GeoAngelo
Full Member
Who's J. Snyder? Well, according to this 1858 map he owned the extinct farm myself and a couple of digging buddies detected yesterday.
I obtained this permission back in August by cold calling the owner. He was kind enough to say yes and I've been waiting for the vegetation to drop since its all wooded in the present day. The whole site is about 100 acres and I can see about half of it used to be farm fields. The home foundation was fairly easy to find and there's plenty of workings to explore. So far I've identified two cellar holes, one bank barn and a second barn foundation. Here's a few pics.
Unfortunately we had to cut the hunt short due to a bow hunter coming along (he has the same property leased for hunting season). Since he's paying to be there and we're not, the right thing to do was bow out. We can always come back in December.
Just before he came along, I was swinging away near a natural spring deep in the property. As I was crossing a boggy area below the spring to get back to dry ground I got an ear splitting, shallow 45 signal. I was traversing the water at that spot totally by chance. I bent down and right in the flow of the spring I'm looking at the top of something spherical. Didn't even have to dig for the target. I bent down and picked up this:
I'm thinking "no, it can't be." I'm turning this in all directions looking for any telltale sign that this isn't a cannonball but what do I see? A clear casting line and a sprue remnant. What you're looking at, confirmed by two experts, is a Rev War era four pound solid shot cannonball. I have no idea how it got there. That said, this land was part of Livingston Manor at one point (160,000 acre grant given by King George I to Robert Livingston) so perhaps its related to that somehow. Here it is before I worked on it.
And here it is after some manual wire brushing with a brass bristle brush.
I'm honestly not sure what to do with it next. It still has some organics on it from the bog - I can tell because there's an odor. How do I get this thing 100% clean and protected? I don't want to make any mistakes with it. Any help with conservation would be appreciated!
Thanks for looking
I obtained this permission back in August by cold calling the owner. He was kind enough to say yes and I've been waiting for the vegetation to drop since its all wooded in the present day. The whole site is about 100 acres and I can see about half of it used to be farm fields. The home foundation was fairly easy to find and there's plenty of workings to explore. So far I've identified two cellar holes, one bank barn and a second barn foundation. Here's a few pics.
Unfortunately we had to cut the hunt short due to a bow hunter coming along (he has the same property leased for hunting season). Since he's paying to be there and we're not, the right thing to do was bow out. We can always come back in December.
Just before he came along, I was swinging away near a natural spring deep in the property. As I was crossing a boggy area below the spring to get back to dry ground I got an ear splitting, shallow 45 signal. I was traversing the water at that spot totally by chance. I bent down and right in the flow of the spring I'm looking at the top of something spherical. Didn't even have to dig for the target. I bent down and picked up this:
I'm thinking "no, it can't be." I'm turning this in all directions looking for any telltale sign that this isn't a cannonball but what do I see? A clear casting line and a sprue remnant. What you're looking at, confirmed by two experts, is a Rev War era four pound solid shot cannonball. I have no idea how it got there. That said, this land was part of Livingston Manor at one point (160,000 acre grant given by King George I to Robert Livingston) so perhaps its related to that somehow. Here it is before I worked on it.
And here it is after some manual wire brushing with a brass bristle brush.
I'm honestly not sure what to do with it next. It still has some organics on it from the bog - I can tell because there's an odor. How do I get this thing 100% clean and protected? I don't want to make any mistakes with it. Any help with conservation would be appreciated!
Thanks for looking
mind blowing is an understatement, epic find!!!
