Civil War Relics & Old Coins

Last weekend was so great, I had to go back for more! My brother couldn’t make it but I invited my dad to come out with me and we headed west to a town with roots in the 1830’s. We got there just in time too. I didn’t want to leave too early because I don’t like knocking on doors early in the morning. When we arrived the home owner was on her way out, but luckily gave us the go ahead to stay and detect.

It’s a great place to hunt because the area is large, there is no interference, very little trash, and lots of old treasure. It was about40 minutes in before I had my first good target – a smashed Minié ball. about 30 minutes later I found a musket ball and about 1 minute after that another.

Another 15 minutes or so when by and I hear a faint signal that read 21 on the Equinox but the tone was hampered with what sounded like trash one direction and OK but not that great in the opposite direction. It sounded just like the first two musket balls, so I called my dad over so he could swing over it with his AT Max. He too agreed that it didn’t sound that great but I told him I think it is another musket ball, so I let him dig it and keep it, it was his first musket ball for the day!

We continued on and the next thing I know I’m digging up another musket ball. Shortly later my dad says, hey I got another one too. Moments later I hear, Mike, and I see my dad waving me over. He’s sitting on the ground with a huge smile on his face. He found what appears to be shrapnel from an exploded canon ball! How cool is that?

Then things slowed down for a while, but we continued on and it was worth it. My dad found a 3rd musket ball and I got a 1902 V Nickel. By this time my dad was getting tired so he went back to the car to sit down.

I kept at it though for about another 30 minutes. I was closer to the road and there was more junk in the ground. But then I hear this loud strong 34 or 35 VDI signal sketching from my Minelab Nox head phones. It was reading to be at about the same depth as the other good finds, but I thought to myself, there’s no way its going to be anything good. I was wrong; it was a 1901 Barber half dollar!

I detected for another 15 minutes or so but I knew my dad was waiting in the car for me so I figured I’d save the rest of the field for next time and we packed up for the day.

Garret AT Max finds included 4 Musket Balls & Exploded Cannon Ball Fragment- US Civil War Era
MineLab Equinox 800 finds: 4 Musket balls, 1 Minié ball, 1902 V Nickel and a 1901 Barber Half Dollar

American Civil War Era Relics Found

Tim and I hadn’t been out hunting for a while, so we were excited to get out to see what we could find. We usually take turns picking locations to go detecting and this weekend I chose to return to Bartow county. In the past, we’ve done pretty good finding some older coins and relics out this way. We’ve found V nickels, a shield nickel, and a blade belt tongue or batwing to name a few. Tim and I both didn’t expect to find much because we’ve been out numerous times and usually come home empty handed despite having hours of fun.

But we both had a pretty good day. At the first stop for the day, Tim started things off by finding a ’48 silver Roosevelt dime and a really cool wooden nickel play coin circa 1940. The site must had been worked over pretty well in the past though, there were few targets and I left with not much more than a wheatie.

GTI 2500 Finds including a 1948 Silver Dime and wooden nickel play coin token

Across the street from the 1830’s location number 1 was a new house that we gained permission to hunt next. It was a pretty big yard, but hard to tell where the property line ended. Neither of us found anything but clad at this location though. So to lunch we went.

After lunch we hit location number 3 – a property across the street from where I found a large cent last year. Here there was a gigantic yard to hunt and we didn’t waste much time before we got started. Unfortunately, after only 20 minutes or so the owner told us he had an emergency to tend to and asked us to leave. Luckily he said we were welcome back in the future though. Before we chased off Tim found a really cool iron work, perhaps from a bench?

We were off to location number 4, a couple doors down from location number 1. This site too had a large yard for us to hunt. The owners of the 1965 built house said it was 5 acres in total. After about 30 minutes searching in the field I found a super worn mercury dime. I was happy to finally get on the board for the day. About 5 minutes later I unearthed a musket ball – a first for me. Two-three minutes later, Tim is shouting at me, Minié ball!

With excitement in our eyes we continued to hunt the large field. A flat iron was among one of the more interesting finds. It has some writing on it, so I’m going to try and clean it up to see if I can date it. After the flat Iron, I was lucky enough to find another 3 musket balls and my first Minié ball to go with them. Meanwhile, Tim uncovered some horse shoes.

It was getting late in the day and we had to call it quits, but the property owners told us we could come back again in the future. I think we’ll be taking them up on that offer.

Equinox 800 finds of the day include a Flat Iron, Minié ball, and 4 musket balls.