in 1942. Courtesy the Library of Congress, U.S. Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information, Library of Congress.

Conceived to supply wartime fuel demands — and in response to deadly U-boat attacks on oil tankers along the eastern seaboard, the Caribbean and in the Gulf of Mexico — the oil pipelines lines were extolled as “the most amazing government-industry cooperation ever achieved.”

Speedy Welding

With a goal of transporting thousands of barrels of oil per day, the $95 million project called for construction of a 24 inches in diameter pipeline (Big Inch) from East Texas oilfields to Illinois. An accompanying pipeline with a 20-inch diameter — the Little Big Inch — would transport refined products as far as New York and Philadelphia.

“America’s petroleum industries pour out fuel and lubricants for the United Nations,” notes a post-war caption of a Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information photograph collection (Library of Congress), describing the largest oil pipeline project in the world. “The pipe line extends from the oil fields of the U.S. southwest state of Texas to the New York City – Philadelphia oil district of the U.S. eastern Atlantic coast, a distance of almost 1,400 miles (2240 kilometers).”

Before being lowered into the trench, Big Inch section were coated with hot asphalt, noted the U.S. Farm Security Administration. The pipeline was completed 350 days after construction began.

“A ditch four feet deep, three feet wide and 1,254 miles long was to be dug from Longview (Texas) across the Mississippi River to Southern Illinois and then east to Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, with lines from there to New York City and Philadelphia,” explained the Texas State Historical Association.

Ceremonies marked the final weld on the Big Inch in July 1943, just 350 days after construction began. Soon after the Little Big Inch began transporting refined products in 1944, the official dedication of both pipelines took place in Rockwood, Pennsylvania, on March 24.

Construction of the Big Inch began in August 1942 and was completed just one year later. Little Big Inch construction began April 23, 1943, with the placing of the last pipe on October 8. Map courtesy Texas Eastern Transmission Corp.

The Little Big Inch line could carry four products: gasoline, heating oil, diesel oil, and kerosene — each separated by solid rubber balls that were slightly smaller than the inside diameter of the 20-inch pipe.

Before the two pipelines began transporting oil, Kriegsmarine U-boats had sunk so many tankers that many Caribbean island beaches were seriously polluted with oil, said historian Miller.

U.S. Oil wins WW II

Miller, a speaker with the Organization of American Historians Distinguished Lectureship Series since 1999, reported that Burt E. Hull of the Texas Company, “was what one might call the ‘dean of the pipeliners’ in the U.S. Under his direction the Big Inch was completed in record time.”

The pipelines, both finished before the D-Day invasion at Normandy on June 6, 1944, made possible the delivery of huge quantities of oil and its refined products for Operation Overlord, the landing in northern France, Miller explained in his oil history.

Between January 11 and February 28, 1942, 74 ships were attacked and all but one were sunk or damaged — with no losses to the U-boats. Photo courtesy National Museum of the U.S. Navy.

U.S. oil supplies were indispensable in manufacturing synthetic rubber for tires, lubricants for machinery, and fuel for mechanized forces. Using 100-octane aviation gasoline proved essential for achieving Allied air superiority.

“Now, it cannot be stated too forcefully,” Miller concluded, “American oil, which amounted in all to 6 billion barrels, out of a total of 7 billion barrels consumed by the Allies for the period of World War Two, brought victory! Without the prodigious delivery of oil from the U. S. this global war, quite frankly, could never have been won.”

Post-War Oil and Natural Gas Pipelines

After the war, the famous pipelines became war surplus property. Uncle Sam put them up for sale. “The pipelines became the focus of a clash of interest groups, with the oil and gas industry wanting to convert them to natural gas pipelines and the railroad and coal industries opposing this,” noted the Texas State Historical Association.

Texas Eastern Transmission, today part of Spectra Energy, bought both pipelines in 1947.

The Surplus Property Administration hired an engineering firm, which recommended the pipelines be converted to natural gas transmission. A four-month lease with the Tennessee Gas and Transmission Company proved natural gas transmission feasible, which led to their being auctioned.

Texas Eastern Transmission Corporation  — created specifically to bid on the War Assets Administration sale — purchased the war surplus pipelines. The company submitted its winning bid of $143,127,000 nine days after incorporating on January 30, 1947. It then managed the Big Inch and Little Big Inch pipelines for more than four decades.

In 1989, Panhandle Eastern Pipe Line Company bought Texas Eastern Transmission for $3.2 billion and became PanEnergy. Eight years later, Duke Power Company purchased PanEnergy and formed Duke Energy.

In January 2007, Spectra Energy separated from Duke Energy to become an independent publicly traded, natural gas company — and owner of the two historic pipelines.

Learn more about U.S. pipeline infrastructure in Trans-Alaska pipeline history.

_______________________

Recommended Reading: Oil and Gas Pipeline Fundamentals (1993); Fightin’ Oil (1943); Oil: From Prospect to Pipeline (1971); The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money & Power (1991). Amazon purchases benefit the American Oil & Gas Historical Society. As an Amazon Associate, AOGHS earns a commission from qualifying purchases.

_______________________

The American Oil & Gas Historical Society (AOGHS) preserves U.S. petroleum history. Please become an AOGHS annual supporter and help maintain this energy education website and expand historical research. For more information, contact bawells@aoghs.org. © 2025 Bruce A. Wells.

Citation Information – Article Title: “Big Inch Pipelines of WW II.” Authors: B.A. Wells and K.L. Wells. Website Name: American Oil & Gas Historical Society. URL: https://aoghs.org/petroleum-in-war/oil-pipelines. Last Updated: November 5, 2025. Original Published Date: April 25, 2014.

The post Big Inch Pipelines of WW II appeared first on American Oil & Gas Historical Society.

Commissioned on March 12, 1914, the USS Texas was the last American battleship built using engines with coal-fired boilers. Converted to burn fuel oil in 1925, the “Mighty T” became even more dominant at sea during the worldwide maritime change from coal to oil power.

When the Industrial Revolution ended the “Age of Sail,” supplies of coal that fired the boilers of steam-powered ships became a strategic resource. Worldwide “coaling stations” were essential at a time when oil was used as an axle grease or resource for making lamp kerosene.

Commissioned in 1914 with coal-powered boilers, the USS Texas converted to fuel oil in 1925, becoming “the most powerful weapon in the world, the most complex product of an industrial nation just beginning to become a force in global events,” according to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, which has administered the “Mighty T” since 1983.

But as Pennsylvania oilfield discoveries continued, Congress in 1866 appropriated $5,000 to evaluate petroleum as a potential replacement for coal to fire the Navy’s boilers. The experts decided to stay with coal.

“The conclusion arrived at was that convenience, health, comfort and safety were against the use of petroleum in steam vessels,” reported Admiral George Henry Preble.

“The only advantage shown was a not very important reduction in the bulk and weight of fuel carried,” the admiral added.

Coal vs. Fuel Oil Power

In Great Britain — with its plentiful supplies of coal — the Admiralty also resisted making the coal-to-oil switch, according to Royal Navy historian Steven Gray. “Britain, by this point, was already the leader in naval, trade and industrial power, and this control of coaling resources only served to strengthen its grasp of power,” he noted in 2011.

USS Texas was the last American battleship to be built with coal-fired boilers. Sailors shoveled over 124,000 cubic feet of coal (2,891 tons) to fill its bunkers. Photos courtesy History Magazine, March 2006.

“Despite the many advantages that oil held over coal for naval ships (cleaner, easier to refuel, more powerful, etc.), the fact that Britain did not own a supply of oil made the decision to switch painful,” Gray explained. “With it, Britain bought a majority share of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, and the age of ‘petro-politics’ began.”

The Spanish-American War of 1898 changed the U.S. Navy’s mind about using coal for fuel. For the first time, coal-fired war vessels had to fight far from the continental shores. Despite American victories in Manila Bay in the Philippines and Santiago de Cuba, hard strategic lessons were learned about fueling coal-powered battleships.

Fleets of coal-powered ships required regular visits to strategically placed coaling stations across the world. A battleship burned up to 10 tons of coal every hour, producing dense smoke and tons of ash. Photo courtesy Navy Archives.

Coal-fired boilers not only produced dense smoke, they created tons of ash. Sailors (with ratings of coal heaver and later, coal passer) labored with shovels to feed massive boilers.

Range limitations and resupply needs made coaling stations critical. When the Spanish fleet tried to run the American blockade of Santiago, four American ships were absent…re-coaling 45 miles away.

“Coaling ship” was a major undertaking. “Our ship held about 2,000 tons of the stuff,” recalled a coal passer from the battleship USS Connecticut in 1907.

“All the deckhands would go down into the collier and fill these big bags with about 500 pounds,” the American sailor added. “Then they’d hoist ‘em over to us down in the coal bunkers and we’d spread out the coal with shovels until all the bunkers — about 20 — were full to the top.”

Coal gives way to Oil

With lessons learned from the Spanish-American War experience, fuel oil began to replace coal in U.S. warships. Petroleum supplies became more abundant within America’s borders in the early 1900s as the oilfield at Spindletop and other major discoveries emerged.

The Spindletop field, which produced more oil than the rest of the world’s oilfields combined, launched the modern U.S. petroleum industry. The discovery well near Beaumont hastened the military’s coal-to-oil transition. Oil produced far more energy per pound than coal and vastly simplified the logistics of resupply.

The use of oil-fired boilers changed maritime design dramatically and contributed to the development of massive new battleships.

Designated a National Historic Landmark in 1977, the “Mighty T” served as a museum battleship docked at La Porte, Texas. In August 2022, it arrived at a Galveston shipyard for $35 million in hull work by Gulf Copper Dry Dock & Rig Repair. Photo courtesy thirdcoastdrone.com.

On July 2, 1910, as the Navy converted from coal to oil-burning ships, President William Howard Taft established three Naval Petroleum Reserves.

Concerns about an assured oil supply in the event of war or a national emergency had resulted in the Pickett Act of 1910, which authorized the president to withdraw large areas of potential oil-bearing lands in California and Wyoming as sources of fuel for the Navy.

Sailors shoveled 2,890 tons of coal from barges to fill the USS Texas’ coal bunkers.

Within 15 years, the properties that made up the Naval Petroleum and Oil Shale Reserves included three petroleum and three oil shale reserves. A Naval Petroleum Reserve Number Four, on the north slope of Alaska Territory, was added in 1923.

As not only the largest owner of oil lands, but as a prospective large consumer of oil by reason of the increasing use of fuel oil by the Navy, the federal government is directly concerned both in encouraging rational development and at the same time insuring (sic) the longest possible life to the oil supply. — December 6, 1910, message to Congress by President Taft

By 1916, the Navy had commissioned its first two capital ships with oil-fired boilers, the USS Nevada and the USS Oklahoma. To resupply them, “oilers” were designed to transfer fuel while at anchor, although underway replenishment was possible in fair seas.

During World War I, a single oiler refueled 34 destroyers in the mid-Atlantic — introducing a new era in maritime logistics. The sailors’ rating of “coal passer” passed into history by 1917.

“When the USS Texas was commissioned on March 12, 1914, she was the most powerful weapon in the world, the most complex product of an industrial nation just beginning to become a force in global events,” noted one military historian. 

The “Mighty T” converted from coal to oil-fired boilers in 1925.

Designated by the Texas Legislature as the official “State Ship of Texas” in 1995, the USS Texas was the first and oldest US battleship to become a permanent floating museum. Today under the jurisdiction of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, ship operations are assisted by the Battleship Texas Foundation.

_______________________________

Recommended Reading:  Historic Battleship Texas: The Last Dreadnought (2007); The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money & Power (2008). Your Amazon purchase benefits the American Oil & Gas Historical Society. As an Amazon Associate, AOGHS earns a commission from qualifying purchases.

_______________________________

The American Oil & Gas Historical Society (AOGHS) preserves U.S. petroleum history. Please become an AOGHS annual supporter and help maintain this energy education website and expand historical research. For more information, contact bawells@aoghs.org. © 2025 Bruce A. Wells. All rights reserved.

Citation Information – Article Title: “Petroleum and Sea Power.” Authors: B.A. Wells and K.L. Wells. Website Name: American Oil & Gas Historical Society. URL: https://aoghs.org/petroleum-in-war/petroleum-and-sea-power. Last Updated: June 28, 2025. Original Published Date: March 1, 2008.

The post Petroleum and Sea Power appeared first on American Oil & Gas Historical Society.

Secret pipelines unwound from massive spools to reach French ports and transport vital oil across the English Channel after the June 6, 1944, D-Day landings.

Wartime planners knew that following the Normandy invasion, Allied forces would need vast quantities of petroleum to continue the advance into Europe. The Allies also knew any tankers trying to reach French ports would be vulnerable to Luftwaffe attacks. A secret plan relied on new undersea pipeline technologies.

To prevent fuel shortages from stalling the invasion, the top-secret “Operation PLUTO” — Pipe Line Under The Ocean — became a key Allied strategy. It would fuel victory with oil production from the U.S. petroleum industry.

The Royal Air Force in 1944 produced a film including Disney’s dog Pluto and a “conundrum.” Image courtesy Imperial War Museum.

Although by 1942 the industry had laid thousands of pipe miles across all manner of terrain, to span the English Channel would require an unprecedented leap in technology. The channel was deep, the French ports distant, and the hazards unpredictable. In great secrecy, two approaches were developed.

Undersea Pipeline Technology

The first PLUTO system required a new kind of pipe that looked more like an undersea communications cable than an oil pipeline. It exploited existing subsea cable technology, but instead of a bundle of wiring at its core, a three-inch flexible lead pipe would carry fuel.

Each mile of this new pipe would use over 46 tons of lead, steel tape and armored wire – crossing almost 70 miles from Isle of Wight to Cherbourg.

Modified to carry pipelines for Operation PLUTO, the Liberty-class ship Arthur M. Huddell later laid communication cables and a secret sound surveillance system. U.S. Maritime Administration drawing courtesy Library of Congress.

Unique ships would be needed to lay this new pipe under the channel. No existing communications cable-laying ship could do it.

Described as the workhorses of World War II, Liberty ships included the Arthur M. Huddell, modified to carry pipelines for use in Operation PLUTO. The vessel later laid communication cables for the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (ATT) and the Cold War’s secret Sound Surveillance System (SOSUS).

A civilian passenger vessel, London, was the first to be modified to accommodate a huge spool around which the new pipe would be coiled. The first pipeline from Isle of Wight to Cherbourg was laid on August 14, 1944, with another to follow.

Floating Conundrums

An alternative approach proved even more successful. This method used three-inch steel pipe, which had proven to be flexible and durable in the oilfields of Iraq and Burma. The steel pipe could be wrapped around giant drums.

Pipeline was wound onto enormous floating “conundrums” designed to spool off the pipe when towed. As the spools unwound, the pipe settled to the bottom of the English Channel.

Welders assembled 20-foot sections of pipe into 4,000-foot lengths. The pipeline was wound onto enormous floating “conundrums” that were designed to spool off the pipe when towed.

Gen. Dwight Eisenhower declared Operation PLUTO, “Second in daring only to the artificial ‘Mulberry’ harbors”

These deployment systems weighed 1,600 tons each and were pulled by three tugboats from the British site at Dungeness to the French port of Boulogne, 31 miles away. As the spools unwound, the pipe settled to the bottom of the English Channel.

Ultimately, using both pipelaying methods, 17 pipelines supplied thousands of gallons of fuel to Boulogne.  By March 1945, one million gallons of fuel were being delivered each day and Allied success was assured.

Among the collections of the Imperial War Museums is a secret Operation PLUTO film produced by the Royal Air Force in 1944, “with detailed coverage of the network of pipes and pumping stations on the English coast, the manufacturing process of the main types of undersea pipeline used and coverage of various sea trials of pipeline laying equipment.”

An earlier project to fuel the Allied war effort led to the longest U.S. pipeline construction project ever undertaken – two lines spanning 1,200 miles from Texas oilfields to eastern refineries (see Big Inch Pipelines of WWII).

The end of World War II brought a hiatus to development of undersea pipeline technology. In the shallow Gulf of Mexico, the petroleum industry continued laying pipe by welding individual lengths of oil and gas pipe together aboard barges. The process required frequent halts for new sections to be added.

But by the 1960s, the World War II engineering feat of reel-laying began to reappear in the offshore industry. Operation PLUTO precedents can be seen in modern pipe-laying vessels unrolling coiled pipe to remarkable lengths.

The massive, towed drums have receded into history. Coiled pipe reels now ride aboard specialized vessels — constructing a subsea infrastructure that safely connects oil and natural gas production platforms with refineries on shore.

The MV Solitaire set a world record in 2007 for an ultra-deep pipeline installation that reached depths of 9,100 feet.

In 2007, the Mitsubishi-built MV Solotaire laid pipe to a record-setting depth of 9,100 feet. Capable of holding more than 22,000 tons of 60-inch diameter pipe, the ship can lay down almost six miles in a day.

D-Day Jack-Up Rigs: Mulberrys

“Second in daring only to the Mulberry Harbours, was PLUTO.” – Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower.

The D-Day logistics of supplying troops put ashore on Omaha and Gold beaches in June 1944 included highly classified construction of artificial harbors, codenamed Mulberrys – employing the ancestors of today’s jack-up rigs.

Mulberrys used barges 200 feet long and 60 feet wide – each with four retractable 60-foot pylons to provide platforms to support floating causeways that extended to the beaches. Tons of supplies and equipment came ashore in the massive effort. Offshore drilling companies adopted this jack-up pier technology after the war.

San Francisco, December 15, 1958: “Seemingly towering above the Golden Gate Bridge, this ungainly barge with towering legs proceeds on its way towards the open sea. The towers, which will eventually serve as legs reaching to the ocean floor, were raised again after passing the bridge.”

Offshore exploration advanced rapidly after Kerr McGee’s 1947 success with the first producing well out of sight of land, the KerrMac No. 16, which stood in only 20 feet of water in the Gulf of Mexico. Surplus World War II tenders supplied these drilling operations.

Within ten years, in addition to tender-serviced platforms in shallow waters, jack-up rigs equipped with much larger pylons were operating successfully to depths of more than 150 feet.

Pylons grew in length from the original 60 feet to almost 300 feet. Col. Leon B. DeLong of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers continued developing D-Day’s jack-up rig concept. After the war, DeLong designed platforms that began operating as Modular Offshore Drilling Units (MODU) miles from shore (see Offshore Oil History).

Learn about another top-secret World War II “English Project” in Roughnecks of Sherwood Forest.

_______________________

Recommended Reading: Code Name MULBERRY: The Planning Building and Operation of the Normandy Harbours (1977). Your Amazon purchase benefits the American Oil & Gas Historical Society. As an Amazon Associate, AOGHS earns a commission from qualifying purchases.

_______________________

The American Oil & Gas Historical Society (AOGHS) preserves U.S. petroleum history. Please become an AOGHS annual supporter and help maintain this energy education website and expand historical research. For more information, contact bawells@aoghs.org. © 2025 Bruce A. Wells.

Citation Information – Article Title: “PLUTO, Secret Pipelines of WWII.” Authors: B.A. Wells and K.L. Wells. Website Name: American Oil & Gas Historical Society. URL: https://aoghs.org/petroleum-in-war/secret-pipelines. Last Updated: June 7, 2025. Original Published Date: February 3, 2010.

The post PLUTO, Secret Pipelines of WWII appeared first on American Oil & Gas Historical Society.

After burning oilfield facilities at a creek in northwestern Virginia (soon to be West Virginia), Confederate Cavalry Gen. William “Grumble” Jones reported to Gen. Robert E. Lee: “Men of experience estimated the oil destroyed at 150,000 barrels. It will be many months before a large supply can be had from this source…”

On May 9, 1863, the booming oilfield community at Burning Springs fell to the rebel cavalry raiders led by Gen. Jones. His four regiments of Virginia cavalry burned cable-tool drilling derricks, production equipment, storage tanks, and thousands of barrels of oil.

“The First Virginia (Rebel) cavalry at halt. Sketched from nature by Mr. A. R. Waud.” From Harper’s Weekly, September 27, 1862. Gen. Jones’ Brigade consisted of the 6th, 7th, 11th, 12th Virginia Cavalry Regiments and the 35th Virginia Cavalry Battalion. Photo courtesy Library of Congress.

The surprise attack south of Parkersburg along the Kanawha River by Gen. Jones marked the first time an oilfield was targeted in war, “making it the first of many oilfields destroyed in war,” proclaimed oil historian and author David L. McKain (1934-2014) in Where it All Began: The story of the people and places where the oil & gas industry began: West Virginia and southeastern Ohio.

The Burning Springs oilfield (near Elizabeth) was destroyed by Confederate raiders in May 1863 when Gen. William “Grumble” Jones and 1,300 troopers attacked in what some call the first oilfield destroyed in a war. Map courtesy Oil & Gas Museum, Parkersburg, West Virginia.

 According to McKain’s 1994 book, after the oilfield attack, Gen. Jones reported his cavalry troops left rows of burning oil tanks, a “scene of magnificence that might well carry joy to every patriotic heart.” 

Making West Virginia

“After the Civil War, the industry was revived and over the next fifty years the booms spread over almost all the counties of the state,” explained McKain, who from 1970 to 1991 was president of Acme Fishing Tool Company, founded by his grandfather at the height of West Virginia’s oil and natural gas boom in 1900.

A drilling boom began at Burning Springs when an 1861 well produced 100 barrels of oil a day.

McKain, who established an oil museum in Parkersburg, spent decades collecting artifacts on display in the former company warehouse. He was often seen driving his black truck loaded with muddy, early 20th century oilfield engines and other equipment.

Once often seen driving his pickup loaded with historic oilfield equipment, David McKain founded a Parkersburg oil museum — and built exhibits at Burning Springs. Photo by Bruce Wells.

Almost a century before the Civil War, George Washington had acquired 250 acres in the region because it contained oil and natural gas seeps. “This was in 1771, making the father of our country the first petroleum industry speculator,” he noted. The Parkersburg historian authored several books, including a detailed history of the West Virginia petroleum industry.

Detail from 1864 “Map of the oil district of West Virginia,” including Burning Springs (at Elizabeth) in Wirt County courtesy Norman B. Leventhal Map Center Collection, Boston Public Library.

As early as 1831, natural gas was moved in wooden pipes from wells to be used as a manufacturing heat source by the Kanawha salt manufacturers.

Rathbone Well and Statehood

Modern West Virginia’s petroleum industry began when it was part of Virginia.  John Castelli ”Cass” Rathbone produced oil from an 1861 well drilled near Burning Springs Run in what today is West Virginia. His well had reached 300 feet and began producing 100 barrels of oil a day.

Rathbone drilled more wells along the Kanawha River south of Parkersburg — beginning the first petroleum boom to take place outside the Pennsylvania oil regions

In 1861, at Burning Springs, Rathbone had used a spring pole — an ancient drilling technology — to drill to a depth of 303 feet, and the well began producing 100 barrels of oil a day. Soon, a commercial oil industry began in the towns of Petroleum and California near Parkersburg, which later became a center for oilfield service and supply companies.

The Rathbone well and commercial oil sales at Petroleum marked the true beginnings of the oil and gas industry in the United States, according to McKain.

David L. McKain established the Oil and Gas Museum at 119 Third Street in Parkersburg, West Virginia. As early as 1831, local salt manufacturers used natural gas as a heat source. Photo by Bruce Wells.

McKain, the founder of the Oil and Gas Museum in Parkersburg, maintained that the wealth created by petroleum was the key factor for bringing statehood to West Virginia during the Civil War.

“Many of the founders and early politicians were oil men — governor, senator and congressman — who had made their fortunes at Burning Springs in 1860-1861,” McKain explained.

President Abraham Lincoln issued a proclamation admitting the state on June 20, 1863.

Grumble burns an Oilfield

When Confederate Gen. William “Grumble” Jones and 1,300 troopers attacked Burning Springs in the spring of 1863, they destroyed equipment and thousands of barrels of oil.

Confederate cavalry Gen. William “Grumble” Jones.

“The wells are owned mainly by Southern men, now driven from their homes, and their property appropriated either by the Federal Government or Northern men,” said Gen. Jones of his raid on the early oil boom town.

Gen. Jones officially reported to Gen. Robert E. Lee: All the oil, the tanks, barrels, engines for pumping, engine-houses, and wagons — in a word, everything used for raising, holding, or sending it off was burned.  Men of experience estimated the oil destroyed at 150,000 barrels. It will be many months before a large supply can be had from this source, as it can only be boated down the Little Kanawha when the waters are high.

The West Virginia Oil and Gas Museum was established thanks to David McKain, who added a small museum at the site of Burning Springs and an oil history park at California (27 miles east of Parkersburg on West Virginia 47). In addition to his Where It All Began, McKain in 2004 published The Civil War and Northwestern Virginia.

Learn more about petroleum’s strategic roles in articles linked at Oil in War.

_______________________

Recommended Reading: The Civil War and Northwestern Virginia — The Fascinating Story Of The Economic, Military and Political Events In Northwestern Virginia During the Tumultuous Times Of The Civil War (2004).  Where it All Began: The story of the people and places where the oil & gas industry began: West Virginia and southeastern Ohio (1994). Your Amazon purchase benefits the American Oil & Gas Historical Society. As an Amazon Associate, AOGHS earns a commission from qualifying purchases.

_______________________

The American Oil & Gas Historical Society (AOGHS) preserves U.S. petroleum history. Please become an AOGHS annual supporter and help maintain this energy education website and expand historical research. For more information, contact bawells@aoghs.org. © 2025 Bruce A. Wells.

Citation Information – Article Title: “Confederates attack Oilfield.” Authors: B.A. Wells and K.L. Wells. Website Name: American Oil & Gas Historical Society. URL:https://aoghs.org/oil-almanac/confederates-attack-oilfield. Last Updated: May 1, 2025. Original Published Date: May 5, 2013.

The post Confederates attack Oilfield appeared first on American Oil & Gas Historical Society.