Early morning hunt sheds new light

Today was a great day in my metal detecting adventures. I managed to recover some great  relics and in doing so, I answered several questions that had been tormenting me for a while now.

The elusive 1800's ....where in the world are all the lost goodies from the 1800's ? Why can't I find any?
Am I doing something wrong? Are they just too deep? Am I in the wrong area?
And these are just some of the questions. These lead to other more complex questions....but my goal is not to bore you . So let me rather just get on with this morning's hunt.

Woke up early to a perfect day for an early morning ramble in the country side. I got my stuff together and was at my site around 6 am. I decided to hunt the area that last produced the military wings, an area beneath a fairly decent sized Oak tree.

You can just make out my detector leaning against the tree, on the left.

The going was slow and the first decent signal turned out to a be 1971 1c piece, depth on the indicator was at 7 inches, I eventually recovered the coin at around 200mm, not bad  performance I would say. And the signal was clear enough to get the blood pumping! Those old copper coins really sing when you find them.

1971 is the year I was born so it's still a 40 year old coin!

The next few target sounded really promising only to be bottle tops....really old bottle tops! The large one has a picture of a Galleon on it so I thought it might look interesting in a show case.

Next out of the ground was the nail in the top of the picture, followed shortly by the eye of a tarpaulin..........or a tent maybe?

I have found these in clumps around this farm and I started to wander if there might not at some stage in history, have been a military presence on the farm. Strangely enough this one was on it's own.

The shaft is of brass and could be a part from an irrigation fitting, not too sure. It gave a wonderful signal at the base of a poplar tree and it's other part was lying about 20 cm away.

Now it started picking up. I decided to give the opposite side if the gravel road try and within 3 seconds I had a hit ...at the base of a old dead Oak tree. It looked like a clump of dirt about 25 mm across. I gave it a squeeze and as with the last musket ball I found, the crust  gave way to reveal a perfect specimen.

They also all seem to have the same colour patina. That is one old piece right there and I am pretty sure that it has not seen the light of day in well over 100 years.

Very next signal gave me a solid 81 on the screen and really clear sound . The depth said 13-14 inches so I thought it was a small silver coin that was probably at only half that depth.  So I started digging......and then some more ......

Finally it was out and it turned out to be another of the large, very damaged copper coins, that I had found on the last two hunts.You can see it lying just above the coil.

But this one is different because the soil on this side of the road is lighter and dryer for some reason, and the time in the ground left one or two unmistakable details. Namely a date and a few letters!

You can also see the faint details of a person sitting on a throne, with a long "trident" type object running just off vertical to the top of the coin.1878....Yahoo!, So that answers  all the questions that had been niggling me.

I am finding them...I have three so far!

No, I am not doing anything wrong, my settings are perfect (for now), and the T2 is working like a champ!

Yes the stuff is deep and yes, I am in the right area! Well I can tell you that this is one hell of a confidence boost! And incredibly rewarding.

It's as if the universe decided to stop taunting me and leave just enough detail to put my doubts to rest.

Just a few letters  are still visible on the obverse side. Man that really is some nasty deterioration. This ground is really rough on the relics.......all the more reason to get them out ....before they're all gone.

Well it was getting to 8.30 and I knew the kids would be getting restless to start the Sunday morning grocery shopping routine, so I slowly head back to where I had parked the bakkie.

Ping Ping Ping.........nice! What could it be......  

It turned out to be a Ticky lying in the open at around 15cm, but I was now back on the previous side of the road and this little silver coin has taken a beating. I am going to try the electrolysis method of cleaning coins and I think this will be a great little test subject. I really would like to get a decent look at it.

The Ticky is the coin on the lower right side.

I was happy, I had a great hunt and I was looking forward to a cup of coffee so I continued walking towards my car, I had gone about 3m and bang there it was again, "awesome but this must be the last one" I thought to myself and proceeded to clear the grass and sticks away, scanned again and yes there it was still giving me a good solid repeatable whistle ....this sounded like a big aluminium bottle cap again.

Depth was indicated at 12-13 inches so I thought that if I found it at, say 8 inches it would most likely be a cap. Finally it was out of the ground at about 30cm in a soft, spongy patch of soil.......AH.... NO WAYS!!!.....

Now this is what I'm talking about hehehe!

Well I could only guess that this was a military button of sorts and, the fact that it was so ornate......only the British would come to the  African bush wearing this type of clothing HAHAHAHA!

I must say I was shaking  when I  picked it up.....this is a true relic.And a beautiful piece for any collection.

Once I cleaned it up a bit at home I could make out some wording on the back, it says something like "Player Bros" and "Birmingham"  ...I thought it was British!

This a pic I took late this afternoon, not the best lighting I know! She sure is pretty though. A very quick research session on Google suggests a period Pre-1902....that means BOER WAR! And that also means that at least one British Soldier was on this land at around that time. Another question answered, I think I might have to start taking a closer look at the places that produced the Tarp eyelets, there could very well have been some sort of military presence here. Funnily enough now that I think of it those spots also produced a few old tent pegs that now warrant a closer look.

That sums up this weekends hunt , I really must do a post on my recovery business but this is just so much more fun!

Feel free to leave a comment, and thanks for your time. I will try and keep the good stuff coming and who can tell, maybe one of those Redcoats left us a cache or some gold coins. Both preferably!