Goalrush- Thanks. Huge congrats on your four GWs, and their recent appraisal. Hope you find four more in 2010.
IP- You've had some quality this year, yourself, to put it mildly. That '44 half is sweet, and the cob and military buttons aren't too shabby, either.
If I have to dig 10,000 shotgun shells to get a Revolutionary War button this year, I'll be satisfied.
BB- The silver in question is a Peruvian 2 reale from the 1830s. It has been made slightly concave/convex, and the side with the date has been smoothed and inscribed "John Thompson Born July 4, 1782." Since the coin was minted about 50 years after Mr. Thompson's birth, I presumed it was either made for the occasion of his 50th birthday, or, perhaps more likely, made on the occasion of his death. I believe the token is the only thing I've posted here that wasn't found on my main hunting grounds- it was found at a friend's house in Providence, RI. I tried to research the name, but as Don in SJ pointed out, John Thompson is/was a VERY common name. I'm afraid I've hit a dead end in that particular line of inquiry.
There are three half cents at the top of the coppers pics, and the rest are mostly GII halfpennies and matron head cents, with some small variety of everything else in between.
The Iron Brigade did great in '09. Congrats on all those coppers. Look forward to your posts in 2010.
dwayne