Collection: Totnes Museum

Collection-level records:

• Collection overview (Cornucopia)

  Archaeology Collection

  The collection includes the excavated finds from Totnes Castle discovered in 1954.

  Subjects

  Archaeology

  Numismatics Collection

  The museum has some Saxon coins minted in Totnes within the numismatic collection.

  Subjects

  Numismatics

  Biology Collection

  There is a walled herb garden in addition to the small collection of artefacts.

  Subjects

  Biology

  Personalia Collection

  There are artefacts and archives relating to Charles Babbage, the computer pioneer; and W J Wills, the Australian explorer.

  Subjects

  Personalia

  Transport Collection

  There is a variety of items from the South Devon Railway, including lamps, badges, ceremonial shovels and railway documents.

  Subjects

  Transport

  Science and Industry Collection

  The collection includes artefacts from local trades and industries including 18th century clock making

  Subjects

  Science and Industry

  Social History Collection

  Artefacts of local trades are complemented by domestic artefacts, mostly of the 18th and 19th centuries. There is a variety of artefacts from the Park Pharmacy Trust, Plymouth, c.1900.

  Subjects

  Social History

  Decorative and Applied Art Collection

  Furniture of the Jacobean period is well represented in the collection with both cased and turned furniture. There is a local oak tester bed, c.1637; two local oak carved arm chairs, c.1600; an oak table, c.1700; a walnut table, c.1800; a mahogany wash stand, c.1900; and a carved press, c.1700.

  Subjects

  Decorative and Applied Arts

  Archives Collection

  The study centre within the museum houses an extensive archive relating to the museum’s collections, the history of Totnes, its people and the locality. It is also a service point of the Devon Record Office. It holds bound works from St Mary’s Parvis, the Rutter library and the Mechanics Institute Library and holds a full collection of Totnes Times from 1860 to the latest bound volumes, in both original copy and microfilm up to 1939. The centre holds on microfilm tithe maps and apportionments, OS reference plans. local parish registers and the International Genealogical Index for Devon 1984. There are indexes of Census returns for 1841, 1851, 1861 on computer and from 1871 and 1881 in hard copy. There are Election returns, local apprenticeship records, rentals and reports on the town’s built heritage. The work of the Totnes Community Archive 1981-1985 constitutes a resource in pictorial, text and oral history form.

  Subjects

  Archives

  Other

  Subjects

  Medicine; Music; Oral History; Agriculture; Arms and Armour; Costume and Textile; Ethnography; Fine Art; Geology; Maritime; Medals

  Source: Cornucopia

  Date: Not known, but before 2015

  Licence: CC BY-NC