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W4UVV
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Several weeks I found a lot of coins in a local elementary school playground. I also found $13.89 that day and had to stop because my Whites XLT battery finally died. The next week I returned and found an additional $10.48. I have never found that much money at one time at one place. Among the coins found were two shown in attachments. Obviously one of them is a Mexican 5 peso coin. My question is what is the center metal content of the coin? Is it bronze or some other metal alloy? As to the second coin I have no idea as to country or value. It is 8 sided and probably from an Arabic country with a mosque graphic on the rear. If anyone can id it please email me at <[email protected]>,
The soil of central Virginia tends to be acidic and is very destructive to anything metal. Only aluminum cans, pull tabs, gold and silver items sustain will little damage over time. I found a SC state quarter that was so badly oxidized I had to take a magnifying glass to id it. Iron based items from the Civil War period suffer badly. Last week in the Petersburg area I found 1 dropped Union 3 ring raised bullet, an unfired cleaner bullet and a sheared portion of a fired Union bullet. They are nothing exotic. What was interesting was that all three lead items had oxidized a whitish color due to their being in red clay for the past 140 years vice the typical grayish hard pan clay common to the area where lead tends to oxidize a greyish color. Attached is a jpg of the sheared/impacted bullet. It is hard to see in the attachment, but a small raised relief of a skull with 2 eyes, raised relief and area for a mouth formed on the sheared bullet upon ground impact.
Finds are still being made. An article in the Richmond newspaper last week profiled a fellow from Lynchburg who recently found 34 Confederate 12 lb. cannonballs buried 3/5 ft. down in the area along Lee's Retreat to Appomattox from Petersburg. The Confederate artillery unit was being chased by the Union calvary. In haste they buried the ammunition and left with the artillery pieces. April, 1865, was not a good month for the Confederacy.
The soil of central Virginia tends to be acidic and is very destructive to anything metal. Only aluminum cans, pull tabs, gold and silver items sustain will little damage over time. I found a SC state quarter that was so badly oxidized I had to take a magnifying glass to id it. Iron based items from the Civil War period suffer badly. Last week in the Petersburg area I found 1 dropped Union 3 ring raised bullet, an unfired cleaner bullet and a sheared portion of a fired Union bullet. They are nothing exotic. What was interesting was that all three lead items had oxidized a whitish color due to their being in red clay for the past 140 years vice the typical grayish hard pan clay common to the area where lead tends to oxidize a greyish color. Attached is a jpg of the sheared/impacted bullet. It is hard to see in the attachment, but a small raised relief of a skull with 2 eyes, raised relief and area for a mouth formed on the sheared bullet upon ground impact.
Finds are still being made. An article in the Richmond newspaper last week profiled a fellow from Lynchburg who recently found 34 Confederate 12 lb. cannonballs buried 3/5 ft. down in the area along Lee's Retreat to Appomattox from Petersburg. The Confederate artillery unit was being chased by the Union calvary. In haste they buried the ammunition and left with the artillery pieces. April, 1865, was not a good month for the Confederacy.
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