Rough 2 1/2 Hour Hunt Paid Off

I got to the cellar hole at 6AM and gridded out a section I wanted to hunt. Digging the usual trash and get then a solid hit, it was deep, so I thought more junk. Out comes a beautiful bell. This bell is in nice shape as far as no pits or corrosion and it's heavy. My question is....could this be a silver bell ? It definitely isn't steel or brass and copper come out of our ground in terrible condition. :dontknow:

This site is an early 1800 and it's hard to believe a poor dirt farmer could afford silver bells, but that's what I think it might be. I clean up my silver coins with baking soda and water and think I'm going to try it on this bell. :thinkingabout:

I continue working my line and get another good hit and at 7+ comes my first half dime, an 1849 in decent condition. :happydance01: It cleaned up nice with the baking soda. What's nice about being a newbie is that every day you hunt you can find a first.

By this time I am saturated, I don't know how you guys/gals do it but I guess I'm just a 65 year old wimp. lol I'm beat up pretty good by now but after those two finds I want to push on. Bam..another good hit that I feel good about, I dig down and out comes a large copper. I can't make the date out and it's in rough shape ( like me lol ) but I'm going to clean it up and see if i can get some identifing marks on it.

Anyway, after two and a half hours I'm ready to make the long walk back to the truck. I'm satisfied with what I found and that's all that counts but I sure can't wait for the cooler weather to come in and make these hunts even more fun. :yes:

Very, very nice hunt. It does seem that the finds you make, make the weather tolerable. Congrats on that 1/2 dime, nice early one. The bell is great looking and I am sure some member will chime in about that LC. Don't you wish you started detecting 20 years ago, I do.

Great finds , love the half Dime . :smitten: 65 eh ? I can relate to that. lol Keep digging as Silver and gold has medicinal qualities . thumbsup01 thumbsup01

I cant wait to score a half dime, You made some sweet finds!!! Congrats on the early half dime in GREAT condition!! Excellent Hunt!! Happy Hunting!!

aloldstuff link=topic=6643.msg77788#msg77788 date=1312643298 said:

LC. Don't you wish you started detecting 20 years ago, I do.

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I sure do. :yes: The years I have left will be digging in the woods as long as I can. :daydream:

I cleaned up the bell and did a little research and although it doesn't look like brass or bronze ( color ) it must be. It's hard to believe a dirt farmer could afford silver bells and it didn't clean up like the half dime. Still happy to make the find though. :yes:

Sweet seated thumbsup01

:clapping: :clapping: thats a great couple of hours detecting Frank :cheering: :cheering: beautiful half dime and it looks like it might have a repunched 9 on the date :beerbuddy: the crotal bell or petal bell as their sometimes called for the flower petal design on the bottom is made mostly of brass and clean up pretty well . sometimes theres a number or letters ( maker initials)one the bottom as well . heres a couple of links with more info on them .as for your copper it has me stumped for now , Frank anyway you can get a picture of the front and back with the light casting across it for better detail.

http://www.classicbells.com/info/BellDesign.htm

http://www.ukdfd.co.uk/pages/crotal-bells.html

congrats again

del link=topic=6643.msg77819#msg77819 date=1312667685 said:

:clapping: :clapping: thats a great couple of hours detecting Frank :cheering: :cheering: beautiful half dime and it looks like it might have a repunched 9 on the date :beerbuddy: the crotal bell or petal bell as their sometimes called for the flower petal design on the bottom is made mostly of brass and clean up pretty well . sometimes theres a number or letters ( maker initials)one the bottom as well . heres a couple of links with more info on them .as for your copper it has me stumped for now , Frank anyway you can get a picture of the front and back with the light casting across it for better detail.

http://www.classicbells.com/info/BellDesign.htm

http://www.ukdfd.co.uk/pages/crotal-bells.html

congrats again

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Thanks for the links Dan. thumbsup01 You don't miss a thing....It looks like you're right on the double strike 9, although not by much. :yes:

Wow Frank, she is a looker. :smitten: You made out quite well with those finds. :clapping: Yeah, I can't make out anything on the copper either. :thinkingabout: I guess the one thing that we can be sure of is that it is old. lol Sweet hunt. thumbsup01

A crotal bell, a seated silver and a copper, thats what I call an awesome hunt erfect10:

Nice score Frank erfect10: That seated half dime is sweet. But try and not clean any more with baking soda, it takes away all the value :girlcry: I just run mine under water as I brush the dirt off of it. After the dirt is gone, I rub (while under water ) the coin with just my fingers nice and hard. This get rid of the minute stuff that is in the letters and doesn't scratch the coin, since all of the big dirt is already gone. This merc was done that way

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That crotal bell is copper based, but because of the mixture of metals, it makes what we refer to as Tombac material. We get a lot of older buttons made in that color and I always thought they were lead and tin (like a pewter), but they are mostly copper. A beautiful bell. eace: The copper is gonna be real hard to figure out since it looks like it has the real damaging kind of corrosion to it. Sometimes it's from being in the moist ground and other times it's from fertilizers that are in the fields. You had a real nice hunt!! :clapping: And the date on the half dime is either a repunched date (I'm not thinking it is) or an overdate 1849/8 (Which I think it may be) or the rarer 1849/8/6