A few weeks ago two of the Year Six boys at Diptford Primary School discovered what they thought to be an old egg cup just under the surface in one corner of the school site.

With the teachers permission Henry Filtness and Tom Power continued to dig and as they did more and more objects came to the surface, ranging from stoneware bottles and jars to pieces of porcelain.

They were put in touch with Gary Mills, Chair and Founder of the Teignbridge Archaeological Society who after visiting the site and meeting with the boys agreed to host an official school Dig Day.

This is the first time the society has ever undertaken a dig on a school site.

Gary, joined by other members of the society, Ralph Allnatt, Philip Simmons and Sarah Sargent set up a number of activities to fully engage the children for the duration of the day.

Firstly the dig site was set up and run by Archaeologists Gary and Ralph; the children were each given trowels and gloves and shown exactly how to carefully remove finds from the ground.

Secondly a wash site was set up by Sarah; here any finds would be cleaned carefully in trays with small brushes. Inside the children spent time researching the finds that had been discovered and drawing and documenting them.

For one final treat Phillipa brought along a spinning wheel, gave a talk about ancient cloth and led a class that enabled each child to have a go at felting by hand which is harder than it looks.

The quantity of finds was extraordinary and it is almost certainly the remnants of a Midden (ancient dump) dating from the mid 1800’s.

Some of the more exciting finds were;

A Ginger Beer Bottle and Glass bottle, both in perfect condition, from the Sutherlands Brewery in Totnes, a number of marmalade and preserve jars, in particular one printed with the Hartleys on the base, ink wells, a number of poison bottles and in particular a lovely small blue one as well as an intact broach pin.

All the finds date from around the same period when the Midden would have been used, which they estimate may be around from the mid 1800’s to early 1900’s

Diptford is a relatively small village, the church was built in 1226 and so is celebrating its 800th anniversary this year and the school was established in 1845.

It’s a thriving, small village school with around 60 pupils aged from 3 to 11 and many of the children who attend the school are 3rd and 4th generation students from local farming families.

A spokesperson from the school said: “We can only imagine what life was like for the village around that time but uncovering these objects really helps bring the past to life and has encouraged all the kids to think about the history of the area.”

“By the end of the day they were all asking more in depth questions and wanted to know much more.”