LEE RINGS REUNITED IN TOTNES - Totnes Elizabethan House and Museum

By: John Tissandier
Added: 15 March 2012

A very special delivery took place this morning at Totnes Museum. The Victoria and Albert Museum in London has very kindly granted Totnes the temporary loan of their Lee Ring allowing them to be re-united for the first time in almost four hundred years! The Lee Rings were given by the town of Totnes to Katherine and Christian, the grand-daughters of Richard Lee senior, a wealthy wool merchant. This was in gratitude for the fact that he had presented the Church Walk to the town in around 1612, to be used as an Exchange. Only one of the rings was in Totnes museum, the second Lee Ring had been lost for many years. The photograph shows Rachel Church of the V&A, and Richard Wyatt a former committee member of Totnes Museum. It is thanks to these two that the missing ring was located last autumn. Richard photographed the ring and sent the photo to many major museums. It was Rachel who remembered that the V&A had a ring on display just like it, but without knowledge of its fascinating history.

The rings will be on display to the public from Monday 19th March. The photograph also shows the newly designed display case. The formal opening will be on 23rd April and more details will follow.