Back in May I explored a public footpath that I’d been meaning to do – one that in all the years growing up in this place I’d never walked on. It was awkward in that the gate was just off the main road but about a 10 min walk with no pavement and fast cars driving past.
The footpath started within a high hedgerow on the right hand side and open field on the other. It led toward a narrow cut-through where boundary fences started along the side where the open field was until I was walking through a dark “tunnel” pathway. I started scanning around the hedgerows and then walked alongside a farm that had a few rusty parts near the field and in the hedgerow.
I met a guy cutting the field to the farm and we chatted about the local area and I explained my interest in digging for old bottles. He said I’d be welcome to look around the edges of the field which was great, so I thought as I’d been aiming to visit the local woods, I’d bank that for another time. He also mentioned that nearby, just off a road junction near to the woods I was heading to, he’d been clearing out a grassy verge for drainage some time before and found loads of old bottles scattered about. I was completely intrigued and went to have a look for myself. The bank was just a triangle of grass on a junction, which was mostly road dust, gravel and earth. One side of it was flanked by a large hedge. I scraped my 3-pronged hand tool over the dusty earth on the triangle but found nothing. The only tools I had were a hand trowel and the scraping tool so it was quite hard work. I felt like it would be better to dig into the bank which was really overgrown and mainly sticks and weeds. When I started digging, I first found lots of modern fly-tipped stuff: An old bed spring, an empty shotgun shell, plastic crisps wrappers, and other bits of modern stuff. I instead went to the very corner of the bank and crouched down and dug there, half under a small tree. It was tough going and I did get a few weird looks from the occasional cars that drove past. The weather was really hot and I had to wear suncream. It felt nice to be amongst nature. Some walkers came past asking for directions – they were doing one of the long footpath routes. Luckily as I’d grown up around there, I was able to help. I found a single Coca-Cola bottle which was cool but then I moved on to the wood which I was heading to originally. I wasn’t expecting to find anything as the ground is carpeted in chert and small rocks but I was just looking down and found two bottles on the surface. There’s no other signs of there being dumped things there and as it’s right next to the main road, I assume it’s just stuff people threw out when driving past.
Star Find ⭐️
Seymour’s Sherborne, Dorset
As the name suggests, Seymour’s were a drinks manufacturer from Sherborne. This Facebook post has some great history about it:
Seymour’s, manufacturer of aerated table-waters, was one of Sherborne’s most successful industries, producing lemonade, pale dry ginger ale, super-carbonated soda water, cherry cider, fruit wines, ginger beer and other non-alcoholic cordials. It was particularly noted for its cleanliness, its modern methods of production, its excellent service and artistic and distinctive branding.
The company was founded in 1862 by William Seymour, a wine and spirit merchant from Stalbridge, at Greenhill in Sherborne
By 1927, Seymour’s products were available in Dorset, Somerset and Wiltshire, including Weymouth and Dorchester, Taunton, Glastonbury and Wells “and many other towns and villages”
It continued as one of the major industries in Sherborne until its closure in the 1980s
Hard to tell when this bottle originated, but it looks earlier than 1980s.
White Horse Distillers – Scotch Whisky Hip Flask c.1930s-1950s
Taken from Whiskypedia (what a name!):
In 1927 White Horse Distillers Ltd. was taken over by the Distillers Company Ltd (DCL) which, for a number of years, used it as a holding company and granted it the licence to a number of distilleries including Lagavulin and Glen Elgin.
DCL also withdrew White Horse blended whisky from its home market, concentrating on overseas sales, and, although the whisky itself is still produced, new owner Diageo dissolved White Horse Distillers Ltd. as a company in 2010.
B558 U.G.B. The U.G.B initials stand for “United Glass Bottle Manufacturers”.
Mine looks like the ones seen here: https://whisky.auction/auctions/lot/24707/white-horse
Coca-Cola bottle c.1970
I can just about make out the numbers 70 on the bottle which would date it at 1970 – these are known as “date codes”. A quick Google search found this excellent resource: https://myweatheredhome.com/dating-old-coca-cola-bottles/
