An antique artillery shell that had been used as a decorative heirloom prompted a response from police and the military in Pefferlaw this week.

After her parents moved to Lindsay, Bonnie Cauchard began cleaning out the family cottage. When it came to moving a heavy piece of furniture, her brother enlisted help from a neighbour – a York Regional Police officer.

“While he was touring the cottage, he spotted the shell and told me not move it. He said he would talk to the bomb squad and see what should be done with it,” Cauchard said.

“First thing the next day, the bomb squad called and said they where on there way and that the army was coming from Base Borden to investigate.”

After she took a few pics with the responding officers and service members, Cauchard turned over the shell to be detonated back at Borden.

“The army said that there was a good chance it was live as they wrapped it in bubble wrap and put it in a metal box,” Cauchard said.

The news certainly came as a shock, who noted that it had once served as a doorstop and had once been stored in the kids’ bedroom at the cottage.

“We played with it as kids — my parents had no idea where it came from,” she said.