Civil War Relic Hunting

[Dan(NM)]

8 minutes ago, Chase Goldman said:

The brass U.S. plate stamps are similar on the belt and box plates so without the backing, it's anyone's guess.  I've seen pictures with very faint/delicate script "I"'s or anchors on those pre-war eagle shield buttons.  Great finds!

Thanks for the info!!

[groundscanner]

Super nice finds!

[strick]

You have been killing it lately...nice work!

strick

[Flowdog]

Hi Dan,

Beautiful display you have posted - again. ?

I am curious about the average depth you are finding these relics? Also, if you might share a brief summary of the site conditions and the settings you use to meet the challenges.

I hope your streak stays strong.

Curtis

[Dan(NM)]

38 minutes ago, Flowdog said:

Hi Dan,

Beautiful display you have posted - again. ?

I am curious about the average depth you are finding these relics? Also, if you might share a brief summary of the site conditions and the settings you use to meet the challenges.

I hope your streak stays strong.

Curtis

Thank you Curtis. Here's a description of the site followed by my settings.

This place is different from most, it's on private land and in the middle of a pecan orchard. There's only a very small area that's original, maybe an 80x80 spot, that's where the breast plate came from 9" deep. The rest they dug the dirt and terraced the landscape to water the trees. No dirt was removed according to the owner, just moved around to form berms and low spots for the trees. It seems like all the aluminum somehow ended up 12-18" deep lol, most of the items are 4-7" deep, sometimes more shallow. The dirt is desert sand, but, for some reason contaminated with iron, of course!!

The trees are providing a nice shady spot to hunt for the most part, yesterday, almost everything I dug came from the low spots where the trees are planted, but, quite a few items have been found on the mounds. There doesn't seem to be much mineralization or EMI  interference because I was running my sens at 23 most of the day and recovery speed at 4. My plan is to go back and open my 800 up from -9 to +5, run my recovery speed at 5-6, park 2 and sens at 24.

 

These are my setting:

 

Park 1

No disc

Recovery speed 4

Ground balance  0

Iron bias  0

2 tones

Tone break -9 to +10

Volume on tone break at 6 and  25 for my accepted range

Sens 23

11" coil

 

 

[GB_Amateur]

In 1861 the two existing U.S. Dragoon regiments were re-designated as the 1st and 2nd Cavalry. This reorganization did not affect their role or equipment, although the traditional orange uniform braiding of the dragoons was replaced by the standard yellow of the Cavalry branch. This marked the official end of dragoons in the U.S. Army, although certain modern units trace their origins back to the historic dragoon regiments.   (from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragoon)

Based upon this my conclusion is that your 'D' button is from prior to the Civil War, but I'm far, far from an expert on the subject.  Really great finds!

[Flowdog]

Dan, thanks for taking time to put context to your finds. I look forward to your report comparing the Park 2 settings you have in mind vs the very successful Park 1. I read recently to pay attention to the details when a great find is made. Thanks again for the particulars!