RELIC HUNTING STORIES

If you have a relic hunting story and would like us to put it on this page,
please email it to us. Pictures are welcome but for space and downloading time, please convert them to JPEGs before sending. Stories can be humorous, exciting, sad, embarrassing, etc. We have all had experiences that would be of interest to other relic hunters.

"When Men's Hearts Beat Faster"
by Vernon Cross
My Website
E-mail Vernon at vcross@ideafamilies.org

It was a loud intrusive sound he heard as consciousness started to return, it was very close. He could feel his body being moved roughly. The flashing pain in his head felt as if it were split in two. A peculiar smell seemed to dominate his senses and his ears rang loudly. Again the searing pain shot through his brain. He raised his right hand and placed it to his head. He could feel the warm blood, and he touched and felt a large deep gash in the side of his head starting at the end of his eyebrow and running back to his ear. He felt himself being lifted and heard the sounds of men's voices as he was jostled around. He tried to open his eyes but only one responded, the other was swollen shut. He saw that he was being carried on a canvas stretcher toward a wagon drawn by two horses. Other soldiers lay crammed in the wagon with various wounds. Many had bloodstained white bandages on one or more parts of their body, some were unconscious, others moaned in their misery and pain clutching their injuries. Other wagons being loaded with wounded men were on the field as well. Medical corpse personnel moved through the grim scene assessing the injuries and calling for stretchers. As they lifted him up to the men in the wagon, his bayonet slipped from it's sheath and fell into the tall field grass. The wagon moved on about its business of collecting the wounded from the battlefield. Men who were able held up their hand to signal for help, it would be a long night for those who were missed. Crows called to one another in the distance as they headed for their roost; it was the last thing the solider heard that day as he gazed into the setting red sun. He felt himself drifting back into unconsciousness, a twirling downward vortex into blackness.

The Civil War Battle of Cedar Mountain took place a few miles outside of Culpeper Virginia. The year was 1862 when this heated engagement, also known as "Slaughter's Mountain", was fought on a hot August day. Almost 25,000 troops were involved resulting in nearly 3000 casualties. I walked these same fields with my detector that so many fought on and died that day.

Little has changed in the last 140 years, the land is now a corn field and may very well have been one back then. The old farm house that is shown on Civil War maps of the time still sits upon the treed hill and cattle graze peacefully in this now idyllic setting. I swung my coil over the ground where on that day so many years ago, men's hearts beat faster. Cannons thundered and white smoke drifted heavily across the field. Hot lead flew thick through the air and the smell of burnt gun powder permeated the valley. Cannon balls exploded or sped and bounced along the ground cutting a deadly swath through the ranks. Distant crackling musket fire carried on its rolling cadence up and down the lines of held positions. Bark and limbs showered down from trees as heavy musket balls slammed into opposing positions, many of the balls finding their targets with sickening thuds. The deafening roar of returning musket fire rolling up and down the defending lines, made for a foreboding rhythmic dance of death. A line had been drawn in this field that day and those that came would step across it.

As I detected, I listened and tried to hear the shouts of the officers and screams of wounded men above the pitched tempo of battle, surely the sounds still echoed through the valley, riding forever on the winds of time. Surging waves of humanity rushing this way and that. Sword wielding riders on screaming wide-eyed horses crashing to the ground their hoofed legs flailing the air. Exploding aerial canister rounds raining shrapnel down from the sky and hell itself rose up to claim its due.

My XLT sounds off loud... bringing my thoughts back to the present. It had been silent for quite awhile, only the faint hum of the threshold through the headphones merged with my thoughts of so long ago. But now the machine spoke to me, shaking my senses. I looked at the screen, the VDI number read 52, that could very well be another Civil War bullet. 12 inches of red Virginia dirt I took out of the hole before the white coated lead projectile was mine, I lifted it from its grave. This was not just any old bullet, this was a bullet immortalized the second it was fired. A Union solider took it out of his ammo box in the heat of battle, his adrenaline rushed as he shoved it down the barrel of his weapon with a ramrod. Caught up in the swirling insanity of war and the fear for self preservation, he cocked the musket, took aim at another American... and fired it. This bullet I held in my hand was a piece of that history . A minute part of the essence of the Civil War itself. Last touched by that soldier... or the unfortunate body it went through.

It was a gut wrenching war. A nation laid open and bleeding, inflicting deep and horrendous wounds upon it's own-self, leaving the country exhausted and bone weary after the merciful end finally came. So many lives lost. Many of the great southern cities lay in ruins. Whole families, farms and plantations gone. It was responsible for the assassination of one of our most beloved presidents. Hundreds of thousands of brave and gallant officers and enlisted men on both sides gave the ultimate sacrifice for their beliefs and their cause. Many forever immortalized in the annals of time, while a few became outlaws having lost all. It left an ugly scar seared across the face of this land and history will forever bear the memory of those trying times.

There has been more written about the Civil War than any other event in America's history.More memorials have been erected to it than any other American war. It was so different from other wars where a foreign power comes against a nation united, for the most part, in the defense of the nation as a whole. The Civil War caused a nation to be torn apart, each side willing to fight and die for their beliefs... and die they did; The Battle of Chancellorsville saw over 24,000 casualties. The Battle of Gettysburg had 51,000 dead or wounded in three days of fighting. The Second Battle of Manassas saw over 22,000 casualties. The Battle of Chickamuga cost over 34,000 dead or wounded. Shiloh 23,000, Spotsylvania 30,000, Wilderness 29,000 and the list goes on and on. The Civil War claimed the lives of more than 600,000 soldiers. More lives were lost during the Civil War than in all other American conflicts combined.

My thoughts about the war continued to flow as I swung my coil over the historical ground. At times the detector would call out to me excitedly; "Here... here is another"! I would kneel on the ground as if in reverence and carefully retrieve the relic from the ground, this one was a round musket ball probably fired by a rebel. Early on in the war the south was poorly armed, their weapons were inferior and still fired round balls of lead. Other artifacts came to the surface as well after 140 years of silence. They spoke to me of fear and sorrow, courage and honor, suffering and death. Union 58 caliber bullets and more musket balls surfaced into the light of the twenty first century. Date era Indian head pennies, horseshoes, iron rings and canister shot rose from the ground like ghosts from the past. An old brooch, perhaps a soldiers keepsake and a couple of unidentifiable coins or tokens saw the light of day after their long exile.

A bayonet emerged from a depth of 5 inches near the edge of the corn field in the tall field grass were it had lain for 140 years. Its sinister looking form now covered in rust and caked with red dirt. Crows squawked out their haunting calls in the distance as I wiped off the dirt from the cold bayonet. A chill ran down my spine as my mind raced through scenarios of how it came to be here and the fate of its owner. These were not just inanimate objects, some spoke softly of a time in the past, while others like this bayonet shouted with urgency of the history they were a part of.

The loud intrusive calling of a crow startled me from my thoughts. I turned to look at my tormentor perched in the limbs of a huge old oak tree a short distance away. That old tree was standing there when this battle took place. The crows black eyes blinked rapidly as he cocked his head in puzzlement at my activity, I felt sorry for its lack of understanding. It's life hinged on the next road kill or corn bin raid, what would it know of war, sacrifice and sorrow.

I rose from the ground, placed the bayonet in my pouch and gazed out across the miles of harvested corn field into the setting red sun. Crows called out to one another as they headed for their roost. I would swing the coil over the ground in measured rhythmic swings. My back ached and my arm was stiff but there was no time to rest, the next lost piece of history was just up ahead waiting somewhere in that vastness.

THE KEY TO SUCCESS

By Richard Angelico

It was late on a hot Sunday afternoon in June and my hunting partner , Hy D'Antonio, and I had dug well over 40 fragments,most over a foot deep and many at 2 feet or better.Our best finds so far,several pieces of grapeshot and one or two very large mortar fragments. I was so beat I had started leaving fragments in the ground after uncovering them to make sure they weren't shells, which is unusual for me, since I dig and keep it all,ask my wife.

Our luck in this area was running pretty good.Since we began hunting here we have found 1- 9 inch Union Naval Watercap Fused ball dated 1861, 3 - 24 pound solid balls, 9 - 3 pound cannister , dozens of grapeshot , one half of a ten inch ball,several nice pie fragments,7 dated naval water cap fuses, several hundred bullets, a few pieces of lead sabots and what seems like two tons of fragments. The only downside:It is extremely hard hunting. The area is a network of thick brush and briars, held together by poison ivy, whose lone inhabitants, the water moccasins seem to resent our presence...but then.... that's why the stuff's still here, isn't it?

The prize though,was not to be found: Those rare,rifled Dahlgrens that we knew had been fired at this position. My mentor ,Billy Spedale, the legendary Louisiana relic hunter kept encouraging me everytime we spoke saying," Those big iron minie balls are there, Rich, you just gotta keep looking". He also warned they were probably pretty deep,might only give off a weak signal and I would have to do a lot of deep digging to find one.Well, deep or not and digging both strong and weak signals, they were nowhere to be found as far as I was concerned. However, I knew from experience,persistence pays off, so I kept looking. And, I kept remembering those pieces of lead sabots I had found.

This particular Sunday it was almost time to pack it in, when I decided to go look for a key I had lost the week before.After an hour or so, I wandered into a new area and spotted an old glass whisky flask sticking out from under some leaves.I pushed it with the coil on my CZ 70 to uncover it and got a signal.I always hunt in all metal so I switched over to I.D. and got a high coin tone. I figured it was probably the screw cap to the bottle, since it was missing but then, a high coin tone in these parts also means a Naval fuse. I checked the depth and it read out 2 inches. I dug out a quick shovel full of dirt and no screw cap. No signal in the dirt pile either but checking the hole again, I got another signal that gave a zinc penny tone.Strange.I stuck my shovel in the ground again and heard the unmistakable scraping sound and feel of cast iron. I bent down and began scooping out dirt with my hands and at about five inches under the surface was this cone shape staring up at me. At first I thought it was a fragment,then I noticed the nose was a perfect cone and I could see a glint of brass on the tip of the shell.It was the unmistakable brass pin of a Dahlgren.Using a 3 foot probe I felt along the sides of the cone and it was straight and uniform. My God, I thought, I just found a Dahlgren looking for a lost key! Snapping some pictures of the shell in the ground with the 35mm I always carry, I called HY on the radio saying, " I think I got a whole shell, a Dahlgren." I waited for Hy to wade through the brush before pulling it out of the ground so he could see how the shell had landed or perhaps burrowed thru the ground. Before digging it out, we both checked the shell in I.D. mode and it read zinc penny! Never got an iron I.D. signal off of it.I guess the combination of the brass tip,lead sabot, iron body and bad ground fooled the I.D. system... but then,I never rely on that anyway.I only use the CZ here because the ground is so bad and the CZ has a salt mode that still hits extremely deep on iron and iron is what we are looking for.

I pulled out the shell and it was 100% complete, sabot and all. We were both absolutely speechless.While Hy snapped a final picture...all I could hear were Billy Spedale's words,"Those big iron minie balls are there, Rich, you just gotta keep looking."

Elephant Memory

About 10 years ago a digging buddy of mine told me about an area in Chantilly, Virginia where he had found some Confederate relics. He didn't say exactly what relics but in fact they were Confederate. It was May 1996 and I had been digging with a real good friend of mine, Joe Klecz, every weekend for several months. However, this particular weekend he had to go to his son's soccer game. I thought this is a perfect chance to check that spot in Chantilly; find out if it is a waste of time and if so, erase it from my memory. It was a Saturday morning and I woke up hungry. I went to Subway and pigged out on one of their foot long subs. After the feast I headed to Chantilly. Arriving at the spot I grabbed my metal detector and my gear and started hiking. After about 300 yards I came upon a nice little creek with two gradual slopes on each side. Searching this area carefully..... there was nothing, I mean nothing, not even a shotgun shell. At the top of the west slope there were flowers in the distance. Hunting my way toward the flowers I started picking up signals, lots of signals, then a deep cut in the road. Thinking this could be a house site, my next thought was "could it be old enough to be Civil War period"? At first I started finding lots of house site stuff: spoons, jewelry, door pulls, etc.. Nothing "good". Finally a three ringer, thinking "They were here", then an eagle button, "Yes", a U.S. box plate, "Unbelievable", a U.S. buckle, another U.S. box plate. I began shaking, thinking I better calm down before I whack something good with my shovel. So I turned my detector off, sat down and drank some water from my canteen. Already having my best plate day yet at three, but feeling greedy, I thought "Just one more". Well it happened, an eagle plate, and again the same thought, "Just one more". It didn't happen. The streak ended at four, all in less than two hours. I was "on the top of the world". After spending several more hours digging, I was rewarded with 69 caliber round balls, several C. S. gardners and 2 iron stirrups. Well I'm glad I kept this spot in my memory, turned out to be a virgin house site and my best plate day yet. Les T. Hill, Jr.

We will call this one "The Greatful Dead"
"Digitup" was spot checking last summer in Central Virgina off of R.t 3 at about the time when a body was found and there was lots of local fear regarding the "Rt. 29 Stalker". He was just 50 or so feet off of the highway when he suddenly stopped dead in his tracks as a motionless body lay in the woods with an arm facing skyward as if rigamortis had already set in. He cautiously approached the apparent dead man and after questioning if he needed help or something was totally convinced that the man was really dead. He called 911 on his cellular which he always carries with him on a hunt. The police instructed him not to touch the body and wait there for them to arrive. After about 10 minutes or so 3 cruisers arrived and about 5 officers which all studied the body were convinced it was that of a dead man and proceded to call the medical examiner. They taped off the area around the body and searched the immediate area for evidence or some sign of a murder weapon or something. About 30 minutes went by with "Digitup" and the 5 officers standing around the dead body etc. until the examiner arrived. After a few moments the examiner did a few preliminary tests and then proceeded to check the mans pulse on his neck. All of a sudden the man jumped up, scaring the hell out of "digitup" and the officers. Apparently the "dead body" was a local black man who was constantly drunk, had passed out on his property while drinking in the woods and had fallen in such a way that his arm was contorted so it looked like one of the dead in a Gettysburg battlefield picture. After the "live" gentlemen cussed out the police and "Digitup" he stumbled on to his nearby barn and passed out again. Well, "Digitup" was not about to waste the day so after the police left he went back to the old gentlemans barn, woke him up and got permission to dig in his woods! The day ended with "digitup" scrapping egg off of his face and getting skunked. Bob, this really happended, "Digitup" phoned me from the body while I was at work, all shook up and kept me in the loop until after the dead man awoke. "Digitup" is a club member that we all know and love, but I don't think I"ll reveal his name except to say that his licence plate reads "Digitup" and his initials are R.C.

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