Stood in the middle of a development site in a Welsh medieval town, archaeologist Andrew Shobbrook knew there was a high chance of finding the odd remnant of human activity. But not even he could have predicted finding 307 bodies buried beneath an old department store in Haverfordwest which is being redeveloped as part of a multimillion pound facelift of the Pembrokeshire town.
Andrew was on site as a supervisor for the Dyfed Archaeology Trust in August 2021 and it was him who put the contractors on stop after he discovered a human skull in the earth. At first it was just two small narrow pits, initially dug as part of site stability investigations, that produced two sets of human remains.
"We knew pretty much we were in a cemetery," Andrew explained. "We knew we would find something because the site is in the medieval core of Haverfordwest. It's just no-one knew where it was. But you never know what you're going to find until you start digging." If the names of nearby streets and pubs didn't give it away - The Friars Vault and Hole in the Wall Street - then two 800-year-old skulls certainly did.
