Detecting a 1870 Montana home! Crotal bells, Silver, IHPs

LovestheShiny!

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I had an opportunity to detect an early (for Montana) Territorial home on acreage here in Western Montana. This home was built in 1870, and had some good lawn areas and massive trees.

I invited a local friend of mine (uses AT Max) and we gridded out various sections of the property, and had a great time. This was a very enjoyable hunt as we were out in the middle of nowhere with no other people around. As usual, the front of the home produced the coins, and one side of the home produced one silver and lots of early rifle cartridges.

We started in on one side of the front sidewalk, and began to find good coins. My first coin was an undated Buffalo Nickel, and some teens wheat cents. Since the place was so old, I dug signals in the mid 60's that I normally would not have. These turned out to be old brass shotgun shell bases, buttons, clips and small buckles. I did find my first Crotal Bells in the field just north of the house, they look really old, and are rare to find in this state. I was delighted with these and they will be a treasured addition to my detecting finds. Detecting this property seemed like we had gone to the East Coast USA and were getting early stuff!

My friend began near the front sidewalk, and found a wheat cent spill with 4 coins, nothing newer than 1920. He got one more signal and I watched him pull out a 1907 Indian Head Cent, which made him very happy. About 5 feet away from the spill, he pulled out a Barber Dime, which really made his day! We then headed away from the walk and hunted around a huge old maple tree. The roots were horrid, but I did pull a 1898 Indian Head Cent there.

The north side of the property gave me a 1927-S Mercury Dime, and a few more wheat pennies. The owners and guests must have shot a lot of guns off in this area, as we found early 10, 12, 16, and 410 gauge brass shotgun shell bases, along with lots of rifle cartridges. My friend really knows his rifle stuff, and he identified them as 1860's Henry rimfire cartridges, 1873 Winchester cartridges, and later Winchester cartridges. Early stuff for sure! There was also a lot of odd stuff, lids to bottles, shaker tops, and odd copper garbage. One of my unusual finds came out near this area, a Sterling Silver buckle with an iron center and tongue, unusual.

We didn't get a ton of finds, but what we did were all pretty much all old. Other than a couple of clad quarter spills, the newest coin was the 1927-S Merc Dime. One of the wheat cents was a 1922 with a very weak "D", and most were in the teens and early 20's. The pics show some of my finds, and my friend's Barber Dime. The ammo is at my friend's house for a bit of brushing on the base for better ID. We plan to donate the cartridges and most of these finds to the owner, I'll probably put them with ID labels in a large Riker mount or something similar.
 

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At one time, in 1911, I'll bet that dime would have bought a drink at the Beaver Slide saloon, eh ? :cool3:
 
At one time, in 1911, I'll bet that dime would have bought a drink at the Beaver Slide saloon, eh ? :cool3:

I wondered what a "Beaver Slide" was until I did a bit of research, they are the large wooden contraptions you see in hay fields, that tip the harvested grasses into a huge pile.
 
pics of a couple of cartridges

I went back tonite for a short time to the 1870 home, hoping to find a couple of cartridges and I did. These are a U.M.C. 44-40 (Union Metallic Cartridge Co.) used in the 1873 Winchester Rifle. The other cartridge is a ca 1860 Henry Repeating Rifle rimfire cartridge. Neat to find these pioneer used cartridges!
 

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Sweet silver buckle, I'd keep that! Nice coins.
With all the shells they must have eaten local wildlife and scared away or killed bears wolves and big foots!:lol:
 
Congrats on the old permission David. That silver buckle is a great find. And you even found a couple crotal bells to top it all off. Love the play by play too! Good luck on your future hunts.
 
Sweet silver buckle, I'd keep that! Nice coins.
With all the shells they must have eaten local wildlife and scared away or killed bears wolves and big foots!:lol:

Thank you Metal! Yep, I will keep that Silver buckle and a couple of the cartridges, all other stuff will go to the display

Great finds! Good luck on any return trips, sounds like a great spot!

Thank you milco!

Congrats on the old permission David. That silver buckle is a great find. And you even found a couple crotal bells to top it all off. Love the play by play too! Good luck on your future hunts.

Thanks Gale, a fun hunt out in the country!
 
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