brianc053
Bronze Member
- Joined
- Jan 27, 2015
- Messages
- 1,021
- Reaction score
- 3,723
- Golden Thread
- 0
- Location
- Sussex County, DE
- 🏆 Honorable Mentions:
- 3
- Detector(s) used
- Minelab Equinox 800
XP Deus 2
- Primary Interest:
- Metal Detecting
Hi everyone. The birds woke me up at around 6AM this morning so I headed out detecting shortly afterward.
Inspired by one of our other forum members (who found a seated dime recently) I wanted to search for something from the 1800's, so I did NOT go back to that park with the sidewalk to nowhere.
Instead I headed to a nature preserve in the town next-door because my research of our area's 1850's map told me there should be an old homesite somewhere in the middle of it. This preserve is undeveloped; there are some rough trails but nothing like a "park" would have, other than a parking area.
Sure enough, the homesite was easy to find and was maybe 200 yards from the parking area. The cellar hole had split rail fence around it, and is kind of built into a hillside. The hole itself is full of bushes so I won't get a good look at it until this winter.
This home's location was surrounded by farm fields back then, and the preserve is keeping them as open space. Luckily someone has mowed a few acres of them, so I didn't have to fight with long grass and the inevitable ticks.
I didn't have a lot of time before I needed to start my day-job, so I made one pass out from the homesite area and then one pass back. I got lucky about 2/3 of the way into the outbound pass and found the Indian Head Cent pictured below. It was right next to a square nail, and was like 2 feet from a screw top bottle cap - and the weird part was the bottle cap was maybe an inch or two deeper than the IHC. My guess is that the field was turned/plowed in the not too distant past.
On the return back to the parking area I found the button at maybe 2"; it doesn't have the shank but I can make out "Treble Gilt", with a plain front.
If the field has been turned over somewhat recently then I guess I have to dig every signal, and so I did. I pulled a decent amount of junk out of the field and quite a few square nails.
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At home I carefully cleaned the IHC and uncovered the 1864 date. I think that coin is in really good shape considering the age, and given that the IHC's I find here in New Jersey are usually much more toasted.
This one weighs 4.1grams, so I think it's a "Fatty" and made of the Copper-Nickel alloy from 1864.
I didn't know this, but research taught me that 1864 the mint used two different metal alloys: they made 13million out of copper-nickel and 39million out of bronze [copper-tin]. The copper-nickel ones weighed 4.7grams when minted and the bronze ones only 3.1g, so this one has to be the copper-nickel and I guess I found the less common version!
Looks like I was successful in finding something with "age", and now I've got two different spots to visit that have strong potential and a lot of un-searched acres!
Maybe the birds will wake me up early again tomorrow!
- Brian
Inspired by one of our other forum members (who found a seated dime recently) I wanted to search for something from the 1800's, so I did NOT go back to that park with the sidewalk to nowhere.
Instead I headed to a nature preserve in the town next-door because my research of our area's 1850's map told me there should be an old homesite somewhere in the middle of it. This preserve is undeveloped; there are some rough trails but nothing like a "park" would have, other than a parking area.
Sure enough, the homesite was easy to find and was maybe 200 yards from the parking area. The cellar hole had split rail fence around it, and is kind of built into a hillside. The hole itself is full of bushes so I won't get a good look at it until this winter.
This home's location was surrounded by farm fields back then, and the preserve is keeping them as open space. Luckily someone has mowed a few acres of them, so I didn't have to fight with long grass and the inevitable ticks.
I didn't have a lot of time before I needed to start my day-job, so I made one pass out from the homesite area and then one pass back. I got lucky about 2/3 of the way into the outbound pass and found the Indian Head Cent pictured below. It was right next to a square nail, and was like 2 feet from a screw top bottle cap - and the weird part was the bottle cap was maybe an inch or two deeper than the IHC. My guess is that the field was turned/plowed in the not too distant past.
On the return back to the parking area I found the button at maybe 2"; it doesn't have the shank but I can make out "Treble Gilt", with a plain front.
If the field has been turned over somewhat recently then I guess I have to dig every signal, and so I did. I pulled a decent amount of junk out of the field and quite a few square nails.
---------------------
At home I carefully cleaned the IHC and uncovered the 1864 date. I think that coin is in really good shape considering the age, and given that the IHC's I find here in New Jersey are usually much more toasted.
This one weighs 4.1grams, so I think it's a "Fatty" and made of the Copper-Nickel alloy from 1864.
I didn't know this, but research taught me that 1864 the mint used two different metal alloys: they made 13million out of copper-nickel and 39million out of bronze [copper-tin]. The copper-nickel ones weighed 4.7grams when minted and the bronze ones only 3.1g, so this one has to be the copper-nickel and I guess I found the less common version!
Looks like I was successful in finding something with "age", and now I've got two different spots to visit that have strong potential and a lot of un-searched acres!
Maybe the birds will wake me up early again tomorrow!
- Brian
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