Help with identity of possible badge or badge plate

**dmiller** · 19-03-14, 07:47 PM

I was metal detecting yestersay when i found a ball of metal. I unfolded it to find what resembled a badge pattern. It measures just a littke less then 2.5" wide and high and only about 1/32" thick. I have done a little research and pretty well come up empty handed. I did find a picture of some items that look to be the same pattern. I will post a pic of them as well. They have numbers on them. Mine had a little white paint left on it in places but no other marking. It was foumd in an area close by where a civil war battle took place. Not sure that its that old but could be i really dont know.

**Arcade Al** · 19-03-14, 11:19 PM

They look like house numbers to me, the ones in the second picture anyway.

**oldbiscuit** · 20-03-14, 01:41 AM

As you have found, that plate could have come off of just about anything. That badge shape was a pretty common shape at the turn of the last century. I have a Union Giant hit & miss gas engine from the early teens that has the serial number/identification plate in the same shape attached to the front of the water hopper. I have seen that same shape attached to a galvanized fence post with the manufacturers name on it. It's a nice find, but I doubt you will ever know for sure what it's off of, Mark

**Huw Eastwood** · 21-03-14, 03:05 PM

Those sort of tags, plates and badges were, and still are, punched out in their masses by loads of companies for a multitude of uses- the shield was popular like oldbiscuit said, also discs, rectangles, scalloped edged variations etc. Plus, if it's only 1/32" of an inch thick and you found it buried in the ground then it's unlikely to be that old- brass that thin wouldn't last long unless it was bone dry in a desert!