Help locating a foundation from 1868

[sathmcnugent]

My question is that I have an old foundation on my land from 1868. The only clues I have on how to find where it was is a landowners map from 1868 which has the house directly on my land. My grandfather knew of the house from his father (my great grandfather). This is all I have to go on this.. my grandfather gave me a general area about where it used to be. I do know that there was a murder that had taken place in the house. I researched this and I come up with nothing but that the guy who lived there served in the civil war from 1862-1864. I looked at an aerial map to look for differences in the soil and I can pick out much..perhaps I dont know exactly what to look for either. Any Ideas anyone??

 

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[sathmcnugent]

As well as to finding this foundation..my cousins property just next door to me..if you go back in his woods about 200 yards sits an old abandoned house which dates back to the 1850's..I detected it and the only thing I found is a silver spoon..no coins..explain that one...i know for a fact no one ever detected it..this house has no electric it even has the persons beds in it and they are made of straw!! no kidding..many old news papers and bunches of old leather shoes..nothing of real value except for maybe the oil lamps..oh and the basement is full of old wine/whiskey bottles half full..i dont understand why i did not find a single coin there..strange because every old house i have detected yielded an old coin or two

 

[One mans trash...]

Might not be much to see. I don't know what sort of farm houses they put up where you are. Where I am, you're lucky if they used any stone. Most had cedar posts, if that, and I know of exact sites of old houses with no sign left at all. If there's no physical sign, maybe walk the most likely areas, looking for the midden. Again, different soils act differently. Around here, any buried junk tends to work its way up and appear on the surface. Pottery and bottles commonly do. People generally like to locate the house near trees, if any, and didn't clear those threes, so a cluster of very old trees or just one can mark the spot, especially if they're now in the middle of a field, left in the way for no reason apparent today. And they would need water, either a natural source or a well. A filled in well may show as a depression and will often accept a probe more easily than the ground around it. I've been thrown off more than once by trying to think through where a house would be sited. Foliage changes dramatically. Old access routes can vanish, although on farm land, a path still being used for access to a field can be the original route. And in some places, an isolated few fruit trees can get you close to the house site, since people sometimes deliberately planted fruit trees that wouldn't have naturally occurred near the house. Might just have to crank the sensitivity up with no discrimination and make quick passes for cast off iron pieces from implements.

 

[Kantuckkeean]

I agree with One mans trash. I don't MD, but I've found old house sites by my knowledge of vegetation. In my area, non-native but non-invasive horticultural plants located in the forest (such as daffodils, irises, lilacs, forsythia, or sometimes yuccas or fruit trees) are almost always a sign that an old structure was nearby. I'd look for trees of a common age class that differs from the rest (i.e. older), or plants that seem out of place.

Some trees, such as sugar maples, make better yard trees than others, but that would depend on your area. Also, most hardwoods are self-pruning. That is, they reach for light when competing with other trees and shed their lower branches when they grow in close proximity to other trees. This creates a forest full of tall trees with straight trunks that loggers like to see. When open-grown, many hardwoods will not shed their lower branches, as there is no competition for light. They will then develop a spreading form that resembles a mushroom (i.e. short and squat trunk, with many live lower branches that reach far from the trunk). Finding a few of these open-grown mushroom-shaped trees together in a area that is surrounded by younger, forest-form trees should be a definite tip-off.

 

[traderoftreasures]

you may not of found coins because, if you worked all week for a dime you sure ain't going to lose that sucker