Part 3: Mummy’s Hand & Vanished Wings

The salty breeze whispers secrets through the cobbled streets of Barrow-in-Furness. This time, it carries tales of not one, but two missing museum marvels: a mummy’s hand and a vanished butterfly brigade, both allegedly disappearing around the same time. Welcome to the strange tale of the Mummy’s Hand Barrow, one of Cumbria’s most curious museum mysteries.

Our story begins in the early 1990s. The Barrow Library collection, brimming with forgotten treasures, was being transferred to the newly built Dock Museum. Amidst a flurry of boxes and dust, something vanished — perhaps two things. A mummy’s hand and a butterfly collection, both part of Barrow’s lost museum artefacts, disappeared without a trace.

What Happened to the Mummy’s Hand Barrow?
Enter Charlie Hawley, the Dock Museum’s very own “Indiana Jane.” Her meticulous records confirmed the existence of both a mummy artefact and an extensive butterfly display. But their provenance? Unknown. And now, both the ancient hand relic and the butterfly brigade are missing.

The likely window for their disappearance? During the library’s closure. But an earlier event — the 1974 local government reorganisation — also triggered a shake-up in the town’s museums. Could our Barrow mummy story have slipped through a bureaucratic black hole?

A Victorian Artefact Disappearance?
No photos survive of the mummy’s hand. No catalogue entries detail the butterfly specimens. Even photos from the Cumbria Archives, filled with dusty displays from the old museum, yield no clues. The artefacts might’ve been part of a Victorian artefact collection, quietly transferred… or quietly lost.

And what of security? Could a missing museum item have been quietly pocketed by someone with access? Or were these relics simply misplaced, mislabelled, or archived under the wrong name?

Help Solve the Barrow Dock Museum Mystery
This is where you come in. Mysteries like this one rely on community memory. Do you remember a hand-shaped parcel arriving at the library? Do you recall seeing something odd in a museum case in your childhood? Did someone mention a butterfly exhibit at a family gathering?

The Barrow local history community has long whispered about this tale. Maybe you hold the missing clue — or at least a lead that brings us closer.