Civil War Caltrops

Elvis

Bronze Member
Jan 8, 2007
1,108
1,125
Lafayette, Georgia
🥇 Banner finds
1
Detector(s) used
Tesoro and Nokta Simplex+
Garrett Pro-Pointer AT
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
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.
 

Attachments

  • caltrops[1].jpg
    caltrops[1].jpg
    13.4 KB · Views: 7,487
  • relics 002.jpg
    relics 002.jpg
    11.6 KB · Views: 5,606

BuckleBoy

Gold Member
Jun 12, 2006
18,123
9,688
Moonlight and Magnolias
🥇 Banner finds
4
🏆 Honorable Mentions:
2
Detector(s) used
Fisher F75, Whites DualField PI, Fisher 1266-X and Tesoro Silver uMax
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
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

Gold Member
May 22, 2007
5,860
397
Western Colorado
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

Hero Member
Dec 9, 2006
803
12
In bed at the moment
Detector(s) used
Dowsing rods
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
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

Gold Member
Sep 18, 2006
11,697
148
Montana
Excellent finds for sure... I also rarely see them even on-line... :)

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

RETREAD

Jr. Member
Dec 16, 2007
40
0
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
 

Top Member Reactions

Users who are viewing this thread

Top