paleomaxx
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- Aug 14, 2016
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Incredibly I had both Saturday and Sunday mostly free before the holiday, so with the storm and deep freeze on its way I decided to check out a huge section of woods that had been recommended to me just a few weeks before. It had several roads on the old maps as well as a number of homesites which is promising, but I've found this section of New York has been heavily hunted in the past so most of the sites I find are pretty well emptied.
It was worth a shot though and I reached the first homesite after just 15min of hiking along a rock wall. It's a huge complex of rock structures with a particularly large cellar hole and an extensive barn foundation. There were piles of iron on a few rocks so it seemed very likely that it had been hunted, but I wanted to give it a shot anyways. Perplexingly one of the first signals was a nice early suspender's buckle just under the leaf litter. Then an 1820's flat button. There were a few signals still in the dirt too so I started gridding around the cellar hole. After four amazing hours I lost the daylight so I went back the next day and spend another four hours. The results were spectacular. (There are going to be a lot of photos!) To start this is just the iron:
There were just an incredible quantity of large iron relics as well as a number of identifiable smaller pieces. In some spots I was pulling out a piece every two steps!
Three horseshoes is the most I've found in one spot and four ox shoe pieces is also a personal best. There were a number of other horse-related relics.
Two different bits and a stirrup (only my second ever), in addition to many buckles and harness pieces. I do wonder why so many horse-related items and many were along one strip next to the house so maybe that's where they tacked up their horses? Strange that it wasn't next to the barn though.
Many farming tools too. Three different garden hoes including one in great condition, as well as two axes. The one axe on the left is the first I've found in that shape. It's always nice to add a new axe type to the collection!
There were actually two plow blades, but I haven't hiked the second out yet. At a certain point the backpack seemed like it wasn't going to take the punishment which meant I had to keep the trips down to 35lbs at a time. The large tool is interesting and I'm curious if anyone knows what it was used for. If I had to guess it looks almost like it was designed for pulling up roofing shingles. Very cool though and in great condition.
This hunt is also a new record holder for number and variety of buckles:
This large brass one may be my new favorite non-shoe buckle. I usually find batwing buckles in this area (this site being no exception as I found a broken one), but this style is new to me.
I also found my very first knee buckle!
It's made of pewter and I'm so glad to have found it. There was also a second colonial buckle.
This one was missing a little bit, but oddly was also a surface find just under the leaf litter. It has very fine etchings on the top and is of a particularly dainty construction so I'm amazed it held up as well as it did.
Now on to the non-ferrous finds:
I'm still amazed at the quantity and variety of relics. They were fairly evenly distributed around the foundation, but there were a couple hot-spots and almost all of the buttons came from one gentle incline across from what was the front door.
Two dandy buttons, as well a few tombacs, but nothing too fancy. The one in the second photo seems to have a stamped floral design, but that was the only one. The dandy missing a shank is super thick and I was convinced it was a slick copper until I cleaned it up and the shank scar became obvious. Oh well.
There were two gorgeous bridle rosettes. One has an iron back so more recent, but the more ornate one has a lead back so early 1800's perhaps?
I was particularly happy about this find. It's a gag loop from a horse harness, but it's in great condition and of a design I haven't seen before.
I found two oil lamps, one of which is very well preserved and the hinge is even intact. The patent date on the knob is 1864 too.
The door knob was a surprise since the detector was insisting it was metal and I disagreed strongly. It wasn't until I cleaned it off and spotted the lead slug inside that I understood. Very pretty, but probably one of the most recent relics. The piece of a plate just happened to be in a hole, but the blue feathered edge pearlware is late colonial correct?
These thin brass pieces are a bit of a mystery; the first especially. The two cylinder pieces have stamped designs all around them and remind me of a paint brush collars, but the tapered one seems wrong.
I love this find! I think it's a pewter toy gravy boat and despite missing the handle and being a little smooshed is just awesome. Correct me if I'm wrong, but this would have been a very nice and expensive toy for a child in those days.
There were a number of other odd finds including the two tiny brass rings linked together and the pewter pipe like piece. Not sure what either was from, but interesting. I did find the obligatory shoe plate, leather rivets, and crotal bell fragment so I can cross them off the checklist for this site. I'm hoping a whole crotal bell turns up since I love finding those.
What was very odd was that despite the vast number of relics, there wasn't a single coin.
My thought is that perhaps the person who detected here before was a coin shooter and just dug all the coin signals; hence the odd surface finds. But I did dig a number of good and undisturbed coin signals, so maybe not. It seems likely that the site was occupied from the late 1700's to around the civil war based on the finds so that's a good long range to not drop any small denomination coins. I did find one small piece of mangled silver that was from a larger sterling piece:
Based on the relics I also think this was a fairly affluent farm, at least in the 1700's so it seems likely that there would be a few coin drops. Very strange, but maybe once I start fanning out from the homesite they'll turn up.
Unfortunately right now there's about 8" of fresh snow and it's supposed to be below zero at night for at least the next week. Hopefully the snow insulates the ground from freezing completely because this would be a great site to spend the rest of the winder pounding. I also have a few more cellar holes along the same road to investigate too. Still, a great new site is about the best Christmas present I could ask for, so you'll hear no complaints from me!
It was worth a shot though and I reached the first homesite after just 15min of hiking along a rock wall. It's a huge complex of rock structures with a particularly large cellar hole and an extensive barn foundation. There were piles of iron on a few rocks so it seemed very likely that it had been hunted, but I wanted to give it a shot anyways. Perplexingly one of the first signals was a nice early suspender's buckle just under the leaf litter. Then an 1820's flat button. There were a few signals still in the dirt too so I started gridding around the cellar hole. After four amazing hours I lost the daylight so I went back the next day and spend another four hours. The results were spectacular. (There are going to be a lot of photos!) To start this is just the iron:
There were just an incredible quantity of large iron relics as well as a number of identifiable smaller pieces. In some spots I was pulling out a piece every two steps!
Three horseshoes is the most I've found in one spot and four ox shoe pieces is also a personal best. There were a number of other horse-related relics.
Two different bits and a stirrup (only my second ever), in addition to many buckles and harness pieces. I do wonder why so many horse-related items and many were along one strip next to the house so maybe that's where they tacked up their horses? Strange that it wasn't next to the barn though.
Many farming tools too. Three different garden hoes including one in great condition, as well as two axes. The one axe on the left is the first I've found in that shape. It's always nice to add a new axe type to the collection!
There were actually two plow blades, but I haven't hiked the second out yet. At a certain point the backpack seemed like it wasn't going to take the punishment which meant I had to keep the trips down to 35lbs at a time. The large tool is interesting and I'm curious if anyone knows what it was used for. If I had to guess it looks almost like it was designed for pulling up roofing shingles. Very cool though and in great condition.
This hunt is also a new record holder for number and variety of buckles:
This large brass one may be my new favorite non-shoe buckle. I usually find batwing buckles in this area (this site being no exception as I found a broken one), but this style is new to me.
I also found my very first knee buckle!
It's made of pewter and I'm so glad to have found it. There was also a second colonial buckle.
This one was missing a little bit, but oddly was also a surface find just under the leaf litter. It has very fine etchings on the top and is of a particularly dainty construction so I'm amazed it held up as well as it did.
Now on to the non-ferrous finds:
I'm still amazed at the quantity and variety of relics. They were fairly evenly distributed around the foundation, but there were a couple hot-spots and almost all of the buttons came from one gentle incline across from what was the front door.
Two dandy buttons, as well a few tombacs, but nothing too fancy. The one in the second photo seems to have a stamped floral design, but that was the only one. The dandy missing a shank is super thick and I was convinced it was a slick copper until I cleaned it up and the shank scar became obvious. Oh well.
There were two gorgeous bridle rosettes. One has an iron back so more recent, but the more ornate one has a lead back so early 1800's perhaps?
I was particularly happy about this find. It's a gag loop from a horse harness, but it's in great condition and of a design I haven't seen before.
I found two oil lamps, one of which is very well preserved and the hinge is even intact. The patent date on the knob is 1864 too.
The door knob was a surprise since the detector was insisting it was metal and I disagreed strongly. It wasn't until I cleaned it off and spotted the lead slug inside that I understood. Very pretty, but probably one of the most recent relics. The piece of a plate just happened to be in a hole, but the blue feathered edge pearlware is late colonial correct?
These thin brass pieces are a bit of a mystery; the first especially. The two cylinder pieces have stamped designs all around them and remind me of a paint brush collars, but the tapered one seems wrong.
I love this find! I think it's a pewter toy gravy boat and despite missing the handle and being a little smooshed is just awesome. Correct me if I'm wrong, but this would have been a very nice and expensive toy for a child in those days.
There were a number of other odd finds including the two tiny brass rings linked together and the pewter pipe like piece. Not sure what either was from, but interesting. I did find the obligatory shoe plate, leather rivets, and crotal bell fragment so I can cross them off the checklist for this site.
I'm hoping a whole crotal bell turns up since I love finding those. What was very odd was that despite the vast number of relics, there wasn't a single coin.
My thought is that perhaps the person who detected here before was a coin shooter and just dug all the coin signals; hence the odd surface finds. But I did dig a number of good and undisturbed coin signals, so maybe not. It seems likely that the site was occupied from the late 1700's to around the civil war based on the finds so that's a good long range to not drop any small denomination coins. I did find one small piece of mangled silver that was from a larger sterling piece:
Based on the relics I also think this was a fairly affluent farm, at least in the 1700's so it seems likely that there would be a few coin drops. Very strange, but maybe once I start fanning out from the homesite they'll turn up.
Unfortunately right now there's about 8" of fresh snow and it's supposed to be below zero at night for at least the next week. Hopefully the snow insulates the ground from freezing completely because this would be a great site to spend the rest of the winder pounding. I also have a few more cellar holes along the same road to investigate too. Still, a great new site is about the best Christmas present I could ask for, so you'll hear no complaints from me!
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