Davers
Gold Member
- Jan 8, 2013
- 8,166
- 7,199
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- Whites Spc xlt & Tesoro Tejon- Now back ...Fisher 1266-X. TRX Pointer. New .Teknetics G2 + . New AT Pro .
- Primary Interest:
- All Treasure Hunting
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The key looking piece is a can opener, of the type for sardine and canned ham, and yes even spam, as described in this recent thread: http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/what/557296-pistol-cleaning-rod.html
Yours has a coil of the strip that comes off of the can when opened around it.
The ball with wire thing may be the clapper from a bell?
At the time of the civil war, what we now called "canned goods" (vegetables, fruit, etc) were made by soldering tin-plated sheetiron together to form a cylinder, with a solid sheetiron disc on one end, and a washer-shaped disc as the top lid. The can was sealed by soldering a smaller sheetiron disc onto the can's open-at-the-center top lid. See the photo below. That SEEMS to be what we see in your photo... due to the rust-encrustation, it's difficult for me to feel very certain. However, that method continued in use for more than just a few years after the end of the civil war. There's no way to know whether your can parts are from the war years or sometime later.