Civil War Caltrops

[Elvis]

My brother and I found @ 20 in an area used by the Confederates, these are just the ones I found and cleaned up. They were found in 2007. The photo with the red backgound is an example of what a perfect one should look like. Sorry for the photo.

 

[stoney56]

Nice finds. They didn't do much to deter the foot soldier but they could sure lame a horse.

 

[BuckleBoy]

AWESOME! I love seeing photos of these. I have seen many relics for sale but haven't seen very many caltrops. Excellent!

-Buckleboy

 

[Old Dog]

They still will do a lot of foot damage to a horse even now.

Thanks for picking them up.

Nice finds, The major number of caltrops have secomed to elements and rusted away.
They are not common.
The only ones I have seen were in a wooden box from my brother's barn he found in the rafters. They were probably to be used to inhibit Union Troops in the Woodstock area of Virginia.
They never got used ... other than some slight surface rust they were pristine.
My brother's place is in Maurer Town , that is between Mt. Jackson and Woodstock.

He owns one of three barns that were not burned by union troops in that area.

I have no idea what he did with the caltrops.

OD

 

[kindafoundabuckle]

I guess that would be like a horse stepping on a land mine. I wonder how effective they were? In all my civil war reading I have never heard them being mentioned. To be honest until I was a Tnet member I had never seen one. Gotta love this site!

KFB

 

[Montana Jim]

Excellent finds for sure... I also rarely see them even on-line...

They were very effective - causing a horse to lame up fast.

 

[RETREAD]

The magazine Man At Arms had an excellent article about a year ago detailing the history of the caltrop. Amazingly , variations are still found and they are used to inhibit movement of humans and animals

 

[digger_girl]

Elvis~
JARMAN had posted something in What Is It about Calthrops, and no one could really give him an answer.
Here is a link http://forum.treasurenet.com/index.php/topic,142807.0.html

What do you think?