🥇 BANNER Civil War Sharps carbine bullets -- with intact paper cartridges!!

gtoast99

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Minelab GPX 5000
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Relic Hunting
Hey y'all! I got back yesterday from DIV 32 at Cole's Hill. I had a blast digging with my friends again at a very special property to me. As for finds, I did quite well, especially on bullets. But my find of the hunt came just before lunch on the third day.

I was hunting an area with quite a few relics, all of which were super deep. So I was excited to get any nice subtle deep low tone on the GPX. This particular one, though, just kept going down and down into the center of the hole. Finally I reached the target - a Sharps bullet. But I knew there was no way I got a signal at that depth from one Sharps. Knowing there had to me more, I stuck my pinpointer back into the hole, and it sang.

I quickly pinpinted another Sharps, laying horizontally. As I pulled it from the ground, I noticed the round indentation where the bullet came from and realized that these bullets still had their waterproofed paper cartridges intact!!

I was able to salvage the cartridge from one of these first two bullets, and continued more carefully as I recovered the rest. In total I got 8 complete cartridges, one separated cartridge, and one bullet by itself, as well as several percussion caps. I would later see onli e original packages of Sharps cartridges, sold in packages of 10. So I'm assuming that an entire box was discarded or forgotten, and the deep red clay kept the waterproofed cartridges intact for 150 years.

I very carefully brought them home packed in native clay. Cleanup was a challenge, and I did the best I could with dry brushing and a toothpick. I then used a wet brush over the bullet part, as well as the sturdier cartridges. The reconstruction bullet leaked gunpowder around the rim when I was cleaning the bullet, so I know it mush have gotten a small amount of water inside. I hope that doesn't destroy it. Dried them all off with cloth and letting them air dry for a long time before putting the top of the glass case on. I did the best I could, now I guess time will tell how well they hold up. But they seem surprisingly solid.

This is easily one of the coolest things I've ever found. Of all the Civil War relics dropped, they have to be the right combination of cartridge and location to be preserved intact after so long. I have seen a few of the intact 58 minie balls online before. But for an already scarce subset of dug relics, the Sharps are even significantly less common. Needless to say, I'm over the moon with this recovery.

I hope you enjoyed reading (if you made it this far) and the pictures. Happy hunting and God bless.
 

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Upvote 77
That's to cool!
 

That is truly an amazing find ! Congrats !!!
 

That's awesome. I love Sharps. Ive only dug one and would love to find more.
Finding one with the paper attached is amazing. Finding 10 in the same hole, 9 with paper attached is incredible.
You did an excellent job preserving those as well.
You have my vote.
Those other pics are nice too. that's a lot of bullets, and some pretty nice ones at that.
 

Never saw anything like this recovered from the ground, Great finds..
 

Banner find those are amazing!
 

I can't believe there are not more people raving over this find. The only reason I didn't say much in my first post is that I was utterly speechless. It is so incredible you managed to get them out of the dirt without destroying the paper.

If it was just the lead and no paper it would be a 4 pager by now, sometimes I just go :dontknow:
 

I was wondering the same sort of thing. Actually, I count 6 caps in the picture, and gtoast99 said he was "missing 6 caps". Does that mean that there were 10 bullets with paper cartridges and 12 caps in a box? Perhaps 2 extra caps for misfires?

gtoast99, Keep stopping back by here to look at these things again! Wish I could vote twice.

I was interested, so I googled around a bit to answer my question... sure enough, 10 cartridges and 12 caps. Now I know what you meant about missing 6 of them. Just awesome that a full box like this one was dropped\left, then recovered deep from the dirt 150 years later with paper intact.

0240sharpslinenpkt_1.webp
 

GREAT GREAT GREAT Great saves. Great story. Great pictures. Thanks so much for sharing. Banner for me. I know it's Banner for you. God Bless
 

gtoast99, Keep stopping back by here to look at these things again! Wish I could vote twice.

I was interested, so I googled around a bit to answer my question... sure enough, 10 cartridges and 12 caps. Now I know what you meant about missing 6 of them. Just awesome that a full box like this one was dropped\left, then recovered deep from the dirt 150 years later with paper intact.

View attachment 1237081

That's awesome. I bet the box actually helped preserve the wrappers!
 

Thanks for the replies and banner nods everyone!! Im still thrilled with this find. I keep going back and looking at them in disbelief lol

And that really begs the question how long did it take you to get it all out of the hole you must have spent considerable time

I took my time with it once I realized the cartridges were there. The signal wasnt super loud, but for as deep as they were I knew when I got to the first bullet there had to be more. It wasn't until the second bullet I realized the skins were there and started to save those too. So it was a lot of feeling around with the pinpointer and then trying to guess which angle the cartridge was sitting. I have some of that on video, I'll get to editing at some point lol.

I was interested, so I googled around a bit to answer my question... sure enough, 10 cartridges and 12 caps. Now I know what you meant about missing 6 of them. Just awesome that a full box like this one was dropped\left, then recovered deep from the dirt 150 years later with paper intact.
View attachment 1237081

Yup,that's exactly what I meant about the 6 missing p caps. I should have been more thorough about scanning the spoils pile, but its alright. If it were my site rather than div, Id go back and get them, lol.

That's awesome. I bet the box actually helped preserve the wrappers!

Could be! There was no sign of the box whatsoever, since it wasn't waterproofed like the cartridges.

GREAT GREAT GREAT Great saves. Great story. Great pictures. Thanks so much for sharing. Banner for me. I know it's Banner for you. God Bless

Thanks so much! You got that right!
 

My hat is off to you for not destroying them! And the rest of your finds were plenty as well. Since no one has chimed in about preservation, I have never found an intact sharps, but I (and my dad) have found some intact paper 3-ringers (Or pigskin - not sure which). Anyway, with mine, (after cleaning) I held the bullet and carefully dipped the cartridge (paper first) into polyurethane. I stopped before the poly got on the lead. They are only a couple of years old, but holding up great. I still have one of my dad's paper finds from the 60s. he did nothing at all to it, and while it is VERY fragile and dry, it too, is hanging in there, 40 years out of the ground. My favorite paper find ever, was a package of 6-wing pcaps, in the trench, intact. Great job, man!

IMG_4907.webp

IMG_4146.webp
 

Incredible, rare finds. Congrats!
 

Congrats!
How long did they take to clean?
 

Thanks again to everyone who commented and voted! Yea, I guess I should have put the rest of the volume of finds in the first post, right? I figured you all have seen plenty of bullets before. Lol.

Congrats!
How long did they take to clean?

Hours of toothpicking, brushing, and wiping, lol. Well worth it though. Fingers crossed that they stay as sturdy as they are now for another 150 years!

My hat is off to you for not destroying them! And the rest of your finds were plenty as well. Since no one has chimed in about preservation, I have never found an intact sharps, but I (and my dad) have found some intact paper 3-ringers (Or pigskin - not sure which). Anyway, with mine, (after cleaning) I held the bullet and carefully dipped the cartridge (paper first) into polyurethane. I stopped before the poly got on the lead. They are only a couple of years old, but holding up great. I still have one of my dad's paper finds from the 60s. he did nothing at all to it, and while it is VERY fragile and dry, it too, is hanging in there, 40 years out of the ground. My favorite paper find ever, was a package of 6-wing pcaps, in the trench, intact. Great job, man!

Thanks for sharing your paper finds! You just don't see them much. They have to be the right paper, at the right depth, in the right soil, and then dug without being destroyed. Those are great, love the caps in paper!

The advice I've received in person, on forums, and by experts I've reached out to seems split down the middle on the subject of coating them with poly or pva or just leaving them be. I've decided to leave them as is, and continue to monitor their condition. If they seem like they might start to crack or peel, I can always dip them at that point.

From my reading online about preserving paper relics, two of the biggest problems for paper relics are acid and light. So I'm going to go out to a hobby store and look for some archival grade acid free liner for the display case. And then I will probably put something over that small case in my larger glass shelves so they aren't exposed to direct sunlight. I will have to remove the cover to show them off or look at them myself, but that's a small price to pay for preserving them for many future generations.
 

WoW!

Tony, I hate that I didn't get to see these in person. They turned out amazing my friend.:thumbsup:
 

I usually try to display my finds at the meeting, but I wasn't sure how fragile they would be, and I was trying to keep them packed in dirt until I knew better how to preserve them. Sorry about that! But if you're ever in Carrboro hit me up and I can show you :)
 

Awesome save. Thanks for sharing. I vote Banner!
 

You have my banner vote! That's awesome that you found NINE intact cartridges in the same hole! Saving history! See you in a few weeks!
 

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