As you all know after Thanksgiving I always go deer hunting on my land south of Sanderson. I've always found arrowheads close to the middens, so I decided to take the metal detector this time and I found some iron pieces all in a pretty close proximity to the middens. I know the iron I found came from the Indians because it was right near their camp. When I ventured off I would only get signals from our bullet fragments over the last five years and nothing else. Here is the pictures with my finds:
Nothing special, but here is the flint


Hal this kind of looks like the one you found with broken points. A perforator

Broken mano

And the iron. One has two broken barbs and the other has one The one in the middle looks complete and I think it was used as a knife. The thing on the top I'm unsure about but has a hole drilled into it.


Some misc iron found around the middens and two wheat pennies and a 1945 cinco centavos found in the town of Sanderson.

Not even one bean can

I agree, metal was so valued, any scraps were brought to camp with the hope of finding some use for it.
Who would drop money out in the middle of nowhere ?
Well done, nother couple hundred yrs from now coin shooters with atomic hemetite detectors will be digging
up those slugs and wrapping them in soft tissues to be sure not to damage those artifacts !
The metal with a hole might be the front sight of a blunderbuss. . .OR. . . a zipper, zipper !

Even if the pointy rock was ment for a Jack rabbit, I'd be pretty tempting to use it to make some buttom holes.
Could that one base be the mouse eared Frio ?

All surface finds ?? Like the 5 yrs of slugs, youse guys have been surfacing there for 5 yrs !

Desert landscape pics are travel brochure beautiful, and like travel brochures, dont convey smells or
temperature. Did you have to keep a fire going under the ATV to keep the oil from freezing ?

How about the gun barrel for scale, Where's the antlers

Very good report [ except the antlers ! ]

Who would drop money out in the middle of nowhere ?

The money was found in town at a parkeverything else was found on my land.

Could that one base be the mouse eared Frio ?

You talking about the yellow one in the middle. I thought it was a frio.

All surface finds ?? Like the 5 yrs of slugs, youse guys have been surfacing there for 5 yrs !

The flint is all surface but the majority of the iron you had to dig.

Desert landscape pics are travel brochure beautiful, and like travel brochures, dont convey smells or
temperature. Did you have to keep a fire going under the ATV to keep the oil from freezing ?

It was pretty cold down there, but wasn't that bad durig the day looking for artifacts.

How about the gun barrel for scale, Where's the antlers

Saw some little bucks and lots of doe, but nothing to shoot. I'm going again Friday and coming back Sunday, so I have one more shot.

Good Report DJ, makes one kinda wonder if perhaps some
of the last indians of the historic period using this
camp might have brought in the metal fragments from a
calvary outpost, or maybe just a past land owners
unexplained refuse? Thats what I like so much about
both archeology & geology, the more things you find
out, the more questions generated! I think that Dryden
originated only as an early railway stop, but I have heard that there was a calvary fort at Sanderson. Also
supposed to be lots of sites and caves in and around
Sanderson Canyon, but the canyon is really spread out.

I wouldn't be suprised if there were alot of sites around Sanderson. There is many canyons and shelters all over the place.

sweet pics DJ. You gotta love Texas' sunsets

Ah, that beautiful metal prompted me to take a pic of the debris I had found around Roman ruins in N Africa. .



Closeup of a few items, nore very classic style Roman arrowhead.



I had not spread these out for a closer look in decades ! All memories, Each one was a dug up "target" like your Sanderson finds .

Cool, those are probably alot older than mine. What is that shark looking thing in the middle? Is that a arrowhead?

Update with the little t-shaped item with a hole in it. I posted this on treasurenet.com and someone replied:

That T shape piece with the hole drilled in it is part of a muzzle loading rifle. Usually called a barrel loop. It fits into a dovetail slot on the bottom of a rifle barrel. The hole is where a pin went through the stock and then through the hole and it held the stock on the barrel, or visa versa. A half stock rifle usually had one on it and a full stock rifle had three.

They were called barrel loops because originally they were made of a round piece of steel that was bent like a staple. Two holes drilled in the barrel and the ends were swaged into the holes. That created a loop on the barrel. That style of barrel loop had a wedge that passed through a slot in the stock, through the loop and through the other side of the stock.

When the T shape style came into use the name barrel loop stuck with it

Well DJ, it looks like you have at least a good clue towards a time period for that find!

Hi DJ,
Excellant report from Sanderson & nice finds, I always like hearing about West TX. Heres a nice point I found back in 2006 out East of Sanderson on a large ranch while walking. It is "in-Situ" in this pic......later, John :)

Surface hunting always does give you a thrill when you find something like that. All the walking and then........bingo.......there it is. Just laying there looking at you.

That's a nice surface find John!


Another update:

I had another fellow respond to my post on the other website and didn't realize I may have an iron awl amongst the iron I had. He didn't know I had it, he just said watch out for them. I searched the pile and bingo! What do you guys think?

Re Roman finds, bout 1800 yrs old, not shown, coins with ruling emporers image, very easy to date.
The shark is an arrowhead, some of the alloy rusted, guess it was a "one shot deal" [ didn't use more expensive bronze ]
Big top left Knife scabard tip. Right side, some kind of key on ring [ before they invented split rings for car keys ! ]. Bottom ring, top view does not do justice, its nicely wide with a big round area that may have had a design. Looks exactly like the one size fits all jewelry that might be in a cereal box today.

Very nice ID on the old gun part, thats real history. Who would have thought of an AWL [ except a
top notch coin shooter ! ] Your example is a good candidate. There was so much leather in the early days Even early travelers must had leather working tools like we have car jacks & tool kits.

Just recently that History channel program with the marine Gunny showing hardware included Indian muzzle loaders in the story. Said they were a prestige symbol but soon fell into disfavor. Too much problems with keeping powder dry, loading on horse back or slow loading for a second shot when your neighbor tribal enemy was running at you with a stone AX.
Piece by piece, most guns were eventully taken apart for other uses, starting with the butt plate that made a world class scraper.

I now see that the coins were not found at your site but from the location you mentioned, my observation still has a true value - - "who would drop money out in the middle of nowhere ? ". . .[ tee hee ]

John, very nice find, sure looks like East Sanderson soil too !

Best find of the metal detecting part of the day in the digfest dig area. . .



Delicate digging tool, 9 1/2 inches, all stainless [ no corrosion ! ]



Dont want to bore you with the other finds, Shotgun caseing base, .22 LR shells, wire pcs.

I found these metal detecting today. Two silver coins, two wheat pennies, a earring and a fraternity pendent.

I know that knife is a joke right? Nevermind, I took a better look and already know.

Thats a LOT of targets ! The people must have been doing hand stands on their way across the property.
Sortta like finding a coin midden camp.. Good show.
My knife find is for real, just what might be expected around a dig area, a digging tool.

Hal, don't you think it is obvious this is a trade point with broken ears?

Yes, especialy given the camp context where it was found. All three in your upper first report are good candidates too.

I didnt do very good Googling TRADE POINTS but they must be a well studied sub culture by collectors. The Overstreet books have coverage in most divisions.

The ones shown are all flat stock like yours, the manufacturers must have been stamping them out like bottle tops. By comparison to a NON TRADE arrow point, recheck that Roman made version above, has a real thickness to it [ for it's size ]

Yeah, mine are are very thin. The overstreet doesn't show any trade points with ears either. Here's a pic with some similar to yours: