Steve's 2019 UK Adventure

[Steve Herschbach]

This in many ways is a repeat of my 2018 UK Adventure except two weeks this time instead of three. The 2018 thread is loaded with details and very many local photos that I will not repeat here. Go to the link for the "full tour" with location and travel details.

I booked the trip last year as is pretty much mandatory for the Colchester trips. There are only a limited number of trips available in the spring and fall and with so many people returning every year you really have to plan ahead. Mindy had a 10 day opening so I jumped on that as a week is just not enough in my opinion.

With the benefit of last years trip experience I was able to weed my suitcase down to 40 lbs including two complete Equinox with 15" coils. Had it about perfect except for a couple shirts I never did wear. I was packed well in advance, and had great connections, so was looking forward to a relaxed trip. I had an afternoon flight out of Reno connecting in Chicago with an overnight to London. Perfect for me to sleep away a lot of the 10 hour overseas portion, and arriving in London in the morning.

The plane was half boarded when they announced boarding would halt while they evaluated a flight advisory just in from Chicago. Massive thunderstorms, all flights in delayed for three hours - just enough to miss my connection! I have to give American Airlines credit, they automatically booked me into another flight just two hours later than the original connection, still arriving in London plenty early.

We land at Chicago and the plane taxis forever. Finally the pilot announces the gate is blocked and he has driven past it twice. I'm looking at my watch thinking "this is going to be close!" Luckily the gates were close together, but I literally got off the one flight and walked onto the other. I was pretty sure my bag was not going to make it.

Well, the flight was fine but less seat space than any overseas flight I have had yet. Price was great though so oh well. I can't say I was shocked to find my bag had been left behind in Chicago as did prove to be the case. Still, all we were doing was booking into a hotel next to the airport before heading out next day, so I hoped my bag would follow on the next flight.

No such luck, so next day on the first hunt in the afternoon I was in my travel clothes and on a field with a borrowed Equinox. Thanks Tim! Luckily in a group of seven people somebody always has spares; just as I always travel with a spare, so do others. My very first target that I dug was a full British Crown, I believe a 1937 George VI. Not that old but a large coin and 50% silver. I made some other finds but was hampered a bit wandering around in corn stalk stubble in street shoes. Can't complain though... I was happy to be in England and out detecting!

12th-14th century St Mary the Virgin's Church, Little Bromley

Again, American Airlines came through in the end. They actually delivered my bag that afternoon the 99 miles to Colchester (their limit is 100 miles) at no charge. So it really was just a minor snafu of no consequence, mainly due to good weather and a spare machine being available.

We had a really great group, four guys and three gals including Mindy. Mindy cooks in each evening except for one pub night out. There was also an optional museum tour for one day later in the trip. I wanted to wait and see how my finds were doing before deciding about that. Weather for the first part of the trip was the best I'd ever seen in England, about 70F each day. It made for really pleasant field hunting.

I was as always hoping for a gold coin, with anything else accidental by catch. I was making nice coin and relic finds, including a couple hammered silver coins. A few days into the trip, good buddy Tim, he of the gold ingot from last year, was nearby when he scored his second Celtic 1/4 stater ever, a real beauty. Not minutes later Mindy found here first ever Saxon sceat, a small rare coin that was one of her last "bucket list" items. Lots of smiles and high emotion in the group that day! This may not seem real but the fact is I come very close to liking somebody else making a great find as making one myself. I was right there, got to see the finds right out of the ground, and shared in that "great find high". It's one of the best things about hunting with a group in my opinion. I may never find a Celtic gold coin, but I have been right there when it happened several times now, and that really is about as good for me.

Tim and Mindy's finds - Celtic quarter stater and Saxon silver sceat

A few days later we were hunting a field right across the road from a small town. I was getting some nice buttons and 1800's coins but nothing spectacular. Late in the day I got another typical button signal of about 17 on the Equinox. I proceeded to dig but the hole was getting deeper and wider with no button found. One of the things I like about the 15” coil is I can pinpoint fairly well with the tip or heel of the coil, and nosing around in the hole revealed the target was deeper and larger. At over a foot the target was squealing, and I was sure it was a large iron target or possibly even an aluminum can. There have been times and places where I have kicked the dirt back in the hole and moved on from such targets, but not in England where you never know what might turn up. I was however getting near the plow line now, the point below which the ground turns rock hard and where due to the rules we have to stop digging. I worked round the center of the target and gave a last scoop, and there sitting in the bottom of the hole was a large green item that tumbled out of the shovel full of dirt.

I’m no expert at this kind of stuff, but it looked like a Bronze Age ax head to me. This was not something that I had ever expected to find and so my brain was not really processing it. I wandered over to my buddy Tim who was nearby and asked “is this what I think it is?” I swear he almost fell over, realizing the import of the find more than I had, and assured me I had found an excellent condition Bronze Age ax. Better yet, it appeared to be intact, as many of these that are found have been broken. The final verdict was that my find is a Bronze Age palstave, a predecessor to the modern ax. A palstave is a development of the flat ax, where the shaped sides are cast rather than hammered.

My particular find has been identified as a Bronze Age (circa 1500-1400 BC) cast copper alloy primary shield pattern palstave, dating to the Acton Park Phase. In other words about 3500 years old, and about as old as anything that can possibly be found with a metal detector! I never in my wildest dreams ever thought I would ever find anything so ancient while metal detecting, and the fact this ax is intact and in good condition makes it the find of a lifetime, and that is no exaggeration. I have always been looking for that gold coin, but after all the gold I have found in my life and now with this I am officially saying "good enough". Anything I ever find from here on out in my detecting career is just gravy, my detecting bucket list is complete. 

Bronze Age (c.1500-1400 BC) cast copper alloy primary shield pattern palstave, dating to the Acton Park Phase
(photo of Steve by Tim Blank with permission)

This trip was extra good because everyone in the group was making some really great finds, many in excess of what they were hoping for. After many years detecting these huge fields are far from hunted out, with many of the best finds coming from fields that have been hunted well over a decade. Still new ground does come online regularly, and those fields add a little extra fun in the form of the unknown, especially as regards possible horde finds.

There was one set of new fields that another group had found a lot of Roman stuff, including a really nice Roman silver coin and some good condition bronze coins. The trip was over half over and our weather had turned rainy. Not too bad really, just passing storms, with two hours of solid rain the worst I saw. Still, this limits some of the hunting as some fields with a lot of clay content get really nasty. After my ax find I had four days of mostly newer 1700s and 1800s coins and various widgets, but sort of a four day dry spell. So Tim and I passed on the museum tour and braved the rains instead since time was now running short.

That plan paid off for me in a couple more hammered silver coins, bring my total for the trip to four. The hammered silver are kind of the standard prized find on these trips, rare but not so rare that most everyone has a good shot at some. Most date from 1200 to the 1600's after which milled silver coins replaced them. I found them off in one corner of the field and as the day wore on decided to head back to the area where all the Roman stuff had been found. There were many footprints but lots of gaps and so I hunted in the gaps. The day was almost over when I got a strong signal and dug up an odd looking lump. At first I had no idea what it was, but suddenly as I cleaned it a head and shoulders resolved into view. I had what appears to be a small bronze Roman bust!

There is no real way to date the find, but it definitely looks like a Roman noble of some sort, and was found in the middle of a lot of other Roman finds so it is 90% certain to be around a couple thousand years old, maybe 100 AD going by the coin finds. I am in some ways more pleased by this find than the ax head for some reason. It’s almost like I am talking to that old Roman. I wonder who lost it and what it was. Decorative? A child’s toy? There was a Roman barracks in the area so military related somehow? It is just a great find and I am not aware of anything like it being found by the club before.

Small bronze Roman bust found by Steve

As noted I was running the Minelab Equinox with 15" coil the whole trip. In retrospect I wish I had brought steveg's new rod with counterbalance as my upper back would have thanked me for it the first three days, but it was a bit too long for my suitcase. Since everyone always wants to know, I basically used the same settings this year as last year with one minor tweak. Last year I ran Recovery Speed 5 and this year lowered that to 4. I normally run with nothing rejected, full tones, but have the Horseshoe button set up to reject 6 and under. This eliminates small stuff, maybe even small silver cut coins, but anything round will still ring up. Target ID 1-6 gets all manner of really tiny stuff almost always small lead or brass fragments. Stuff that’s also slow to recover. So as I say I normally hunt wide open and dig it all, but if time is limited or I am just tired of tiny stuff I hit the Horseshoe Button to go to “Cherry Pick Mode”.

Park 1
Frequency Multi
Noise Cancel 0 (adjust as needed)
Ground Balance Manual, 0
Volume Adjust 20 (adjust as needed)
Tone Volume 12, 25, 25, 25, 25 (Steve 4, 25, 25, 25, 25)
Threshold Level 0
Threshold Pitch 4
Target Tone 5 (Steve 50)
Tone Pitch 1, 6, 12, 18, 25
Reject –9 to 1 and Accept 2 to 40 (Steve Reject -9 to 6 and Accept 7 to 40)
Tone Break 0, 10, 20, 30
Recovery Speed 5 (Steve 4)
Iron Bias 6
Sensitivity 20 (Steve 22 to 25)
Backlight Off

Just a really great time with great people and some fabulous finds. I will post a complete set of pictures at some later date when I get the export listing, but for now here are a couple of my favorite hammered silvers from the trip to wrap up this report. Submitted to Minelab for the Find of the Month contest so we will see if I get lucky there also. 

 

[Bill (S. CA)]

Wonderful article, Steve. Can't wait to see more pix.  Thanks for taking the time to share your trip.

[GB_Amateur]

Ok, Steve, you've branded yourself as a full-fledged, dyed-in-the-wool relic hunter.  No turning back.  Of course you can still hunt for the common, easy stuff in your spare time.  😁

Did your two ancient finds go to the government for evaluation & deterimination of ownership, etc.?  And I don't recall reading if your gold find from last year has been settled.

 

 

 

 

[Steve Herschbach]

I still can’t really get my head around “3500 years old”!

I got one gold find back from last year while on this trip, my large “gold flake” which is probably the remains of a thoroughly wiped out Roman gold coin. So I sort of found a gold coin. My other find, the “votive offering” or whatever it is, has been disclaimed by the museums and is going through the process of getting back to me still. Hopefully not much longer now.

Treasure is any non-coin precious metal or items found in groups of several or more. So single finds of bronze, like my ax head and bust, will be coming back to me for sure.

Relics get old for me quick. People would be horrified by the number of buttons and musket balls I tossed in the hedge or ditch. I am more into quality than quantity except for gold or silver, where simple weight matters. My first trip I kept every single button etc. but last trip and this one the weeding was pretty severe. I only kept buttons with writing or patterns, watch winders, lead seals and tokens... the rarer more interesting stuff.

[roustabout]

Congratulations Steve!  You deserve the great finds because of all the help you've so freely given to so many

[GB_Amateur]

51 minutes ago, Steve Herschbach said:

My other find, the “votive offering” or whatever it is, has been disclaimed by the museums and is going through the process of getting back to me still.

It amazes me that they don't consider this worth keeping, technicality or not.  I guess that's good for you in some ways, but it's their loss, IMO.  Anyway, the UK system beats the heck out of ours.

 

[Steve Herschbach]

The magnitude of finds there makes this nothing special, and they do have budget constraints. If they buy every little thing that comes along, they have no money for something really serious when it comes along. Take a look at the Colchester Club home page for examples. Mine is shown there but is far from the best find in my opinion, closer to last place than first.

Example of a Colchester Museum type find

[unearth]

Steve-

Great hunt. Congratulations on the Axe head and the Roman bust. By the way, what numbers did the Axe head come in at on the Nox? The four hammered aren't to shabby either.

I'll be heading to England on the 14th of this month for a 10 day hunt. Like you, looking for the gold, preferably Roman gold.

I'm a bit confused on what you did to the Nox to go to the 'Cherry Pick Mode' by hitting the horseshoe button. Doesn't hitting the horseshoe button put the Nox into all metal?

I know what you mean about the upper back getting sore using the 15" coil. I purchased Steveg's shaft with the counterbalance. What a difference the counterbalance makes. I made a counterbalance unit for my Minelab shaft. It works really well. I'll be using it in England as Steve's shaft, as you say, is to long for most suitcases. 

Again, great hunt with outstanding finds. Hope we can hunt England together again sometime.

Gary

[unearth]

Steve-

Forgot to ask...why use Park 1 instead of Field 1?

[Steve Herschbach]

Hi Gary,

12 hours ago, unearth said:

Doesn't hitting the horseshoe button put the Nox into all metal?

If in disc mode the horseshoe button puts it in all metal, and if in all metal it puts it in discriminate. It’s a toggle.... otherwise it would take you to all metal and you could never get back to discriminate.

12 hours ago, unearth said:

Steve-

Forgot to ask...why use Park 1 instead of Field 1?

No, why use Field 1 instead of Park 1? 

I do a factory reset, and my machine is by default in Park 1, which I modify as described. If you wish, you could toggle to Field 1 and modify it to end up in the same settings. Park 1 and Field 1 are the same mode except for the presets.

Reminder. These are just my settings. That’s no reason to use them. People ask, I tell, but I make no claims they are “the best” settings. They are simply what I prefer. Others may prefer something different.