Terry Pratchett's unpublished works are crushed by steamroller

It is thought that up to ten incomplete novels were flattened at the Great Dorset Steam Fair by a six-and-a-half tonne vintage steamroller named Lord Jericho.

Now that is a sentence you don’t hear every day.

The hard drive was run over multiple times before a concrete crusher pulverised whatever was left.

Pratchett, the fantasy author who created the Discworld series and wrote over 70 novels, died aged 66 in 2015 after a long battle with Alzheimer’s.

A lot of his work – including Truckers, Johnny and the Dead, Wyrd Sisters and Soul Music – was adapted for television.

Before destroying the hard drive, his assistant Rob Wilkins tweeted from the official Terry Pratchett account that he was "about to fulfil my obligation to Terry".

https://twitter.com/terryandrob/status/901028525200879616

https://twitter.com/terryandrob/status/901037198665019392

Richard Henry, curator of Salisbury Museum, told the BBC: "The steamroller totally annihilated the stone blocks underneath but the hard drive survived better than expected so we put it in a stone crusher afterwards which I think probably finally did it in".

He said Pratchett did not want his unpublished works to be completed and released by someone else.

He added: "It's something you've got to follow, and it's really nice that they have followed his requests so specifically.

"It's surprisingly difficult to find somebody to run over a hard drive with a steamroller.

"I think a few people thought we were kidding when I first started putting out feelers to see if it was possible or not."

The pieces of the hard drive will go on display in the Terry Pratchett: His World Exhibition at the museum on 16 September.