Help ID items from Civil War Camp

[Keith123]

Second trip to this site and came up with a couple more mini balls, a musket ball, and buttons (including a flat button) and this lead piece in the photo below. The flat part is 9/16” (14mm) diameter and appears to be lead. There’s also a small disc of some other material where the stud meets the flat part. The flat button is 5/8” (16mm). Any help with the lead piece or identifying if the flat button is earlier period would be appreciated!

 

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[TheCannonballGuy]

Your brass 1-piece flatbutton with an INDENTED-lettering backmark was manufactured sometime between approximately 1810 and the mid-1830s. The fact that the backmark's word "color" is spelled the British way means it was made in Britain, and imported by US clothing-makers during the time when the infant US button-making industry wasn't able to produce enough for the needs of the clothing-makers.

The lead stud is the base (sometimes called the "thumbtack") which held the zinc washer onto the bottom of a yankee .58 Williams "Bore-Cleaner" bullet Type 2 or Type 3. Those types were manufactured only between 1863 and 1865. Yours seems to still have a little bit of the zinc washer remaining. By the way, the "thumbtack is made of a hardened-lead alloy, which only turns grey in the ground, never white like pure lead.