Home Metal Detecting

May 22, 2011: Merc and odd find of the week - 1861 Great Britain Penny

pcgs69pcgs69 Posts: 4,324 ✭✭✭✭
Got out for a couple hours today. Really wanted to get to a town common, but I guess it's privately owned, so I'm working on permission now. It dates to the late 1700s so I got my fingers crossed!

Went to Plan B - which was an oldish looking schoolyard. Pretty slow going with a wheat cent here and there (haven't totaled them yet). After an hour or so I get a copper coin signal. But instead of another wheat, out pops a large copper coin. What the heck? Thought it might have been a King George at first, but that would not have made sense. Put it in my pocket and kept going.

About a half hour later got a deep silver signal. Dug about 8 inches and the sweet sight of silver showed! There's a pretty good scratch on the obverse, unfortunately I think it's from digging. Still has original luster, so must be AU+.

Got the large copper home and figured it was actually a woman - probably Queen Victoria. After rubbing the back with oil, it came out pretty good. Turns out it's an 1861 Great Britain penny. My guess is this is a show-and-tell item gone wrong!

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Comments

  • rickoricko Posts: 98,724 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Nice finds... that British penny is a nice surprise.... Cheers, RickO
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