Reunited 400 Years Later And A Heavy Weight, Cannonball Update

[F350Platinum]

The weather has been miserable here 🙄, every 3 days it rains with high winds, and we got a cold snap in the low teens and twenties recently. I know y'all have it much worse in some places, but winter is my relic hunting time, so every day that is marginal is precious. All I had was a couple hours yesterday before the next nor'easter came in.

A little under a year ago I dug a 1607 King James I hammered silver Sixpence in this field, and some buttons, bits of pewter, and a broken belt buckle from the same period. It was probably from an exploration after the discovery of this area in 1606 by Captain John Smith, who founded Jamestown in 1607.

I'm using the stock Deus 2 setup with the 13" coil and the new RCDIGS mount.

Wherever the ground was in shade it was frozen, very difficult to dig. Thankfully the areas in the sun were easy albeit a bit muddy, it only got up to 42.

I headed over to the spot where I found all the stuff last year and searched around, got a 67 and dug this:

I immediately recognized it as the missing piece of the 1600s buckle I dug a year ago! 🥳

I searched around the spot a bit more and found some pieces of lead, nothing important.

Then I decided to cross the field and near the other side I got a really strong 82, solid all the way around. I dug and dug and dug, and almost two feet down I managed to pull this out:

It's about 5" in diameter, and weighs at least 10 pounds, I think it is a cannonball. Furthermore I think it is an errant shot from the British during the War of 1812, this field is near the Potomac River. There was little to no Civil War action here. I can't find evidence of a fuse, thankfully. 😅

I got home, and reunited the buckle bit in the display box with the other items:

If you zoom the picture you will see the date on the coin. It was really great to find the missing buckle piece!

Not sure what I'm going to do with the cannonball yet, I got it out of the field so they won't hit it with a plow or farm equipment, and marked the spot I left it on my GPS app.

I'm not thrilled with handling ordinance of any kind and am glad I didn't get blown up digging it. 😬 I've dug lots of live bullets but this one goes boom 💥 or not. It could be solid, but if it is Civil War era, it could be live. A warning to you all.

Here's the trash, mostly lead and interesting sounding iron bits.

Glad I was able to bring something back. 😀

[Capphd]

Wow! Great cannon ball find. THAT’S a relic. 

[F350Platinum]

24 minutes ago, Capphd said:

Wow! Great cannon ball find. THAT’S a relic. 

 

Thanks Capphd,

It is for sure, but I much prefer digging stuff like the 400 year old belt buckle 😅

I knew what the cannonball was when I got down to it, I know that the British used solid shot when they invaded in 1812, 3000 troops landed here in 1814, and there was a major offensive up the Potomac where they burned Washington DC. Local militias often fired on the ships and attempted to repel the invaders albeit unsuccessfully. The British also had Congreve Rockets, another lovely bit of ordinance I'd rather not find 😬 Francis Scott Key wrote a familiar song about them 🤔

There is no record of anyone firing on this area but at some point it happened, the question is when. The Union Army had a fort directly across the river, it could also have been an unrecorded shot from there, or it was from one of the Union boats that patrolled the Potomac in the Civil War. There was no activity at all here during the Revolution. That was all further south in Yorktown.

It's not impossible to get killed by mishandling ordinance, so I am going to consider any further action with this object carefully. 🙂

[JCR]

Special finds indeed.

[ColonelDan]

Yet another outstanding hunt.  Congratulations my friend.   

I have a cannonball from the French and Indian War...a French 16 pounder and the dimensions of yours are like the one I have.  That sounded off when you swung your coil over it didn't it?   😀

[F350Platinum]

52 minutes ago, ColonelDan said:

Yet another outstanding hunt.  Congratulations my friend.   

I have a cannonball from the War of 1812 and the dimensions of yours are like the one I have.  That sounded off when you swung your coil over it didn't it?   😀

Yep blasting 82, all around. I knew it was deep iron, but the signal was so strong I wanted to see what it was. 🙂 

Is your ball solid? No fuse?

[NCtoad]

That’s a Big piece of history!   Congrats on all the great finds and letting me tag along vicariously.  

[F350Platinum]

1 minute ago, NCtoad said:

That’s a Big piece of history!   Congrats on all the great finds and letting me tag along vicariously.  

My pleasure, NC. 🙂 We only got a dusting today, and last week's snow is all gone, benefit of being surrounded by water I think. Does NC have a lot of snow or frozen ground? Next week it will be in the 50s here.

[NCtoad]

2 minutes ago, F350Platinum said:

My pleasure, NC. 🙂 We only got a dusting today, and last week's snow is all gone, benefit of being surrounded by water I think. Does NC have a lot of snow or frozen ground? Next week it will be in the 50s here.

No snow where I’m at, but getting down to 10 degrees tomorrow morning.  Gonna warm up next week here too.  Looking forward to your next hunt!

[ColonelDan]

7 hours ago, F350Platinum said:

Is your ball solid? No fuse?

Solid.... I sent you a photo.  I originally said War of 1812 for some reason....it's from the French and Indian War...a French 16 pounder