Mammoth find was made with a digger

A quarry worker has come up with new information which could rewrite the history of one of Shropshire's biggest ever discoveries - the uncovering of the Condover mammoth in 1986.

The discovery of the mammoth bones in the Condover quarry caused a sensation in the scientific world and when they were dated to around 12,700 years ago it proved that mammoths had roamed Britain 5,000 years after they had been thought extinct.

In our recent 1980s supplement we told of the competing claims for credit for the discovery between a group of quarry workers, and Eve Roberts of Bayston Hill, who had been walking her dog and had alerted the authorities to the find.

But now Andy Edwards, of Baschurch, says that the real finder was an unidentified contractor who kept his mouth shut for fear of getting into trouble.

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"I still work at the quarry. It says in the article about this woman finding them, but it was actually another gentleman. He was the guy who actually dug the bones out of the ground," he said.

"He dug them out with a drag line - a rope operated excavator. He was a contractor on hire to ARC at the time, as was the machine.

"Unfortunately, I don't know his name. I think he might have been somewhere from the Stoke area.

"He put the bones to one side. He had worked in a quarry previously - not for ARC, but another company - and had pointed out some bones and raised the alarm, but had been threatened with the sack on that occasion, so he said nothing."

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"He did not want to create any problems because he knew the rules and regulations and that the place would be brought to a grinding halt. These bones had been there a couple of days before the alarm was raised.

"He found them at a depth of about 30 to 40ft. He was down quite a way.

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"They were trying to get to the bottom of the clay to see if there was any gravel underneath."

Further excavations after the initial discovery uncovered further bones from one adult and three juvenile mammoths.

By Toby Neal