DetectingWales.com

Never dug so before in my life. All these musket balls and no hammies  >:( >:( >:(

(http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa71/zeus98765/photo-7.jpg)

seems like you need to do the research  Joel, you could have stumbled upon the edge of a site of a small civilwar skirmish. In which case, persevere and the other finds will come along

Hi partner in grime....i would be so happy 2 have found all those musket balls,one of my favorite finds,,,, like handyman said persevere and the rest will come....

Wow Joel  :o What a great day's 'tecting.  How long were you out for?
Well done
Rookypair
 :)

i made it a long day today. I was out for 8 hours and didn't even stop for lunch

mist be a dardiff scan club site nr wick :)

Hi Joel
You've got some interesting finds there. Well done. ;D
ProConsul Geoff posted a message from a fella called Gordon Hill who is researching Battle sites in Wales and if you could spare the time to contact him about the Musket balls I'm sure he'd be very interested. His E.Mail address is     gordon@gordontheguide.co.uk

Val

Thanks guys and Badge your way off fella  ;D ;D

There is already a known battle that took place so no need to report to anyone  ;) ;)

Can wait to go back when it's all plowed so see what other goodies comes up

i saw yaaa lol.watchin yaa on google earth  ::)

No Joel you couldn't be more wrong if you tried. Battlefields are the most delicate archaeological sites you can work on, as they operate in space and not in time, there is no time stratification of finds only position relative to each other and it's by this means that a picture of the events and strategies of a battle can be mapped out.
Removing things without GPS positioning means they are then useless and in the case of musket balls become just lumps of lead.

"IMPO"
People died in that battle (and all battles) and some for causes that they believed worth the sacrifice. Nearly 400 years ago men fired those muskets to kill but mainly, to not be killed themselves and win a battle for a cause in the most part they believed in. The adrenalin of fear at that time is something that most will luckily never experience but I believe that we are honour bound to tell their story and by recording (even in your own personal way) means that regardless how low born or insignificant their part, the musketeers and dragoons who fired those shots and the men they  fired at, will in some way have been remembered.

hows there so many musket balls on swansea bay then at low tide by council building where theres a lovely sewage outlet?

In support of Geoffs comments, the plotting of the musket shot is essential. I give you the link to the naseby battlefield musket shot findspots, and from it one can gain a better understanding of the battle itself and the rout afterwards.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/attract_marketing_tourism_and_attraction_consultancy/2796204870/# (http://www.flickr.com/photos/attract_marketing_tourism_and_attraction_consultancy/2796204870/#)

If you are detecting on a known site Joel, then i would strongly suggest tha tyou record the position of the musket shot and feed that back into your HER team, or FLO for them to forward onto interested parties.

Probably the same reason you get so many on Brean beach, they aren't actually musket balls but canister shot.

what is/was cannister shot

Basically it's a tin can full of musket (type) balls, that you fire from a cannon which turns it in to a very big shot gun ;D
Generally an anti-personnel weapon which is still used today in tanks when fighting infantry. A very nasty piece of kit ;D

..............  the RAF called it 'flak'   ;D ;D ;D ;D

No, flak generally consists of very sharp pieces of copper from where the shell fragments at a certain height,  sending hundreds of bit's of metal in all directions.
This is a typical piece of WWII flak;
(http://i693.photobucket.com/albums/vv294/Chef_02/240812110.jpg)

after tubes these are the bits i least like finding , great signal s#'t result  >:( >:( >:(

i just weighed in copper fragments of flak and got 35 quid for them,loads on aberavon

Regarding recording the position of musket ball finds, I did some metal detecting for arkies on a Civil War battle site a few years back. They were particularly interested in any jagged or uneven bits of lead (what we would regard as rubbish). They told me that these were used in cannons as they were more effective than the usual cannon ball, you can imagine the awful scatter gun effect in a battle. So I'd suggest that any objects like this were also properly recorded.

Yes good point Win, these are once again a sign of cannister shot. The importance of these is that it shows that the action was a "battle" rather than a skirmish as artillery took time to deploy effectively, and so rules out a skirmish ;)

im confused now,seems like a load of old balls to me ::)

Very interesting read nice one lads ;)