Mills Jewelers Notebook
June 25th, 2014
Less than a month before her wedding, Danielle Maurer was boating with friends on tranquil Lake Pawtuckaway in New Hampshire when a freak accident turned the picturesque day into a diamond disaster.

lake1

All was well at the lake on a spectacular Sunday in early June... until it was time to bring the small boat back to the dock. Somehow, in her effort to guide the boat, Maurer's hand got pinned between the corner of the dock and the boat, squashing her engagement ring, compromising the integrity of the setting and sending her solitaire diamond on a hopeless descent to the bottom of the lake.

lake4

After being treated for minor cuts and scrapes and having the damaged ring pried off her finger, the 30-year-old Maurer from Beverly, Mass., grabbed a snorkel and attempted to retrieve the diamond on her own. The water was eight feet deep and the bottom was strewn with reflective rocks.

"I jumped down and went to look for it, but there were all these shiny things in the water and I said, 'We're not going to find it,'" Maurer told Seacoast Online. "I pretty much assumed it was gone and I tried to come to terms with it."

lake2

The timing of her loss couldn’t have been worse. In two weeks, she and her fiancé, Kumar Thangamuthu, were set to fly to India to prepare for their wedding, which would take place on July 7.

The couple’s sadness turned to elation the very next day when a family friend and owner of the dock, William Mercer, sent a “remarkable” email reporting how he recovered of the diamond after diving into the lake with his scuba gear.

lake3

Mercer, a veteran diver, told Seacoast Online that his first attempts at finding the diamond were fruitless, but then he had the answer. By dropping a diamond-size pebble off the corner of the dock, Mercer was able to track its path to the approximate location where the diamond had landed. His theory was spot-on.

The recovered diamond will be with the couple on their voyage to India and will be set into a repaired ring by a jeweler there. Also, on the voyage will be the hero of our story, Mr. Mercer, who was invited to attend as a thank-you gesture for his selflessness.

“It's a great story,” Maurer told Seacoast Online. “[The ring is] beautiful, and now I think it has more meaning."