Erkennungsmarken & Trench-Art
Mountain tops with fresh snow, rain, yellowing leaves, cold winds and half an hour of sun is how this "summer" will be described for ages to come. We got a bit more than thirty minutes of sun this week though. Almost a whole day actually, and it was spent with my nose towards the ground in a pine forest where all the spiders seemed to have come to live.
The eight legged little furballs had tied their strings between nearly all the trees and it made tiny crackling sounds when I crashed through them. Keeping my mouth shut to avoid any uninvited guests.
Some of their silk ropes were spared every time I ducked down to check signals in the ground, and the first of many I checked this morning was a German compass. It was the military type with the black plastic body. But it was not alone. Together with it were a losantine box, a bicycle tire repair kit, a shoulderboard button with the number "16", and a rotted harmonica.
It was far between signals in this forest, but once in a while when the detector picked up something it was usually in a cluster of metal bits spread out across a few meters radius.
At one point I even found a dumping pit, which I haven`t found many of so far this season. It didn`t contain much interesting though, mostly alu food tins and rusted cans, but also a cool axe.
Near the ditch I dug up two nicely preserved tent pegs. Both with the producer mark " S & C 37 ".
A cool little axe. Two tent pegs.
The best finds of the day happened as I was returning to the car to go home in the afternoon. In the middle of one such junk-cluster two pieces of ID tags had been waiting for me.
I located the signal with my pin-pointer and spotted the square shape as I lifted away the top soil, and saw that it was one half of a Stalag tag. It originated from the infamous Stalag 309, which had been located in Finland until 1944 and many of its POWs ended up in my region towards the end of the war and the liberation. I have found a handful of tags from that camp, but this was the best one. Very clear and sharp text on it.
I searched for the other half of the tag, but got instead a full German EKM only two meters away. It was also in nice condition and the unit marked on it was 2. JNF. ERS. BAT. MOT. 156 ( Infanterie Ersatz Bataillon Motorisiert ).
On another trip I did this week the weather was normal. Wet and foggy, with moments of icy winds.
The temps had also crept low enough that I went to the choice of wearing woolen underwear. Garments not intended for summer. Unless you live in the north. But it kept me comfy the long day which I spent hunting for gebirgsjäger relics.
With the first swing of the detector I won a denazified steel Heer belt buckle, and a broken steel göffel.
Denazified heer buckle. Broken göffel.
In one part of the camp I had many small aluminum signals, so I hoped for a bunch of tags. Instead they were tiny bits from some kind of trench-art production. A few of the bits had patterns or letters engraved. Like if the artist had done tests before applying it to his project.
A brass signal stood out in that spot and I let out a ghasp when I dug it out. It was a small square piece with an Edelweiss hammered in. Really lovely, and it makes me wonder for what was this metal flower intended. Maybe as an inlay on a cigarett case lid.
Scrap from trench-art production. Trench-art Edelweiss.
I dug up two halves of erkennungsmarken between some sapplings. One was blank while the most deteriorated one had text, belonging to the same unit I had found several other of on this site earlier: 4.Gb.Jg.Rg.139. Too bad it was so rotted that it was almost unreadable.
Blank EKM halve. Half EKM from 4.Gb.Jg.Rg.139.
After lunch I did a search along the outskirts of the gebirgsjäger camp and came across another cluster of aluminum scrap from trench-art production.
Here was a really interesting find. An unfinished cigarett case. The bottom of the little case had been folded together and with it was a piece cut out from a mess kit with the lid part for the cigarett case marked out and partly decorated with a house and mountains. A lovely last find of the day.
Unfinished trench-art case. Nice engravings.
Also this week me and the GirlfriendWife have been trying to find berries for the winter. Blueberries and Crowberries. Not. A .Single. Berry. Everywhere we checked. Empty. Places where any other year the ground has been black from berries and one could pick liters in no time. Nada. Totally bizarre, but I guess it should be expected after such crappy weather we have had for months now. So we are risking scurvy this winter.
Thanks for reading :)
Keep Smiling :)
Numbered German button. Stalag 309. 2. JNF. ERS. BAT. MOT. 156 Denazified buckle. Quite good preserved. Edelweiss. Good craftmanship on this little piece. 4/Gb.Jg.Rg.139. Unfinished trench-art Bicylce tire repair kit. Harmonica. Padlock securing the ground. Compass. Half stalag tag. Fishing lure. Thexol toothpaste. Vicotrat A+D vitamin concentrat.
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