National Benzole

National Benzole was a petroleum brand used in the United Kingdom from 1919 to the 1960s. In 1934 the company acquired Power Petroleum. In the early 1960s it was renamed as simply National. The company was founded in February 1919 in a room next to the boiler house of the Gas Light and Coke Company in London’s Horseferry Road. In the early years of the century, benzole production had been small scale. But, because it was as good at propelling shells as motor cars, production was expanded massively during World War One. And this led to something of a post-war “benzole-lake”. Gathered in a room around a trestle table, a group of men in the know, including Samuel Henshaw, then the chairman of the Staffordshire Chemical Company, reckoned...