🥇 BANNER Winter camp Gold!

[JDug]

The other day I was digging in the frozen ground a winter camp and had found 4 bullets and some camp lead in about 2 hours. Then I broke my shovel trying to pop out a large plug. It was a iffy signal with the GPX, either iron falsing on both sides of the target or 2 targets. Anyway I came back the next day and opened it up only to find a square nail. Without checking for another signal I started digging down to the plow line to see if the sub-soil was where it was suppose to be because I've found several Fire-pits there. When I threw out the 1st scoop the clod broke apart and out popped Gold, clear as day. After freaking out for several minutes, videoing and washing I decided to keep detecting and found another fire-pit just 10 feet from the Gold 2 1/2. From that I got 4 buttons, 1 J-hook, a bullet worm, a firing cap, bone and lot's of iron. The Eagle I is of the rare variety w/ the arrows on the left and the 2 1/2 Gold is in the best condition of any coin I've ever dug and it's a S mint mark, which only 24,000 were made. HH all!

 

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[JDug]

John- that's an incredible find! Guess your next one will be the $5 or are you going to skip that one and go for the $10 or $20 LOL

Congrats also on making the banner again!

Thanks Keith! I'll take whatever the ground gives me.

 

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[wayfas4u]

Banner Find all the way JDug......glad you found your second gold coin! Keep doing what you are doing!

Rodney Hiers (wayfas4u)

 

[ANTIQUARIAN]

Congratulations on banner #2 Dug!
Looks like you had quite the workout on that hole too!

Dave

 

[JDug]

Banner Find all the way JDug......glad you found your second gold coin! Keep doing what you are doing!

Rodney Hiers (wayfas4u)

Thanks Rodney!

 

[JDug]

Congratulations on banner #2 Dug!
Looks like you had quite the workout on that hole too!

Dave

Thank you Dave!

 

[coinman123]

WOW! That is amazing, definitely dropped by a Civil War solider, that date fits perfectly with the time period. It seems a lot of gold coins have been found lately! Congrats on an incredible find, it deserved banner for sure!

Coinman123,

 

[Goldiver]

Wow, great gold! Congratulations, keep those finds coming!

Steve

 

[Msbeepbeep]

Incredible find! Congrats on making your second banner!

Loved the video of your barely contained excitement! The laugh is priceless!
I don't know how you are able to film videos in the field after making that kind of a gold find, I'd be all over the place. All you'd see would be blurred scenery and a lot of OMG'ing.....if I remembered to turn the camera on!

 

[Urban Grund]

Wow! Just Wow!

 

[goldnugget]

Congradulation on the Banner Find. Amazing it was so deep. Hope you re-scanned all the dirt on the tarp.

 

[eyemustdigtreasure]

almost proof! WoW!
now, can you beat that?!
try, (please?)

 

[rjw4law]

Yep....banner plus

 

[Sooper Dave]

Incredible find! Those other relics are awesome as well, but that coin is Amazing! Way to go!

 

[Davers]

Thanks fellas! I just took it to the coin shop to have them look at it and they said it's probably worth about $500 but went on to say if I hadn't cleaned it could of been $800 t0 $2000. I thought I was really careful and didn't rub it but they said I put hairline scratches in it and I should of left the dirt on it. It just seems to me that caring it around with dirt on it would scratch it worse. I don't care what they say I love it for the history. I'm sure glad buttons don't have to hold up to such scrutiny.

I took a week off from TN & came back to see this awesome find.
I have only read through the thread up to this post.

It makes me wonder what the coin would have looked like when the Soldier Had it . (scratch -less)
I think not.
I guess sitting in the ground for 150 years cleaned the original scratches away.
From what I have Noticed 'on Silver coins' is even a Soft toothbrush is enough to put hair line scratches on a coin & that's with no visible dirt left on it's surface.
Gold being softer would be much easier to scratch. Daa.

IMO the best you /me can do is when dug Handle such coins as little as possible then put it into a pill type container, heck I've used leaves or even packed the container full of dirt to keep the coin from moving around.
Then when I get home either Air or Water blast the Dirt off ,even with that 98% of the time my OCD Butt can see Scratches that I likely caused at some point.

Being that you know where It was Dug & that it was 99% most likely lost by a CW soldier makes it "Priceless".

It's funny how all those Morgan Dollars Can have all those UGLY nicks'Bag Marks' & other Surface imperfections & Still Grade MS 60 +. but A half dollar down to a $1 Gold coin that has 1 mark of that type is automatically a "Details" coin

Don't make much sense to me...love the I button & Minies as well.
Davers

 

[Davers]

awesome gold. the S-mint mark is wild. I once dug a near mint 1856-S half dollar. when I flipped it out I ran to the car and went home immediately. I gently rinsed it under the faucet then put it in a case. I took it to a coin dealer and he said that I had 'cleaned' the coin and caused scratches. this was BS. under a loupe I could see fine scratches but they were there when it was lost. I sure didn't cause the scratches by running the coin under the faucet. I let it air dry as well on a towel. in my opinion it rubbed against another coin in the miner's pocket then was lost shortly after it was made. but the value does not matter to me as I would never sell it. this is why I don't collect coins as I hate the subjectivity in the 'experts' opinion.

I think the $500 was a low ball offer. I think your coin is worth more. Early San Francisco mint coins are scarce and were generally used up in the west. I was shocked to see the nice detail in yours. congrats on a banner find!

p.s., I study both the American Civil War and the California Gold Rush. your 1861-S coin dug in a Civil War camp is significant. Most Civil War guys do not understand the importance of CA gold. to put it in context, more gold was pulled out of California in the first part of the Gold Rush than the previous 200 year worldwide production combined. In 1857 the SS Central American carrying ONE gold shipment sank and it contributed to a 'mini-recession'. Gold and silver production during the Civil War greatly financed the war for the Union. Without it there is no telling what sort of problems there could have been with 'greenbacks', etc.

Gold production was so important during the war that there were several attempts by the Confederates and/or Confederate sympathizers to either take California or at the very least, take gold shipments...

Great Post....

 

[nsdq]

Nice cold coin i mean gold coin

 

[Digger70pa]

Great find buddy

 

[Silver Tree Chaser]

JDug - I hadn't commented on your fantastic gold coin recovery, and could let that go. Absolutely fantastic. Congrats.

 

[swamp yankee]

BIG CONGRATS on your finds including the "color",she's a beauty! I'd make this area my new "home" for the warm weather for sure and see if you can find her sisters too. HH

 

[deepseeker3]

Oh my god!