Had a great hunt with matt on saturday at an old property that we were lucky enough to get permission to hunt. With the cows overlooking our work, Matt was lucky enough to find some old coins ( fishscale, indian head, half penny) . While i didnt find any coins worth noting, I did find a few old relics among all the square nails, an axe head, horseshoe , part of an oil lamp and a big old shell casing. I had never seen such a large caliber shell casing. It was covered in green oxidation so i believe it's made of copper. Here's what i've been able to learn about this shell. There are no markings on the head of the shell, but from measurements i think its .58 caliber. This shell used an internal primer called a benet primer - A common style of inside-primed cartridge developed by Col. S.V Benet commander of Frankford Arsenal in the late 1860s. A copper or iron cup was secured inside the head of the case by characteristic crimps. This cup served as an anvil to enable the firing pin to activate the priming mixture and also to reinforce the head of the case. The production of benet primed cases ended around june or july of 1882 in favour of externally primed cases. This would date my shell to late 1860's -1882.

The coins were from our sunday hunt at a local park, $11.05 and a nice little pocket knife. My best daily clad count to date .


just under the quarter inch mark from the head of the shell you can see the crimps that hold the benet primer cup in place.




Left pictures shows no headstamp just the mark left by the firing pin in the center
On the right you can see the benet primer cup inside the cartridge.


Good luck and HH everyone!