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The Tale of Peter Speke's Signet Ring
This is the signet ring that Jeff Speke's father inherited from his father Peter Speke on his 21st birthday in 1956. It was lost in 1985 and found again by an EDMDC detectorist in 2025. Read the complete story below!
The motto roughly translates as above ethereal power. The double headed eagle and porcupine come from the family's Norman origins, whilst the crocodiles, hippo and Nile were added on permission from Queen Victoria after John Hanning Speke became the first European to see lake Ukerewe on 30 July 1858. He returned in 1862 and saw a large rive leave Lake Victoria at what is now Jinja in Uganda.
Jeff Speke's father, Peter Speke, was born into a long established Somerset family in 1935. Unfortunately he was killed in North Africa in World War II. Peter's mother remarried a Canadian soldier and so he grew up in Canada.
Dad inheritied very few personal possessions from his father and hence on his 21st birthday in 1956 his mother had a new signet ring engraved with the family crest in Canada. He wore that ring with pride.
In 1965 Peter and his immediate family returned to Somerset, and when a farming tenant retired switched from being a solicitor to being a farmer. He ran quite a large farm based around a milking herd based at Shrubbery Farm.
Part of the farm was naturally used to grow silage for the cows. Around 1985 Peter was working in the silage clamp, and lost the ring somewhere in the grass nearby.
Peter Speke's granddaughter Francesca with Peter
Jeff Speke with EDMDC detectorist who found the ring
Fast forward 40 years to 2025. Peter had his 90th birthday in June. Then the East Devon Metal Detecting Club visited the site on 7 September having detected a number of times on the farm before. Towards the end of the day a deep signal was detected and a gold ring was unearthed. After cleaning and some research it was found that the ring had the Speke crest and was mad eof 14 carat gold, commonly used in Canada and has the name 'Birks' - a jewellers in Toronto - and therefore was in fact Peter's ring! A week later the ring was returned to Peter's son Jeff. Peter was of course thrilled. He wore that ring every day until he died a happy man on 30 October 2025. This story was used as part of the eology at Peter's recent memorial service.
NOTE: If you have lost a metallic object of value, you request EDMDC to look for it by filling in a request HERE selecting "Lost Personal Item" from the Others area.
