Civil War Soldier's ID Tag in the Old Dominion today!

DocBeav

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Man, I'm still in a bit of a shock with what I found today! Unbelievable!

(update, had to add 2 better pictures in sunlight brings out more detail and you can still see some of the gold gilding on the shield. Still on cloud 9!)
Obverse ID Tag.jpg Reverse ID Tag.jpg


Gigmaster (Steve) and I went out on the river today to check some of his past hot spots and look for a few new ones. (Make sure to check out his video on youtube:

We were pretty much getting skunked at sever of the places we went to. Too much silt and drift wood in some spots and TONS of aluminum and trash in others. It wasn't looking to promising and neither of us had found much of anything, not even a minnie ball or other bullet until....lol

I hit a nice 1899 Indian Head Penny which was nice, things were looking up!

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We also saw several bald eagles today:
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A little further down the riverbank I got a nice signal (I was using the CTX) that showed a 12.39 and I thought I might be on another penny. After a few scoops the signal improved to 12.43 then a 12.46! Awesome! I was hoping for silver at this point and when I had it out of the hole and dumped the scoop on the edge of the water I saw what I was SURE was a large cent. I called Steve over as I checked it out to see what he thought and to get his camera. I started to make out the lettering on it and could clearly see 5th Reg and we both knew it was WAY better than a large cent, It was a MAJOR bucket list find! An AWESOME Union Soldier's ID Tag!

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My celebration was a bit toned down as I realized that this is the second time now in as many weeks (look at Steve's videos and you'll see) that he has taken someone with him (though not to the same location) that went and found one of these! Steve, I'm sorry man BUT you did make up some ground with that sweet silver 1830 Capped Bust dime! One VERY nice coin despite being "holed".

Once I was home all I did to it was take some damp q-tips and roll them across it to get some of the caked on dirt and debris off of it and left it at that for now. I put it in a coin slab just to protect it. Dan, through Steve, suggested using a small amt of museum wax and just rub it on which I will do once I find some.

Civil War ID Tag Front.jpg Civil War ID Tag Back.jpg

After I was able to read it better I was able to find the name and the information on the soldier: "Moe" made it through his first enlistment, reenlisted, was promoted to corporal and finished out the war. 1861-1865. And we thought we had it rough with 6 month to one year deployments when I was active duty!

Emery "Moe" T. Guptil
Waterbury VT

MILITARY SERVICE

Age: 18, credited to Stowe, VT
Unit(s): 5th VT INF
Service: enlisted: 8/10/61
mustered in: 9/16/61, Pvt, Co. D, 5th VT INF
reenlisted:12/15/63
promoted: CORP 3/28/64
mustered out: 7/10/65

VITALS
Birth: abt 1843, Waterbury, VT
Death: 1932


The 5th Regiment, Vermont Volunteer Infantry (or 5th VVI) was a three years' infantry regiment in the Union Army during the American Civil War. It served in the Eastern Theater, predominantly in the VI Corps, Army of the Potomac, from September 1861 to June 1865. It was a member of the Vermont Brigade.

The regiment was mustered into Federal service on September 16, 1861, at St. Albans, Vermont. It was engaged in, or present at, Lee's Mill, Williamsburg, Golding's Farm, Savage's Station and White Oak Swamp during the Peninsula campaign; Crampton's Gap and Antietam during the 1862 Maryland campaign; Fredericksburg, Marye's Heights, and Salem Church; Gettysburg and Funkstown during the Gettysburg campaign; Rappahannock Station; the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, and Cold Harbor during the Overland Campaign; Charlestown, Opequon, Winchester, Fisher's Hill, and Cedar Creek during the Shenandoah Valley campaign and in the siege of Petersburg.

The regiment lost during service: 201 men killed and mortally wounded, 4 died from accident, 1 executed, 21 died in Confederate prisons and 112 died from disease; total loss: 339.

The regiment mustered out of service on June 29, 1865.

Thanks all for looking, I had a few other posts I needed to get done as well from a couple of PA farm hunts and another river hunt with Gigmaster but I had to get THIS one out first! Special thanks to you Steve! Yours is NEXT!
 

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Upvote 50

Gridwalker306

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This is an awesome find and post! Thank you for sharing the detailed information you found, it sure makes the piece come alive.

I guess I'll be first in saying BANNER
 

garren

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Wow! Great save. Congrats on an awesome find! I second the banner vote.
 

CASPER-2

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RVRoamer73

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Truly a great find.....Congrats !!
 

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relic nut

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Congrats on a great find!!! It's hard to beat those personal relics. Hope we can see it on top.

HH, RN
 

Turbo21

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My banner vote is in. Hard not to vote banner. (See avatar)
 

Trezurehunter

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Outstanding find. Congrats, and I like the history you were able to "dig up" on the soldier.
 

neodetectorist

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Wow, talk about "The rest of the story....".
Now you can add to it with your find.
A picture of the soldier in a framed display case would be museum quality.
Doesn't this deserve a banner?
Nice
 

Carolina Tom

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Congrats on an epic find sir.

Kudos to Steve too.
 

Rubka888

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What great find and equally good back story! Great job on the research and the post!
 

OP
OP
DocBeav

DocBeav

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Thanks for the great comments and banner votes all! I appreciate it! Still grinning today!
 

CRUSADER

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ScubaDetector

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Another awesome piece of history. Great find
 

Ahab8

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I'll give this a BANNER vote. Personal with a great story and scarce. Congrats on a really nice piece
 

joeyfresh

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Great find and research. It's hard to fathom all of the battles, all of the marching, disease and sickness. What a terrible war that was. One in ten military aged men died and more than half of those died from disease.
That ID tag is a survivor like soldier it belonged to. I vote banner as well
 

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