2013 Feb. Brooch found in garden (PV)
On 23rd February 2013, I was turning over the earth in my back garden ahead of springtime planting. This was a day I will remember.
I saw something shine, out of the corner of my eye. Reaching down, I scratched away the soil from what quickly became apparent as being a brooch. I could have ignored that completely, as all I saw in front of me were diamonds! Such a rush of excitement. The back looked corroded, the front looked like 9 set diamonds of around 3 or 4 carrots each! I dropped to my knees without a care for the trousers I had on, and dug the earth, but nothing else was there. It looked like a brooch, the pin at the back. Feeling the stones, they felt hard….expensive. And in a garden known to be 285 years old!
I swear, as a ran the short distance from the garden into the house, my mind had already spent the find! My wife wasn’t at home, so wide eyed and thrilled, I carefully washed the jewelery and using a fine paintbrush, got rid of most of the dirt. Surely this cant be real, my mind was saying. The stones felt hard to my teeth, as i tried to bite. A good sign, but i knew nothing about diamonds. So using the best method to test, that a construction manager has available…. I took a claw hammer to one of the stones on the corner and to my absolute dismay and disgust, it smashed into pieces, in what I can only describe as ‘plastic or glass’. Can diamonds shatter? No. I took the hammer to the rest of it and unfortunately every “stone” easily broke. So, I found a piece of costume jewelery. Now, I know that a few previous owners of my house may be reading this, so if this was yours, you can laugh at the afternoon I had that day and how sick I felt for a day after.