Australian WWII - Far North Queensland Metal detecting and recovery

[AT P Sweep]

Here is the result of a clean up after the last hunt ~

The LE stock discs are stamped ~ '27' '30' '38'

The RS badge has suffered badly form an acidic soil ~

The small clasp on the left is stamped 'Carr 1942'

The beer keg bung was a very early find I came across in my early days but I have never been able to read the engraving until now ~ after being treated with my new snake oil ~

It reads ~ Carlton Brewery Melbourne ~

[Anderson]

Those relics cleaned up nicely ATP. A bit off topic, but are their any relics from the Japanese attack on Darwin?

[AT P Sweep]

are their any relics from the Japanese attack on Darwin?

Persoanlly I do not know of nay but a MD associate in the NT has found quite a few bits and pieces scattered around "the top end' ~ Most recently he foudn a drop tank from a japanese zero ~

That aside as I am sure you can imagine rare events ~

But having said that I was talking to a bloke about two years ago and he was working on a cattle station in the Top End and they were on a pig Hunt ~

Part of this routine is running blindly through tall rough grass and he took a fall as he tripped over something~

Long story short it turned out he tripped over the tail plane of a Japanese Zero ~

The pilot remains were still in situ and it appeared that the pilot either took a large calibre round to the back of the head from AA fire or had been taken out by a fighter plane ~

Which ever the plane had obviously flown on without control and crash landed ~

He went onto explain the pilot's cranial remains still stained the control panel and the plane had a detrerioated boby trap ~

They reported the plane to authorities ~

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[AT P Sweep]

Well Today's * Saturday's lesson is entitled ~ "Have great day out ` but score Zip !" OR "Winters over and the Joe Blakes are on the Move!"

Headed out in the chance of rain ~ but in short turned out a perfect day ~

Still working on locating new ground `~ sites !

I returned to a 'new ' area where I found several small bottle dumps and even 9 mm and 303 shell cases, even broken stock Army china frags ~ last week ~ I figured to expand the search area ~ but nothing more and no goodies to be found.

Even found the dreaded stock tent eyelets

I plodded the open heavily grassed areas as it is still officially Winter and too early for the Joe Blakes to be coming out of hibernation! Right!?


But despite two trips and extreme persistence in heavy grass and timber/ Bush~ including the bush being obvious regrowth~ nothing ~

I can only assume the site contained a small 'spot' or maybe staging camp site?

Eventually gave up and headed to another site which I KNOW was a training area ~

but as I looked at the current position and the map I figured it was too far and opted out for an nearby old renowned and known site which I have had great success with~



It is essentially open ground and topped with bushland ~ I worked up the slope and planned to hit the bush ~ after all it is still Winter ` ~ Right?


I exited heavy grass into an open ground and straight into a < 1 meter> black snake !! ( My first ever MD hunt snake !

The bar^%$& charged straight for me !

I thought ` "CRAP! My first ever known encounter and I walk into a Taipan !"

( They are very aggressive ~ especially when emerging from Hibernation ! And on i regained my composure it appeared more in reflection like a Black red belly snake which officially no one has ever been recorded as falling foul of a RBB snake in Australia!)

But it shot past me into the grass ~and obviously was Hell bent on escaping this large black protrusion with a huge round attachment on the end !


I decided against more brush bashing and retreated to the open ground where I picked up a great signal but it was deep ~ Long story short turned out to be a military rectangular chest or part there of ~


Fortunately it was easy digging as I dug deep and eventually removed what was left o the chest ~ to reveal the remains of what left of canned food tins and a single mean's fashion statement ~ slip on shoe ~
Photo shows partially refilled hole ~

The question has been asked ~ why a steel chect with tinned food and a single ~man's shoe ?

There was huge amount of criticism publicly and in even Federal parliament as to the wanton waste of materials and food at the end of the war by the Australian military ~

I figure the canned food ~ which was even mentioned in the parliament ~ was just more incident of such a waste ~ but for the shoe ~ with hole in the sole ~ who knows !

13 Sep 1946 - DISGRACEFUL ARMY WASTE - Trove

13 Sep 1946 - BUILT WHOLE HOUSE FROM ARMY DUMPINGS - Trove

The dumping of material extended to this region as well~ ALTHOUGH there were also many positive contributions made to the community by the military post war !


Breaking for lunch I decided to head home~ but deviated to yet another known site ~ but again nothing but some solid brass for the scrap bin, more tent eyelets ~ and the remains of another fire place ~ period fireplace and surrounding fixtures ~ obviously been used recently for what ever purpose !
So ~ no rain bewt day~ more site research ~ but certainly not over burdened by finds ~

Ms M suggested I leave the kit in the ( new) ASX and try again Sunday ~ but guess what it was raining ~

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[inka]

Man you Aussie diggers must be brave!!I d go for a slash - burn- then search strategy

[AT P Sweep]

I'd go for a slash - burn- then search strategy

Nice thought Inka ~

But in true Aussie fashion any burn off~ fire would probably surge forward into a great bush fire ~

AND many areas nearby are national parks ~ and those that are not, too often have some bloke with an illegal humpy growing crazy weed ~

After all we would not want to cremate some free loader on the government benefits ~

[AT P Sweep]

Well finally put in a good day's hunt on Saturday ~

We decided on a visit to the rough country ~ a 07:00 start saw us on site around 08:30 ~

The morning was very cool with a brisk easterly breeze to cool proceedings the temperature rose ~

A mix of very rough ground and then some fairly even ground where a 19 century mining village was placed until 1920's.

A Bower Bird nest ~ an intriguing creature that decorates his nest with ideally blue bits and pieces to woo a potential partner ~ ( note blue plastic cap off to the left !~ a puzzling find on his part for sure in this area ! )

Some of the Bower birds pieces surely came from one of these palm flowers ~







This 25 Lber I came back for as I figured it would make for an intriguing relic ~

I came back after Smoko and lugged the bloody thing for around 3/4 kilometer ~ dropping it at least three times to rest ~

When I finally got back to the vehicles ~ I scraped the dirt out of the top to find ~ it was technically a UXO ~ the TNT was intact !



Another 25 pounder HE~ but positively exploded ~ but way too far. way too rugged country and way too heavy to lug back to camp base ~







Sunbaker 3" UXO mortar ~ ( GPS marked it and buried under stones ~ after all soem Drongo even after 70 Years will surely take it home ~ if it does not explode first ~ )



We eventually stuck to our plan and after Smoko moved to the nearby former mining town site for a few hours ~

Home by 16:30


My best of day ~







Thanks to the site imput managed to ID the cartridge casing as I suspected ~ George Kynock Birmingham .577 Martini Henry ~ 1884 ~

Amazing condition after < 100 years > buried ~





3" mortar frags match and are stamped 1942 /|\ plus identity serial numbers ~

The rifling band is most likely 40 mm / 2 pounder ~




A great day ~ but bloody hard yakka ~ and despite Winter ~ bloody hot ~

6,293

[AT P Sweep]

Some more pieces of the 3" Mortar retrieved from the Snake oil treatment ~

Pretty well a full primer ~ Obviously buried it self before firing ~

Plus afew small other pieces ~

Appreciate any suggestions on the container cap on the left (?)



And first go at the projectiles ~ buffing and coated with Rust primer ~ Not totally satisfied with the result so ~ although the large frag looks great



The tracer round while a tad sad ~ fortunately for me the phosphorus has leaked out before I found it ~

OR it had been fired ~ of course ~

[AT P Sweep]

Interestingly ~ the 20 mm Tracer case we now believe is in fact an Italian cartridge ~ most likely bought back by a Digger from Tobruk and or North Africa !

TOBRUK, LIBYA. 1941-09-06. A GUN CREW OF THE 3RD LIGHT ANTI-AIRCRAFT REGIMENT AT THEIR POSITIONS ON A CAPTURED ITALIAN BREDA MODEL 35 20MM CANNON.

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[AT P Sweep]

Been cleaning up a few of the fuzes I have ~

Found an intriguing revelation ~ The remnants if the 117 Fuze is in fact BSA 6/40 ~

Quite surprised to find a UK export from the Birmingham Small arms factory ~

And I was surprised to realise that another shell casing was in fact another George Kynoch Birmingham M.H. .577~ No idea where or when i found the damaged cartridge case.