A lucky treasure hunter from Somerset has stumbled upon the largest gold nugget ever found in the UK, and it is worth £30,000. Richard Brock, 67 was hunting in the Shropshire Hills armed with just a metal detector when he found the gold.
Richard revealed that he had to travel for three-and-a-half hours to get to the exact location to start his unforgettable treasure hunt. However, when he got there, his metal detector wasn’t working properly so he was forced to use an old one.
Despite not having his tried and trusted tool, Richard, who has been hunting for treasure for 35 years, made the find of his life. He found and dug up a golden nugget weighing an incredible 64.8g.
READ MORE Hotel accused of illegally selling alcohol and housing Bulgarians
READ MORE Police officer ‘raped victim in her home’ court told
The nugget, which has been named ‘Hiro’s Nugget’, is now set to be sold at auction. It could fetch at least £30,000 because it’s believed to be the biggest nugget of its kind ever found in England.
Dad-of-four Richard said: “I have been detecting since 1989 and decided to join the trip as a similar previous one to Australia was cancelled during the pandemic.
“So I drove three-and-a-half hours to Shropshire and I actually arrived about an hour late, thinking I’d missed the action. Everyone there had all this up-to-date kit and I bowled up with three old machines, and one of them packed in there and then.
“At first I just found a few rusty old tent pegs with this back-up detector which had a fading screen display.”
Somerset Live WhatsApp Breaking News and Top Stories
Join Somerset Live’s WhatsApp community for top stories and breaking news sent directly to your phone
Somerset Live is now on WhatsApp and we want you to join our community.
Through the app, we’ll send the latest breaking news, top stories, exclusives and much more straight to your phone.
To join our community you need to already have WhatsApp. All you need to do is click this link and select ‘Join Community’.
No one will be able to see who is signed up and no one can send messages except the Somerset Live team.
We also treat community members to special offers, promotions and adverts from us and our partners. If you don’t like our community, you can check out at any time you like.
To leave our community, click on the name at the top of your screen and choose ‘Exit group’.
If you’re curious, you can read our Privacy Notice.
After just 20 minutes of scanning the ground, Richard found the incredible treasure just five or six inches under the ground. He said after digging up the gold, he eagerly showed his prize off, which sparked other treasure hunters to swarm the same area.
Richard said: “I was a perhaps bit too honest and started showing people, and then all of a sudden I had swarms of other detectorists scanning the same area. The machine I was using was pretty much kaput – it was only half working. It just goes to show that it doesn’t really matter what equipment you use.
“If you are walking over the find and are alert enough to what might be lurking underneath the soil, that makes all the difference. I couldn’t believe it. I turned up late, was only there a matter of minutes and this treasure hunting expedition was supposed to last all day.
“I couldn’t look for anything else as I had the land owner, the organiser of the dig and every other detectorist around me trying to get a look at this nugget.”
Exactly why the record breaking gold nugget was found in the Shropshire Hills is still unknown. Areas like Much Wenlock and Wenlock Edge is an ancient landscape which was once under a prehistoric ocean and hunters often find remnants of coral in the area.
There was also a large amount of rock which originally came from Wales, a country known to be rich in gold. Richard’s discovery was made on a site believed to have been an old track or road with railway lines running through, containing stone possibly distributed from Wales.
The only previous bigger examples in Britain have been found in either Wales and Scotland. The Douglas Nugget, found in Perthshire, weighed 85.7g, while another nugget from Anglesey weighed 97.12g. The Reunion Nugget, discovered in Scotland in 2019, weighed a hefty 121.3g.