A small bomb has been discovered on farmland at Ardleigh.

It was found yesterday at Pole House Nursery, in Harwich Road, close to the village's boundary with Lawford.

Smallholder Peter Wensak said: "We had been ripping out old rabbit fencing along a strawberry field with a digger over the past couple of weeks.

"The ground was being tidied when I noticed a hard lump, which I thought at first was a piece of an old farm implement."

Mr Wensak, an Ardleigh parish councillor, said he had left it there but later, having thought about it, decided it might be a bomb.

He went back to take another look, picked it up and took it into the yard of the smallholding, which specialises in growing strawberries for most of the year.

He then called the police, who in turn called the Army and a bomb disposal team from Colchester, which was soon on the scene to remove the bomb.

Published Tuesday August 17, 2004

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