What is this? What is It?!? Please identify...

[dhphillips]

Anyone identify this button?

 

[lupaglupa]

Anyone identify this button? View attachment 427553View attachment 427554

You should start a new thread for that button!

 

[UCVRelics]

Anyone identify this button? View attachment 427553View attachment 427554

From the back construction, its a way post CW civilian flower button.

 

[Woods-walker]

From the back construction, its a way post CW civilian flower button.

I 'd guess based on design and patina early 20th century

 

[Jack7171]

OK, here's what I don't get about all this relics selling online... knowing that it is at the very least a Federal offense to hunt for and remove from NPS or other federally protected land ANYTHING (not just relics from past events), why would you list something as being found and removed from a specific area that is well with the boundaries of the park??? Why not just say it was found in Gettysburg and just leave it at that?? That's a pretty nebulous answer considering all the privately owned land surrounding the town. If challenged you could say "I found it on private property".... End of conversation. Just look on eBay and you'll see what I mean. Someone has a piece of an " artillery shell " that supposedly was found at the PA memorial. That's just being stuck on stupid

My grandfather was in the CCC in the 1930s, and was sent to the wilderness battlefield as part of workforce that cleaned up the battlefields and surveyed, built the trails and roads, etc, to create the national parks we see today. It was commonplace for the men to send shoeboxes stuffed full of relics they picked up throughout their time working to build the parks. There were no metal detectors at the time, but anything that was found, aside from live munitions and soldiers remains, was fair game. For several years they loaded flat wagons piled high every single day with random debris that was left behind. Anything serviceable was picked up right after the fighting, but the tens of thousands of bullets, broken weapons, destroyed wagons, uniform remnants, destroyed artillery carriages, and whatever got dropped and lost in the woods, or the fires, all remained for decades, until the wood decayed, leaving behind the iron. He had said they got pretty good at identifying pieces, everything from limber hardware, to knapsack buckles, and trying to guess what things were became sort of a game among the men,,to help pass the monotony,,I have a few of those shoe boxes full of the relics he sent home that he picked up 85 or so years ago, and that's what started me collecting myself.

 

[Woods-walker]

One other thought is that land is continuing to be added from private ownership to NPS. I ve found many relics from the four area Fredericksburg battlefields that were on private property when I dig them, but since have been incorporated into one of the four area battlefields.
Additionally, my farm in Spotsylvania saw action on May 10 '64 and I routinely hunt it and nearly always find shot bullets, and shell fragments

 

[UCVRelics]

One other thought is that land is continuing to be added from private ownership to NPS. I ve found many relics from the four area Fredericksburg battlefields that were on private property when I dig them, but since have been incorporated into one of the four area battlefields.
Additionally, my farm in Spotsylvania saw action on May 10 '64 and I routinely hunt it and nearly always find shot bullets, and shell fragments

All my relics were found on private property with landowners permission

 

[Tom Hughes]

OK, here's what I don't get about all this relics selling online... knowing that it is at the very least a Federal offense to hunt for and remove from NPS or other federally protected land ANYTHING (not just relics from past events), why would you list something as being found and removed from a specific area that is well with the boundaries of the park??? Why not just say it was found in Gettysburg and just leave it at that?? That's a pretty nebulous answer considering all the privately owned land surrounding the town. If challenged you could say "I found it on private property".... End of conversation. Just look on eBay and you'll see what I mean. Someone has a piece of an " artillery shell " that supposedly was found at the PA memorial. That's just being stuck on stupid

I've thought the same thing....The least they could do is say something like "my G-Grandfather found it at Culp's Hill back in 1910 and picked it up and passed it down". That way, at least there's both some innocence and provenance without getting into trouble with hunting NPS.

 

[Jack7171]

I would imagine Culps Hill will be giving up more of its stuff with the upcoming restoration of the battlefield to wartime landscape

 

[TNBandit]

That particular seller has a reputation for being very liberal with his descriptions to say the least. He sure likes using White paint on things. For example unmarked artillery shell fragments that are fairly cheap locally at the Smoky Mountain Knife Works Relic Room suddenly end up listed on his Ebay page with the names of famous battles painted on them... With that said I have purchased a couple of small things from him. Example was a 69 caliber worm. I know up front it's a repro regardless of what his description says but it was cheap and it works.

 

[Woods-walker]

All my relics were found on private property with landowners permission

The way it should be done along with respect for the property owner by doing something to help them or by offering some of your "bountiful " digs

 

[Noonanda]

One other thought is that land is continuing to be added from private ownership to NPS. I ve found many relics from the four area Fredericksburg battlefields that were on private property when I dig them, but since have been incorporated into one of the four area battlefields.
Additionally, my farm in Spotsylvania saw action on May 10 '64 and I routinely hunt it and nearly always find shot bullets, and shell fragments

Spotsylvania Courthouse is also one of my favorite places. I have a couple small intermittent permissions that have given me some really cool items. Probably my favorite is my NY cuff button that still had thread attached to it.

 

[History hoarder63]

OK, here's what I don't get about all this relics selling online... knowing that it is at the very least a Federal offense to hunt for and remove from NPS or other federally protected land ANYTHING (not just relics from past events), why would you list something as being found and removed from a specific area that is well with the boundaries of the park??? Why not just say it was found in Gettysburg and just leave it at that?? That's a pretty nebulous answer considering all the privately owned land surrounding the town. If challenged you could say "I found it on private property".... End of conversation. Just look on eBay and you'll see what I mean. Someone has a piece of an " artillery shell " that supposedly was found at the PA memorial. That's just being stuck on stupid

Much has been said about this subject but I will add one more thought as to relics that came from what is now National Park property. In the late 1950's and very early 1960's the NPS viewed relic hunters differently than they did now. They were kind of a harmless oddity.

It was not uncommon for the very first relic hunters to dig at some of the more rural battlefields unmolested by NPS personnel. Lots of relics were dug at places like Spotsylvania's Bloody Angle, Chancellorsville, Cold Harbor and Petersburg in those early days. The NPS even allowed relic hunters to dig at places like Vicksburg side by side with rangers to collect relics for the museum collections.

As more and more people entered the relic hunting/detecting hobby in the first half of the 1960's and targeted the parks, the NPS rapidly began to take a dim view of their actions. While removing relics from NPS land had never been "officially allowed", it had been basically ignored until it became a constant problem and that was about the mid 1960's. At first it was more of a problem of destruction (digging holes all over the place) and later battlefield archaeology integrity became a concern.