Myers Depot Metal Detectors

WII POW Camp (Round 2)

AceGVSU11

AceGVSU11

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Well I headed back out to the POW Camp for round 2 and it surely didn't disappoint! I got there bright and early as the sun was rising around 8am. The day was a bit warmer than most have been lately so I was excited. I was suppose to meet up with some other members from my club at 10am in the next town over but I wanted to get the most hunting in I could for my day off...

I started out near the area I found my last items. I kept using tone mode with no disc so I could listen for the low grunt of iron. This would help tell me where the tents and buildings were set up. I quickly zeroed in on a 30 x 30 area and began working it. Targets started to appear and soon enough I had my first relics. My goal today was to atleast dig up another button and the first one I dug was awesome! I dug the US eagle button and was tickled about it all morning, I couldn't wait to show my club members. I picked a few more targets up and then headed over to meet them.

As we gathered and game planned our hunt, one of the guys had a old paper mill and park to hunt so we gave it a try. Not much was producing at the paper mill and by that time I was ready for lunch. I told them they are more than welcome to come out to the POW Camp if they wanted before I left. They headed over to the park and I was off to Subway. The only disappointing part of the day was that they were out of cookies! lol!

I finished up lunch and called them to see how the park was going... just some clad were the reports... so I offered the POW Camp. I headed out there and began hunting again. I pulled all kinds of goodies, from buttons to coins to tent apparel. The sad thing was only one person decided to come over and hunt... oh well... more for us I guess!!

Any info on anything I have posted would be appreciated however! I plan on making a display and then giving it to the town's historical society museum. The small button that says "US Army" I didn't noticed it said that until I was about to take the picture... I got real excited to see that!! I hope you all enjoy!
 

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I have found about 3 of those round donut looking things,any Idea what they are? Nice haul by the wy.
 
Ya, Thats a German ID Tag. Nice Buttons! I have one of the ones on the right with the 4 holes. The Donut looking things are from either a poncho or a Shelter half. I have found probably 50 of those all over Fort Drum. Great Finds!!!
 
Monster84 said:
I have found about 3 of those round donut looking things,any Idea what they are? Nice haul by the wy.
Click to expand...

The donuts are tent grommets... the pieces next to them are used to tighten the tent ropes down with... When I started to find these pieces I knew I was in a good area...
 
Very nice finds :) The buttons and the dog tag half are awesome ! I am somewhat biased towards the WW2 German stuff though :) :)

The dog tag you have is the 'deadmans' half as it has only one hole from which it was hung on a cord. The other half was identical in shape and size but had two holes, thus allowing threading of a cord to hang it around the soldiers neck.The German method of identifying its soldiers was not governed by any real directive from on high, meaning each unit used their own method. This means they are sometimes very difficult to track down. Lerenfort should be able to help you more than me as, being Europe mainland based, he has more experience of these dogtags.

What I can tell you is that the 'B' is likely to be the blood group of the owner, and the rest is the unit to which he belonged. British and American tags carried the soldiers name and serial number, German tags carried the soldiers unit ID, (usually the replacement unit he came through, not the unit he ended up in !!), so you can see why they are a little difficult to track down.

It is a good example of one though and I'd defy any of your club members to have ever found one ! They must be a rare find indeed in the USA.

You can clean it up a little more to make the unit name more 'visible'. Use a scouring pad to remove the rust around the lettering then re-post a picture and I should be able to help more.

The item you have a question mark next to looks like a spent 30-06 round, but it is difficult to get the scale in your photo. Hopefully it wasn't fired at a POW ! Your other bullet looks like a .45, both very commonly used by the US Army.

Cheers

RRPG
 
ww11 camp 2

Nice going Ace, I'm sure the historical society will be very happy to receive the display. Let me know when you plan to donate it. I would like to be there with the owner of the land. Good publicity like that will be very good for the hobby and will open up other doors for us. :D
 
I've had a bit more of a look at the tag you found.

The 131 is the Stammrollennummer, basically the number that ID's the soldier. The B is definitely his blood group.

One thing that is puzzling me is the 'KP50' at the bottom. Regiments had, at the most, 15 kompanien (company), so I can't work out why it seems to say '50'.

Have you cleaned it up any more ? Please post a picture if you have.

Cheers

RRPG
 
Here is the ID tag all cleaned up... Hope this helps... seems like you've been able to get most the info identified on it thus far... The tag reads as follows:

B 131

GZ SGHZ ABSGHTNG HR

KP30
 

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Ok this has taken some time to work out and I've had to enlist the help of some more knowledgable people on this subject. The reason the tag was causing so much problem was that the stamped letter 'G' probably isn't meant to be a 'G' but a 'C'. The tag is nonsense if you accept the 'G' but makes much more sense if you convert it to a 'C'. The experts opinion is that they had to make do with a 'G' instead of a 'C' for whatever reason and for however long.

Anyway, assuming it is a C, here is the translation of the disc.

Grenzschütz-Abschnitts-Nachrichten-Kompanie 30 (Border section news company 30).

Now as I've said, this was merely the supply unit to the main unit and all we can find out about this replacement company is that it went to the Corps Signal Battalion 437. From there it seems to disappear. It was probably based in the Netherlands in 1942 but that's as much information as I can find.

As I've said, tracing German tags is a full time job all in itself !

RRPG
 
Wow! thanks for all that... I'm a bit shocked that they make this information so vague and hard to track, but I guess some things involving military are meant to be "top secret" or atleast have a tough code to crack...

RRPG said:
Ok this has taken some time to work out and I've had to enlist the help of some more knowledgable people on this subject. The reason the tag was causing so much problem was that the stamped letter 'G' probably isn't meant to be a 'G' but a 'C'. The tag is nonsense if you accept the 'G' but makes much more sense if you convert it to a 'C'. The experts opinion is that they had to make do with a 'G' instead of a 'C' for whatever reason and for however long.

Anyway, assuming it is a C, here is the translation of the disc.

Grenzschütz-Abschnitts-Nachrichten-Kompanie 30 (Border section news company 30).

Now as I've said, this was merely the supply unit to the main unit and all we can find out about this replacement company is that it went to the Corps Signal Battalion 437. From there it seems to disappear. It was probably based in the Netherlands in 1942 but that's as much information as I can find.

As I've said, tracing German tags is a full time job all in itself !

RRPG
Click to expand...
 
No problem Ace.....glad to help :)

The German tags were a breed apart. The UK and US tags had the soldiers name and service number on them making them as easy to trask as the German ones are hard ! (if that makes sense :) )

RRPG
 
Nice lot of finds Ace,

Glad to see RRPG deciphered the tag for you. It does appear to be border guard related. The what's it's in your first photo are a couple of laundry tags, German I think, although not able to clearly read the text. The other hooked item is a clothes hook, these were fitted inside the tunic to help adjust the waist size and also to help keep up the leather belt. See my site for details:

http://www.lerenfort.fsnet.co.uk/page62N.htm

The 10 ring type items in your second photo are from a German shelter quarter (zeltbahn). Which is what Johnny9fingers has already told you - sorry just read his post above!

Certainly got an interesting site to explore. Good luck!

Kind Regards,
Simon.
 
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