Summing Up Summer

A green woodpecker is often seen here, and we can’t help wondering whether it is the one that we rescued a couple of years ago – although I suppose the chances of that are slim.

- Gill Davies

In May we had almost given up hope of any more detecting until after harvest but our good pal Dave rang to say a farmer had given him – and us – permission to detect over a field. This had been cultivated ready to plant a maize crop but it was going to be drilled any day, so we had to make the most of it while we could.

We’d had a few days when it seemed that summer might have come and on the two lovely afternoons we detected over the field the weather conditions were ideal.

The field had been well cultivated prior to the seed being sown, so the digging was easy. We were there for about six hours in all on the two occasions and although we each made a number of finds, there were only four of any interest between Dix and me, a nice flint being the first, eyes only of course (Fig.1).

My two finds included a 17th century lead powder charger cap, sometimes referred to as an apostle cap; unfortunately it was without one of its loops (Fig.2). My second find, although modern in comparison to the others, probably dates to the First World War period, and turned out to be quite interesting.

It is a leaden cloth or bale seal (Figs.3a & b), absolutely complete (which is something of a miracle) and as soon as Dix saw it he recognised the initials as being those of the War Department with the upward arrow between. Above this, in a circular band over the initials, is the word PIMLICO. On the other part of the seal was a hand-incised, upward pointing arrow and ¼. I did some research on the Internet and discovered that in 1862 the Army Clothing Factory was established at Grosvenor Gardens, Pimlico (London), and it closed in 1932.