Every town across the world has treasure and hidden cache ledgens, and the town i live in is no exception. My town was found by a very enterprising ex-covict by the name of Henry Hopwood, because of its location (between 2 major rivers and in between a very rich goldfield and prime cattle country) he soon had the monopoly on the river crossings and trade.
As with any successful town lawlessness becomes an issue, so a police force was raised and outfitted with the latest weapons. The Martini-Henry service rifle was chosen for this role and our policemen became very apt at using the rifle, practising many times a week in what was known back then as the Police Paddock (a large sand hill being the target)
Well with the advent of new technology the service rifle became obsolete, so it was decided that the rifles should be disposed of, so a trusted constable and the police Sergeant gathered the rifles up and a box of unissued guns (still in grease mind you) and carted then out to the sand hills and buried them.
In Australia we have a saying "never let the truth get in the way of a good yarn" nothing could be more true in this case. The amount of stories and differences of what is in the cache is amazing, from there not being rifles but pistols, to actually confiscated items being buried instead.
After researching the location of the old rifle range and asking a few of the older locals, my brother and I did a brief recci of the location and decided on a spot that would be the most likely location, after a few sweeps with the old Minelab we hit paydirt, barely a foot down we unearthed an undeformed lead bullet, the same type fired by a Martini-Henry rifle. After sweeping a bit more we started to unearth more bullet lead, by the time we had finished we probably had about a dozen bullets.
With the light fading and pretty certain we had rediscovered the location of the old police rifle range we called it a day and proceeded home.
Due to a new addition to the family i have yet to venture out again and have a serious search.
Below is a full cartridge with a .22 cartridge alongside.
As with any successful town lawlessness becomes an issue, so a police force was raised and outfitted with the latest weapons. The Martini-Henry service rifle was chosen for this role and our policemen became very apt at using the rifle, practising many times a week in what was known back then as the Police Paddock (a large sand hill being the target)
Well with the advent of new technology the service rifle became obsolete, so it was decided that the rifles should be disposed of, so a trusted constable and the police Sergeant gathered the rifles up and a box of unissued guns (still in grease mind you) and carted then out to the sand hills and buried them.
In Australia we have a saying "never let the truth get in the way of a good yarn" nothing could be more true in this case. The amount of stories and differences of what is in the cache is amazing, from there not being rifles but pistols, to actually confiscated items being buried instead.
After researching the location of the old rifle range and asking a few of the older locals, my brother and I did a brief recci of the location and decided on a spot that would be the most likely location, after a few sweeps with the old Minelab we hit paydirt, barely a foot down we unearthed an undeformed lead bullet, the same type fired by a Martini-Henry rifle. After sweeping a bit more we started to unearth more bullet lead, by the time we had finished we probably had about a dozen bullets.
With the light fading and pretty certain we had rediscovered the location of the old police rifle range we called it a day and proceeded home.
Due to a new addition to the family i have yet to venture out again and have a serious search.
Below is a full cartridge with a .22 cartridge alongside.
Attachments
Upvote
0
