Prickwillow Drainage Engine Museum

The Fenland Flood of 1947

Fenland, the low-lying area of Eastern England, was devastated by a massive flood in 1947. The story of this terrible flood is told with reminiscences illustrated with archive images.

Filmed on location at Wicken Fen National Nature Reserve, courtesy The National Trust.

Please visit Prickwillow Museum to learn more about Fenland and the great floods.

Reminiscences portrayed by Gill Fraser Lee. Filmed and produced by HistoryNeedsYou.

Created in association with the Ouse Washes Landscape Partnership
and the Heritage Lottery Fund

Prickwillow Ploughing Festival 2015

Heavy horses, tremendous tractors and vintage vehicles at Prickwillow Museum in October 2015. Prickwillow Museum, near Ely in Cambridgeshire, tells the story of how Fenland was transformed by drainage. Fenland now contains the richest farmland in England and this is celebrated by the annual Prickwillow Ploughing Festival.

Visit Prickwillow Museum to see the mighty engines that transformed the landscape of Fenland PrickwillowMuseum.com

Created in association with the Ouse Washes Landscape Partnership ousewashes.org.uk

Filmed by John Marrow from the WWT Welney media team. Edited and produced by HistoryNeedsYou.com

Moonshiners MCC - 2016 - Drifter to Prickwillow

Time to head out East - to the drainage engine museum at Prickwillow . . . . and the sun was out all day.

prickwillow ploughing day 2013

We present a selection of clips from the Autumn Ploughing Festival at Prickwillow drainage engine museum October 2013.

4th Prickwillow Ploughing Festival

An event which is quickly becoming a tradition in the Fen calendar. The weekend features many attractions, including:
Heavy Horse and Vintage/Classic Tractor Ploughing • Working Displays and Stationary Engines • Classic Cars • Tractors and Commercials • Arts and Crafts • Trade Stands • Real Ale Bar • Full Catering • Music and Entertainment for all the Family.

Prickwiillow Engine Trust - Museum of Fenland Drainage

The mainstay of the collection is the six large diesel pumping engines, all British-built and of early to mid twentieth century design, rescued from Fenland pumping stations. The Mirrlees engine is the original engine installed at Prickwillow in 1924, the remainder have been rescued from other sites.

The large engines are complemented by a collection of small, portable, engines by Lister, Petter and other manufacturers.

These engines are augmented by explanatory boards, photographs, historic maps, and other exhibits consisting of agricultural implements and artefacts.


Holberg Suite, Op. 40 (string orchestra arr.) - Extract
The Holberg Suite, originally named Fra Holbergs tid (literally from Holberg's Time) is a suite in five movements written by Edvard Grieg in 1884, celebrating the 200th anniversary of the birth of playwright Ludvig Holberg. The work is subtitled Suite in an old style (suite i gammel stil in its original Norwegian), and is numbered as Op. 40. The suite recalls musical styles and forms from the past, and it has been technically compared to some of Grieg's most fine achievements. Though originally written for solo piano, it was arranged for string orchestra a year later.

The Story Of Welney - Fenland Drainage Chapter

Grand Norfolk Trek - stage 3: Ely to Shippea Hill

The third stage of my Grand Norfolk Hike. The clip was taken by the river Lark at Prickwillow. See more on the hike at martinblack.com