pieces of silver coin, of a description they had never seen before.
Sir Oswald Mosley, Bart.,[1] in referring to the history of this Earl of Lancaster, gives the following account of the finding of these coins: 'Mr Webb, the proprietor of the cotton mills at Tutbury, being desirous to obtain a greater fall for what is commonly termed the tail-water of the wheel which works the machinery of his mill, prolonged an embankment between the mill-stream and the river much farther below the bridge than it formerly extended; and as a part of his plan, it became requisite to remove a considerable quantity of gravel out of the bed of the river, from the end of his water-course as far up as the new bridge. While they were engaged in this operation, on Wednesday, the 1st of June, 1831, the workmen found several small pieces of silver coin about sixty yards below the bridge; as they proceeded up the river, they continued to find more; these were discovered lying about half-a-yard below the surface of the gravel, apparently as if they had been washed down from a higher source. On the following Tuesday the men left their work in the expectation of finding more coin, and they were not disappointed, for several thousands were obtained that day; as they advanced up the river they became more successful; and the next day, Wednesday, June the 8th, they discovered the grand deposit of coins from whence the others had been washed, about thirty yards below the present bridge, and from four to five feet beneath the surface of the gravel. The coins were here so abundant, that one hundred and fifty were turned up in a single
- ↑ History of the Town and Houses of Tutbury.
