IT'S TIME — for the Totnes Derby Clock to go home.

The forgotten 250-year-old timepiece, which has been gathering dust in the Totnes Elizabethan Museum's attic store room for almost 40 years, is going to be sent back to the town where it was made.

The pendulum clock was originally donated to the museum by Dartington's philanthropist millionaire Leonard Elmhirst back in 1971.

Now a museum in Derby — where the man who made the timepiece, clockmaker, scientist and engineer John Whitehurst, came from — has asked for it back so it can go on display in its home town.

Museum administrator Alan Langmaid explained: "It is good museum practice to reunite items to the area where they come from where they are more relevant."

John Whitehurst was an 18th century scientist who is considered to be the father of modern geology and was a founder member of the Lunar Society along with Erasmus Darwin, Josiah Wedgewood and James Watt.

Mr Langmaid said that Whitehurst was to Derby what the famous clockmaker Williams Stumbles is to Totnes.

The Derby Museum plans to put his long lost clock on display.

The clock, which has only one hand, has not been on show since it was donated to the museum back in 1971.

"It's a nice looking clock but so far as I am aware it has not been on display since it was donated to the museum in 1971 which is another good reason for it being donated to the Derby Museum."

He said no one seems to know why Leonard Elmhirst gave it to the museum in the first place or how it came to be part of Dartington Hall.

The decision to send the clock home was made by members of the museum trust after it was spotted gathering dust in the attic by local historian and museum volunteer James Bellchambers.

Meanwhile the museum is appealing for help in finding more volunteers to help man the desk when it is open.

The list of volunteers, who deal with customers but can also become involved in cataloguing and other museum tasks, has been shrinking as people leave to move on to other jobs or other places.

At the moment the museum can field a team of 11 but ideally it needs some 15 to put in a couple of hours a week, explained Mr Langmaid.

Anyone who can help can contact Mr Langmaid on 01803 863821.