Another Helmet Hoard
The weather did an oposite-thing this week. We had rain only for some hours, while the rest of the time it was rather nice and sunny, and one could even be tempted to remove a layer of winter underwear. But the last formations of southbound geese has passed over our heads and the first autumn storm is about to hit us later today, so this bliss won`t be long lasted.
Tuesday morning I went to the camp where I last year found a trench-art Lapplandshield. Like an ant to a sugar trail. The slope where I found it has been trawled a few times since, but I wanted to do a search along the top.
Quite instantly the detector picked up on something in the ground. With barely any roots or rocks the ground opened up easily and presented to me a small dumping pit. Leaning towards the sidewall of the hole was a triangular vehicle pennant made from a celluloid covered metal frame. Inside it was a hint of cloth left. Imagine having found it fifteen - twenty years ago, the flag would probably still be recognizable.
Celluloid pennant. I wish more of the cloth had survived.
The rest of the relics looked like they had been poured out from a small personal crate. It was a pair of toothbrushes, a shaving kit, cream tubes and -jars, eight or nine coins and one tram token from Oslo Sporveier.
Obviously bits of the crate got dug up, a few pencils, cloth hangers, a small bag made of some kind of rubberized material and food tins. When I filled the spoils back in, I grabbed with me a rectangular piece of foil that caught my interest. I am glad I did.
When emptying the finds bag at home I noticed that it was a bookmark. It was printed with the town hall building in Breslau, had some yellow and green color and the text Breslau Rathaus.
The following hours I roamed the site but had no more finds except a small pile of crushed radios and a tail fin from what I think might be a post-war bazooka rocket, seeing the place was being heavily polluted by early Nato activity during the Cold War.
Oslo Sporveier token. Breslau Rathaus. Bookmark.
A few days later I went back to last weeks camp where I found the helmets and gasmask canisters.
It was summery. Warm. The low morning sun divided the woods into sharp and long corridors of light and shade. Pure magic for the soul.
Since we haven`t had any frost yet the blackflies and midges were swarming me. They have barely had any human this season so they all wanted a taste. And when I had built up a sweat the bugs went into a frenzy. I gassed myself with repellent and put my head into netting so that it was possible to continue.
I wanted to search a place in the camp where vehicles had been dissected after the war since I have some friends restoring old wehrmacht machinery, and in not long I had made a small pile of parts which needs to be identified.
One find I could recognize right away was a really nice Mg box frame for a Truppenfahrrad. It is probably a field produced variant, but very well made. The eyelet bolt lock still had the thin wire preventing it to be lost, attached to the frame.
A smashed up steering wheel. A lid for something. Mystery bits.
I continued searching and suddenly smashed the coil into something hiding in the undergrowth. An iron rod was sticking out of the ground.
After digging around the rod, it became clear this was a dumping pit. I had metal going in all directions. Lots of rust, wires and barrel bands, and broken glass.
Having managed not to cut myself yet I had a first good find. A metal bottle in black enamel. With a logo, Sfinx 1937. I couldn`t recall having seen such one before. I did a quick research and knew that I had dug up an Austrian military canteen. So I was pretty chuffed.
Sfinx 1937 bottle Austrian canteen. 1937.
Unaware that I was moments away from becoming near ecstatic, I uncovered a bayonet scabbard. I had wished the bayonet would be with it. Instead I unexpectedly had my finger running along the edge of an upturned German helmet sticking out from the wall of the ditch.
As I pulled it free another one appeared! Could I be having a sunstroke? In only +17 Celsius?!
Minutes apart the third helmet was safely tucked away on the surface together with the others. They all looked rather good, although none having any leather elements. Having not found any evidence that the ditch had been set fire to I think there is a good chance for some color left under the rust on them.
The first helmet looks to be the one with best potential. It is the best feeling seeing lids sticking out from the ground. Three in a row.
I resumed the digging, finding a bunch of keychains. All with tags. Steel ones sadly, but after electrolysis maybe there will be visible text on some of them.
The next relic was very interesting to me. A large triangle. Braided, twisted and bent together from three lenghts of wire. It looked to me like a field made pennant frame.
Most of the ditch had been cleared, but in front of me was left a small part. I dug towards the bottom and shaved off a part of the wall, and there it was. Two cool finds. The missing bayonet. And the round shape of something in the wall. A fourth helmet!
This helmet had wires attached through the rim and the vent holes, so it had probably functioned as a bucket.
From what was left of this incredible little garbage dump I found remains of a visor from a hat, a pair of winkers for a vehicle, two OVT clamps, a few tools, lid part for a soup container and a long and big field kitchen ladle.
When I was back home the digging continued for some hours more. There we had a whole field of potatoes that had to be done. It wasn`t tiring at all. But in the end we had circa 45 kilos of goodies for eating.
Winter can come now :D
Rusted keys with keytags. Helmet number four. Autumns gold from the ground.
Yesterday morning we squeezed in one more expedition. Again the weather was as good as it can get in the autumn, so we loaded the bikes into the van and drove to the mountains. We cycled along an old gebirgsjäger road leading to some artillery positions.
The positions were nothing more than large holes in the ground and it was not much else from the wartime to observe. A few way markers built from stone, the road itself and along it was the occasional earthen dug out, in one of which we found a rusted old army bed. Another relic of the past slowly becoming one with nature was a heavy winter sleigh, of the type which carried equipment and was often hitched on to vehicles or dragged by animals.
Everywhere we looked we saw berries, so we might need to make a dedicated berrypicking trip there before long.
Gebirgsjäger artillerie position. Road leading to the positions. A wehrmacht bed.
Next week is starting soon, and even if the weather looks like its gonna be bleak I am hoping to get some more searching done.
Until then, Have a great time.
Thanks for reading.
The Austrian canteen was in surprisingly good condition. Truppenfahrrad mg ammo box carrying rack. Field made pennant frame. Celluloid pennant frame. Sadly the flag was no more. K98 bayonet. Small plastic box for a razor. Shaving mirror. Cream tubes and brushes. A pencil. Esbit burner. A cloth hanger. Coins. Bazooka rocket tail fin. A leftover from nato exersises. Bits from radios. mortar grenade box. unknown part. Mystery part. Looks like a vehicles window frame. Vehicle part. Scabbard. The first helmet. Another helmet. Klauenbeil pionier axe head. The visor from a hat. Helmet used as a bucket. OVT clamp. For soup container lid. Winkers. Field kitchen ladle. Wrench. A pile of goodies.
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