A petition has been launched in a last ditch attempt to save historic artefacts from the former Church Farmhouse Museum.

The museum in Church End, Hendon, was stripped after Barnet Council closed it in March, 2011 after withdrawing its £126,000 annual funding.

It came to light last week the council plans to auction off some of the remaining artefacts in Warwickshire.

But Labour councillors are furious about the plans and have launched a petition in an attempt to persuade the council to stop the auction. 

Councillor Pauline Coakley Webb said: “We ask that the council advertise by public notice for donors to reclaim any items they donated to the museum, and that any remaining items are either offered to Barnet Museum or are re-housed for viewing or for archive in Barnet's libraries so that generations to come can enjoy and learn from them."

Some of the artefacts have been handed back to the people who originally donated them and others are being stored at Hendon Library.

But dozens more can be found on the auction list which includes domestic items such as tea pots and candle sticks as well as jewellery and furniture.

Labour's spokeswoman for libraries, Councillor Anne Hutton said: “The council should have made more of an effort to contact the people who donated the artefacts.

“Auctioning the artefacts all the way in Warwickshire just makes it all seem very underhand. There are auction houses in Barnet – they could have sold them in the borough.

“It looks like they don’t care about what happens to local history and the artefacts. It’s not right.”