An elaborate three-tier antique bronze fountain weighing approximately a ton was stolen from the garden of an estate in Fisherton de la Mere, near Warminster. The theft took place between October 8th and October 10th.
The Baroque style fountain features a cherub in an scallop shell blowing a horn as the top tier. Four cherubs dance around the central over an even larger scallop shell on the middle tier. At the base are four fantastical dolphins, fish or sea monsters with their mouths open and tails vertical against the column.
Wiltshire Police have now launched an appeal for any information about the theft — people who were in the area during the time and may have seen or heard something suspicious, anyone who sees the fountain for sale online, etc. They’re calling it unique, but It’s not. The design is still being manufactured today, and antique versions can found at auctions.
As an antique, it is worth an estimated £10,000 ($13,350), but I very much doubt anybody’s going to be offering a one-ton sculpture on Facebook Marketplace. I bet this is a scrap metal theft. People have been stealing funerary plaques and urns from cemeteries for the metal value, so the sheer quantity of bronze in a piece like this would make it attractive to very bold (and strong) thieves. The best chance of finding it is if a scrap metal dealer has scruples.
Scrap metal dealer with scruples? Never going to happen, we affix plastic tags to the copper wire at our well sites, they say property of X. We have had our lawyers send letters to every scrap dealer with 250km telling them anything with those tags is stolen property. Yet if we get hit we find the copper wire with the tags at a scrap yard. They always claim the seller told them they had permission to sell it. They know its stolen but don’t care .
Thanks for all the history articles, your one of my 3 daily reads.
To Hell with Antichrist and part taking scrap metal dealers!!! 🔥️
Stealing works from cemeteries is even more gross than normal thefts 🙁