✅ SOLVED Solved thank you! Any Civil War Relics Here?

[cdsieg]

Lots of different bullets, just curious if any are really old or significant, I don't have a caliper so I have one strike against me already. Please help if you can.
Thanks,
Cindy

 

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[Kieth-Tx]

Re: Any Civil War Relics Here?

None that I see....although the large bullet looks very curious!

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

Re: Any Civil War Relics Here?

Civil War projectiles is my "specialty-area" in relic digging and collecting. Your photos do not seem to show any civil war era bullets.

One of your "larger" bullets is distinctly a US Army .45 Colt Automatic pistol copper-jacketed bullet. That bullet's main body is made of lead, but is covered with a copper "jacket" except for the center of the bullet's flat base.

An ID-clue for you to keep in mind for the future:
On some of the bullets in your photos, you see a body-groove which contains multiple tiny parallel raised ridges (which is called a "reeded" groove). Put another way... The groove looks the edge of a US dime has been pressed into the bullet's lead body. Whenever you see a "reeded" groove on a bullet, it means the bullet is from approximately the late-1870s/early-1880s or later. (The "reeded" groove is still in use on modernday bullets.) To show exactly what I'm talking about, I'll attach a photo of a bullet which has a clearly-visible "reeded" groove at the end of this post.

On your shotgun-shell bases' center, you see a small brass disc, which is actually the bottom of a tiny brass cup. It contained the primer which ignited the cartridge's gunpowder. Those are called "centerfire" cartridges. The centerfire-primer cartridge had not yet been invented at the time of the American Civil War. So, whenever you see a centerfire cartridge, you know it was made sometime after the civil war. Centerfire ammunition is the most common kind of ammunition in use today. I'll also include two photos showing the base of some centerfire cartridges, for any readers who don't already know how to recognize that kind.

I realize you may already know some of the information in this post. I've included the info for other readers of this forum, who may not already know it.

 

[cdsieg]

Re: Any Civil War Relics Here?

Civil War projectiles is my "specialty-area" in relic digging and collecting. Your photos do not seem to show any civil war era bullets.

One of your "larger" bullets is distinctly a US Army .45 Colt Automatic pistol copper-jacketed bullet. That bullet's main body is made of lead, but is covered with a copper "jacket" except for the center of the bullet's flat base.

An ID-clue for you to keep in mind for the future:
On some of the bullets in your photos, you see a body-groove which contains multiple tiny parallel raised ridges (which is called a "reeded" groove). Put another way... The groove looks the edge of a US dime has been pressed into the bullet's lead body. Whenever you see a "reeded" groove on a bullet, it means the bullet is from approximately the late-1870s/early-1880s or later. (The "reeded" groove is still in use on modernday bullets.) To show exactly what I'm talking about, I'll attach a photo of a bullet which has a clearly-visible "reeded" groove at the end of this post.


On your shotgun-shell bases' center, you see a small brass disc, which is actually the bottom of a tiny brass cup. It contained the primer which ignited the cartridge's gunpowder. Those are called "centerfire" cartridges. The centerfire-primer cartridge had not yet been invented at the time of the American Civil War. So, whenever you see a centerfire cartridge, you know it was made sometime after the civil war. Centerfire ammunition is the most common kind of ammunition in use today. I'll also include two photos showing the base of some centerfire cartridges, for any readers who don't already know how to recognize that kind.

I realize you may already know some of the information in this post. I've included the info for other readers of this forum, who may not already know it.

I know NOTHING! so I appreciate EVERYTHING! Thank you so much for the excellent information.

 

[cdsieg]

Re: Any Civil War Relics Here?

Thank you Keith and TheCannonballGuy! I will mark this one as solved and I really do appreciate your feedback. Cindy

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

Cindy, since you said you did not previously know any of the information I gave you, here's one more bit of education for you about bullets. It is something I forgot to mention in my pevious post. In the photo I posted which shows new-condition cartridges, the small circular disc in the middle of the brass cartridge's bottom does not have a tiny round dent at its center ...but the brass bullet-casings and shotgun-shell bases which you found do have the tiny round dent in the small round disc's center. The tiny dent is made by the gun's firing-pin. That's what begins the ignition of the cartridge's gunpowder. An unfired cartridge will not have the tiny dent.

 

[cdsieg]

Very good information!