how long did it take to find your 1st civil war relic?

maxxkatt

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How long did it take you in an estimate of hours did it take you to find your first civil war bullet?

Or any other civil war relic?

I am using an Nox 800 and have adjusted my tone breaks to make bullets ring out loud and clear.

How much research do you do for areas near civil war battle fields?

I have done a lot of research and found some areas near the battle fields that I have permissions. I figure now it is just a matter of putting in the time and careful searching since I know I am hunting where some of the battles actually took place in 1864. I plan to devote my summer searching the easier places and in the fall and winter hunt the areas that are 1-2 feet high in weeds.
 
My property is part of a campsite (Union and Confederate) where I have found over 200 items (100 of which are bullets of various caliber and manufacture) since March of this year that I have identified and categorized - and over a thousand other pieces that I am still researching and trying to identify. Of course, it took only a few minutes to dig my first relic, with that knowledge.

Considering that eleven miles per day was the most common distance travelled by military units on both sides, I suggest starting a known location and ... using an old map ... search for campsites on the routes to and from that known location along the routes that existed at that time. Unlike the areas at and surrounding battlefields, many of these areas in route (to and from) remain to be identified and dug.
 
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These critical elements successfully completed in the order given will over time produce whatever you're looking for:

1. Location (research)
2. Persistence (commitment)
3. Detector (pick one)

How long you ask? Who knows, that's a big part of why we swing one of these things.
 
Thanks, need some encouragement on a June day in the mid 90's with high humidity. That is the weather these days. But back on July 19-20, 1864 that is exactly what the soldiers on both sides were doing, but with bullets and shells flying. All I have to worry about is heat, bugs and snakes. I can handle all of them. Not sure I could have handled what soldiers have to face.
 
I began this hobby as a coin shooter and my first CW relic was an accident!

Digging in a Chattanooga,TN park and I pulled out a minie ball thinking "what is this? Some kind of fishing sinker?!

It was a dropped Enfield and I put a royal gash across it, not knowing what I was digging. Still one of my favorite relics and it was all downhill after that!
 
I began this hobby as a coin shooter and my first CW relic was an accident!

Digging in a Chattanooga,TN park and I pulled out a minie ball thinking "what is this? Some kind of fishing sinker?!

It was a dropped Enfield and I put a royal gash across it, not knowing what I was digging. Still one of my favorite relics and it was all downhill after that!
Chattanooga is my old stomping grounds. Now that is a town where one can accidentally find a CW bullet!

Minelab Equinox 600, Garrett AT Max.

I can dig it.
 
Only buttons for me so far and it took about a year to find the first one. Have found several more since then and an old spur that I've been told is of CW era, but I'm not certain. None of this was found at any "actual" CW site that. Just luck I guess!
 
My first Civil War relic was an accident also. I had only been metal detecting a couple of months. I found a Union infantry button on an old site I hunt. Practically no nonferrous in that area. The only old nonferrous I have found there so far is the CW button, musketball, and a piece of a pewter spoon or fork. The button was a big surprise and I did not even know it was a CW button until clean up.
 
I was lucky, a friend took me to an encampment site a few weeks after getting my first detector. Found my first three ringer minutes later. Have probably about 3-500 bullets now.
 
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