Recently I have been reminded that I don't have to find cool relics all the time. The experience of being out in such a beautiful place is the greatest treasure of all.
Last week I took a lunch break, hopped in my car and took a drive to that field where my wife found that Victorian horse-tack piece. It was a lovely spring day that took me back to my school days and reminded of walking home from the bus stop on the last day of school at the start of the summer holidays.
I arrived at the field convinced that there must be more to be found here. This field is located right next to the old wagon road and is nice and level, the perfect place to set up camp.
I zig-zagged across the field and only got signals when I got near the road. These, unfortunately, turned out to be bottle-tops and cans, typical modern roadside junk. I worked my way all the way until I neared the two electrical Pylons, towards the side where the rural township begins. I was just thinking I can't be more than a few meters from where my wife found that horse tac tag when my detector sang a sweet high 70s tones into my ear. "That sounds better," I said to myself as I checked the depth. The target was deep and the ground was really hard so I had a good feeling from the start. When I saw the size and shape of the target I immediately knew I had just dug my own British Cavalry horse-tack tag. On the way home my mind raced. Was each item serialized or was a number issued to a rider or regiment? The tag was dirty and I could only just make out the crown on it. What I found when I cleaned it took me totally by surprise. It was indeed a queens crown but the initials that came through were not those of Queen Victoria but rather those of Queen Elizabeth.
Elizabethan horse-tack serial number tag.
Surely there must be more to this area if we can find two of these tags, so close together on the same field. The tags could be up to 100 years apart in age. The farmer did describe the field as "The field with the two pylons where they dumped the horse manure." He may have been referring to the old days as we didn't see any horse manure. Perhaps these items ended up getting dumped with the horse manure.
While on the subject of horse-tack, I often see detectorists posting these brass rivets and for the most part, no one seems to know what they were from.
Brass rivets often dug on old sites.
One of the uses I have discovered was for horse-tack. Occasionally, I dig up items that still have bits of leather attached. Below you can see how leather was attached using those brass rivets.
Brass rivets hold leather to buckles.
On the weekend we spent some more time beach hunting and found more ruined coins and a few "spendies" for our jar. I also dug a live 9mm round which is not the type of target you expect or would like to find on the beach. As a parent, I could just imagine finding a child playing with the bullet while building their sand-castle. I'm just glad I could find it first and dispose of it properly.
Live bullet found on the beach.
We bumped into another couple who were detecting on the beach and it was really awesome being able to chat about the hobby. Of course, we exchanged phone numbers so we can arrange some hunts sometime in the future when this Corona madness is behind us.
On Sunday we decided to check out a field that has been cleared recently. Why we choose the hottest days to go to fields you can only get to on foot is beyond me. It reached 35 degrees celsius and we must have lost a few kilo's that day. The field was super... super quiet that is. We did find a ton of smashed up modern bullets on the one side I assume someone had been doing some target practice. I also found a random piece of metal I decided to clean up and discovered part of a word or name, "ARC", stamped on it. Once again proving that it's always a good idea to clean those random pieces of metal before disposing of them.
Random piece of metal which turned out to have letters stamped on it.
The cane fires have been raging and more fields are being cleared, so I have plenty of ground to cover.
Freshly burnt sugarcane. This field will just be sand in a few days.
Oh, and of course I made some trips to the Field of Buttons, and yes, there are still finds being made there. I'm still convinced I'm going find a silver coin there, or a coin from the 1800s.
Here are some of the latest finds from the field of buttons...
A buckle and a piece of a possible bracelet.
This appears to have been the front cover to a pocket watch.
This is a French suspender buckle. stamped "Solide", "Paris"
Some harmonica reed pieces, a good sign there
is still more to be found.
Badge or Pin, possibly a decorative "V" or "W"
We drive past some of the other farms in the area on our way to town and they have also been busy clearing fields. Looks like it's time to pluck up the courage to ask some strangers if I can wander around on their land looking for treasure. I think the conversation will be easier now that I can use their neighbour as a reference.
No comments:
Post a Comment