Collection: Watchet Market House Museum

Collection-level records:

• Collection overview (Cornucopia)

  Maritime Collection

  This is the major collection in the museum and includes a diverse range of artefacts relating to Watchet and the sea. There are paintings, photographs, at least fourteen models and a set of shipwrights’ tools. The paintings include six pictures by Thomas Chidgey, one dating to before 1860. Among the many maritime objects are a figurehead of Coronella; a barometer salvaged from the schooner Josephine Marie which sank in Watchet harbour; a canvas sea anchor from a World War II airborne lifeboat; a sea chest; an engraved porthole from HMS Fox; the port and starboard navigation lights from Arron Monarch; and a brass casting of a ship. There are also sail making items.

  Subjects

  Maritime

  Social History Collection

  The collection includes the town crier’s bell; the trade plate of J Chidgey; the workhouse bell; information about the local paper mill; and photographs, public notices, documents and ephemera.

  Subjects

  Social History

  Transport Collection

  There is a plan of the Watchet section of the GWR railway; a painting of a railway engine; and a model of a railway incline.

  Subjects

  Transport

  Archaeology Collection

  There are some palaeolithic and Mesolithic implements and Romano-British artefacts.

  Subjects

  Archaeology

  Geology Collection

  There is a large fossil ichthyosaurus on loan from Somerset County Museum; a mammoth tooth; and a large fossil ammonite as well as a small number of other fossils.

  Subjects

  Geology

  Numismatics Collection

  The collection includes three rare Saxon pennies, a medieval penny and replicas of coins from the Saxon mint.

  Subjects

  Numismatics

  Source: Cornucopia

  Date: Not known, but before 2015

  Licence: CC BY-NC