Confederate Buckle and a Civil War Bonanza

[smokeythecat]

This is from today, and a couple days ago. I went to two different sites, and both sites have been pounded in the past. I saw still able to get some nice items out of them. The Confederate buckle is iron and rather non-descript but a si miliar one is shown in "Confederate General Service Accoutrement Plates" by Lon Klein. They were widely used but this is the first one I have found. Another heavier buckle is still attached to the iron strap and has a square nail still in it. They lost a lot of the knapsack pieces, and I have some small iron buckles from the same spot. In the riker mount is some more miscellaneous items including some charcoal from a late 1863-1864 civil war hut!

The little eagle button was attached to a piece of a ration can, and the Deus picked it up about 4" down in the horrible Virginia red dirt. The crotal bell is a No. 5 and late 18th to early 19th century and was found in my PA site. Some of the nails are rose heads and will get cleaned up.

The melted minie is nice, it's half melted. Enjoy.

 

[smokeythecat]

Phishfarmer, the item is the flattened part of a spoon or knife handle, in brass. BTW I think ALL the iron buckles went to this same saddle as they were in the same hole. as the iron loop with the sheet metal and nail. I have a cooler relic I have to photograph and get up here. It is a hand made drink holder, made from barrel straps they would have set over a fire to heat up coffee or such. It's still sitting next to the sink. Cleaning iron takes time but I dug it totally intact! Really cool trench art, as they call it. Much better than a carved bullet. Two deteriorating canteens came from this site as well as an eagle breastplate. And a partridge in a pear tree.

 

[treblehunter]

I went back today with the XP Deus in my Equinox (pun intended) and drove across the fields that were too muddy to get into with a vehicle yesterday. Went to the far ridge and pulled a modern clad dime and some junk, but nothing good. Drove back, avoiding the groundhog holes and couldn't pick any more items from our hot spots we had really pounded. I ran the Deus at the big 74 khz just to see if I could nail any small, deep targets. It's amazing how it went from mudpie to solid enough to drive on overnight.

Anyway, I decided to detect for another crotal bell in the area our vehicles were parked on. It's a set of two small grass strips with 15 year old planted oak trees lining the driveway. I found a clad quarter, some brass shell casing which are modern and then almost went deaf with this signal. At this point, I don't think anything this place produces will surprise me. This is my FIRST actual US belt buckle and I think I overcleaned it the Renaissance wax, however, I believe the wax will evaporate over time. The driveway was an old original road, and the plate was saved by the plow as it was withing a couple feet of the road, and out of the plow zone. View attachment 1529954

Merry Christmas Smokey, nice finds! I'd love to hit all those grassy areas, could you imagine what is under that paved road? Congrats on that US plate (it deserves a post of it's own) That is an exciting site, I too loved the two Capped Bust Dimes, I have been wanting to find some for quite some time. Someday I'll get them.

 

[WannaDig3687]

Wow, wow, wow! Congratulations on these very nice finds. So happy for you, Smokey!

 

[smokeythecat]

Treblehunter, Saturday was the first day I had permission to hit the grassy areas near the trees. I did about half of it. There is an exploded remnant of a farm tractor a little uphill so that probably won't be a good place to look. Only place not checked thoroughly is near the paved road. Other than that, we're looking at diminished returns at this point.

I cleaned up the item, somewhat, from a dig last week. This is a soldier made cup holder for keeping one's mug (tin) from falling in the campfire.

Kinda neat.