SMCC > Collections > Geology > East Surrey Museum

East Surrey Museum

Size: 600 Specimens

Content:
British, mostly SE England fossils and rocks, with a smaller amount of local material.

There are a number of good fossils from the IOW including several iguanodon dinosaur vertebrae from the Wealden, plus fish and turtle shell, and a fragment of a reptilian ( Diplocyodon sp.) jaw from the Oligocene deposits. There is also a iguanodon footrint in rock (from Cuckfield, Sussex).

Other fossils include small numbers of molluscs from the East Anglian Red Crag, from the London Clay of Sheppey, sharks teeth from Abbey Wood (SE London), as well as a small number of chalk fossils from Kent and Sussex.

From slightly further afield are ammonites and bivalves from the Lower Jurassic (Liassic) rocks of Lyme Regis and Charmouth. Amongst the non-local rocks and minerals are a small number of specimens from Egypt and the USA.

There is a small but interesting collection of Pleistocene mammal bones which include those of mammoth, rhinoceras, bear (skull), wild horse, deer, and auroch. Most of these were found in the Marons Sandpit, Chertsey.

Considering that neighbouring Godstone is built on the Lower Greensand there is surprisingly little in the way of fossils from some of these beds (there is a large nautiloid Cymatoceras sp. from quarries near Redhill), although there are examples of some of the sandstones and also some honey coloured baryte from the Fullers Earth workings.

In addition, there are a small number of locally collected ammonites ( Hoplites sp, Euhoplites sp., and Hamites ) from the overlying Gault Clay (probably from quarries near Godstone or Merstham), yet no recognisable specimens of rocks or fossils from the overlying Upper Greensand beds once quarried for 'firestone'and 'hearthstone' between Godstone and Reigate.

Local chalk fossils fossils are much more common, including bivalves such as Inoceramus crippsi from the Lower Chalk and a variety of common echinoids and Inoceramus lamarcki from the Upper Chalk - these are probably from the Caterham area as well as from South Croydon, Kenley, Bletchingley etc.(though many aren't labelled). Some of them are flint moulds, possibly derived from the overlying Clay with Flints.

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