Elephants in Netherbury: Tusk Find (1971)

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Documented by Sue Morse (with information received from Allan Harvey) in February 2016 Background In 1971 a main sewer was put into Netherbury to take the foul water from the village to a new pump by the bridge; the pump then pushed the sewerage from there to the main sewer which ran from Beaminster to Bridport. Before this all the foul water was emptied into the River Brit via a stone culvert. The original objective was to only send sewerage into the new pipe and continue to send all rain water via the stone culvert into the river – money ran out and only the houses below The Redes, on the corner of Bridge St and St James Rd, had their water separated and drained in this way; all other houses in the village send their foul and grey water to the pump and then away from the village. A 10ft-15ft deep trench was dug from ‘The

Square’ to the ‘Pump’; there was about 3ft of

soil, 6ft of very wet vegetable matter which

hadn’t decayed very much and then a layer of

dark thick mud.

Allan Harvey, a local resident had an interest in

archaeology and asked the workmen who were

digging the trench to notify him if anything of

interest was found. Several ‘old’ pieces of wood

were extracted and sent to the Dorset County

Museum and it was in the mud that white

decayed matter of about 6ft in length was

found.

A sample of the decayed matter was sent

to the Dorset Natural History and

Archaeological Society who then sent it

on to The British Museum (Natural

History).

Letter from the British Museum

(Natural History) to the Dorset

County Museum, 8 Dec. 1971.

(Note: The Natural History Museum was

officially separated from the British Museum

in 1963 but it was still listed as British

Museum (Natural History) until 1992 when

The British Museum name was dropped).

Netherbury

Elephants in Netherbury: Tusk Find (1971)

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Letter from Dorset County Museum to Alan Harvey, Netherbury, 19th Dec. 1971.

Elephants in Netherbury: Tusk Find (1971)

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The findings were written up in the Proceedings of the Dorset Natural History & Archaeological

Society (1971) report – see below. It has been stated by the Dorset County Museum that the reference to ‘Powerstock’ should read ‘Netherbury’ – it was reported incorrectly; there was no correction in the

report for the following year.

VOLUME 93, PAGE 39, ELEPHANT TUSK FROM POWERSTOCK [NETHERBURY]

‘During excavations for drains in Powerstock [Netherbury] bone-like material in a badly decayed state

came to light in a sticky dark clay. It was brought to Miss Samuel who sent it for identification to the

British Museum (Natural History). There it was identified as part of a tusk of an elephant. As it was in an

advanced state of decay the identification could not be precise, though it appears probable, from its

location, that its origins are likely to be Pleistocene.’

The Pleistocene is the geological period which lasted from about 2,588,000 -

11,700 years ago, spanning the world's recent period of repeated glaciations.

The article on the right was published in the Bridport and Lyme Regis News

on 31st December 1971.

Response by Dorset County Museum to a request for information - 12 February 2016 Thank you for your enquiry. Our researchers have had a look at our GMS 80, which contains the originals of the letters you attached, and also a copy of a clipping from the Bridport News referring to the BM (NH) identification. They have concluded that the reference to Powerstock in Proc DNH&AS Vol 93 was most likely an editorial slip up, as it’s highly unlikely that two identical specimens, both reported as being in drainage trenches, would have been found several miles apart in the same year. As to the main question of what happened to the specimen after it had been examined, I am afraid that we simply have no data. The researchers suspect that because the specimen was in such poor condition that the BM (NH) had only been able to give a pretty vague identification, it was just scrapped. There’s nothing in our records to suggest that the specimen was ever photographed, which would have been a lot harder work in the early 70s than it is today. We have nothing in our collection listed as being from Netherbury; the 20 or so items we have on the system from the Powerstock area are all Jurassic fossils which bear zero relation to elephant tusks. I apologise that we cannot be of more help to you in this matter, but we simply do not have the means to pursue the enquiry further. Yours sincerely Chris Corben Museum Assistant Dorset County Museum

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glaciation

Elephants in Netherbury: Tusk Find (1971)

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An email was sent to the Natural History Museum on 14 March 2016 requesting any information

they may have.

A response was received on 15 March 2016 from the curator of Pleistocene Mammals in NHM stating:

My name is Spyridoula (Roula) Pappa and I am working as a curator of Pleistocene Mammals in

NHM.

We received your email and we looked your request regarding an elephant tusk found when digging a trench in Netherbury, Dorset in 1971, but unfortunately we could not find anything matching this description in our collection.

I am sorry that we could not help you this time, but we don’t have further information about this.

Many regards,

Roula